I just gave him an apologetic smile as I shook my head. As much as I wanted to support Gabe, Brendan and I avoided school functions like the plague. Hell, the fact that you just got mugged, attacked, demonically assaulted, whatever that was, on a school trip proves that you and school functions go together like peanut butter and razor blades.
Jenn finished her game, and she and Cisco talked about making plans to meet up before the Battle of the Bands. My head was beginning to throb, so I leaned it against the chilly window, the cool pane of glass soothing my skin. I stared at the cityscape, relieved to see that we had made it across Manhattan and were just twenty or so blocks away from Vince A. The posh store windows on Lexington flashed by, their designer wares just a blur. A chunk of my resolve to maintain my composure broke away with each block we passed. It had been less than twenty-four hours since I’d last seen Brendan, and my world had completely transformed in that time.
Brendan had texted that he would wait for me outside the school. And as if there were an invisible chain pulling me to him, I knew exactly where to look for him the moment the bus pulled up.
His hands were in his pockets as he leaned against the school, his right foot propped up against the building behind him. He wore a navy hoodie over his uniform, keeping the hood up, his head casually resting against the stone structure. He looked calm and unbothered to any of the passing students who looked at him—and they most definitely did look at him, the scandal du jour—but his eyes were alive, actively scanning the darkened windows of the bus, looking for me. I held my palm up against the glass, and when our eyes found each other, his lips curled into a small smile—which faded almost immediately.
Brendan stood up straighter, and I could see his body get rigid. He squinted his eyes, giving me a questioning look.
“You okay?” he mouthed, taking out his earbuds and stuffing them in the pocket of his hoodie. I just shook my head.
My classmates had started filing out of the bus. I was antsy to get off, but we were stuck in the back, waiting for everyone to take their precious time exiting. Really, it’s the weekend. Don’t you all have somewhere to be? I glanced out the window and saw Kristin approach Brendan, holding out a Cloisters pamphlet and her notebook as if she were offering him her notes from the class trip. Of course, she held everything right underneath her overly padded chest—her boobs were practically sitting on her notebook. Really? Who did she think she was kidding? She must truly want me to jump her after school. She said something, but Brendan’s lips curled in disgust as if she were offering him a cool, refreshing drink of water from the subway tracks. He waved his hand as if he were swatting away an insect and walked away, continuing to scan the bus windows for me. Kristin pulled on his sleeve—and for a brief second, I considered doing the Emoveo spell on her from my perch in the back of the bus. I could feel the same heat taking over my body, crawling up my skin. In that moment, I had no doubt that I could definitely knock her down the block—or hell, through a building. I took a deep breath, regaining control of my emotions as Brendan jerked his arm back, giving Kristin the finger. Pure shock was etched on her tangerine face—surprising, since it wasn’t a secret that he hated her. She stomped away, pulling out her cell phone, no doubt to complain to one of her sycophants.
I looked up, and the bus had cleared out. I gave Cisco and Jenn hugs goodbye, and walked off the bus as quickly as I could, barely stopping myself from just running straight into Brendan’s arms.
“What’s going on?” he asked, taking my hand in his as we began walking slowly to the train station.
“Not here. People are looking,” I said quietly, casting a glance around at the students milling about.
“Don’t care. Are you okay?” he asked, kissing the top of my head softly. Finally I shook it back and forth, frowning.
“I knew it. As soon as I saw you, I just knew something was wrong,” he whispered, dropping my hand to rest his arm across my shoulder, tucking me into his side. “Let’s just get out of here.”
Chapter 4
“So is that everything?”
I searched for some kind of anger in Brendan’s eyes, but I didn’t see it. Just concern—and a little frustration at being kept in the dark—but there wasn’t anything hard in those glittering green eyes as he rested on his left side, his head propped up with his hand.
I nodded and he shut his eyes, taking a deep breath before leaning over me, steadying his balance with his palm resting over my left shoulder and taking care not to hit my raw knee. We were barely dressed, and we were sprawled out on his large bed in his family’s empty, palatial town house—but the situation was anything but romantic. For starters, I held a bag of frozen vegetables against my knuckles. Cisco was right, they were red. And puffy. And nothing sets the scene like a melting bag of broccoli. Seriously, it’s the sexiest vegetable.
Brendan just had on an undershirt and his black school pants, and my clothing was in the washing machine on the floor underneath his—yes, he had an entire floor for a bedroom. So Brendan, an only child whose parents traveled a lot, had the place to himself. He was like a teenage Bruce Wayne, but without a driver’s license for the Batmobile. In fact, none of my New York friends had their licenses.
I was in a pair of Brendan’s boxer shorts and one of his T-shirts, which hung on me like an oversize shirtdress, but when I showed him the knife, any possibility of romance went out the window. All my rage and thoughts of vengeance joined it as soon as I’d stepped foot in his room. I started sobbing, stuttering out everything—the spell that foretold disaster for me and possibly Brendan, Angelique’s mystical sense of doom, which clearly predicted the attack at the Cloisters, the magic mojo I summoned to disarm my attacker—even Kristin and Kendall’s catty commentary. I probably should have left that last part out, but every lurid detail of the past twenty-four hours came tumbling out as I blubbered like a big stupid baby in his arms. I even continued to blubber while he gently tended to my shredded knee, cleaning it and getting the splinters out while I sat on the rim of the bathtub in his messy bathroom, blowing my nose into a continuous roll of toilet paper like the sexy beast I am.
“I understand why you think you had to wait to tell me about the spell you and Angelique did, but I need you to promise me that you won’t keep things from me anymore, even if you think you’re just looking out for me,” Brendan implored, wiping away an escaping tear with his thumb. I thought I had gotten them all out, but much like me, a few of my tears liked to run late.
“Okay.” I sniffled, blinking back the rest.
“Don’t just ‘Okay’ me, please,” he said a little more firmly, his voice getting more agitated as he continued to speak. “We talked about this only yesterday, remember?”
He pulled at his black hair, frustrated. “Promise me you won’t keep this kind of stuff from me, not even for a little while. Especially when it’s something magical! I mean, hell Emma, only four months ago, we beat a millennium-old curse that could have tortured our very souls for all eternity. I’m not asking you to tell me every time you use the damn bathroom, but when you do a spell that indicates that there’s a major evil out there for you, that’s even stronger than us—because that’s what those crystals meant, right? A billion evil little crystals and one tiny red one for us?—then I need to know!”
He took a deep breath and shook his head bitterly.
I whispered another apology.
“Stop apologizing,” Brendan moaned, rolling onto his back next to me with such force he almost hit the wall. He rubbed his face with his hands so hard I thought he was going to take his nose off. Then Brendan propped himself back up on his elbow.
“Emma, I know there’s magic at play here, but can you do me a favor and remember that you’re also in New York City?” he asked, and this time I did see anger glinting in those green eyes.
“What do you mean?”