Demon in My View

'Who is he? ' another girl asked.

'No idea,' the first one answered. 'But you've got to admit he's cute.'

'Cute?' a third girl repeated. 'He is totally hot.'

Jessica couldn't see the subject of this profound conversation. Probably some handsome bland substitute who will turn out to be the most hated teacher in the school, she thought pessimistically.

'Who are you looking at?' she asked the three gawking girls.

The quietest, a senior named Kathy, looked over her shoulder, recognized Jessica, grabbed her friends' arms, and pulled the girls away.

Jessica scowled as she watched them go. At least most people were subtle about moving away from her.

She quickly forgot the girls' behavior, however, when she glanced into the office and saw the object of their admiration.

His face could have been modeled after the portrait on a Roman coin. Hair the color of raven feathers contrasted with his fair skin, and when he turned a bit she saw that a few strands had fallen across his eyes, shading them. He was dressed entirely in black, except for a gold chain around his neck. The pendant on the chain looked like a cross, but Jessica couldn't be sure from where she was standing.

A shock of recognition struck her. Aubrey.

Aubrey was, without a doubt, her favorite character from the books she had written. He had been the villain in Tiger, Tiger and the main character in Dark Flame. Gorgeous, powerful, and somewhat mysterious, he was every teenage girl's fantasy … or at least, he was hers. Considering her present status in the world of teenagers, she couldn't pretend to speak for the rest of the female population.

Of course, Aubrey was a vampire.

Get a grip, Jessica. You write fiction, she reminded herself. Aubrey doesn't exist. She would hardly have minded if her vampire hero had existed, but such a thing was impossible. Vampires were not real.

Yet the resemblance between this new boy and Aubrey was uncanny, and the sense of familiarity lingered despite her efforts to shake it. She forced herself to turn away and walk to her homeroom before the boy could notice her watching him.

She sat in the back of the room once again, and this time no one came to talk to her. Caryn looked over once from the group she seemed to have been accepted into, but Jessica sent a fierce gaze her way and Caryn cringed, visibly shaken.

A few moments after attendance had been taken, the boy from the office walked in. He handed a form to Mrs. Katherine but didn't bother to explain why he was late.

'Alex Remington?' Mrs. Katherine asked, reading the form.

He nodded, barely paying attention to the teacher as he sought out an empty seat.

Alex paused when he saw Caryn, who was watching him with wide eyes. Unlike most of the other females in the room, Caryn looked terrified.

When the bell rang, Jessica watched with curiosity as Caryn pulled on her backpack and slipped quickly through the crowd and out of the room. She was clearly being careful to stay as far from Alex Remington as she could.

Before Alex had even reached the door, a girl named Shannon caught up with him. Jessica could recognize Shannon's methods of flirtation a mile away and shook her head in disgust. Shannon already had a boyfriend, but that had never stopped her when there was a drop-dead-gorgeous male in her line of vision.

Jessica was about to leave when Alex glanced up for a moment, meeting her gaze over Shannon's shoulder. His eyes were jet-black and shadowed by dark lashes. Jessica smiled wryly in response to the amusement she saw in those eyes—no doubt a reaction to Shannon's not-so-subtle advances.

Then something Shannon said caught his attention and he looked away from Jessica, returning his gaze to his more assertive admirer.

A bit reluctantly, Jessica headed down the hall, leaving Alex at the mercy of Shannon the Conquerer.

CHAPTER 6

JESSICA WANDERED into the courtyard at lunchtime, having no desire to sit alone at a table in the cafeteria so that she could be assaulted by the stench of the day's mystery meat.

Her thoughts traveled for a moment to Alex; she remembered how he had caught her eye. Then she mentally chided herself for focusing on a guy who probably had already forgotten she existed. And even if he hadn't, he would never be desperate enough to risk his social standing by associating with the leper of Ramsa High.

She pulled an unlined notebook and a mechanical pencil from her backpack and proceeded to sketch, simply for something to do with her hands, as she discreetly watched the people around her.

Shannon was standing with a few of her friends, but instead of talking to them, she was staring intensely across the courtyard at Alex. Alex, leaning casually against a tree, was smirking slightly as another boy berated him. Jessica recognized the guy as Shannon's boyfriend, and she judged by his posture and tone of voice that he had heard about Shannon's conversation with Alex that morning.

Finally Alex seemed to lose his patience. He locked eyes with the other boy, who, though a few inches taller than Alex and much broader, took a step back. The boy said something Jessica couldn't hear and left quickly.

Jessica shook her head, not surprised. Something about Alex made it evident he wasn't someone to mess with.

As Jessica had watched the confrontation, she had continued to draw. Now she looked down at the pencil sketch and felt a chill run through her.

Even though her model had been nearby, the likeness was remarkable. But the thing that struck her the most was the pendant, which she hadn't yet been able to look at closely but had somehow drawn in careful detail.

The cross was upside down and carefully molded with a viper twined around it. It was the same design as the one that Aubrey wore, and it startled Jessica to see that she had drawn it into her portrait of Alex.

'Mind if I join you?' someone asked.

Not just someone. Alex. Jessica recognized his voice and whipped her notebook shut. His tone was confident, unmarred by adolescent awkwardness. Hearing his silk-smooth voice made her shiver, because she was once again assaulted by a wave of familiarity.

Snap out of it, Jessica ordered herself. Over her mental argument, she heard her voice calmly reply to Alex, 'Go ahead.'

Suspicious of his motives, she couldn't immediately come up with anything more to say. The last time any guy had tried to talk to her, he had done so only on a dare. With that painful memory in mind, she kept her expression cool, waiting for Alex Remington to explain himself.

As he sat down near her, she studied his appearance. The pendant was exactly as she had drawn it— exactly like Aubrey's.

'Do you always keep to yourself out here?'he asked.

'Do you always go out of your way to talk to people who look like they want to be alone?' she answered, instinctively defensive. She bit her tongue after speaking the words. If Alex actually wanted to get to know her, she was an idiot to try to chase him off.

He just looked amused. 'Would you prefer to be alone, or are you avoiding someone in particular?' As he asked this, he glanced over at the windows of the cafeteria. Jessica followed his gaze and noticed Caryn sitting inside with a group of other seniors.

'If I was trying to avoid anyone, it would be Caryn,' she answered truthfully. 'She seems convinced that my inner child needs a friend.'