Forbidden. Part 2

Claire's mom studied her with concern. "Is something wrong? When I called, you said everything went okay at Book Day."

"It did."

"Then why do you look so worried?"

Claire hesitated. How to answer? No way could she tell her about the weird vision she'd had, or whatever it was. The last thing she needed was for her mom to go into freak-out mode. "Because Erica's mom and brother were in a car accident. I just heard, five seconds ago, that no one was hurt."

"Oh-thank G.o.d."

"Yeah." Claire helped unload the groceries. "Mom, is it okay if I go to Erica's after dinner?"

"Sorry, honey. I need the car. I'm meeting a client tonight."

"Can you drop me off at Erica's first?"

Her mom shook her head. "I don't have time to drive all the way to the Valley and back in Friday traffic."

"Maybe I can get Erica to pick me up and drive me home."

"You know how I feel about you riding in other people's cars at night. Anyway, I don't want you going over there. You'll be up talking until all hours, and G.o.d knows what time you'll get home."

"I can sleep over at Erica's, then."

"No. The last time you slept over at Erica's, boys were there."

"A boy. Brian. Our best friend, whom neither of us is even remotely interested in."

"That doesn't mean he's not interested in you, dear."

Claire groaned in frustration. "He isn't, I promise. What do you have against boys, Mom? Don't you trust me?"

Her mom paused. "It's not that. It's just ... Erica's mom doesn't supervise her kids the way she should."

"You mean she doesn't hover over them every second, and never lets them go anywhere or do anything?"

"I don't do that," her mom said defensively.

"Yes, you do." Claire's stomach tensed with rising anger. "I swear, you're the most uptight, paranoid hippie who ever lived."

"Just because I don't believe in bank accounts or use credit cards, that doesn't make me a hippie."

"Yes, it does! You're all: 'Who needs a permanent mailing address, when you can have a P.O. box?'" Claire mimicked her mom's voice and shrug.

Her mom slammed a cabinet door and whirled on Claire, eyes flashing. "Don't you take that tone with me, young lady. Everything I've done is for a good reason."

"What reason? You say that every time! What was so wrong with Chicago that we had to leave? Why have we lived in seven different cities since I was born? What are you running from? Does it have anything to do with my father? It's like we're in the G.o.dd.a.m.ned witness protection program!"

Her mom averted her gaze, a grim look on her face. "What does this have to do with boys, Claire?"

"See! There you go again! Always changing the subject."

"I repeat: What does this have to do with boys?"

Claire sighed, giving up her line of questioning. "It just sucks. You don't date. All men are off-limits for you-and you expect me to follow the same rules."

Her mom looked at her, a hint of apprehension in her eyes. "Since when do you even care about dating?"

"I'm sixteen, Mom. Of course I want to date. Not that I've ever even had a boy look at me yet. But I hope it's gonna happen. And just because I'm now physically able to get pregnant, it doesn't mean I'm gonna end up a high school dropout with a newborn and a guy who ditches me-like you did!"

Claire's mom's eyes widened with sudden pain, and she didn't reply.

Turning, Claire left the kitchen and stormed up the stairs, slamming her bedroom door behind her. She threw herself on her bed, her frustration and anger dissipating as her stomach knotted in guilt. Why, oh why had she said that? She hated these rare fights with her mom and wished she'd kept her thoughts to herself.

It was a truly horrible end to one h.e.l.l of a strange day.

four.

Idiot. Moron. Half-wit.

Alec shook his head in disgust as he drove home. He'd spent the past few hours on his favorite local rooftop, watching the sun set as he struggled to regain his normal sense of calm. He was still struggling. The last thing he'd wanted today was to call attention to himself. Then he'd mangled a locker-something no average teenager would ever be capable of. What had come over him?

He knew the answer, of course. It was because of Claire.

Alec pulled his '69 Mustang into his parking s.p.a.ce and crossed the small concrete lot. He'd felt a brief connection with Claire just before they found their lockers. In that moment, he'd thought that maybe, just maybe, she didn't completely dislike him after all. Then he'd ruined everything with that ridiculous, clumsy move. Not that it mattered. She was obviously more interested in the Choir Boy.

When it came down to it, Alec had no business pursuing his interest in her, anyway. It was dangerous, not to mention forbidden. In the few similar cases he'd heard of, the punishment exacted had been instantaneous and unforgiving.

But he didn't care. He'd left his old life for good-which meant the old rules no longer applied. For more than a century, he hadn't been allowed to indulge in anything remotely pleasurable. There were so many human experiences that had been denied to him-high school among them. Even though human beings often spoke of high school as if it was h.e.l.l on earth, Alec had always strangely longed to try it for himself. Despite his youthful appearance, he'd never infiltrated a school before-his elite training had prepared him for more complex a.s.signments.

If the plan was going to work, however, he was going to have to try harder to fit in.

You need to smile more and stare less, he reminded himself. And your reaction time in conversation was too slow. These things had never mattered before, but they did now.

Setting these concerns aside for the moment, Alec entered his first-floor studio apartment and closed the front door behind him, all senses on hyperalert. He flipped the three locks in quick succession, set down his backpack, and withdrew a black metal knife from his boot, whirling to search for any sign of intruders. Without opening the blackout curtains, he carefully cased the dark, starkly furnished s.p.a.ce. Nothing behind the couch. No one in the shower. Kitchen: empty. Weapons cabinet: undisturbed.

With a relieved sigh, Alec glanced at the light switch. It blinked on.

He sank down on the couch, resheathed his knife, and removed his boots. Unable to relax, he unzipped his backpack and dumped everything out onto the coffee table. One by one, he began scanning the contents of each textbook, curious to see what juniors in high school would be learning this year, to understand what he was-and wasn't-supposed to know.

The academics would be easy to handle. Other than socialization, he had only one real worry. He'd spent decades planning his escape and had taken every precaution to cover his tracks-but even so, there was still a chance he could be found. He wondered who they'd a.s.signed to search for him.

He would never-could never-go back. He was committed to making this work, no matter what. Not that they'd take him back even if they did find him. If he was lucky, he'd be tried and imprisoned for life at a mountaintop monastery in Tibet.

If he was unlucky?

The penalty was death.

five.

"Are you kidding?"

"No, I'm serious." Claire leaned forward on the table, cupping her grande soy vanilla latte in her hands. "I felt nauseous and light-headed, and suddenly it was like I was the one in the car, like I was your mom, reaching out to hold Henry back and everything."

Erica stared at her. "Oh my G.o.d."

"I know, right?"

The aroma of brewing coffee wafted out to the coffee shop's shady garden patio where they sat. It was that quiet period after the Sunday morning crowd had left and the afternoon rush had not yet begun.

"So ... what?" Erica's eyes narrowed. "Are you, like, psychic or something?"

"If I am, it's news to me. Nothing like this has ever happened to me before."

"Never? Are you sure?"

"Yes." But then Claire remembered something. "Oh, wait. There was this one other thing, Friday morning."

"The same day as the accident?"

"Yeah. My mom was all worried about some doc.u.ment she couldn't find for work, and as I was hugging her goodbye in the car, the same weird feeling came over me-and suddenly I knew exactly where it was. It was like the image popped into my head. I saw my mom's hand putting the page into her bag."

"You saw it? Like you were watching your mom doing it?"

"No, it's like I was her, seeing it from her perspective."

"Wow. Trippy."

"I didn't think much about it at the time. After your mom's accident, I thought the thing I saw had something to do with her bracelet. Like it was cursed or magical somehow."

"It's just a bracelet, Claire. I've worn it a dozen times, and I've never gotten any visions. No, this is all about you."

Claire tried to shrug off the suggestion. "I did some research on the internet last night about psychic abilities and phenomena. There are ten million sites about ESP, clairvoyance, telepathy, telekinesis, and all kinds of weird bulls.h.i.t from ghosts to Atlantis and killer fog. It all looks so cheesy, I couldn't take any of it seriously."

"Maybe you should." Erica sipped her coffee, then looked up with an eager expression. "What am I thinking right now?"

"I have no idea. That I'm a lunatic?"

"No, no, no. What am I thinking? Use your new mojo."

"I can't read minds, Erica."

"How do you know? Try it."

Claire stared at her friend for a moment. "This is stupid."

"Oh, wait, wait, wait! Maybe it's not a telepathy thing. What if it's a touch thing? You hugged your mom and got a vision through her eyes, right? Then you touched my mom's bracelet and saw something about her."

"Huh. Okay, so?"

Erica grabbed Claire's hand and plunked it against her arm. "Tell me what you feel. Are you getting any vibes about me?"

"Yeah. I'm rethinking which one of us is the lunatic."

Erica sighed and sat back on her stool. "You're such a disappointment. It would be so awesome to have a best friend who's psychic. You'd be able to tell me who my next boyfriend's going to be, where I can find a pair of anklewrap, blue suede, Jimmy Choo sandals in size eight, what questions are going to be on my pre-calc tests, even which colleges to apply to."

Claire shook her head. "No, the stuff I saw had already happened. I think."

"Good point. Well then, you're definitely useless."

They sat in silence for a long moment.

"Maybe I was just suffering from an iron deficiency that day," Claire mused.

"Maybe you're having hallucinations induced by your mom's drug-taking days, a brain defect pa.s.sed on at birth."

"As far as I know, my mom never took drugs. She's a free spirit, yes. But she's devoted to clean living."

"Okay. If you're not psychic, then how else would you explain it?"

"It defies explanation."

"I guess you'll just have to wait and see if it happens to you again."

"G.o.d, I hope it doesn't." Claire let out a nervous breath, then finished her coffee. "In the meantime, promise not to tell anyone, okay? Especially my mom. We had a fight on Friday. I apologized, and I think she forgave me. But I don't want to give her any more fuel for liftoff."

Erica gave her a two-finger salute. "Copy that. Don't tip off the crazy hippie lady."

c.r.a.p, Claire thought, as she stood before her locker early the next morning. She'd forgotten that it was busted. She'd have to report it to the office later so they could a.s.sign her a new one. What a great way to start the year.

She stepped over to Alec's locker, got out the combination, and opened it. She stopped short. A shiny, brand-new LockerMate had been installed. Her books were neatly arranged on the shelves, but none of Alec's books were in sight. Instead, a bulky, black metal lockbox took up the entire bottom s.p.a.ce.

What the h.e.l.l? Claire thought. She stared at the box. What on earth was he keeping in there? Blackmail photos? A rare comic book collection? His mother's haggis recipe? p.o.r.n?

The first bell rang. She had ten minutes to get to cla.s.s. Claire grabbed her honors history book, slammed the locker shut, and raced to the farthest end of the school. She joined the small herd of students filing into cla.s.s, then paused just inside the door. The desk you chose on the first day of school was important. It usually ended up being the seat you were in for the whole year, and it gave the teacher an impression of who you were. Claire didn't want to sit in back with the slackers or in front with the brownnosers. The only spot left in the zone she wanted was right next to Alec, who was settling into the secondrow seat against the wall.

Alec glanced at her with an awkward grin. Claire briefly returned his smile as she sat down next to him. She studied the walls of the room. They were hung with maps of the United States during various historical periods, an American flag, and a large poster that read: NO CELL PHONES.