"What's this for?" I asked, peeking inside the bag, having absolutely no idea as to what might be inside.

  'Open it."

  I pulled a brown cardboard box out of the to-go bag and lifted the lid. Inside was a snow globe with a miniature Delphic Seaport Amusement Park captured inside. Brass wires were bent roughly into a circle for the Ferris wheel and twisting loops for the roller coaster; flat sheets of tarnished metal formed the Magic Carpet ride.

  "It's beautiful," I said, a little astonished that Patch had thought of me, let alone gone to the trouble of buying me a present. "Thank you. I mean it. I love it."

  He touched the curved glass. "There's the Archangel, before it was remodeled." Behind the Ferris wheel a thin wire ribboned to form the hills and valleys of the Archangel. An angel with broken wings stood at the highest point, bowing his head, gazing down without eyes. "What really happened the night we rode it together?" I asked.

  "You don't want to know."

  "If you tell me you'll have to kill me?" I half joked.

  "We're not alone," Patch answered, looking through the windshield.

  I glanced up and caught my mom standing in the open doorway. To my horror, she stepped out and walked toward the Jeep.

  "Let me do all the talking," I said, stuffing the snow globe back in the box. "Don't say a word-not one word!"

  Patch hopped out and came around for my door. We met my mom halfway up the driveway.

  "I didn't know you were going out," she told me, smiling, but not in a relaxed way. It was a smile that said, We'l1 talk later.

  "It was sort of last minute," I explained.

  "I came home right after yoga," she said. The rest was implied. Lucky for me, not so lucky for you. I'd been counting on her going out for smoothies with her friends after class. Nine times out of ten, she did. She turned her attention to Patch. "It's nice to finally meet you. Apparently my daughter's a big fan."

  I opened my mouth to give an extremely concise introduction and send Patch on his way, but Mom beat me to it. "I'm Nora's mom. Blythe Grey."

  "This is Patch," I said, racking my brain for something to say that would bring the pleasantries to an abrupt halt. But the only things I could think of were screaming Fire! or faking a seizure. Somehow, both seemed more humiliating than braving a conversation between Patch and my mom.

  "Nora tells me you're a swimmer," Mom said.

  I felt Patch shake with laughter beside me. "A swimmer?"

  "Are you on the school swim team, or is it a city league?"

  "More… recreational," said Patch, passing me a questioning glance.

  "Well recreational is good too," Mom said. "Where do you swim? The rec center?"

  "I'm more of an outdoor guy. Rivers and lakes."

  "Isn't that cold?" asked Mom.

  At my side, Patch jerked. I wondered what I'd missed. Nothing about the conversation seemed out of the ordinary. And I had to side with my mom on this one. Maine was not a warm, tropical place. Outdoor swimming was cold, even in the summertime. If Patch really was swimming outdoors, he was either crazy or he had a high pain threshold.

  "All right!" I said, taking advantage of the lull. "Patch needs to get going." Go! I mouthed at him.

  That's a very nice Jeep," Mom said. "Did your parents buy it for you?"

  "I got it myself."

  "You must have quite a job."

  "I bus tables at the Borderline."

  Patch was saying as little as possible, keeping himself carefully shadowed in mystery. I wondered what his life was like when he wasn't around me. At the way back of my mind, I couldn't stop thinking about his frightening past. Up until now I'd fantasized about discovering his deep, dark secrets because I wanted to prove to myself and to Patch that I was capable of figuring him out. But now I wanted to know his secrets because they were a part of him.

  And despite the fact that I routinely tried to deny it, I felt something for him. The more time I spent with him, the more I knew the feelings weren't going away.

  Mom frowned. "I hope work doesn't get in the way of studying. Personally, I don't believe high school students should work during the school year. You have enough on your plates already."

  Patch smiled. "It hasn't been a problem."

  "Mind if I ask your GPA?" Mom said. "Is that too rude?"

  "Gee, it's getting late-," I began loudly, consulting the watch I didn't wear. I couldn't believe my mom was being so uncool about this. It was a bad sign. It could only mean her first impression of Patch was worse than I'd feared. This wasn't an introduction. It was an interview.

  "Two-point-two," Patch said.

  My mom stared at him.

  "He's joking," I said quickly. I gave Patch a discreet push in the direction of the Jeep. "Patch has things to do. Places to go. Pool to play-" I clamped a hand over my mouth.

  "Play?" my mom said, sounding confused.

  "Nora's referring to Bo's Arcade," Patch explained. "But that's not where I'm headed. I've got a few errands to run."

  "I've never been to Bo's," she said.

  "It's not all that exciting," I said. "You're not missing anything."

  "Wait," said Mom, sounding a lot like a red flag had just sprung up in her memory. "Is it out on the coast? Close to Delphic Seaport? Wasn't there a shootout at Bo's several years ago?"

  "It's tamer than it used to be," Patch said. I narrowed my eyes at him. He'd beaten me to the punch. I'd planned on outright lying about Bo's having any history of violence.

  "Would you like to come in for ice cream?" Mom asked, sounding flustered, caught between doing the polite thing and acting on the impulse to drag me inside and bolt the door. "We only have vanilla," she added to sour the deal. "It's a few weeks old."

  Patch shook his head. "I've got to get going. Maybe next time. It was nice meeting you, Blythe."

  I took the break in conversation as my cue and pulled my mom toward the front door, relieved that the conversation hadn't been as bad as it could have been. Suddenly Mom turned back.

  "What did you and Nora do tonight?" she asked Patch.

  Patch looked at me and raised his eyebrows ever so slightly.

  "We grabbed dinner in Topsham," I answered quickly. "Sandwiches and sodas. Purely harmless night."

  The trouble was, my feelings for Patch weren't 't harmless.

  Chapter 19

  I left the snow globe in its box and tucked it inside my closet behind a stack of argyle sweaters I'd poached from my dad. When I'd opened the present in front of Patch, Delphic had looked shimmer) and beautiful, light swirling rainbows from the wires. But alone in my bedroom, the amusement park looked haunted. A camp ideal for disembodied spirits. And I wasn't entirely sure there wasn't a hidden camera inside.

  After changing into a stretchy camisole and floral pj pants, I called Vee.

  "Well?" she said. "How'd it go? Obviously he didn't kill you, so that's a good start."

  "We played pool."

  "You hate pool."

  "He gave me a few pointers. Now that I know what I'm doing, it's not so bad."

  "I bet he could give you pointers in a few other areas of your life."

  "Hmm." Normally, her comment might have incited at least a flush from me, but my mood was too serious. I was hard at work, thinking.

  "I know I've said this before, but Patch doesn't instill a deep sense of comfort in me," Vee said. "I still have nightmares about the guy in the ski mask. In one of my nightmares, he ripped off his mask, and guess who was hiding under it? Patch. Personally, I think you should treat him like a loaded gun. Something about him isn't normal."

  This was exactly what I wanted to talk about.

  "What would cause someone to have a V-shaped scar on their back?" I asked her.

  There was a moment of silence.

  "Freak," Vee choked. "You saw him naked? Where did it happen? His Jeep? His house? Your bedroom?"

  "I did not see him naked! It was sort of an accident."

  "Uh-huh, I've heard that excuse before," said Vee.

  "He had a huge, upside down V-shaped scar on his back. Isn't that a little weird?"

  "Of course it's weird. But this is Patch we're talking about. He has a few screws loose. I'm going to take a wild guess and say… gang fight? Prison scars? Skid marks from a hit-and-run?"

  One half of my brain was keeping track of my conversation with Vee, but the other, more subconscious half had strayed. My memory went back to the night Patch dared me to ride the Archangel. I recaptured the creepy and bizarre paintings on the side of the cars. I remembered the horned beasts ripping the wings off the angel. I remembered the black upside-down V where the angel's wings used to be.

  I almost dropped the phone.

  "S-sorry, what?" I asked Vee when I realized she'd carried the conversation further and was waiting for my response.

  "What. Happened. Next?" she repeated, enunciating each word. "Earth to Nora. I need details. I'm dying here."

  "He got in a fight and his shirt ripped. End of story. There's no what-happened-next."

  Vee sucked in a breath. "This is what I'm talking about. The two of you are out together… and he gets in a fight? What's his problem? It's like he's more animal than human."

  In my mind I switched back and forth between the painting of the angel's scars and Patch's scars. Both scars had healed to the color of black licorice, both ran from the shoulder blades to the kidneys, and both curved out as they traveled the length of the back. I told myself there was a good chance it was merely a very creepy coincidence that the paintings on the Archangel depicted Patch's scars perfectly. I told myself a lot of things could cause scars like Patch's. Gang fight, prison scars, skid marks-just like Vee said. Unfortunately, all the excuses felt like lies. Like the truth was staring me in the face, but I wasn't brave enough to look back.

  "Was he an angel?" Vee asked.

  I snapped to myself. "What?"

  "Was he an angel, or did he live up to his bad-boy image? Because, honestly? I'm not buying this whole he-didn't-try-anything version of the story."

  "Vee? I have to go." My voice was strewn with cobwebs.

  "I see how it is. You're going to hang up before I get the details on the big shebang."

  "Nothing happened on the date, and nothing happened after. My mom met us in the driveway."

  "Shut up!"

  "I don't think she likes Patch."

  "You don't say!" Vee said. "Who'd have guessed?"

  "I'll call you tomorrow, okay?"

  "Sweet dreams, babe."

  Fat chance, I thought.

  After I got off the phone with Vee, I walked down the hall to my mom's makeshift home office and booted up our vintage IBM. The room was small, with a pitched roof, more of a gable than a room. One greasy window with faded orange curtains from the 1970s looked out at the side yard. I could stand up to my full height in about 30 percent of the room. In the other 70 percent, the top of my hair brushed the exposed beams of the rafters. A single bare bulb hung there.

  Ten minutes later the computer secured a dial-up connection to the Internet, and I typed "angel wing scars" into the Google search bar. I hovered with my finger above the enter key, afraid that if I went through with it, I'd have to admit I was actually considering the possibility that Patch was-well, not… human.

  I hit enter and mouse-clicked on the first link before I could talk myself out of it.

  FALLEN ANGELS: THE FRIGHTENING TRUTH

  At the creation of the garden of Eden, heavenly angels were dispatched to Earth to watch over Adam and Eve. Soon, however, some angels set their sights on the world beyond the garden walls. They saw themselves as future rulers over the Earth's population, lusting after power, money, and even human women.

  Together they tempted and convinced Eve to eat the forbidden fruit, opening the gates guarding Eden. As punishment for this grave sin and for deserting their duties, god stripped the angels' wings and banished them to Earth forever.

  I skimmed down a few paragraphs, my heart beating erratically.

  Fallen angels are the same evil spirits (or demons) described in the Bible as taking possession of human bodies. Fallen angels roam the Earth looking for human bodies to harass and control. They tempt humans to do evil by communicating thoughts and images directly to their minds, if a fallen angel succeeds in turning a human toward evil, it can enter the human's body and influence his or her personality and actions.

  However, the possession of a human body by a fallen angel can take place only during the Hebrew month of Cheshvan. Cheshvan, known as "the bitter month," is the only month without any Jewish holidays or fasts, making it an unholy month. Between new and full moons during Cheshvan, fallen angels invade human bodies in droves.

  My stare lingered on the computer monitor a few minutes after I finished reading. I had no thoughts. None. Just a complexity of emotions tangling inside me. Cold, panicky amazement and foreboding among them.

  An involuntary shudder roused me to my senses. I remembered the few times I was certain Patch had breached normal communication methods and whispered directly to my mind, just like the article claimed fallen angels could. Comparing this information with Patch's scars, was it possible… could Patch be a fallen angel? Did he want to possess my body?

  I browsed quickly through the rest of the article, slowing when I read something even more bizarre.

  Fallen angels who have a sexual relationship with a human produce superhuman offspring called nephilim. The nephilim race is an evil and unnatural race and was never meant to inhabit Earth. Although many believe the great Flood at the time of Noah was intended to cleanse the Earth of nephilim, we have no way of knowing if this hybrid race died out and whether or not fallen angels have continued to reproduce with humans since that time, it seems logical that they would, which means the nephilim race is likely on the Earth today.

  I pushed back from the desk. I crammed everything I'd read into a mental folder and filed it away. And stamped SCARY on the outside of the folder. I didn't want to think about it right now. I'd sort through it later. Maybe.

  My cell phone buzzed in my pocket and I jumped.

  "Did we decide avocados are green or yellow?" Vee asked. "I've already filled all my green fruit slots today, but if you tell me avocados are yellow, I'm in business."

  "Do you believe in superheroes?"

  "After seeing Tobey Maguire in Spider-Man, yes. And then there's Christian Bale. Older, but killer hot. I'd let him rescue me from sword-wielding ninjas."

  "I'm being serious."

  "So am I."

  "When was the last time you went to church?" I asked.

  I heard her pop a gum bubble. "Sunday."

  "Do you think the Bible is accurate? I mean, do you think it's real?"

  "I think Pastor Calvin is hot. In a forty something way. That pretty much sums up my religious conviction."

  After I hung up, I went to my room and slid under the covers. I threw on an extra blanket to ward off the sudden chill. Whether the room was cold, or the icy feeling originated inside me, I wasn't sure. Haunting words like "fallen angel," "human possession," and «Nephilim» danced me off to sleep.

  Chapter 20

  I tossed all night. The wind gusted through the open fields rimming the farmhouse, spraying debris against the windows. I woke several times, hearing shingles being pulled from the roof and tumbling over the edge. Every small noise from the rattle of the windowpanes to my own creaking bedsprings had me jumping out of sleep.

  Around six I gave up, dragged myself out of bed, and padded down the hall for a hot shower. Next I cleaned my room-my closet was looking slim, and sure enough, I filled the hamper with three loads of laundry. I was climbing the stairs with a fresh load when a knock sounded at the front door. I opened it to find Elliot standing on the doorstep.

  He wore jeans, a vintage plaid shirt rolled to the elbows, sunglasses, and a Red Sox cap. On the outside, he looked all-American. But I knew better, and a jolt of nervous adrenaline confirmed it.

  "Nora Grey," Elliot said in a patronizing voice. He leaned in and grinned, and I caught the sour tang of alcohol on his breath. "You've been causing me a lot of trouble lately."

  "What are you doing here?"

  He peered behind me into the house. "What's it look like I'm doing? I want to talk. Don't I get to come in?"

  "My mom's asleep. I don't want to wake her."

  "I've never met your mom." Something about the way he said it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand tall.

  "I'm sorry, do you need something?"

  His smile was half sloppy, half sneering. "You don't like me, do you, Nora Grey?"

  By way of answer, I folded my arms across my chest.

  He staggered back a step with his hand pressed to his heart. "Ouch. I'm here, Nora, as a last-ditch effort to convince you that I'm an average guy and you can trust me. Don't let me down."

  "Listen, Elliot, I have a few things I need to-"

  He drilled his fist into the house, smacking his knuckles against the siding hard enough to shake loose chipped paint. "I'm not finished!" he slurred in a heated voice. Suddenly he tipped his head back and laughed quietly. He bent over and placed his bleeding hand between his knees and groaned. "Ten dollars says I'm going to regret that later."

  Elliot's presence made my skin crawl. I remembered back several days, when I actually thought he was good-looking and charming. I wondered why I'd been such an idiot.

  I was contemplating closing the door and locking it, when Elliot pulled off his sunglasses, revealing bloodshot eyes. He cleared his throat, his voice coming out straightforward. "I came here because I wanted to tell you Jules is under a lot of stress at school. Exams, student government, scholarship applications, yadda, yadda, yadda. He's not acting like himself. He needs to get away from it all for a few days. The four of us-Jules, me, you, Vee-should go camping for spring break. Leave tomorrow for Powder Horn and come back Tuesday afternoon. It'll give Jules a chance to decompress." Every word that came out of his mouth sounded eerily and carefully rehearsed.