Rebel Belle

by Rachel Hawkins

Page 16

 

  She slumped back into her seat, shaking her head. “I tell you everything,” she said softly. “Everything. ”

  I put my drink back in the holder and took her hand. “Hey,” I said softly. “I tell you everything, too. I promise. ” Guilt tasted more bitter than the espresso, but I told myself that it wasn’t technically a lie. After all, I wasn’t lying to her about Ryan and David. Not really. Still, for just a second, I thought about how nice it would feel to tell someone—someone who loved me, someone who wasn’t David Stark—about what was going on.

  But it was too bizarre, and for all I knew, it might also be dangerous. Until I had a better idea of who was after David and why, the best thing I could do was keep things as normal as possible.

  So I leaned forward and said, “Ryan and I did have a little argument yesterday, but it was nothing. We’ll be fine. I plan on making up with him as soon as I see him today. And there is nothing going on with me and David Stark. ”

  She swiveled her head to face me. Bee’s eyes had always been both spooky and beautiful, almost startlingly dark against the peachiness of her skin and the wheat blond of her hair. Now, they were narrowed and wary. “Promise?”

  I held up my hand. “Pinky swear. ”

  After a pause, she giggled and hooked my finger with hers. The little silver ring Brandon had gotten for her—complete with a pink cubic zirconia that we will not talk about—dug into my skin. “Pinky swears are sacred, you know. ”

  “I do,” I said, sitting up primly. “So I don’t use it lightly. ”

  Her grin turned into something like a leer. “So when you and Ryan make up, is it gonna be hot?”

  Rolling my eyes, I disentangled our pinkies. “Perv. ”

  That sorted, we got out of the car. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I caught sight of David standing outside Wallace Hall, waving at me. He was wearing a bright purple argyle sweater over a white button-down and jeans, so he wasn’t exactly inconspicuous.

  As subtly as I could, I flicked my hand at David behind my back. I knew we needed to talk, but with Bee on high alert where he was concerned, now was not the time.

  “I can’t believe we still have a sub in history,” Bee said, snapping my attention back to her.

  “Oh, is, uh, Dr. DuPont out?” I asked, trying not to imagine him standing in front of me, my shoe sticking out of his neck.

  “Apparently,” Bee said, nodding across the courtyard. Mrs. Hillyard, the substitute teacher from yesterday, was hurrying up the steps into Wallace.

  “But Dr. DuPont was a jackass anyway,” she added. “Didn’t he give you a hard time?”

  You could say that. “Oh, not really,” I replied, just in case there were undercover police officers hiding in the bushes or something. “I actually kind of liked him. ”

  “Liked who?” Brandon asked, coming up to join us. “Me? Because I can tell you one thing, Miss Harper here is not a fan of the Bran Man. ”

  “And I’m not a fan of you calling yourself that,” Bee muttered, even as she let him take her hand and swing it.

  “No, I’m serious!” Brandon insisted, flicking his blond hair out of his eyes. “Yesterday, she full-on smacked me in the middle of the hall. For no reason!”

  “Oh, I’m sure,” Bee said sarcastically.

  “It’s true,” Brandon insisted before shooting me a sideways look. “Is that why Ryan’s out today? Did you smack him around, too?”

  That was way too close to the truth for comfort. Frowning, I asked, “He isn’t here today?”

  “Not yet,” Brandon said, nodding toward the parking lot. Sure enough, Ryan’s car wasn’t in its usual spot. Heart sinking, I did my best to look concerned, but not panicked.

  “Maybe he’s running late,” I offered.

  David chose that moment to walk over to us, and next to me, I felt Bee stiffen a little.

  “Harper, can I talk to you for a sec?”

  “The bell’s about to ring,” I said to David, hoping he heard that as Friend Time, not right now.

  He frowned. “We really need to talk about yesterday. ” He had gotten my message, and now he was sending one of his own: I don’t care.

  “What happened—” Bee asked, but I was already tugging her away.

  “Your apology was more than sufficient,” I called breezily over my shoulder. “We’re fine. ”

  I could feel David glaring at my back, but I kept pulling Bee toward the school. Yes, yes, David might be my noble cause, but Bee was my best friend. There was a chance I’d already screwed up the boyfriend thing. I didn’t want to screw up what I had with Bee, too.

  “You sure you don’t want to talk to him?” she asked once we’d walked through the front doors.

  “Positive,” I replied. “I told you, it’s nothing more than the usual me and David Stark Mutual Disdain Society thing acting up again. ”

  Bee pulled her lower lip between her teeth, stopping just in front of the main office. I thought she glanced back outside toward the parking lot and Ryan’s empty spot. But all she said was, “See you at lunch?”

  “Absolutely!” I chirped, doing my best to ignore David as he stormed past us.

  Nothing happened the rest of the morning, but that didn’t stop me from jumping every time the bell rang. I also went out of my way to avoid the English hall, wondering if I’d ever feel safe at school again. There were no Pop Rocks in my blood, and there was no summons to the headmaster’s office to talk about Dr. DuPont, but I stayed on edge. Ryan’s absence didn’t help. Was he hurt, or too freaked out to even look at me?

  By the end of first period, I’d made up my mind to call him, one more time. Cell phones were a major no-no during school hours, but I decided to risk it in the bathroom.

  I’d just turned down the corridor when a hand shot out of the nearby janitor’s closet and hauled me into the dark.

  Chapter 11

  Without making a sound, I went to slug my attacker, only to have my hand freeze in midair.

  Of course.

  “Are you insane?” I hissed, batting David’s hand away. It didn’t touch him, obviously, but it still made me feel better.

  “I told you we’d talk today,” he whispered.

  “Right. Talk. Like normal people, not . . . skulking around in broom closets. ”

  “Skulking? Really?” David raised his eyebrows, and even in the dim light, I could see the smirk forming.

  “First of all, I’m not taking crap about word choice from the guy who uses ‘egregious’ in every article he writes. And secondly, this—” I gestured to the cluttered shelves, the cleaning products, the damp mops—“definitely warrants the use of skulking. ”

  Rubbing his hand over his eyes, David heaved a sigh. “Fine. We’re skulking. And since the bell rings in five minutes, we need to skulk fast. Tell me everything. ”

  I shifted my weight from one foot to the other. “It’s . . . kind of long. And intense. And not something that can be spilled between classes in the janitor’s closet. ”

  “Try,” David said, his teeth clenched.

  Frowning, I put my hands on my hips. “Fine. On the night of the Homecoming Dance, a janitor passed some kind of superpower on to me before he died. Then I killed Dr. DuPont with my shoe, but when I came back to the bathroom, everything had disappeared and I thought I was going crazy, but then those bad guys chased us yesterday, and they also disappeared, so I’m not crazy, but there’s something super crazy going on, and I think it’s connected to you since I’m totally incapable of hurting you. That’s why I couldn’t slap you the other day even though, trust me, I really, really wanted to. ”

  I took a deep breath. “So there. That’s the fast version. Any questions?”

  David stumbled backward, sitting down hard on an upside down bucket, then shook his head. “I . . . I think my brain actually shut down,” he said. He braced his elbows on his knees, leaning forward with
his steepled fingers covering his mouth.

  “After yesterday, I thought whatever you said, I’d be good. I mean, dude disappeared. And my car magically repaired itself. I should be unshockable, you know?”

  David still wasn’t looking at me, so knelt down in front of him as gingerly as I could, trying not to touch the ground or accidentally flash him. “I know,” I told him. “It sounds insane. It is insane. ”

  His eyes fixed on mine. “You killed someone,” he said, his voice barely audible. “With a shoe. ”

  “He had a sword,” I fired back and then, to my shock, David burst out laughing.

  “A sword. Our history teacher attacked you with a sword in the bathroom and you killed him. ” He dropped his head into his hands, only to raise it a second later. “Wait. You said a janitor passed these powers on to you. A janitor who died. Mr. Hall?”

  Surprised, I nodded. “Yeah. Had you noticed that he was missing?”

  But David was pressing his face into his hands again, moaning. “Oh my God, oh my God. ”

  “What?” When he didn’t answer, I tugged on his sleeve. Apparently that much I could do. “What do you know about Mr. Hall?”

  When David lifted his face, he was pale. “He rented the little house at the back of our property. ”

  I rocked back on my heels. “Mr. Hall lived with you?”

  “Not with me, but more or less in my backyard, yeah. He . . . he took off a few days ago. Or at least that’s what my aunt thought. I even asked her if we should, like, report it or something, but she said he was a grown man, he could come and go as he pleased. ”

  Now David’s skin had taken a bit of a greenish cast, and I grabbed one of the extra buckets, just in case. “I was at school Friday night, working on the paper,” he said, almost like he was talking to himself. “Dr. DuPont . . . do you think he was after me, and killed Mr. Hall when he got in the way?”