student center, but when it came down to it, she’d slept another night in Jonah’s clothes. She pressed the faded cotton against her nose. It still carried his scent.
They ought to bottle that, she thought. And call it Boy Blue. Or, maybe, Bad Idea.
She had nothing to bring to this game. She had no skills. It was her kind of luck to fall for a boy who could read minds. Well, emotions. Did that include lust? It was humiliating . . . like walking around naked with someone who was fully clothed. A just God would have given that gift to Emma . . . so she could sort out the liars.
What time was it? She groped for her phone. Not there. Where was her phone?
Oh. It was back at home. Tyler’s home. It seemed so far away, now. Just one more dream that fades upon waking. A stopping place on a journey to nowhere.
Her groping hand found the notebook paper with her wish list on it—the notes and measurements she’d taken at the woodshop the day before. The shop at the Anchorage was top-shelf, just like everything else on campus. Still, it had an air of neglect, as if the administration had sunk a lot of money into it at the front end, but nobody had paid much attention to it since. It didn’t
She’d made a slow circuit of the larger tools, trying them out with scrap lumber she found in the discard bin. The tools looked nearly new, though some of the blades needed sharpening and everything was covered with a fine layer of dust. She was used to Sonny Lee’s tools and their quirks. For instance, how the pulley on the table saw would slip on the shaft and bind against the body of the saw and you had to act quick if you smelled burning rubber or you might burn up the belt. Or how you had to give the old disc sander a spin to get it going because the capacitor didn’t work and it wouldn’t start up on its own.
There wasn’t much in the way of materials—woods, fittings, and the like. Wistfully, she recalled the racks of seasoned woods she’d left behind at Tyler’s, and wondered if they were still there. I need to get back there, she thought. Somehow.
Propping herself up in bed, she scanned the rows of tiny, precise handwriting, making a few additions and clarifications. New saw blades. Lubricants. The specialized wood glue Sonny Lee always ordered from Germany. And woods: birch and ebony and book-matched maple.
Setting her list aside, she slid out of bed and padded across the floor to the bathroom. She was at a boarding school, where they had set times for things. She’d probably already missed breakfast. She didn’t want to miss lunch, too.
A blinking light in one corner of the mirror caught her attention. She squinted at it, puzzled. Then poked at it with her finger without result.
Then she remembered. Jonah had said something about a digital display embedded in the mirror.
A remote was propped against the backsplash. She scooped it up and began hitting buttons until a message appeared.
Emma pulled on the jeans she’d bought the day before, crispy and new. She chose a black T-shirt with Security in stark white letters on the back and a line drawing of a castle keep on the front. She tugged a brush through her resistant hair, twisted it into a knot, grabbed a hunk of crumb cake from the refrigerator, and went to find the practice rooms.
Emma stepped off the elevator on the first floor. To her left, toward the front, was a common area, with a flat-screen television, comfortable furniture, and a fireplace. It was deserted.
The rear of the warehouse was a rough-finished workspace that showed its warehouse bones, partitioned off with dividers. She walked down a short hallway lined with doors. Displays next to each door listed the room schedule for the day. As she neared the end of the hallway, she began to feel the thud of percussion under her feet, and heard the faint, anguished cry of a blues guitar, the wail of keyboards. Next to the last door, the display said simply Diaz.
Through the door, she heard a voice that all but brought her to her knees.
She eased the door open. It was Jonah, a vintage Stratocaster slung low on his hips, knees bent, head thrown back, eyes closed as he searched out the chords with his fingers. Which should have been difficult, since he was wearing fingerless gloves in studded black leather. Who wears gloves, even fingerless ones, to play guitar?
And why was Jonah playing with the band she’d first heard at Club Catastrophe? She looked them over. Their lead guitarist was missing—the one who’d played the Parker Dragonfly.
The other players were the same. Natalie hunched over a drum kit, her sticks a blur, face gleaming with sweat. The purple-haired girl from the fitness center played an Ibanez bass guitar, and the boy who played keyboards was the same, too.
Emma leaned against the doorframe, head swimming as Jonah’s voice poured over her.
Jonah prowled back and forth, exuding a feral heat, his movements mesmerizing, his T-shirt plastered to his washboard abs, jeans riding low on his hipbones.
Get ahold of yourself, girl, Emma thought. You of all people know better than to fall for a musician.
Just then, the music tangled up in itself and dwindled away amid laughter and good-natured swearing.
“What the hell was
The keyboardist blotted his face with his sleeve. “I was . . . you know . . . improvising.”
Natalie snorted. “I thought maybe you were starting your own band, right here and now.”
Severino looked up and spotted Emma in the doorway. “Hel-lo there! Who are you?”
Jonah had been trying out some riffs, but now the guitar cut off abruptly. He stared at Emma with a stricken, guilty, almost horrified expression. The kind you get when you’ve been caught making out with your best friend’s boyfriend.
“Emma!” Natalie said, grinning. “You’re finally up. How are you feeling this morning?”
“What are
“Because she said she wanted to hear us play,” Natalie said, giving Jonah a behave kind of look.
“Great to see you, too, Jonah,” Emma said. She strode over to the keyboardist and stuck out her hand. “Hi, I’m Emma Greenwood, from Memphis.”
“Rudy Severino,” Rudy said, grinning at her. He was good-looking, and knew it, but sometimes confidence looks good on a person. It was more stage presence than arrogance.
“And this is Alison Shaw,” Natalie said, pointing at the bass player. “Rudy, Alison, this is Emma Greenwood, a new student here at the Anchorage.”
“We’ve already met,” Alison said, around the pick in her teeth.
“Don’t let me interrupt,” Emma said. “Pretend I’m not here.” She straddled a chair, resting her arms on the back. “Was that one of your original songs? The one you just played?”
“Yes,” Jonah said, keeping his eyes fixed on his fingerboard, busily tuning a guitar that was already in tune.
“That one’s brand-new,” Natalie said. “Jonah and his brother collaborate on songwriting.”
