Sera waved the question away as she picked up a sweatshirt and pulled it over her head.
“You don’t have to dress up for me,” I said with a grin, reaching an arm out to loop around her waist.
She settled the sweatshirt down over her chest slowly before whispering, “If it were for you, I wouldn’t be putting clothes on.”
Oh. Hell. Yes.
“But I’m cold.” To prove her point she laid chilly fingers along both sides of my face. I pulled her close and kissed her nose, and when she giggled I went for her mouth.
“The door,” she whispered, twisting away.
“So,” I said, checking out the expansive spring floor. “Are you going to do something cool for me?”
She shook her head. “Sorry, I just finished the weight part of my workout and you should never tumble after weights. Way more likely to injure something.” She pushed up onto her toes and pressed a soft kiss to my cheek. “You go and make nice with my mom and I’ll get ready. I’ll be down in fifteen minutes.”
I snorted in disbelief.
“What? My mom’s not that bad. She’ll mostly just ignore you.”
“Not that. Fifteen minutes? I’ve never seen a girl get showered and ready in fifteen minutes.”
She flipped a confident look over her shoulder. “Time me.”
It took Sera exactly fourteen minutes and thirty seconds to get ready and I know because I looked at my watch every fifteen seconds the entire time she was gone. It wasn’t like Mrs. Hewitt grilled me. . . . She just didn’t do anything. Within the first thirty seconds after I walked into the kitchen she plunked down a glass of ice water in front of me—on a coaster, natch—and then said nothing. She straightened the countertops, flipped through a magazine, made notes about something in a notebook—I could only hope the notes weren’t about me—and nothing else. Not a word, not a sound.
So when I say that Sera was a sight for sore eyes, I mean she was really a sight, and that my eyes were seriously sore.
“You ready?” I asked as I stood. I didn’t take her hand or even touch her. I figured that could come later, out of sight of the mother.
“Back by ten,” her mom said, looking up from her magazine. “School tomorrow.”
Sera sighed as soon as she was safely ensconced in my car. “My mother,” she said. “I know she means well, but she’s such a perfectionist.”
“Well, she’s not here now,” I said, covering her hand with mine. “Just you and me.”
When we arrived at the movie theater, we walked up to the ticket booth and began looking through the titles.
“I think I’ve seen all of these,” Sera said.
“Like three times,” I replied. “I’m kind of surprised there’s nothing new. All of this has got to be on its way out.”
“Do you mind watching one again?”
I hesitated. “Maybe I’m not in the mood for a movie after all.”
“Well, I figure if we’ve seen it before, it won’t be as . . . distracting,” she said, her fingers skimming over my stomach as she wrapped her arm around my waist.
My voice was a little shaky as I turned to the ticket guy. I don’t remember which movie I picked.
But it was way better the fourth time.
Twenty-Two
I WAS CROUCHED BY MY front bushes a few minutes before two a.m. when Khail’s truck swung by and the passenger door popped open. Turned out it was harder to sneak out of my own house than I expected it to be to break into the school. And even when I got around the alarm and the gate, I managed to get a faceful of motion-triggered security light at the last second.
As the truck pulled up, I sprinted to jump in and felt like a kid trying to avoid the monster under the bed.
“You ready?” Khail asked, sounding utterly calm. I have no idea how he did it.
“Yeah,” I said, feeling my pits break out in a sweat even as I gripped the key so hard it made my hand hurt. I’m such a liar. “Where are the guys?”
“In the back, all loaded up.” I peered through the back window and saw them, hoodies shadowing their faces, jammed into the bed of the truck like sardines, arms around duffels.
I’d sorted items with Khail that afternoon and filled almost his entire truck bed with the other wrestlers’ duffels, each labeled with a teacher’s name and stuffed to the brim with bags. We cleared out enough stuff that it would only take one more return to get everything in the cave gone for good.
I couldn’t think about that now, though. One return at a time.
“Is . . . is she here?”
Guilt burned in my chest. I hadn’t seen Kimberlee since Sunday, when I’d abandoned her on the side of the road. She was still mad . . . somewhere. “She’ll meet us there,” I mumbled.
And I wondered if I was telling the truth. She’d been so excited about it; surely she’d come back. Hell, it was her idea.
She’d never stayed away this long, but everything was set and if Kimberlee still didn’t show, I didn’t think I had the guts to back out.
Besides, her big part was the codes and that was done. We’d be okay either way.
Probably.
Khail killed his lights as we pulled into the school parking lot and steered into the shadow of a big elm tree. “You ready?” he whispered.
Hell no. “Yeah.” I grabbed an old ski mask I’d found in the garage that barely fit over my head, and yanked it into place.
With a quick nod Khail slipped from the car and jogged to the front doors. By the time I got there, he’d scrambled up onto the stairway railing, shoved a paper bag over the lens of the camera, and secured it with a piece of tape.
My turn.
I dug the key out and, after a shaky breath, slid it into the lock. I turned it clockwise and for a moment, I thought it wouldn’t go. But a tiny bit more pressure and the unmistakable hollow click of a bolt sliding filled the dark space between Khail and me.
“Ghost girl says it’s all clear?” Khail whispered.
I nodded without thinking. But the guilt hit me half a second later. Still, it probably was all clear at this time of night.
Morning.
Whatever.
“Then move it,” Khail said, brushing past and pushing the doors open. A steady beeping greeted us, just like Kimberlee said.
“Get the doors. I got the code. We’re gone in ten minutes.”
Right.
I gripped the key harder and sprinted through the darkness with the key in one hand, a tiny penlight in the other.
Nothing bigger than a penlight, Kimberlee had warned. Or someone might see the lights through the windows.
I shook thoughts of Kimberlee out of my head and slid the key into the first classroom door. Ten doors on each side of the hallway, two floors. Forty doors, ten minutes.
I was on the second door when the beeping of the alarm stopped. Perfect. I continued unlocking doors and flinging them open, straining my ears for the other wrestlers’ footsteps.
And almost ran right into one before I heard him.
“Keep moving,” he whispered as he brushed past me, barely making a sound. I realized they were all wearing their soft-soled wrestling shoes.
Brilliant, I thought with a grin as I took the stairs two at a time. More than halfway done now.
I zigzagged across the second-floor hallway and the smallest wrestler caught up with me just as I got to the last door—the advanced-chemistry lab.
“This is it,” he whispered. “Head back to the truck.”
I was almost to the stairs when I heard the glass shatter.
I spun and pointed my penlight toward the last classroom along with a couple of other wrestlers emerging from their own classrooms with limp, empty duffels. The little guy popped out. And a bunch of tiny beams of light shone on him.
“It’s okay!” he said, blocking the lights with his hands. “Just a beaker or . . . something. Campbell had a bunch of crap on her desk; I knocked it over. Just go!” he said, sprinting past us.
Don’t have to tell me twice.
A group of about six of us were almost to the door when a piercing wail slammed into my eardrums.
“Dammit, Khail,” I called over the noise when I reached the door where he was waving guys out the door. “I thought you took care of the alarm.”
“I did; what the hell did you do?” He pointed down the hall, where a bright white light was flashing. “It’s the fire alarm, genius.”
I clenched my eyes shut. “The chemistry lab. Shortie broke something.”
Khail punched the door and let out a string of swears that would have earned him about six detentions. “It must have had chemicals in it.”
“I have to go check it out.” I turned and Khail nearly pulled my arm out of my socket yanking me back.
“There’s nothing you can do and the firemen will be here in three minutes. Maybe less. We gotta get out of here.”
“But—”
Khail grabbed me by both shoulders and put his face close to mine. “Are you a fireman, Jeff?”
I shook my head convulsively.
“Then leave it to the professionals. Send ghost girl to check it out if you have to, but we are leaving now.”
We ran to the truck and Khail took about three seconds to do a quick head count before starting the engine and peeling out of the parking lot.
Hands down the fastest and most nerve-racking ten minutes of my life. Maybe twelve.
And Kimberlee wasn’t here to see it.
She’d have loved it.
But she never showed up.
We were driving at a very reasonable three miles above the speed limit when I heard the sirens. Khail turned off the main road before I saw them, but in my mind’s eye they pulled up in front of a Whitestone completely engulfed in flames.
Khail dropped me off about three minutes later, barely slowing down enough for me to get out of the car safely. I managed to make my way back through the security obstacle course that is my house, but my nerves were still crackling so I plugged my noise-canceling headphones into my iPod and cranked it. I lay on my bed, my eardrums throbbing with the volume of my music and slowly—very, very slowly—started to relax.
It was almost an hour before I finally felt the disposable phone vibrate in my pocket. I sat up and yanked off my headphones. “Yeah?” I said in a low voice.
“We’re good,” Khail said softly. “All the guys are home—everything got delivered, and when I drove by the school it looked like the fire trucks were packing up.”
“You saw the school? Did it look like anyone else was there? Hennigan? Bailey?”
“No clue. I didn’t even slow down. Besides, she’ll tell you everything later.”
“Yeah, yeah, of course,” I said evasively. “I just wondered.” I hesitated. “So we’re good? The school didn’t burn down and no one got caught, right?”
“We are golden, bro. Totally golden.”
Twenty-Three
THE NEXT MORNING WAS LIKE a nightmare come true.
When I arrived at school, hired security guards were standing at the doors, directing us to go to the gym for a last-minute assembly. I knew it had to be about us. I wished I could talk to Khail . . . or even Shortie. But we had all decided that, at least until all of this was over, we had to act like we didn’t know one another in school.
I did manage to find Sera, though. “What do you think’s going on?” she asked after greeting me with a kiss that had me desperately wishing we could ditch the assembly.
“Not a clue,” I lied.
She slipped her hand into mine and we walked into the gym together, me trying to subtly sniff the air for smoke. But everything looked and smelled okay. So far.
All around me were confused whispers and people asking what was happening. I heard a few people mention the fire trucks, but half of the students seemed to think that was an exaggerated rumor.
Once most of the students had taken their seats, Mr. Hennigan walked to the middle of the gym, where a podium was set up.
Then he just stood there.
The students quieted at first, and then got fidgety as the silence continued to stretch. I swear he stood up there in front of us for ten minutes. When he finally did speak, it was in a low, simmering tone that sent shivers up my spine.
“A terrible—not to mention expensive—act of vandalism was committed yesterday,” he said.
Expensive? That made my stomach do rather uncomfortable things.
“The details are unimportant. I won’t glamorize this incident by spreading rumors that will only encourage the perpetrator. Perpetrators, I should say.” He straightened and cleared his throat, becoming almost businesslike. “You will have one chance, and one chance only, to turn yourself in. If you choose to do so, I will be lenient with the consequences.”
Something in his tone told me that was a barefaced lie.
“But after today, I will use every resource I can to catch you, and I will make you pay.” He paused and his eyes swept the bleachers, seeming to take in every student. “I want everyone to understand that just because this person is returning things that were once stolen from you does not make him a hero. He is not the good guy here. And,” Mr. Hennigan added, “if anyone here wants to help this person do the right thing, well”—a dry chuckle escaped his throat—“you know where my office is. Also, Mrs. Campbell’s classes will be meeting in Mr. Lewis’s lab today. That is all.”
Without another word, Mr. Hennigan left the podium and strode purposefully toward the double doors.
Leaving Kimberlee in his place.
“Indeed!” she shouted, waving her fist. “You are all my slaves and will help me catch this terrible, terrible person who—by the way—eats babies for lunch. Babies!” she shouted again.
I knew no one else could see or hear her, but I was already overly paranoid and couldn’t help glancing covertly around to make sure.
But everyone was busily whispering about what might have happened, and even Sera was calmly reapplying her lip gloss.
I wanted to stay—to ask Kimberlee where she’d been, to tell her about what we’d done, to apologize for what I’d said.
But I couldn’t now. Today was not the day to act weird.
I managed to make eye contact with Kimberlee for a just a second before being swept out of the gymnasium with the rest of the students. She paused in her ranting. Then she smiled tightly—almost apologetically—and started to bid the completely unaware crowd a lavish good-bye.
Sera’s hand pulled on mine, bringing my attention back to her. “What the hell do you think that was about?”
I tried to look clueless. “I don’t know.”
“Sounds like it’s another hit by whoever is returning all that stuff.” She rolled her eyes. “It’s so lame.”
“Why is it lame? It sounds like they’re doing a good thing.” And, you know, racking up expensive damages.
She shrugged. “I guess so. But after over a year, I think you should just throw everything in the trash and find peace with yourself. This just stirs needless drama up all over again.”
Someone behind us cleared his throat. “Miss Hewitt?” Mr. Hennigan said, his voice carrying through the hallway as only principals’ voices do.
We turned and looked at him together.
“Would you please step into my office?” he said, gesturing.
Sera flipped her hair and—sounding completely chill—said, “Sure. Whatever.” But she turned and whispered in my ear, “Wait for me?” and I could hear the panic she wasn’t showing.
“Of course,” I said automatically. Screw Bleekman. I only had one tardy in his class anyway.
The door closed with a click and I pushed my back against the wall to wait.
Kimberlee walked up and assumed the same position just a few inches away from my shoulder. “Hey,” she said softly.
I glanced up to acknowledge her, but said nothing.
She paused and looked down at the ground for a few seconds before reluctantly meeti
ng my gaze. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there. I—shouldn’t have stayed away. You probably could have used my help.”
I swallowed hard and nodded again.
She looked down again. “You were right,” she finally said. “You’re doing me this huge favor and the least I can do is be grateful—or at least interested—and stay out of your social life. I—I’ll try to do that from now on.”
I thought I’d heard everything from Kimberlee. Yelling, screaming, crying, bad jokes, criticism, whining, shrieking, laughing, but never, ever apologizing.
It was kind of strange. And I didn’t know if I could trust it.
But I wanted to.
I sighed and looked up at her with a small grin, and shrugged. Apology accepted, I guess. What else could I do?
We stood, shoulders almost touching, for a few companionable seconds. “I can’t believe you set off the fire alarm.”
“It was an accident,” I whispered out of the side of my mouth. “Shortie broke something. There must have been chemicals in it.”
“Well, whatever it was melted a hole right through the linoleum. The lab’s a huge, soggy mess.”
Great. Just great.
After another stretch of silence Kimberlee turned to me. “Do you want me to . . . you know?” she asked, pointing her thumb toward the principal’s office. I was trying to decide just how much of a breach of privacy it was to send a ghost to spy on your girlfriend, when the door opened and Sera walked out.
“You think long and hard about that,” Mr. Hennigan said firmly.
Sera didn’t answer but her eyes were wide and dark against her pale skin.
I waited a few seconds until Hennigan closed his door again. “Are you okay?” I asked, slipping my hand into hers. It was cold.
She looked up at me and blinked, and in a matter of a second, her face changed. It was still pale and I could see a trace of worry in her eyes, but her smile was steady and the stressed creases on her forehead flattened out. “Yeah, I’m fine. Um, Hennigan was just worried about me getting enough credits to graduate next year. Thought I needed an extra math class, but it was a mistake.” She turned away and started walking down the hall, with me in tow. “Hurry, we’re going to be late.”