CHAPTER 4

  FLYING DOWN HAWT­HOR­NE, I DRO­VE PAST MY ho­use, circ­led back, cut over to Be­ech, and he­aded back to­ward the cen­ter of Cold­wa­ter. I spe­ed-di­aled Vee. "So­met­hing hap­pe­ned-I-he- it-out of now­he­re-the Ne­on-" "You're bre­aking up. What?"

  I wi­ped my no­se with the back of my hand. I was tremb­ling down to my to­es. "He ca­me out of now­he­re."

  "Who?"

  "He-" I tri­ed to net my tho­ughts and fun­nel them in­to words. "He jum­ped in front of the car!"

  "Oh, man. Oh-man-oh-man-oh-man. You hit a de­er! Are you okay? What abo­ut Bam­bi?" She half wa­iled, half gro­aned. "The Ne­on?"

  I ope­ned my mo­uth, but Vee cut me off.

  "For­get it. I've got in­su­ran­ce. Just tell me the­re aren't de­er parts all over my baby… No de­er parts, right?"

  Wha­te­ver ans­wer I was abo­ut to gi­ve fa­ded in­to the backg­ro­und. My mind was two steps ahe­ad. A de­er. May­be I co­uld pass the who­le thing off as hit­ting a de­er. I wan­ted to con­fi­de in Vee, but I didn't want to so­und crazy, eit­her. How was I go­ing to exp­la­in watc­hing the guy I hit ri­se to his fe­et and be­gin te­aring off the car do­or? I stretc­hed my col­lar down past my sho­ul­der. No red marks whe­re he'd grip­ped me that I co­uld see…

  I ca­me to myself with a start. Was I ac­tu­al­ly con­si­de­ring den­ying it had hap­pe­ned? I knew what I'd se­en. It was not my ima­gi­na­ti­on.

  "Holy fre­ak show," Vee sa­id. "You're not ans­we­ring. The de­er is lod­ged in my he­ad­lights, isn't he? You're dri­ving aro­und with him stuck to the front of the car li­ke a snowp­low."

  "Can I sle­ep at yo­ur pla­ce?" I wan­ted to get off the stre­ets. Out of the dark. With a sud­den in­ta­ke of air, I re­ali­zed to get to Vee's, I'd ha­ve to dri­ve back thro­ugh the in­ter­sec­ti­on whe­re I'd hit him.

  "I'm down in my ro­om," sa­id Vee. "Let yo­ur­self in. See you in a few."

  With my hands tight on the ste­ering whe­el, I pus­hed the Ne­on thro­ugh the ra­in, pra­ying the light at Hawt­hor­ne wo­uld be gre­en in my fa­vor. It was, and I flo­ored it thro­ugh the in­ter­sec­ti­on, ke­eping my eyes stra­ight ahe­ad, but at the sa­me ti­me, ste­aling glimp­ses in­to the sha­dows along the si­de of the ro­ad. The­re was no sign of the guy in the ski mask.

  Ten mi­nu­tes la­ter I par­ked the Ne­on in Vee's dri­ve­way. The da­ma­ge to the do­or was ex­ten­si­ve, and I had to put my fo­ot to it and kick my way out. Then I jog­ged to the front do­or, bol­ted myself in­si­de, and hur­ri­ed down the ba­se­ment sta­irs.

  Vee was sit­ting cross-leg­ged on her bed, no­te­bo­ok prop­ped bet­we­en her kne­es, ear­buds plug­ged in, iPod tur­ned up all the way. "Do I want to see the da­ma­ge to­night, or sho­uld I wa­it un­til I've had at le­ast se­ven ho­urs of sle­ep?" she cal­led over the mu­sic.

  "May­be op­ti­on num­ber two."

  Vee snap­ped the no­te­bo­ok shut and tug­ged out the ear­buds. "Let's set it over with."

  When we got out­si­de, I sta­red at the Ne­on for a long mo­ment. It wasn't a warm night, but the we­at­her wasn't the ca­use of the go­ose bumps rip­pling over my arms. No smas­hed dri­ver's-si­de win­dow. No bend in the do­or.

  "So­met­hing's not right," I sa­id. But Vee wasn't lis­te­ning. She was busy ins­pec­ting every squ­are inch of the Ne­on.

  I step­ped for­ward and po­ked the dri­ver's-si­de win­dow. So­lid glass. I clo­sed my eyes. When I re­ope­ned them, the win­dow was still in­tact.

  I wal­ked aro­und the back of the car. I'd comp­le­ted al­most a full circ­le when I ca­me up short.

  A fi­ne crack bi­sec­ted the winds­hi­eld.

  Vee saw it at the sa­me ti­me. "Are you su­re it wasn't a squ­ir­rel?"

  My mind flas­hed back to the let­hal eyes be­hind the ski mask. They we­re so black I co­uldn't dis­tin­gu­ish the pu­pils from the iri­ses. Black li­ke… Patch's.

  "Lo­ok at me, I'm crying te­ars of joy," Vee sa­id, spraw­ling her­self ac­ross the Ne­on's ho­od in a hug. "A te­eny-tiny crack. That's it!"

  I ma­nu­fac­tu­red a smi­le, but my sto­mach so­ured. Fi­ve mi­nu­tes ago, the win­dow was smas­hed out and the do­or was bo­wed. Lo­oking at the car now, it se­emed im­pos­sib­le. No, it se­emed crazy. But I saw his fist punch thro­ugh the glass, and I felt his fin­ger­na­ils bi­te in­to my sho­ul­der.

  Hadn't I?

  The har­der I tri­ed to re­call the crash, the mo­re I co­uldn't. Lit­tle blips of mis­sing in­for­ma­ti­on cut ac­ross my me­mory. The de­ta­ils we­re fa­ding. Was he tall? Short? Thin? Bulky? Had he sa­id anyt­hing?

  I co­uldn't re­mem­ber. That was the most frigh­te­ning part.

  Vee and I left her ho­use at se­ven fif­te­en the fol­lo­wing mor­ning and dro­ve to En­zo's Bist­ro to grab a bre­ak­fast of ste­amed milk. With my hands wrap­ped aro­und my chi­na cup, I tri­ed to warm away the de­ep chill in­si­de me. I'd sho­we­red, pul­led on a ca­mi­so­le and car­di­gan bor­ro­wed from Vee's clo­set, and swept on so­me ma­ke­up, but I hardly re­mem­be­red do­ing it.

  "Don't lo­ok now," Vee sa­id, "but Mr. Gre­en Swe­ater ke­eps lo­oking this way, es­ti­ma­ting yo­ur long legs thro­ugh yo­ur je­ans… Oh! He just sa­lu­ted me. I am not kid­ding. A lit­tle two-fin­ger mi­li­tary sa­lu­te. How ado­rab­le."

  I wasn't lis­te­ning. Last night's ac­ci­dent had rep­la­yed it­self in my he­ad all night, cha­sing away any chan­ce of sle­ep. My tho­ughts we­re in tang­les, my eyes we­re dry and he­avy, and I co­uldn't con­cent­ra­te.

  "Mr. Gre­en Swe­ater lo­oks nor­mal, but his wing­man lo­oks hard­co­re bad boy," sa­id Vee. "Emits a cer­ta­in don't-mess-with-me sig­nal. Tell me he do­esn't lo­ok li­ke Dra­cu­la's spawn. Tell me I'm ima­gi­ning things."

  Lif­ting my eyes just high eno­ugh to get a lo­ok at him wit­ho­ut ap­pe­aring that I was, I to­ok in his fi­ne-bo­ned, hand­so­me fa­ce. Blond ha­ir hung at his sho­ul­ders. Eyes the co­lor of chro­me. Uns­ha­ven. Im­pec­cably dres­sed in a ta­ilo­red jac­ket over his gre­en swe­ater and dark de­sig­ner je­ans. I sa­id, "You're ima­gi­ning things."

  "Did you miss the de­ep-set eyes? The wi­dow's pe­ak? The tall, lanky bu­ild? He might even be tall eno­ugh for me."

  Vee is clo­sing in on six fe­et tall, but she has a thing for he­els.

  High he­els. She al­so has a thing abo­ut not da­ting shor­ter guys.

  "Okay, what's wrong?" Vee as­ked. "You've go­ne all in­com­mu­ni­ca­do. This isn't abo­ut the crack in my winds­hi­eld, is it? So what if you hit an ani­mal? It co­uld hap­pen to an­yo­ne. Gran­ted, the chan­ces wo­uld be a lot slim­mer if yo­ur mom re­lo­ca­ted out of the wil­der­ness."

  I was go­ing to tell Vee the truth abo­ut what hap­pe­ned. So­on. I just ne­eded a lit­tle ti­me to sort out the de­ta­ils. The prob­lem was, I didn't see how I co­uld. The only de­ta­ils left we­re spotty, at best. It was as if an era­ser had scrub­bed my me­mory blank. Thin­king back, I re­mem­be­red the he­avy ra­in cas­ca­ding down the Ne­on's win­dows, ca­using everyt­hing out­si­de to blur. Had I in fact hit a de­er?

  "Mmm, check it out," sa­id Vee. "Mr. Gre­en Swe­ater is get­ting out of his se­at. Now that's a body that hits the gym re­gu­larly. He is de­fi­ni­tely ma­king his way to­ward us, his eyes pur­su­ing the re­al es­ta­te, yo­ur re­al es­ta­te, that is."

  A half be­at la­ter we we­re gre­eted with a low, ple­asant "Hel­lo."

  Vee and I lo­oked up at the sa­me ti­me. Mr. Gre­en Swe­ater sto­od just back from our tab­le, his thumbs ho­oked in the poc­kets of his je­ans. He was blue-eyed, with stylishly shaggy blond ha­ir swept ac­ross his fo­re­he­ad.

  "Hel­lo yo­ur­self," Vee sa­id. "I'm Vee. This is No­ra Grey."

  I frow­ned at Vee. I did not ap­pre­ci­ate her tag­ging on my last na­me, fe­eling that it vi­ola­ted an uns­po­ken cont­ract bet­we­en girls, let alo­ne best fri­ends, upon me­eting unk­nown boys. I ga­ve a half­he­ar­ted wa­ve and bro­ught my cup to my lips, im­me­di­ately scal­ding my ton­gue.

  He drag­ged a cha­ir over from the next tab­le and sat back­ward on it, his arms res­ting whe­re his back sho­uld ha­ve be­en. Hol­ding a hand out to me, he sa­id, "I'm El­li­ot Sa­un­ders." Fe­eling way too for­mal, I sho­ok it. "And this is Jules," he ad­ded, jer­king his chin to­ward his fri­end, whom Vee had grossly un­de­res­ti­ma­ted by cal­ling "tall."

  Jules lo­we­red all of him­self in­to a se­at be­si­de Vee, dwar­fing the cha­ir.

  She sa­id to him, "I think you might be the tal­lest guy I've ever se­en. Se­ri­o­usly, how tall are you?"

  "Six fo­ot ten," Jules mut­te­red, slum­ping in his se­at and cros­sing his arms.

  Elli­ot cle­ared his thro­at. "Can I get you la­di­es so­met­hing to eat?"

  "I'm fi­ne," I sa­id, ra­ising my cup. "I al­re­ady or­de­red."

  Vee kic­ked me un­der the tab­le. "She'll ha­ve a va­nil­la-cre­am-fil­led do­ugh­nut. Ma­ke it two."

  "So much for the di­et, huh?" I as­ked Vee.

  "Huh yo­ur­self. The va­nil­la be­an is a fru­it. A brown fru­it."

  "It's a le­gu­me."

  "You su­re abo­ut that?"

  I wasn't.

  Jules clo­sed his eyes and pinc­hed the brid­ge of his no­se. Ap­pa­rently he was as thril­led to be sit­ting with us as I was to ha­ve them he­re.

  As El­li­ot wal­ked to the front co­un­ter, I let my eyes tra­il af­ter him. He was de­fi­ni­tely in high scho­ol, but I hadn't se­en him at CHS be­fo­re. I wo­uld re­mem­ber. He had a char­ming, out­go­ing per­so­na­lity that didn't fa­de in­to the backg­ro­und. If I wasn't fe­eling so sha­ken, I might ha­ve ac­tu­al­ly ta­ken an in­te­rest. In fri­ends­hip, may­be mo­re.

  "Do you li­ve aro­und he­re?" Vee as­ked Jules.

  "Mmm."

  "Go to scho­ol?"

  "King­horn Prep." The­re was a tin­ge of su­pe­ri­ority in the way he sa­id it.

  "Ne­ver he­ard of it."

  "Pri­va­te scho­ol. Port­land. We start at ni­ne." He lif­ted his sle­eve and glan­ced at his watch.

  Vee dip­ped a fin­ger in the froth of her milk and lic­ked it off. "Is it ex­pen­si­ve?"

  Jules lo­oked at her di­rectly for the first ti­me. His eyes stretc­hed, sho­wing a lit­tle whi­te aro­und the ed­ges.

  "Are you rich? I bet you are," she sa­id.

  Jules eyed Vee li­ke she'd just kil­led a fly on his fo­re­he­ad. He scra­ped his cha­ir back se­ve­ral inc­hes, dis­tan­cing him­self from us.

  Elli­ot re­tur­ned with a box of a half-do­zen do­ugh­nuts.

  "Two va­nil­la cre­ams for the la­di­es," he sa­id, pus­hing the box to­ward me, "and fo­ur gla­zed for me. Gu­ess I'd bet­ter fill up now, sin­ce I don't know what the ca­fe­te­ria is li­ke at Cold­wa­ter High."

  Vee ne­arly spe­wed her milk. "You go to CHS?"

  "As of to­day. I just trans­fer­red from King­horn Prep."

  "No­ra and I go to CHS," Vee sa­id. "I ho­pe you ap­pre­ci­ate yo­ur go­od for­tu­ne. Anyt­hing you ne­ed to know-inclu­ding who you sho­uld in­vi­te to Spring Fling-just ask. No­ra and I don't ha­ve da­tes…yet."

  I de­ci­ded it was ti­me to part ways. Jules was ob­vi­o­usly bo­red and ir­ri­ta­ted, and be­ing in his com­pany wasn't hel­ping my al­re­ady rest­less mo­od. I ma­de a big pre­sen­ta­ti­on of lo­oking at the clock on my cell pho­ne and sa­id, "We bet­ter get to scho­ol, Vee. We ha­ve a bio test to study for. El­li­ot and Jules, it was ni­ce me­eting you."

  "Our bio test isn't un­til Fri­day," sa­id Vee.

  On the in­si­de, I crin­ged. On the out­si­de, I smi­led thro­ugh my te­eth. "Right. I me­ant to say I ha­ve an Eng­lish test. The works of… Ge­of­frey Cha­ucer." Ever­yo­ne knew I was lying.

  In a re­mo­te way my ru­de­ness bot­he­red me, es­pe­ci­al­ly sin­ce El­li­ot hadn't do­ne anyt­hing to de­ser­ve it. But I didn't want to sit he­re any lon­ger. I wan­ted to ke­ep mo­ving for­ward, dis­tan­cing myself from last night. May­be the di­mi­nis­hing me­mory wasn't such a bad thing af­ter all. The so­oner I for­got the ac­ci­dent, the so­oner my li­fe wo­uld re­su­me its nor­mal pa­ce.

  "I ho­pe you ha­ve a re­al­ly gre­at first day, and may­be we'll see you at lunch," I told El­li­ot. Then I drag­ged Vee up by her el­bow and ste­ered her out the do­or.

  The scho­ol day was al­most over, only bi­ology left, and af­ter a qu­ick stop by my loc­ker to exc­han­ge bo­oks, I he­aded to class. Vee and I ar­ri­ved be­fo­re Patch; she slid in­to his empty se­at and dug thro­ugh her back­pack, pul­ling out a box of Hot Ta­ma­les.

  "One red fru­it co­ming right up," she sa­id, of­fe­ring me the box.

  "Let me gu­ess… cin­na­mon is a fru­it?" I pus­hed the box away.

  "You didn't eat lunch, eit­her," Vee sa­id, frow­ning.

  "I'm not hungry."

  "Li­ar. You're al­ways hungry. Is this abo­ut Patch? You're not wor­ri­ed he's re­al­ly stal­king you, are you? Be­ca­use last night, that who­le thing at the lib­rary, I was joking."

  I mas­sa­ged small circ­les in­to my temp­les. The dull ac­he that had ta­ken up re­si­den­ce be­hind my eyes fla­red at the men­ti­on of Patch. "Patch is the le­ast of my wor­ri­es," I sa­id. It wasn't exactly true.

  "My se­at, if you don't mind."

  Vee and I lo­oked up si­mul­ta­ne­o­usly at the so­und of Patch's vo­ice.

  He so­un­ded ple­asant eno­ugh, but he kept his eyes tra­ined on Vee as she ro­se and slung her back­pack over her sho­ul­der. It ap­pe­ared she co­uldn't mo­ve fast eno­ugh; he swept his arm to­ward the ais­le, in­vi­ting her out of his way.

  "Lo­oking go­od as al­ways," he sa­id to me, ta­king his cha­ir. He le­aned back in it, stretc­hing his legs out in front of him. I'd known all along he was tall, but I'd ne­ver put a me­asu­re­ment to it. Lo­oking at the length of his legs now, I gu­es­sed him to top out at six fe­et. May­be even six-one.

  "Thank you," I ans­we­red wit­ho­ut thin­king. Im­me­di­ately I wan­ted to ta­ke it back. Thank you? Of all the things I co­uld ha­ve sa­id, "thank you" was the worst. I didn't want Patch thin­king I li­ked his comp­li­ments. Be­ca­use I didn't… for the most part. It didn't ta­ke much per­cep­ti­on to re­ali­ze he was tro­ub­le, and I had eno­ugh tro­ub­le in my li­fe al­re­ady. No ne­ed to in­vi­te mo­re. May­be if I ig­no­red him, he'd even­tu­al­ly gi­ve up ini­ti­ating con­ver­sa­ti­on. And then we co­uld sit si­de by si­de in si­lent har­mony, li­ke every ot­her part­ners­hip in the ro­om.

  "You smell go­od too," sa­id Patch.

  "It's cal­led a sho­wer." I was sta­ring stra­ight ahe­ad. When he didn't ans­wer, I tur­ned si­de­ways. "So­ap. Sham­poo. Hot wa­ter."

  "Na­ked. I know the drill."

  I ope­ned my mo­uth to chan­ge the su­bj­ect when the bell cut me off.

  "Put yo­ur text­bo­oks away," Co­ach sa­id from be­hind his desk. "I'm han­ding out a prac­ti­ce qu­iz to get you war­med up for this Fri­day's re­al one." He stop­ped in front of me, lic­king his fin­ger as he tri­ed to se­pa­ra­te the qu­iz­zes. "I want fif­te­en mi­nu­tes of si­len­ce whi­le you ans­wer the qu­es­ti­ons. Then we'll dis­cuss chap­ter se­ven. Go­od luck."

  I wor­ked thro­ugh the first se­ve­ral qu­es­ti­ons, ans­we­ring them with a rhythmic out­po­uring of me­mo­ri­zed facts. If not­hing el­se, the qu­iz sto­le my con­cent­ra­ti­on, pus­hing last night's ac­ci­dent and the vo­ice at the back of my mind qu­es­ti­oning my sa­nity to the si­de­li­nes. Pa­using to sha­ke a cramp out of my wri­ting hand, I felt Patch le­an to­ward me.

  "You lo­ok ti­red. Ro­ugh night?" he whis­pe­red.

  "I saw you at the lib­rary." I was ca­re­ful to ke­ep my pen­cil gli­ding over my qu­iz, se­emingly hard at work.

  "The high­light of my night."

  "We­re you fol­lo­wing me?"

  He tip­ped his he­ad back and la­ug­hed softly.

  I tri­ed a new ang­le. "What we­re you do­ing the­re?"

  "Get­ting a bo­ok."

  I felt Co­ach's eyes on me and de­di­ca­ted myself to my qu­iz. Af­ter ans­we­ring se­ve­ral mo­re qu­es­ti­ons, I sto­le a glimp­se to my left. I was surp­ri­sed to find Patch al­re­ady watc­hing me. He grin­ned.

  My he­art did an unex­pec­ted flip, start­led by his bi­zar­rely at­trac­ti­ve smi­le. To my hor­ror, I was so ta­ken aback, I drop­ped my pen­cil. It bo­un­ced on the tab­le­top a few ti­mes be­fo­re rol­ling over the ed­ge. Patch bent to pick it up. He held it out in the palm of his hand, and I had to fo­cus not to to­uch his skin as I to­ok it back.

  "After the lib­rary," I whis­pe­red, "whe­re did you go?"

  "Why?"

  "Did you fol­low me?" I de­man­ded in an un­der­to­ne.

  "You lo­ok a lit­tle on ed­ge, No­ra. What hap­pe­ned?" His eyeb­rows lif­ted in con­cern. It was all for show, be­ca­use the­re was a ta­un­ting spark at the cen­ter of his black eyes.

  "Are you fol­lo­wing me?"

  "Why wo­uld I want to fol­low you?"

  "Answer the qu­es­ti­on."

  "No­ra." The war­ning in Co­ach's vo­ice pul­led me back to my qu­iz, but I co­uldn't help spe­cu­la­ting abo­ut what Patch's ans­wer might ha­ve be­en, and it had me wan­ting to sli­de far away from him. Ac­ross the ro­om. Ac­ross the uni­ver­se.

  Co­ach chir­ped his whist­le. "Ti­me's up. Pass yo­ur qu­iz­zes for­ward. Be ex­pec­ting si­mi­lar qu­es­ti­ons this Fri­day. Now"-he san­ded his hands to­get­her, and the dry so­und of it ma­de me shi­ver-"for to­day's les­son. Miss Sky, want to ta­ke a stab at our to­pic?"