Хлоя Нейл - Hexbound

And then it began.

Like a tornado had suddenly kicked up in the Chicago underground, all the stuff in the building—doors, walls, tables, medical implements—was sucked behind us.

Scout and I yanked our hands away from each other. It definitely hurt—my fingers burning like I’d stuck them into a roaring fire—but we were still on our feet.

And then we ran like the rats were still after us.

We hurdled spinning lamps and dodged computer gear, pushing ourselves against walls to avoid the doors that came hurtling toward us. Scout stumbled over an office chair, and I grabbed and pulled her along until she was on her feet again.

And the sound—it was like a freight train roaring toward us.

The walls began to evaporate, drywall and wiring sucking back toward the center of the spell. Finally, we turned a corner, and there were Jason and Michael, holding open the double doors that led out of the sanctuary.

It was getting even harder to run, like we were swimming through molasses. The nightmare flashed through my mind, the door I hadn’t been able to reach.

But this was real life, and I wasn’t about to go down in a sanctuary in some nasty tunnel. I pushed forward like I was racing for the finish line. We made it through the doors just as they were pulled off their hinges and into the current.

We ran to the other end of the corridor and hunkered down in the threshold of the tunnel with Jason, Michael, Paul, and Detroit, and then we watched it happen.

All of the stuff—everything but the concrete support columns—was sucked backward into an ever-tightening spiral. It swirled around and closed in, becoming a sphere of stuff. And then, with a pop and a burst of light, it was gone.

There was silence for a moment as we stared at the husk of the sanctuary—a place the Reapers could no longer use to hurt anyone, or try to further their own magic.

“Now that,” Scout said, “was a good spell.”

Maybe needless to say, we slept in Saturday morning. There was something about working serious magical mojo that pulled the energy right out of you.

After checking in with Scout and reading a message from Daniel (Detroit was doing fine, and Veronica’s memories of the capture had been ixnayed by Katie,

who had manipulation power), I finally managed to pull on jeans and a hoodie so I could scrounge through the cafeteria for some breakfast. I nabbed a tray and loaded it with energy: juice, yogurt, and muffins for me, and a plate of eggs, bacon,

and toast for Scout. I ignored the stares as I carried the tray back through the Great Hall. They thought I was weird, and I might have been. But I’d also worked my tail off keeping them safe, and I deserved a little weirdness now and again.

When I got back, I went directly to Scout’s room. We chowed down without speaking, finally mumbling something about being tired when we’d cleared the tray of pretty much every crumb. Although I was still contemplating a trip over to Mrs.

M’s for a postbreakfast.

And that was pretty much how the rest of the morning went, at least until we made the transition to my room.

After all, it was Saturday, and I had a date.

With a werewolf.

I know, I know. I play the unique, totally hip, magic-having, brilliant, always-

together teenager.

Of course, the “teenager” bit is the most important part of that sentence. That was the part that made me change clothes four times, flipping through skirts and jeans and tops and scarves until the floor was pretty much covered in fabric. Scout read a magazine on my bed, generally not helping.

She’d suggested I wear a “potato sack.”

What did that even mean?

The sun was out, so I settled on skinny jeans, a tank, and a half-cardigan. I shooed Scout out of my room and locked the door behind us, then settled the key around my neck. I was getting used to wearing it, and there was something about the weight of it that was kind of familiar.

Outside my door, Scout yawned again, back of her hand at her mouth. “You wanna go to dinner when you get back?”

“Sounds like a plan.”

She nodded, then began to trudge toward her door. “I’ll be in my room. Wave at the gargoyles for me.”

I snorted. “Yeah, ’cause they’re gonna wave back?”

She arched an eyebrow.

Right. We were at St. Sophia’s.

But it was also a weekend at St. Sophia’s, so the buildings were pretty quiet as I walked to the front door. Some of the girls’ parents picked them up for a weekend visit home; some of them headed outside to explore the city.

Me? I was going on a date with a werewolf.

He stood at the edge of the grounds in jeans and a tucked-in, button-up shirt in the same spring blue as his eyes. In his hand was an old-fashioned picnic basket.

“Hello, Lily Parker,” Jason said, leaning forward and pressing his lips to mine.

“Happy Saturday.”

“Happy Saturday.”

“Our goal for today,” he said, “is to pretend to be normal for a few hours. So I thought we’d spend our time outside. In the sun. And not underground.”

I smiled grandly. “Great minds think alike.” I nodded at the basket. “What’s that?”

“We’re having a picnic.”

“A picnic?”

He held out his hand. “Come on. We only have an hour.”

I looked at him for a minute, trying to figure out what he was up to, before taking his hand. “An hour before what?”

“For lunch. Then we have an appointment.”

“All right, bucko. But this better be good.”

“Bucko? We aren’t going on a date in nineteen seventy-four.”

I rolled my eyes, but couldn’t stop the grin. Taking my hand in his, he led me down the sidewalk.

Our picnic spot was a square of grass in a long, narrow park that ran between two buildings off Michigan Avenue. It was like one row in a checkerboard, squares of grass alternating with fountains and plazas with benches. Jason pulled his fleece blanket out of the picnic basket and gallantly held out a hand.

I took a seat and waited for him to unload the basket. The first thing he pulled out was a glossy white box. He unfolded the top, revealing two brownies topped with a dusting of powdered sugar.

I pulled a chunk from one of them and took a bite. “Wow. That’s really good.”

“I made them myself.”

I slid him a suspicious glance.

“Did I say ‘make’? I meant to say I bought them at a bakery on the way over here.”

“I figured. I mean, how would you have the time to bake? And you live in a dorm room, right? Do you even have a kitchen?”

“I have matches and a mug warmer.”

“Rebel.”

“And with a cause, too. Just stick with me, kid. I’m going places.”

I shook my head at the joke and pulled out another piece of brownie, trying to avoid splattering my jeans with a snowfall of powdered sugar.

For nearly an hour, we sat on the blanket in the grass, and ate our lunch. We joked. We laughed. We talked about our hometowns and the people we went to school with.

For nearly an hour, we pretended to be teenagers who had nothing more to do on a weekend than finish up homework, spend the night at a girlfriend’s house, or figure out what to wear to class on Monday morning.

We just . . . were.

And the more we sat in the grass on that beautiful fall day, the more we laughed.

Every time Jason laughed, his nose crinkled up.

Every time Jason laughed, my heart tugged a little.

If I wasn’t careful, I was gonna fall for this boy.

And yet something was . . . weird. Maybe it was the fact that I’d seen Sebastian.

Maybe it was the fact that I’d seen Jason in wolf form. Maybe he was just tired. But there was something in his eyes. Something darker than I’d seen before. Scout had said once that the summer had been long, that the Adepts were tired.