This wasn’t happening. This couldn’t be happening. It had to be a dream. How could it not be? To find out if I was dreaming or not, I did the only thing I could think. I pinched my arm hard. It stung badly, and a pink welt formed on my skin.
Well, that was a great idea.
I sighed, getting to my feet. I had two options here and neither one of them sounded appealing. The first, and my least favorite, wait it out. See what happens. The second option I wasn’t too fond of either. Tell Marco and Sophia. This meant risking looking like a total nut job if they didn’t believe. But getting killed seemed worse. So with a million knots tying their way into my stomach, I headed downstairs.
Okay, so you know that feeling you get when you walk into a room and the air feels thick and heavy and you know you were just being talked about? Well, that’s what happened when I found Marco and Sophia, huddled together at the kitchen table, talking quietly. I instantly got the impression they were talking about me. And by the horrified expressions on their faces when they saw me, I assumed my impression was right on.
Sophia leaned back in the chair and smoothed out her grey pencil skirt. “Do you need something?”
I eyed her over carefully. “I’m not sure.” I’d been so determined not to lose my nerve and tell them what was going on. But now, something felt off. My insides were screaming at me to keep my mouth shut.
Marco swiped a magazine up from the table and fumbled to open it, mumbling incoherently underneath his breath.
“Well, if you don’t need anything…” Sophia drifted out of her chair and roamed over to cupboards.
I stood in the doorway, watching her closely as she opened a drawer, pulled out a pan, and fill it with water. Then she moved over to the pantry, grabbed a can of tomato sauce, and fought to get the lid off.
I glanced at the clock: 4:30. A little too early to be making dinner, don’t you think? Yet there she was, making dinner. I turned my attention to Marco. He shook the magazine out like it was a newspaper, then turned his back to me.
What in the world had I been thinking when I’d decided to come down here? I should have known better than to believe I could talk to them. I didn’t even know them. Not really. I mean for all I knew, the real reason I’d been living with them for the last seventeen years was because they’d kidnapped me. Yeah, I really didn’t think that was true or anything, but until I could one-hundred percent prove it wasn’t true, I wasn’t going to disregard the theory.
The next day at school, I felt like a walking zombie. I’d slept like crap the night before, because of my nightmares, and I had to check under my bed just to make sure there weren’t any real-life cloaked monsters hiding out. Even though the coast was clear, I hadn’t been able to fall back asleep. Of course, I had no problem falling asleep during biology. When the bell rang, it woke me up, and scared the crap out of me, causing me to leap from my seat and bang my knee on the desk. Not to mention, I’d had my cheek resting on my arm, right where my studded bracelet was fastened, so now there was a sequence of dots indented into the side of my face. Which in no way made me look like a bigger dork, let me tell you. Add the humiliation factor with the giant bruise on my knee, and I felt awesome.
I know, I know. I sounded very whiny. But I was having a very bad day so cut me some slack, would you?
My next stop was astronomy. I arrived early and the classroom was empty. The emptiness immediately made me feel uneasy. Goose bumps sprouted all over my skin as I hung my messenger bag over the back of the chair and sat down. God, I was so tired. I needed a nap.
As soon as the first person entered, I rested my head on the table and let my eyelids slip shut. But moments later, a warm tingly sensation shot up my arms and reverberated down my back.
“Tired?” Alex remarked. I heard a chair slide out and then something landed on the table not too far from my head. His backpack, I assumed.
I didn’t say anything. Nor did I look at him. I just wasn’t in the mood to deal with him.
He didn’t say anything else to me, and I didn’t raise my head up until class had started. That’s when I realized Aislin’s chair was vacant.
“She’s not here today,” he said, noticing the direction of my gaze. He was wearing a black shirt, the sleeves pushed up to his elbows. He looked good. He always looked good. Too bad he was such a jerk. “She has the flu.”
“Oh.” I frowned. So it was just him and me? Well, today ought to be fun. About as fun as watching a two hour special on fungi growth (And yeah, I’ve actually had to do that before). Aislin acted as our mediator. With her gone, I could only imagine how well the next forty-five minutes was going to go. I take that back. I actually could since we’d been forced to work together once before. And need I remind you how well that went—with me and Alex getting lectured by Mr. Sterling.
“You don’t need to look so upset about it.” A smirk threatened at his lips. “I’m not that bad to be around, am I?”
Afraid of what might come out of my mouth, I kept it shut.
Ten minutes into class, Mr. Sterling received a phone call. After he hung up, he made an announcement that there was something urgent that needed his attention, and he was going to drop off the class at the library to get a head start on our projects.
I considered ditching. Going home and taking a nap. But I couldn’t muster up enough courage to go through with it. Mark Scholy and Dean Edwards did. They ducked out as soon as Mrs. Bakerly stepped away from her desk. But they very rarely showed up for class as it was. And they didn’t have to worry about a group of freaky yellow-eyed monsters showing up to kill them.
“So what do you want to work on first?” Alex asked me after we’d picked out a table to drop off our things at.
I hung my messenger bag on the back of a chair. “Doesn’t matter to me.”
He took his cell phone out of his pocket and glanced at the screen. “Well, it doesn’t matter to me either.”
We both stood there, mulling over what to do next, and I caught him staring at my eyes. Not into my eyes—at my eyes. Typically when people stared at them, they were awestruck by the shocking color of violet, which bugged me. I knew the color was strange and everything, but staring is rude. However, the way Alex was looking at them erased my normal ping of annoyance, and made my insides melt like hot butter.
Then, of course, he had to open his mouth and ruin everything. “Maybe you should go home and get some sleep. You look tired.”
He might as well have told me I looked like hell.
I shot him a scowl, turned my back on him, and marched off toward the bookshelves. Not necessarily to look for a book, but to get away from him.
He followed after me. “I didn’t mean that in a bad way. I was just suggesting that maybe you should get some more sleep.”
“That would be nice if it were possible.” I couldn’t, though, seeing is how I was afraid to go to sleep. I stopped in front of a shelf, skimming the titles of the books. Realizing I was in the romance section—the last place I wanted to be—I rounded the corner to the fiction section, with Alex trailing at my heels.
“Are you having nightmares or something?” His eyes met mine, and I momentarily spaced out.
“Yes.” I blinked and shook my head. “I mean no.”
His smile was mocking. “Which one is it? Yes or no?”
“Yes, I had a nightmare,” I snapped. “But what does it matter to you, anyway?”
He shrugged. “It doesn’t.”
I bit down on my tongue to stop myself from sticking it out like a three-year-old. Don’t let him get to you. Don’t let him get to you. “You know, I could just write the report for us,” I said. “And then you and Aislin could put the galaxy map together. That way you and I wouldn’t have to work together.”
“What are you trying to do, get rid of me or something?” he teased.
“No,” I answered mechanically. Wait. Where did that come from?
He grinned haughtily.
“Oh, would you just go away?” I yanked a random book from the shelf and fixed my attention on reading the back cover.
Before he could say another snide remark—because I’m almost positive he had one ready—his phone rang from inside his pocket. Instead of answering it, he reached in and silenced it. “Actually, I was thinking about cutting out early.”
I should have been relieved, but for some reason, I developed a nauseated feeling in the pit of my stomach. “Okay, go ahead. I won’t say anything.”
“Oh, I know you won’t.” He slid his hands into his pockets. “I was just telling you in case you wanted to come along.”
I gaped at him. “You have got to be kidding?”
“Nope,” he said. “You really look like you could use a break.”
I had no idea what to say. Although I knew what my heart was telling me to do—go with him. But why would I? He hated me. I knew that. He had to be teasing me. Playing his little Alex mind games.
He ambled over the end of the aisle and glanced over his shoulder, flashing me a taunting smile. “That is unless you are too scared.”
I should have been—after what he’d just said. But for a split second—a very crucial, decision making second—I conveniently forgot about everything. How he’d repeatedly treated me like crap. And I magically shoved the electric feeling right out of my mind, along with the conversation I’d overheard between him and Aislin.
Alex disappeared around the corner of the shelf and headed back to our table. I followed after him, Kelsey Merritt and her clones throwing me a dirty looks as I passed by them.
“So where exactly are you going?” I asked him.
“It’s a surprise,” he said, shoving his books into his bag.
Don’t go, my inner conscious screamed at me. “Okay, I’m in.”
He swung his bag over his shoulder, and I could hear the smile in his voice when he said, “Let’s go, then.”
I hesitated, suddenly unsure. Was I out of my mind? Going off with him—after everything that had happened between us?
But then he dazzled me the most beautiful, heart melting smile—the kind of smile I’d wanted him to give me since the first day I’d laid eyes on him—and that was that. The rational part of my brain quit working. Without a second thought, I grabbed my bag and followed him out the door.
Chapter 7
As soon as I realized where Alex was going, I went into full-on panic mode. I even temporarily contemplated jumping out of the moving vehicle.
After I’d followed Alex out of library, we’d went out to the parking lot and climbed into his car—an old cherry red Chevy Camaro. It was a beautiful car. But a beautiful car that was taking me toward the mountains, something that I realized a little too late. The mountains. Here I was alone with a guy I scarcely knew—a strange guy that I scarcely knew—and I was going straight to the place where I was killed every night in my nightmares, by yellowed-eyed monsters that may or may not be real. I’d really gotten myself into mess here, hadn’t I? I can’t believe how stupid and irrational I was. I mean, a cute boy finally smiles at me and I forget all logic.