you’re going to try and recapture them in order to save the bodies they’ve taken. My best guess is they’re trying to figure out how to get rid of you.”
“Get rid of me?” I snapped, rescuing my cell. Mom had just replaced it last month after I’d dropped it in a pile of Hell Hound drool. That stuff ate through plastic quicker than you could say
“They know you’re a Darker, and that equals trouble for them. They’ll need to get you out of their way if they hope to succeed.”
“How is that, anyway? I don’t look anything like my mom. Am I wearing a sign on my back?
“I imagine one of them followed me to your mother’s office.”
“Maybe.” It was logical. Made perfect sense. And that’s probably why it irritated me. “So that thing about being born in Penance, was it true?”
“It was true.”
Aha! Now we were getting somewhere. “How old are you?”
“You ask a lot of questions,” he said, sighing. “It’s impolite to pry into people’s personal lives, you know.”
“This isn’t prying. It’s me trying to get the information I need to do my job.”
“My age has no bearing on the case. And I didn’t hire you—I hired Klaire.”
Ouch. That was a low blow. But I wasn’t deterred. Besides, pushing his buttons made him do this little scrunchie face. His lip curled up at the right hand corner, and his left eyebrow rose slightly. He probably meant to look annoyed, but it was totally hot. I didn’t date, but no one said I couldn’t enjoy the scenery once in a while. “What did Vida mean back in the caf—about the last time?”
“Who is Damien?” he countered without missing a beat.
I sighed. “You’re kind of annoying. Has anyone ever told you that?”
“No,” he replied, scowling. “But I get the impression people tell you that all the time.”
I bit down on the inside of my lip to keep from smiling. “Ouch. You’ve wounded me. Deeply.”
Lukas didn’t answer. Instead, he pulled the notebook from in front of me and began flipping through it. Opening to a random page, he pointed to the intricate swirl of dark lines. “What’s this?”
I twisted in my seat. “The Chinese symbol for fate.”
Something sparked behind his eyes. “You sketch?”
“Not really—unless stick figures count?”
He flipped to the last page and read aloud. “I set my own course through the ocean of life.”
“Jonathan Lockwood Huie said that. It’s one of my favorite quotes.”
He traced the words with his index finger before flipping to the next page. “Why?”
I shrugged. “It’s all about choice—at least that’s what I get from it. No one can tell you what to do or who to be—you have to make your own choices. Your own mistakes.”
He seemed to consider this, then nodded approvingly. “I like that.”
I tried to keep a straight face but couldn’t help grinning. “So glad I have your approval.”
From the front of the room, Mrs. Manning sighed. She was waiting for detention to finish so she could go down to the teacher’s lounge to make copies. At least, that’s what she’d told us. Really, she was waiting for detention to end so she could sneak a nip from her flask. After I’d ousted Mr. Glenn for taking bribes in exchange for grades, most teachers were leery about leaving me alone with their stuff. Manning was no exception.
She was sitting behind the desk, drumming her fingers impatiently. I could almost swear she was counting. When the big hand on the clock hit twelve, she all but jumped to her feet and said, “All done. You’re free to go. Next time remember to save it ’til after my class.”
I hopped up, as eager to get out of there as she seemed to be, and dashed into the hall to check my cell. One text from Mom.
Straight to the office? Please. We
“Suggestions?”
“On where to start.”
“It shouldn’t be hard to track them. They’ll need to feed often.”
“How do you know?”
“Because Wrath does.”
“Oh…” I’d kind of walked right into that one.
“Any ideas about what to do when we find them? One better, what to do
“We can, actually.”
“Can?”
“They can be put individually back into the box. It won’t lock without all seven, but we can store them inside.”
“Well, score! Now we just need to find the box.”
“That will prove harder than tracking the Sins.”
“What’s it look like?”
“How should I know?” he said with a bit of a bite.
“Um, because you were inside it?”
“Please explain to me how being
“You’re on the snarky side, you know that?”
“I don’t know what that means, but I get the feeling it’s an insult,” he said. I could tell he was trying hard not to smile, which made him look even more amazing.
I shrugged. “Actually, it depends. Me? I’d take it as a compliment.”
“Definitely an insult, then,” he muttered, turning away.
I could’ve kept it going. Pushing his buttons could easily become my new favorite pastime, but I had bigger fish to flay. Sinful, demon fish. “What about starting with the witch? I’m better at digging this stuff up than Mom. I usually take the missing person cases. Got a natural knack for it, I guess. Maybe we should start our own search. Are you sure it has to be someone from the same bloodline? I know a few pretty badass witches. I bet I could find—”
He shook his head, jaw tight. “It
“What happens if the family died off and there’s no one left?”
“The family didn’t die off.”
“How do you know?”
His tone got sharper and he took an almost menacing step forward. “I just know.”
“You can’t possibly—”
With a growl, his fist shot out, crashing into the locker behind me. I froze. The sound echoed through the empty hall and bounced off the walls like a rogue ping-pong ball. For a second, I didn’t dare breathe. Lukas’ face contorted in anger, his hand splayed over the shiny new dent. His breathing was shallow.
Neither of us said a word. The only sound I heard was the subtle whoosh the air made as it passed in and out of his nose. His jaw was tense and shoulders taut, and in that moment, he looked truly frightening. More like a demon than an actual boy. And deep down, a sick part of me liked it.
“I’m sorry,” he said finally, hand slipping from the door. He took several steps back and closed his eyes. “The witch is a sore spot. Talking about her makes me
Angry.
Idiot. It hadn’t occurred to me until now. What the heck was wrong with me? How had I not seen it? “It wasn’t random,” I said, horrified.
