I woke early Sunday morning, jerking straight up in bed, gasping for air. My hand flew to my throat. It hurt. The skin, the fragile bones. Like someone had their hands around my neck, squeezing. . . .
I’d been dreaming.
That much I knew, because moments ago, I’d been back inside that club with those Luxen, but Luc hadn’t been there. Instead it had been a man who looked like Sean and he’d been choking me.
“God,” I whispered, willing my heart to slow down. “It was just a nightmare.”
But there were tiny bumps all over the bare skin of my arms, and my throat hurt. I lowered my hand, and my gaze trekked around the dark room. The comforter was at the foot of my bed, kicked off in my sleep. Everything was quiet, and I could make out the still shadows of my dresser and desk. The clock on the nightstand read only twenty minutes after three.
Way too early to be awake.
I pushed it out of my face. I shouldn’t be surprised by the fact that I was having nightmares after . . . well, everything. Who’d blame me? Especially considering I didn’t really think for one second that the Luxen who Luc had fought had been responsible for what had happened to Colleen and Amanda. It wouldn’t make any sense, since they were trying to get out of this city without drawing attention.
I pressed my lips together as my stomach knotted. What if there was also a very ticked-off Luxen sibling out there now, seeking revenge? On top of everything else? And wouldn’t that be my fault? If I’d stayed in Luc’s room—
“Stop,” I said. “Just stop.”
This was the last thing I needed to be stressing over if I wanted to fall back to sleep. I reached for the blanket piled at the end of the bed but stopped when a sharp pain skated along my stomach.
“Ouch.” Frowning, I straightened and placed a hand on my stomach. I jerked. The area was tender.
Carefully, I leaned over and turned on the bedside lamp. Buttery light filled the room as I sat back. I wrapped my fingers around the hem of my sleep shirt and pulled it up.
“Holy crap,” I said, and gasped.
Three long, jagged welts cut into my skin, right above my navel, like a cat . . . or a demon had gotten ahold of me. They weren’t open scratches and they didn’t look like they’d bled at all, but there were definitely three marks.
What in the world?
I looked around my room again, like it held the answers or something. Then I poked at the welts. Wincing at the spike of pain, I pulled my hand away. I let go of my shirt and walked into the bathroom. From there, I did a full-body scan. There were no other scratches, but there was a bruise on my right hip, probably from when Luc had tackled me.
The scratches had to have happened during that. But how? I didn’t know, but that was the only thing that made sense unless I’d done it to myself while sleeping. The nightmare was pretty vivid, so Lord only knows what I could’ve done.
I grabbed the bottle of peroxide out from underneath the sink and with a couple of dabs with a cotton ball, I determined that I’d done my due diligence when it came to not developing a flesh-eating bacteria.
I turned off the light, hurried back to bed, and all but dived under the covers. I closed my eyes, squeezed them tight, and tried not to think about Luc, the club, or anything, but it was a long time before I fell back to sleep.
* * *
My mood plummeted as I walked into the cafeteria on Monday and saw that the only options for lunch were pizza and salad. Both looked like they’d been sitting out over the weekend.
“What kind of fresh hell is this?” I muttered.
James laughed as he brushed past me. “Want half of my sandwich?”
“Yes.” I followed after him like a lost puppy, practically snapping at his heels. “Please and thank you.”
Finding Heidi already at our table, I sat down next to her and dropped my bag onto the floor while James grabbed the seat across from me.
He opened his bag and pulled out the ziplocked piece of peanut butter heaven. “I should make you work for this,” he said.
“That would be incredibly mean and opportunistic,” I told him, extending my hands. I wiggled my fingers. “Yummy. Yummy in my tummy.”
“Do you know what that song actually meant?” Heidi said, peeling the lid back on her Lunchable. I hadn’t seen anyone else eat them since middle school, but Heidi loved them. “The whole yummy-in-the-tummy part?”
James pulled apart the sandwich. “Probably something dirty.”
“It is.” Heidi picked up a cracker, placed her ham on it, and then topped it off with a slice of cheddar. “Just think about something that involves being with a dude that could end up being yummy in the tummy.”
“What? Ew.” I wrinkled my nose. “That’s gross.”
“It’s true. Look it up.” She offered me a cheese-and-ham-cracker stack.
“Thank you.” I placed it next to my sandwich. “Look at me, piecing together an amazing lunch from parts of my friends’ lunches.”
“You really need to start bringing your own.” Zoe dropped into the seat beside me. She had a salad, because of course she did. “Or try eating something green.”
My lip curled.
“So, you guys hear that Coop’s party is back on for Friday night?” James took a swig of his water. “You guys are going, right?”
Heidi continued to build her cracker delights while I tried not to think about how weird it was to have such a normal conversation. “I don’t think so.”
“Oh, so you go and get an older girlfriend, and now you’re too cool for us and our childish high school parties,” teased James.
“Pretty much,” she replied.
I laughed. “At least you’re honest about it.”
“Speaking of being honest—” Zoe’s eyes narrowed. “What in the hell?”
I followed her gaze as James twisted in his seat, spying April and a handful of students. April was marching—legit marching—across the cafeteria, her blond ponytail swinging in a way that made me want to cut my hair. She was holding some kind of poster in her hands and had a handful of minions with her.
“I have a really bad feeling about this,” Zoe said, sighing.
My gaze flew to the table of Luxen, and I tensed. Connor, the dark-haired Luxen who’d been at the club when I went back to get my phone, was the first to notice April. His mouth moved and the rest of the Luxen looked up.
Heidi craned her neck to see over the table behind us as April grabbed a free chair and pulled it across the floor, creating a horrible screeching sound. She planted the chair in the middle of the cafeteria and then stepped up on it with the aid of one of the guy minions.
She held her hands up in the air and flipped her poster over. My mouth dropped open.
In the center of the poster was the typical alien face, the one with the pointy chin and big black eyes. The face was even colored green. Over it was the circle-backslash symbol.
“Holy crap,” muttered James.
A second later her minions lifted their signs. They were all the same.
“Are you kidding me?” I said, lowering my sandwich.
“I wish.” Zoe pressed her lips together
“Listen up, everyone!” April shouted, and it was like a switch was thrown. The cafeteria quieted, because, hello, there was a girl standing on a chair holding a “Just say no to aliens” sign. “We have the right to be safe in our schools and in our homes, and we don’t have that safety. But Colleen wasn’t safe here—not from them! Neither was Amanda!”
My gaze shot to the Luxen table, and I saw that Connor was still but his face was devoid of emotion.
“They shouldn’t be allowed to go to school with us. They’re not human. They’re aliens!” April continued.
“They shouldn’t be here!” shouted one of the guys standing with her. He rattled his sign as if that helped get the point across. “They don’t belong!”
Pink splashed across the face of one of the younger Luxen. She dipped her chin, letting her brown hair fall forward.
April’s eyes gleamed as she shook her arms. “No more Luxen! No more fear! Come on. Say it with me! No more Luxen! No more fear!”
Those with her picked up the chant. Someone behind us stood, yelling the same. I turned in my seat as Heidi cursed. “Where are the teachers? Jesus!”
“No more Luxen! No more fear!” The chants rose from several other tables. Students lumbered to their feet, climbing onto their seats. Their fists pumped the air, reminding me of those dancing at Foretoken.
Not everyone was chanting.
Others stayed quiet, exchanging awkward looks. I shifted toward Zoe. “This is so wrong.”
Zoe lips pursed. “I cannot believe I was ever nice to her.”
“You and me both.” Anxious energy rose from the pit of my stomach. I should do something. We needed do something. I looked away from Heidi’s pale face and shifted toward Zoe. “We need—”
“That’s enough! Everyone, get off the chairs and shut up!” Coach Saunders, the phys ed teacher, stalked down the middle of the cafeteria. “Right now.”
April’s chin jutted out stubbornly. “You can’t stop me. It’s my right to protest. That’s what being a human means.”
James slowly turned around. “I don’t think April knows what the whole right to protest thing means.”
“He can’t stop us,” April told those around her. “Come on! No more Luxen! No more fear! No—”
“Your right to protest doesn’t extend to the middle of cafeteria, Ms. Collins.” Coach Saunders snatched a poster out of a boy’s hand and tossed it aside. “Get down now and, all of you—every single one of you, get to Principle Newman’s office.”
A few of April’s minions stopped right then and there, but April kept shouting her lame chant until a female teacher showed up and practically yanked her right off the chair. That didn’t quiet April down. She was still yelling as she was escorted out of the cafeteria.
“Wow.” James slowly faced us. “Doesn’t she make you feel all warm and fuzzy?”
Heidi snorted.
“She makes me feel things, all right.” Zoe stabbed her lettuce with a fork. “But more like cold and prickly.”
The table where the Luxen usually sat was now empty.
As I glanced over my shoulder, I saw that some of the shouting students were still standing, their gazes fastened on the doorway, where you could hear April’s distant chants.
They looked . . . woke.
Like they’d just experienced something enlightening and found a righteous path laid out before them. A reason. A cause. A purpose. They were nodding as they looked among one another, faces I’d recognized and saw nearly every day for the last four years. Nice girls. Smart guys. Clever people.
I saw my ex, Brandon.
He was standing by the windows, his floppy brown hair golden in the sunlight. His warm, friendly smile was gone, replaced by a thin, hard line. He was slowly nodding too, as if he were answering April’s call.
He yanked his chair back, climbed up onto it, and then jumped onto the table. “No more Luxen! No more fear!” He thrust his fist into the air. “No more Luxen!”
* * *
I yawned loudly as I switched out my textbooks at the end of the day. I needed to grab my chem book, since I had a feeling there was going to be a quiz tomorrow.
“You doing anything later?” James asked. He was lounging against the locker next to mine, staring down the hall. Part of me wondered if he knew he was staring at the girls’ bathroom.
“I think I’m just going to go home and sleep. Today has been exhausting.” I started to close my locker. “So I’m thinking about napping the evening away.”
“Want company?”
My entire body jerked. That question had so not come from James, but from a now-familiar voice. My breath caught, and I slowly turned to my left.
Luc stood there.
Wearing one of those slouchy knit beanies. Dove gray. He looked good in it. Really good, even though it had to be seventy outside and he was wearing a short-sleeve shirt.
I blinked hard, thinking he had to be a mirage, because he couldn’t be here. But he was still there, standing in the hallway of my school.
One side of his lips kicked up. “Hey, Peaches.”
Knocked out of my stupor, I shut the locker door. “What are you doing here?”
“Recon.” He was wearing those damn contacts.
“Recon?”
“Yeah.” The other side of his lips tipped up. “Thinking about enrolling in good ole Centennial High.”
I gaped at him. He couldn’t be serious.
“Who’s this, Evie?” James asked.
“Luc.” He answered, leaning around me and extending a hand before I could say a thing. “And you’re James.”
James’s gaze flicked to Luc and then back up. His shoulders tensed, and he didn’t take Luc’s hand.
Luc arched a brow.
Oh dear.
“You’re the friend who let her roam around the club when she went to get her phone.” Luc tilted his head to the side. “You’re a good friend.”
“All right,” I said as I gripped Luc’s arm. A charge of electricity, much more benign than before, passed through my palm. “Glad you two have formally met. Can you excuse us?” I asked James. “I’ve got to talk to him.”
His jaw worked. “You going to be okay with this guy?”
Luc laughed, and it was a sound of warning. “That’s an interesting question coming from—”
“I’m fine.” My grip tightened on Luc’s arm.
“Ow,” he murmured, even though I know it didn’t hurt him.
“He might not be,” I finished. “Seriously. I’ll text you later. Okay?”
James didn’t look like he was going to back off, but after a moment he nodded. “Text me.”
“I will.” I smiled and then pulled on Luc’s arm, tugging him away from James and my locker. I waited until we were halfway down the stairs before I let go of his arm. “Seriously. What are you doing here, Luc?”
“I kinda like the arm-grabbing thing,” he replied, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “Very dominant of you. Maybe I’m the submissive type in, you know, the—”
“Shut up,” I hissed. “Why are you here?”
“How can I shut up and answer your question at the same time?”
I shot him a death glare. “Luc.”
“I was in the neighborhood.” He opened the door and then held it as I walked outside. Pretty sure he let it swing closed in someone’s face. “Thought I’d stop by and say hi.”
I had no idea what to respond to that, so I dug out my sunglasses and slipped them on. “You’re not seriously thinking about enrolling, are you?” I didn’t even know if that was possible or not.
Luc snorted as he fell in step with me. “No. I would be so bored out of my mind, I’d probably set the entire school on fire.”
“Wow.”
“Just being honest.” He squinted as he glanced over at me. “There really is nothing new I could learn in school.”
“Really? You know everything?” Gravel crunched under my feet as we neared the area where Amanda’s car had been idling. I focused on Luc, not wanting to think about her sitting in that car.
“Pretty much.”
The desire to prove that wasn’t correct got the better of me. “Okay. Who was the twelfth president of the United States?”
“Zachary Taylor,” he answered immediately. “And he wasn’t president very long. He died of a very upset stomach. Side note, there’s still much debate over what exactly caused his death.”
“Okay. The fact you know the latter part is odd, but whatever. Tell me the square root of five hundred and thirty-eight?”
He laughed, which was unnecessary because he was already getting an absurd amount of double takes from nearly everyone passing by us. “Twenty-three point one nine—and you know what? You don’t know the answer to that question.”
That was true. “How do you know? I’m a math genius.”
“If that were true, you wouldn’t have asked that question.”
My eyes narrowed.
“Taft was one of the last presidents to preside over the addition of a new state. Currently there are eighty-eight known constellations. Beard hair grows twice its normal rate while on a plane.”
“What?”
“It’s true. Another thing that’s true? Honey never spoils. Look it up. It’s also hard to access memories without moving your eyes. Try doing that one day,” he said. “Water can boil and freeze at the same time. Cats always land on their feet because of physics. And there’s enough DNA in one human to stretch from the sun to Pluto seventeen times.”
“School would bore you.” I stopped by my car.
“Not if you were in class.”
I ignored the weird flutter in my chest. “Uh-huh.”
His grin teased at me. “Can I come home with you?”
“Come again?”
“Well, that came out kind of wrong, didn’t it?” He chuckled as he stepped forward, and I had to tilt my head back to meet his gaze. “I want to come home with you.”
My heart did a cartwheel and then face-planted itself against my ribs. “I still don’t think that came out right, Luc.”
“It came out just the way I wanted it to.”
That flutter grew, and I did everything in my power to ignore it. “Are you going to finish our conversation from this weekend?”
“If that’s what you want.”
“Why else would I talk to you?” I shot back.
He laughed again under his breath. “I like to think there are other reasons you’d talk to me, Peaches.”
“Don’t call me that.” I opened my car door. “My mom would flip if she came home and saw you there.”
“I’d be gone before she got home.”
I hesitated. “How would you know that?”
“I’m fast. The moment you heard her pull up, I’d be out of the house.” He paused. “In a jiffy.”
He was fast. I knew that, but still. “I don’t know.”
Luc was quiet for a moment. “You came to my place. How is this any different?”
It didn’t seem like it should be, but it was. Allowing him to come to my house was different.
“Are you afraid of me?” he asked after a moment.
His question startled me. I should be afraid of him, especially after seeing exactly what he was capable of, but truth was, I wasn’t afraid of him.
“No. I’m not.” I took a deep breath. “You can come home with me, but you have to promise you’ll be good before my mom gets home.”
“Pinkie swear.”
I rolled my eyes. “Get in the car.”
Grinning, he walked around to the passenger side and climbed in just as I was turning the car on. I glanced over at him. “So, um, what did you end up doing with your weekend?”
“Patrolling.”
I waited until two girls passed my car, and then I pulled out. “What does that mean?”
“It means I was out making sure we didn’t have a psycho Luxen hanging around, hell-bent on revenge.” He stretched out his long legs, letting his elbow rest on the open window. “Good news is that we didn’t see any signs of Sean and Charity having another sibling.”
“That’s good.” My stomach tumbled. “Right?”
“Right.”
He didn’t sound like it was a good thing. I glanced over at him. Luc was staring out the window. “What are you not telling me?”
He didn’t answer.
Anxiety spiked. “Luc.”
“Everything.” Luc looked at me as reached a stoplight. “I still have everything to tell you.”
* * *
Luc didn’t tell me anything when we got to my place on Monday. Once we got to my house, he’d turned on the TV and started searching for alien movies.
Yep.
Alien movies.
For three hours, he raged about how alien invasions in Hollywood almost always got it wrong. He was kind of right. Real aliens didn’t look like giant insects, but when I pointed out Invasion of the Body Snatchers, I’d stumped him.
It was a weird afternoon, but it had been . . . amusing. And it had also felt . . . normal. Like I’d done this before, and honest to God, I’d never sat and argued about which aliens were freakier: the ones from Independence Day or from the old Alien franchise.
He was skilled at avoiding questions, and talented in the art of distraction. As promised, he’d left right before Mom came home, but he didn’t tell me anything remotely useful.
Luc didn’t show up at my locker on Tuesday.
That was a good thing, because if he did, there was a good chance James might’ve punched him, and that would’ve ended badly . . . for James.
After school on Tuesday, I’d grabbed something to eat with Zoe and Heidi, and we met up with Emery. I was with them when I got a text from Mom that she wouldn’t be home till late, and the girls ended up hanging out at my place until it grew dark outside. Mom came home about twenty minutes after they left.
Tuesday felt normal, like it used to be before Colleen and Amanda . . . and Luc, and I didn’t realize how badly I needed time with my friends until then. Where we just ate a ton of junk food and talked about nothing . . . nothing scary.
Normalcy didn’t last long.
On Wednesday, April and her minions took to protesting the Luxen at the entrance of the school. Their group had doubled in size since Monday.
I couldn’t stay quiet any longer. April and I weren’t the closest, and on most days I didn’t consider her a friend, but I had to try to talk some sense into her, because she was getting everyone riled up.
I waited for her after our third-period class, catching her in the hallway. “Hey.” I slung my backpack over my shoulder. “Can we talk real quick?”
“Sure.” She was shoving a thick monstrosity of a binder into her bag. “What’s up?”
My hand tightened around my backpack strap. “What are you doing, April? With the whole protesting thing?”
She stopped and looked up. “Excuse me?”
“Why are you doing this? The Luxen here haven’t done anything wrong, and you’re—”
“I’m what, Evie?” Her face pinched. “Vocalizing my right to be safe in my high school?”
“You are safe.”
She laughed as she stepped to the side, continuing to jam her binder into her bag. “You’re an idiot if you think any of us are safe anywhere. You saw Amanda. You know what happened to Colleen.”
I stiffened. “I clearly remember what I saw, but that doesn’t mean all Luxen are dangerous. Or that any of the Luxen who go here are responsible.”
“How do you know that? Did you ask them?” she replied.
“I don’t need to ask them. I don’t walk around assuming every Luxen is a murderer.”
“Well, you should.” She yanked up the zipper on her bag. “I really thought that you, out of everyone, would be standing with me. Your father—”
“Stop bringing up my father, April. You didn’t know him.” We were starting to get stares, but I didn’t care. “What you’re doing is wrong and super-disappointing.”
“Disappointing?” She laughed as she flipped her ponytail over her shoulder.
“Yeah, that’s what I said.”
“You know what? You’ve disappointed me.” April pivoted on her heel and stalked off, her sleek ponytail swaying with each step.
I disappointed her? I almost laughed, but nothing about this was funny.
Talking with April had gone about as well as expected, but at least I’d tried. Maybe Zoe could try talking to her. She knew April better.
My conversation failure with April pecked away at me for the rest of the day, only sliding into the back of my mind when I walked out to my car and saw Luc was waiting for me, leaning against the car, ankles crossed and hands resting on the hood.
There was a small group clustered together across from him, openly checking him out. He was grinning like a maniac when I walked up to him, and somehow, thirty minutes later, he was at my house again.
“Do you want something to drink?” I asked, walking into the kitchen. “I don’t have any Coke.”
“Whatever you have is fine.” He lingered by the dining room table as I grabbed two fruit punch Capri Suns. Turning, I tossed one to him. He easily caught it. “Can I ask you something?”
“Sure.” I pulled the plastic off my straw.
“Is there trouble at your school?”
I stabbed my straw through the little hole in the Capri Sun and looked up. “There’ve been protests. You’ve heard about that?”
“I’ve heard some things.”
“How?”
His smile turned secretive.
“Why do you always do that?”
“Do what, Peaches?”
“Seriously. That.”
He bit down on his lower lip and then let it pop free. “You’re going to have to be more detailed.”
I slurped up a good portion of the Capri Sun in one gulp. “You’re always evasive. Like, when you talk, it’s only ever half the story. You still haven’t told me anything you promised you would.”
“I’ve told you a lot.” He finished off his drink. From where he stood he tossed the empty container, and the damn thing actually landed in the garbage. I hated him. “And I’ve actually told you something pretty major that has nothing to do with what I am.”
“Bull.”
Luc shrugged. “You just haven’t been paying attention.”
“That’s not true.” Irritated, I fought the desire to wing my packet at his head. “I’m super-observant.”
He laughed. “That is not true.”
“You know, you can leave.” I sucked my drink dry and then tossed it at the trash. It smacked off the trash can and plopped onto the floor. I sighed. “I have homework to do and you’re annoying.”
“If you actually wanted me to leave, I wouldn’t be here.”
I picked up the damn packet and placed it in the trash. When I straightened, the movement tugged on the tender skin of my stomach, causing me to suck in a sharp breath.
“Are you okay?”
Straightening more carefully, I nodded. “Yeah.”
His head tilted to the side. “You’re lying.” There was a pause. “What happened to your stomach?”
My mouth dropped open. “Get out of my head, Luc.”
He moved too fast. A second later his fingers had a fistful of my shirt, and the next thing I knew, he was pulling the fabric up.
“Luc!” I shrieked, grabbing his wrists, but it was too late.
Waves tumbled over his forehead as his chin dipped. “What the hell, Peaches? What happened to your stomach?”
I tried to pull his hands away, but it was no use. “I don’t know. It’s—”
“You think this happened at the club, when I took you to the floor?” His gaze shot to mine. “I did this?”
“Luc! Seriously. Stay out of my head. It’s rude.”
His jaw hardened. “I didn’t know I hurt you.”
“I . . . I didn’t know either. I didn’t notice until later. It’s not a big deal.” I tugged on his wrists again. “They’re just scratches.”
“Scratches?” His gaze dropped to my stomach, and I sucked in a shallow breath. “Peaches, I think they’re burn marks.”
“What?” I temporarily forgot about the fact that he was staring at my belly.
“Burn marks. Like you touched a flame for too long. I must’ve done it when I grabbed you.” He let go of my shirt, but whatever relief it brought was short-lived, because he placed his palm just below the fading scratches.
I gasped.
The contact, flesh against flesh, took the air right out of my lungs. The touch was intimate and unnerving. My gaze shot to his, and I thought I saw his eyes widen just a fraction, as if the feeling of his skin against mine had the same intense effect on him. His palm was warm, almost too warm against my skin.
Luc’s throat worked on a swallow as his lashes lowered halfway. “I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“Hurting you,” he said, his voice deeper, rougher, as he lowered his head. “I should’ve been more careful.”
“It’s okay.” I shivered as his forehead touched mine. It wasn’t a shiver of fear. It was something else. Anticipation? Yes. And it was more. Tension built in the space between us. I closed my eyes. “You were trying to stop me from getting blown up.”
“Yeah. There was that.” His head tilted just the slightest, and I felt his breath against . . . against my lips. Was he going to kiss me again?
Would I let him?
His hands slipped away, and Luc backed off a good foot, but the tension was still there, crackling in the air between us. Slowly opening my eyes, I pressed my lips together, unsure if I should feel grateful or disappointed that he hadn’t kissed me.
The corners of his lips tilted up.
Oh no. “You’re not reading my thoughts right now, are you?”
“I would never do such a thing.”
Yeah. Right. “I don’t even know why I let you come home with me.”
That smile of his was really starting to concern me. “Oh, you know.”
Luc stepped toward me again, and I tensed. His gaze never left my face, and I had the distinct urge to run away from him and . . . and run toward him. The latter made no sense. He stopped, his brows pinching as he reached into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out his phone. He looked down at it. The frown turned into a scowl as he glanced up. “Do you mind if I turn on your TV?”
“Uh, sure.”
As he walked into the living room, Luc extended his arm and the remote flew off the coffee table and landed in his hand.
My brows lifted. “That’s handy and also incredibly lazy.”
Luc winked and, of course, looked good doing it. The TV came on and he quickly turned it to one of the local channels. The moment I saw the reporter standing out in front of a brownstone, a somber expression on her face, I knew this was going to be bad news.
The reporter was speaking and it took a few moments for my brain to catch up with what she was saying. “All four victims, the youngest three years old and the oldest thirty-two years old, lived in this home. Neighbors are saying that they were a quiet family and very hardworking. I’ve learned that the children were close in age, and it is believed that all four of them were murdered sometime last night.”
Dread filled me as the screen switched to a male reporter behind the news desk.
“This comes on the heels of the murders of Colleen Shultz and Amanda Kelly, two seniors from Centennial High School. Ms. Shultz was found in the school restroom last Tuesday, and Ms. Kelly was found in her car in the school parking lot on Friday,” he added. “Early reports indicate that all four victims have been murdered in the same manner as Ms. Shultz and Ms. Kelly. It is also believed that an unregistered Luxen committed these horrific crimes. I’m learning that these types of incidents are not isolated to Columbia, or even Maryland. Over the last two months, there have been suspicious deaths in Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Tennessee. Attacks by unregistered Luxen are on the rise, and many people are asking what, if anything, will be done? How can we be safe—”
Luc turned off the TV and cursed under his breath. A muscle popped along his jaw. “There’s no way.”
I sat down on the edge of the couch, horrified by the news and terrified by the implication. “What do you mean?
When there was no answer, I twisted away. The living room was empty. I shot to my feet and spun around.
Luc was gone.
And my stomach didn’t hurt with the sharp, careless movement. I looked down and pulled my shirt up, exposing smooth, unblemished skin.
“That’s not possible.” I lifted my gaze.
But it wasn’t impossible, was it? Luc had said that as an Origin, he could do this. He’d also said Luxen could heal humans. Scratches. Bumps. Bruises. Wounds. I let go of my shirt.
Luc had healed me.