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  "Crap," Vee sa­id, re­ading my tho­ughts, "we're ear­less."

  Shi­el­ding my eyes from the sun, I squ­in­ted down the stre­et. "Gu­ess this me­ans we'll ha­ve to walk."

  "Not we. You. I'd co­me with, but on­ce a we­ek is my lib­rary li­mit."

  "You ha­ven't be­en to the lib­rary this we­ek," I po­in­ted out.

  "Ye­ah, but I might ha­ve to go to­mor­row."

  "To­mor­row's Thurs­day. In all yo­ur li­fe, ha­ve you ever stu­di­ed on a Thurs­day?"

  Vee tap­ped a fin­ger­na­il to her lip and adop­ted a tho­ught­ful exp­res­si­on. "Ha­ve I ever stu­di­ed on a Wed­nes­day?"

  "Not that I re­call."

  "The­re you ha­ve it. I can't go. It wo­uld be an­ti-tra­di­ti­on."

  Thirty mi­nu­tes la­ter, I hi­ked up the steps le­ading to the lib­rary's ma­in do­ors. On­ce in­si­de, I put ho­me­work on the back bur­ner and went di­rectly to the me­dia lab, whe­re I com­bed the In­ter­net trying to find mo­re in­for­ma­ti­on on the "King­horn Han­ging." I didn't find much. Ori­gi­nal­ly the­re had be­en a lot of hype, but af­ter the su­ici­de no­te was dis­co­ve­red and El­li­ot was re­le­ased, the news mo­ved on.

  It was ti­me to ta­ke a trip to Port­land. I wasn't go­ing to le­arn much mo­re sif­ting thro­ugh arc­hi­ved news ar­tic­les, but may­be I'd ha­ve bet­ter luck do­ing leg­work the­re.

  I log­ged off and cal­led my mom.

  "Do I ne­ed to be ho­me by ni­ne to­night?"

  "Yes, why?"

  "I was thin­king of ta­king a bus out to Port­land."

  She ga­ve me one of her You must think I'm crazy la­ughs.

  "I ne­ed to in­ter­vi­ew so­me stu­dents at King­horn Prep," I sa­id. "It's for a pro­j­ect I've be­en re­se­arc­hing." It wasn't a lie. Not re­al­ly. Of co­ur­se, it wo­uld ha­ve be­en much easi­er to jus­tify if I we­ren't bur­de­ned by the gu­ilt of ke­eping the bre­ak-in and en­su­ing po­li­ce vi­sit from her. I'd tho­ught abo­ut tel­ling her, but every ti­me I ope­ned my mo­uth to say the words, they slip­ped away. We we­re strug­gling to sur­vi­ve. We ne­eded my mom's in­co­me. If I told her abo­ut El­li­ot, she'd qu­it im­me­di­ately.

  "You can't go to the city alo­ne. It's a scho­ol night and it will be dark so­on. Be­si­des, by the ti­me you get the­re, the stu­dents will ha­ve left."

  I he­aved a sigh. "Okay, I'll be ho­me so­on."

  "I know I pro­mi­sed you a ri­de, but I'm stuck at my of­fi­ce." I he­ard her shuf­fling pa­pers in the backg­ro­und, and I ima­gi­ned she had the pho­ne crad­led un­der her chin and the pho­ne cord wrap­ped aro­und her body se­ve­ral ti­mes. "Is it too much to ask you to walk?"

  The we­at­her was just this si­de of co­ol, I had my je­an jac­ket, and I had two legs. I co­uld walk. The plan so­un­ded a lot mo­re re­aso­nab­le in my he­ad, be­ca­use the tho­ught of wal­king ho­me left my in­si­des hol­low. But asi­de from spen­ding the night in the lib­rary, 1 didn't see any ot­her cho­ice.

  I was al­most thro­ugh the lib­rary do­ors when I he­ard my na­me cal­led. Tur­ning aro­und, I fo­und Mar­cie Mil­lar clo­sing the dis­tan­ce bet­we­en us.

  "I he­ard abo­ut Vee," she sa­id. "It's re­al­ly sad. I me­an, who wo­uld at­tack her? Un­less, you know, they co­uldn't help it. May­be it was self-de­fen­se. I he­ard it was dark and ra­ining. It wo­uld be easy to mis­ta­ke Vee for a mo­ose. Or a be­ar, or a buf­fa­lo. Re­al­ly, any hul­king ani­mal wo­uld do."

  "Gosh, it was ni­ce tal­king to you, but I've got a lot of things I'd rat­her be do­ing. Li­ke stic­king my hand in the gar­ba­ge dis­po­sal." I con­ti­nu­ed to­ward the exit.

  "I ho­pe she sta­yed cle­ar of tho­se hos­pi­tal me­als," Mar­cie sa­id, ke­eping at my he­els. "I he­ar they're high in fat. She can't stand to ga­in a lot of we­ight."

  I spun aro­und. "That's it. One mo­re word, and I'll…" We both knew it was an empty thre­at.

  Mar­cie sim­pe­red. "You'll what?"

  "Skank," I sa­id.

  "Ge­ek."

  "Slut."

  "Fre­ak."

  "Ano­re­xic pig."

  "Wow," sa­id Mar­cie, stag­ge­ring back me­lod­ra­ma­ti­cal­ly with a hand pres­sed to her he­art. "Am I sup­po­sed to act of­fen­ded? Try this on for si­ze. Old news. At le­ast I know how to exer­ci­se a lit­tle self-cont­rol."

  The se­cu­rity gu­ard stan­ding at the do­ors cle­ared his thro­at. "All right, bre­ak it up. Ta­ke this out­si­de or I'm go­ing to cart the both of you in­si­de my of­fi­ce and start cal­ling pa­rents."

  "Talk to her," Mar­cie sa­id, po­in­ting a fin­ger at me. "I'm the one who's trying to be ni­ce. She ver­bal­ly at­tac­ked me. I was just of­fe­ring my con­do­len­ces to her fri­end."

  "I sa­id out­si­de"

  "You lo­ok go­od in uni­form," Mar­cie told him, flas­hing her tra­de­mark to­xic smi­le.

  He jer­ked his he­ad at the do­ors. "Get out of he­re." But it didn't so­und half so gruff.

  Mar­cie sas­ha­yed up to the do­ors. "Mind get­ting the do­or for me? I'm short on hands." She was hol­ding one bo­ok. A pa­per­back.

  The gu­ard pus­hed on the han­di­cap­ped but­ton, and the do­ors auto­ma­ti­cal­ly gli­ded open.

  "Why, thank you," Mar­cie sa­id, blo­wing him a kiss.

  I didn't fol­low her. I wasn't su­re what wo­uld hap­pen if I did, but I was fil­led with eno­ugh ne­ga­ti­ve emo­ti­on that I just might do so­met­hing I'd reg­ret. Na­me-cal­ling and figh­ting we­re be­ne­ath me. Un­less I was de­aling with Mar­cie Mil­lar.

  I tur­ned aro­und and he­aded back in­to the lib­rary. At the ele­va­tors, I step­ped in­to the me­tal ca­ge and punc­hed the but­ton for the ba­se­ment le­vel. I co­uld've wa­ited aro­und a few mi­nu­tes for Mar­cie to le­ave, but I knew anot­her way out and de­ci­ded to ta­ke it. Fi­ve ye­ars ago the city had ap­pro­ved mo­ving the pub­lic lib­rary in­to a his­to­ric bu­il­ding smack in the cen­ter of Old Town Cold­wa­ter. The red brick da­ted back to the 1850s, and the bu­il­ding was comp­le­te with a ro­man­tic cu­po­la and a wi­dow's walk to watch for ves­sels co­ming in from sea. Un­for­tu­na­tely, the bu­il­ding didn't inc­lu­de a par­king lot, so an un­derg­ro­und tun­nel had be­en dug to con­nect the lib­rary to the un­derg­ro­und par­king ga­ra­ge of the co­urt­ho­use ac­ross the stre­et. The ga­ra­ge now ser­ved both bu­il­dings.

  The ele­va­tor clan­ked to a stop and I step­ped off. The tun­nel was lit with flu­ores­cent lights that flic­ke­red pa­le purp­le. It to­ok me a mo­ment to for­ce my fe­et to walk. I was struck by the sud­den tho­ught of my dad the night he was kil­led. I won­de­red if he'd be­en on a stre­et as re­mo­te and dark as the tun­nel ahe­ad.

  Pull it to­get­her, I told myself. It was a ran­dom act of vi­olen­ce. You've spent the last ye­ar pa­ra­no­id abo­ut every dark al­ley, dark ro­om, dark clo­set. You can t li­ve the rest of yo­ur li­fe ter­ri­fi­ed of ha­ving a gun pul­led on you.

  De­ter­mi­ned to pro­ve my fe­ar was all in my he­ad, I he­aded down the tun­nel, he­aring the soft tap of my sho­es on conc­re­te. Shif­ting my back­pack to my left sho­ul­der, I cal­cu­la­ted how long it wo­uld ta­ke to walk ho­me, and whet­her or not I was up for ta­king a short­cut ac­ross the ra­il­ro­ad tracks now that it was dusk. I ho­ped that if I kept my tho­ughts up­be­at and busy, I wo­uldn't ha­ve ti­me to con­cent­ra­te on my gro­wing sen­se of alarm.

  The tun­nel en­ded, and a dark form sto­od stra­ight ahe­ad.

  I stop­ped midst­ri­de, and my he­art drop­ped a few be­ats. Patch was we­aring a black T-shirt, lo­ose je­ans, ste­el-to­ed bo­ots. His eyes lo­oked li­ke they didn't play by the ru­les. His smi­le was a lit­tle too cun­ning for com­fort.

  "What are
you do­ing he­re?" I as­ked, pus­hing a hand­ful of ha­ir off my fa­ce and glan­cing past him to the car exit le­ading abo­ve gro­und. I knew it was stra­ight ahe­ad, but se­ve­ral of the over­he­ad flu­ores­cent lights we­re out of ser­vi­ce, ma­king it dif­fi­cult to see cle­arly. If ra­pe, mur­der, or any ot­her misc­re­ant ac­ti­vi­ti­es we­re on Patch's mind, he'd cor­ne­red me in the per­fect pla­ce.

  As Patch mo­ved to­ward me, I bac­ked up. I ca­me up short aga­inst a car and saw my chan­ce. I scramb­led aro­und it, po­si­ti­oning myself op­po­si­te Patch, with the car bet­we­en us.

  Patch lo­oked at me over the top of the car. His eyeb­rows lif­ted.

  "I ha­ve qu­es­ti­ons," I sa­id. "A lot of them."

  "Abo­ut?"

  "Abo­ut everyt­hing."

  His mo­uth twitc­hed, and I was pretty su­re he was figh­ting a smi­le. "And if my ans­wers don't ma­ke the cut, you're go­ing to ma­ke a bre­ak for it?" He ga­ve a nod in the di­rec­ti­on of the ga­ra­ge's exit.

  That was the plan. Mo­re or less. Gi­ve or ta­ke a few gla­ring ho­les, li­ke the fact that Patch was a lot fas­ter than me.

  "Let's he­ar tho­se qu­es­ti­ons," he sa­id.

  "How did you know I'd be at the lib­rary to­night?"

  "Se­emed li­ke a go­od gu­ess."

  I didn't for one mo­ment be­li­eve Patch was he­re on a hunch. The­re was a si­de to him that was al­most pre­da­tory. If the ar­med for­ces knew abo­ut him, they'd do everyt­hing in the­ir po­wer to rec­ru­it him.

  Patch lun­ged to his left. I co­un­te­red his mo­ve, scur­rying to­ward the re­ar of the car. When Patch ca­me up short, I did too. He was at the no­se of the car, and I was at the ta­il.

  "Whe­re we­re you Sun­day af­ter­no­on?" I as­ked. "Did you fol­low me when I went shop­ping with Vee?" Patch may not ha­ve be­en the guy in the ski mask, but that didn't me­an he hadn't be­en in­vol­ved in the cha­in of re­cent dis­tur­bing events. He was ke­eping so­met­hing from me. He'd be­en ke­eping so­met­hing from me sin­ce the day we met. Was it a co­in­ci­den­ce that the last nor­mal day in my li­fe had be­en right be­fo­re that fa­te­ful day? I didn't think so.

  "No. How did that go, by the way? Buy anyt­hing?"

  "May­be," I sa­id, thrown off gu­ard.

  "Li­ke?"

  I tho­ught back. Vee and I had only ma­de it as far as Vic­to­ria's Sec­ret. I'd spent thirty dol­lars on the lacy black bra, but I wasn't abo­ut to go the­re. Ins­te­ad I re­la­ted my eve­ning, star­ting with sen­sing I was be­ing fol­lo­wed, and en­ding with fin­ding Vee on the si­de of the ro­ad, the vic­tim of a bru­tal mug­ging.

  'Well?" I de­man­ded when I fi­nis­hed. "Do you ha­ve anyt­hing to say?"

  "No."

  "You ha­ve no idea what hap­pe­ned to Vee?"

  "Aga­in, no."

  "I don't be­li­eve you."

  "That's be­ca­use you ha­ve trust is­su­es." He spla­yed both hands on the car, le­aning ac­ross the ho­od. "We've be­en over this."

  I felt my tem­per spark. Patch had flip­ped the con­ver­sa­ti­on aga­in. Ins­te­ad of shi­ning on him, the spot­light was di­rec­ted back on me. I es­pe­ci­al­ly didn't li­ke be­ing re­min­ded that he knew all sorts of things abo­ut me. Pri­va­te things. Li­ke my trust is­su­es.

  Patch lun­ged clock­wi­se. I ran away from him, hal­ting when he did. Whi­le we we­re at a stands­till aga­in, his eyes loc­ked on mi­ne, al­most as if he was trying to gle­an my next mo­ve from them.

  "What hap­pe­ned on the Arc­han­gel? Did you sa­ve me?" I as­ked.

  "If I'd sa­ved you, we wo­uldn't be stan­ding he­re ha­ving this con­ver­sa­ti­on."

  "You me­an if you hadn't sa­ved me we wo­uldn't be he­re. I'd be de­ad."

  "That's not what I sa­id."

  I had no idea what he me­ant. "Why wo­uldn't we be stan­ding he­re?"

  "You'd still be he­re." He pa­used. "I pro­bably wo­uldn't."

  Be­fo­re I co­uld fi­gu­re out what he was tal­king abo­ut, he dar­ted for me aga­in, this ti­me at­tac­king from the right. Mo­men­ta­rily con­fu­sed, I ga­ve up so­me of the dis­tan­ce bet­we­en us. Ins­te­ad of stop­ping, Patch skir­ted aro­und the car. I ma­de a bre­ak for it, run­ning down the stra­igh­ta­way of the ga­ra­ge.

  I ma­de it three cars be­fo­re he ca­ught hold of my arm. He spun me aro­und and bac­ked me aga­inst a ce­ment be­am.

  "So much for that plan," he sa­id.

  I gla­red at him. The­re was a lot of pa­nic be­hind it, tho­ugh. He flas­hed a grin brim­ming with dark in­tent, con­fir­ming that I had every re­ason to swe­at fre­ely.

  "What's go­ing on?" I sa­id, wor­king hard to so­und hos­ti­le. "How co­me I swe­ar I can he­ar yo­ur vo­ice in my he­ad? And why did you say you ca­me to scho­ol for me?"

  "I was ti­red of ad­mi­ring yo­ur legs from a dis­tan­ce."

  "I want the truth." I swal­lo­wed hard. "I de­ser­ve full disc­lo­su­re."

  "Full disc­lo­su­re," he re­pe­ated with a sly grin. "Do­es this ha­ve anyt­hing to do with the pro­mi­se you ma­de to ex­po­se me? What exactly are we tal­king abo­ut he­re?"

  I co­uldn't re­mem­ber what we we­re tal­king abo­ut. All I knew was that Patch's ga­ze felt es­pe­ci­al­ly hot. I had to bre­ak eye con­tact, so I tra­ined my eyes on my hands. They we­re glis­te­ning with swe­at, and I slid them be­hind my back.

  "I ha­ve to go," I sa­id. "I ha­ve ho­me­work."

  "What hap­pe­ned in the­re?" He til­ted his chin back at the ele­va­tors.

  "Not­hing."

  Be­fo­re I co­uld stop him, he had my palm pres­sed to his, for­ming a ste­ep­le with our hands. He slid his fin­gers bet­we­en mi­ne, loc­king me to him. "Yo­ur knuck­les are whi­te," he sa­id, brus­hing his mo­uth ac­ross them. "And you ca­me out lo­oking wor­ked up."

  "Let go. And I'm not wor­ked up. Not re­al­ly. If you'll ex­cu­se me, I ha­ve ho­me­work-"

  "No­ra." Patch spo­ke my na­me softly, yet with every in­ten­ti­on of get­ting what he wan­ted.

  "I had a fight with Mar­cie Mil­lar." I had no idea whe­re the con­fes­si­on ca­me from. The last thing I wan­ted was to gi­ve Patch anot­her win­dow in­si­de me. "Okay?" I sa­id, pus­hing a no­te of exas­pe­ra­ti­on in­to my vo­ice. "Sa­tis­fi­ed? Will you ple­ase let go now?"

  "Mar­cie Mil­lar?"

  I tri­ed to un­la­ce my fin­gers, but Patch had a dif­fe­rent idea.

  "You don't know Mar­cie?" I sa­id cyni­cal­ly. "Hard to be­li­eve, con­si­de­ring you at­tend Cold­wa­ter High, for one. And you ha­ve a Y chro­mo­so­me, for two."

  "Tell me abo­ut the fight," he sa­id.

  "She cal­led Vee fat."

  "And?"

  "I cal­led her an ano­re­xic pig."

  Patch lo­oked li­ke he was trying not to crack a grin. "That's it? No punc­hes? No bi­ting, cla­wing, or ha­ir pul­ling?"

  I nar­ro­wed a lo­ok at him.

  "Are we go­ing to ha­ve to te­ach you to fight, An­gel?"

  "I can fight." I tip­ped my chin up in spi­te of the lie.

  This ti­me he didn't bot­her rest­ra­ining the grin.

  "In fact, I've had bo­xing les­sons." Kick­bo­xing. At the gym. On­ce.

  Patch held out his hand as a tar­get. "Gi­ve me a shot. Hard as you can."

  "I'm-not a fan of sen­se­less vi­olen­ce."

  "We're all alo­ne down he­re." Patch's bo­ots we­re flush with the to­es of my sho­es. "A guy li­ke me co­uld ta­ke ad­van­ta­ge of a girl li­ke you. Bet­ter show me what you've got."

  I inc­hed back­ward, and Patch's black mo­torcyc­le ca­me in­to vi­ew.

  "Let me gi­ve you a ri­de," he of­fe­red.

  "I'll walk."

  "It's la­te, and dark."

 
He had a po­int. Whet­her or not I li­ked it.

  But in­wardly, I was ca­ught in a fi­er­ce ga­me of rug-of-war. I'd be­en idi­otic to walk ho­me in the first pla­ce, and now I was stuck bet­we­en two bad de­ci­si­ons: ri­de with Patch, or risk the chan­ce the­re was so­me­one wor­se out the­re.

  "I'm star­ting to think the only re­ason you ke­ep of­fe­ring me a ri­de is be­ca­use you know how not fond I am of this thing." I blew out a jit­tery sigh, scrunc­hed the hel­met on, then swung on be­hind him. It wasn't en­ti­rely my fa­ult that I was snug­gled up clo­se to him. The se­at wasn't exactly spa­ci­o­us.

  Patch ma­de a low so­und of amu­se­ment. "I can think of a co­up­le ot­her re­asons."

  He sped down the stra­igh­ta­way of the ga­ra­ge, gun­ning it to­ward the exit. A red-and-whi­te-stri­ped traf­fic arm and an auto­ma­tic tic­ket mac­hi­ne bar­red the exit. I was just won­de­ring if Patch wo­uld slow long eno­ugh to fe­ed mo­ney in­to the mac­hi­ne, when he bro­ught the bi­ke to a smo­oth stop, jol­ting me even clo­ser in­to him. He fed the mac­hi­ne, then flo­ored the bi­ke up on­to the stre­et abo­ve.

  Patch ed­ged his bi­ke up my dri­ve­way, and I held on to him to ke­ep my ba­lan­ce whi­le I clim­bed off. I han­ded back the hel­met.

  "Thanks for the ri­de," I sa­id.

  "What are you do­ing Sa­tur­day night?"

  A mo­ment's pa­use. "I ha­ve a da­te with the usu­al."

  This ap­pe­ared to spark his in­te­rest. "The usu­al?"

  "Ho­me­work."

  "Can­cel."

  I was fe­eling a lot mo­re re­la­xed. Patch was warm and so­lid, and he smel­led fan­tas­tic. Li­ke mint and rich, dark earth. No­body had jum­ped out at us on the ri­de ho­me, and all the win­dows on the lo­wer le­vel of the farm­ho­use glo­wed with light. For the first ti­me all day I felt sa­fe.

  Except that Patch had cor­ne­red me in a dark tun­nel and was pos­sibly stal­king me. May­be not so sa­fe.