Meg Cabot - Awaken

There appeared to be something at the bottom of Mr. Rector’s pool. It could have been a double dolphin tile design, to match the one in stained glass on the front door, but it was raining too hard to tell.

“Check it out,” Seth said to me with a grin, pointing at the pool. The generator had kept the pool lights bright, so it was easy to see what happened next …

… which was that a powerful wave crashed against the glass wall around the backyard, surged over it and then across the sandstone, then dumped itself into the pool, filling it with dark, brackish salt water.

I realized then what was at the bottom of the pool: seaweed. Not just seaweed but debris of all kinds, including what looked like pieces of driftwood, coolers from fishing boats that had come loose from their moors, possibly even fish. The entire backyard was flooded. I saw a lobster buoy that had detached from its trap bobbing next to the barbecue. A deck chair floated by. How the lights were even still on with so much salt water corroding the circuits, I didn’t know. But I knew it wouldn’t last long.

All the guys seated around the sliding glass doors hooted appreciatively at the wave, then knocked cups as an impromptu toast to Mother Nature’s wrath.

“That one was superior ,” Bryce shouted excitedly. “Was that one superior or what, Seth?”

Seth’s gaze remained fastened on the pool, but his smile grew devilish.

“That one was superior,” he said. Then his gaze swung towards me. “What did you think, Pierce? Did you think that one was superior?”

Startled to find myself under such a bright, searching gaze, I struggled to find a reply. His eyes , was all I could think. His eyes look so familiar ….

But I didn’t know anyone with eyes that color. John’s eyes weren’t blue. They were gray, as gray as the diamond hanging around my neck. Or as gray as it normally was, I realized after a quick glance down, when it wasn’t swirling as black as that ocean out there.

No, Seth’s eyes were the same aquamarine as the pool. Or, at least, the same aquamarine as the pool used to be.

His eye color wasn’t what I found familiar. It was something else.

“Yeah,” I said, unable to tear my gaze from his. “That one was superior.” Then I licked my lips. I was thirsty, but after what had happened to Farah, there was nothing I dared to drink. “Do you guys think maybe you should turn off the power down there?”

“Why?” Seth asked, his tone slightly mocking. “You aren’t worried someone might get hurt, are you?”

I felt a private storm surge of my own. What was with this guy? How could so many people have liked him enough to have voted for him for class president? Of course, I had some inside knowledge about him they didn’t have.

Reminding myself of Mr. Liu’s warning to hold on to my own kite strings, I tried to keep my tone even.

“People have already gotten hurt,” I said. I was flirting on the edge of danger, I knew, but I had Bryce to protect me if things got tricky. My diamond wasn’t going to be much use. I didn’t think Seth was a Fury, though someone close by obviously was. No, Seth was just an old-fashioned killer.

Seth raised a blond eyebrow at me. “Really? Who?”

“Farah,” I said. I could tell it wasn’t the answer he’d expected when the other eyebrow lifted to join the first. “She says this storm has cost her dad a lot of money. She probably won’t be able to go to college now.”

Seth tucked his lips into a mock pout. “Aw,” he said. “Poor Farah.”

“She’s not the only one who’s gotten hurt,” I said. I said it softly enough that he had to lean forward to hear me. The music was loud, and another wave had struck, causing the guys around us to cheer. “There’s also Alex.”

He’d glanced away to look at the wave, but when I mentioned Alex, his head whipped back towards me.

“Alex?” He raised his cup to his mouth and took a sip of beer. He wasn’t having anything to do with the punch bowl of mystery drink. “Alex Cabrero? He’s a sweet kid. How’d he get hurt?”

The fact that he was pretending like he didn’t know set off another surge inside me. But I knew I had to keep myself in check.

“You know perfectly well,” I said with a smile. “You and the other Rector Wreckers stuffed him into a coffin the other night, then left him there to die.”

Another one, who had his throat pierced through,

And nose cut off close underneath the brows,

And had no longer but a single ear …

DANTE ALIGHIERI, Inferno , Canto XXVIII

Seth lowered the cup from which he’d just sipped, his face never changing expression. But I saw a few drops of beer spill out onto his black polo shirt.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said. “But you better remember who I am, little girl. No one messes with a Rector and gets away with it.”

I had to laugh. What had he thought, exactly, encouraging me to sit down with him? That I’d be too intimidated by his good looks and social position to mention it? Or had he planned on raising the subject himself and making some kind of threat, and I’d beaten him to it?

If so, it had been a dumb miscalculation on his part.

“You do know what I’m talking about, Seth,” I said. “I’m sure your father’s shown you the security tape by now, so you know my friends and I got Alex out. He’s alive, and he’ll be testifying against you … for all of it, not only your trying to kill him.”

Anyone looking at us would have thought we were having a perfectly friendly conversation. We were leaning close together. Even though there were so many people in the room, laughing and screaming and dancing, and the music was playing so loudly, it was almost as if the two of us were alone in our own romantic little bubble.

Except there was nothing romantic about what we were discussing.

“You know what’s going to happen now,” I went on. “You’ll be arrested for attempted murder. You’re eighteen, so you’ll be tried as an adult, like my uncle Chris was twenty years ago, when he took the blame for that drug run your dad sent him on. It’s nice we’re keeping it all in the family, isn’t it?” I smiled at him pleasantly. “So I guess instead of saying, ‘Aw, poor Farah,’ we should be saying, ‘Aw, poor Seth.’ Right?”

I had to hand it to him: He covered pretty well. He didn’t even blink when a streak of lightning lit up the sky outside so brilliantly, it looked bright as noon.

“Seriously,” he said. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. But I do know if you ever repeat any of what you just said, my family’s attorneys will slap a slander suit against you so fast, you won’t know what hit you. I don’t care how much money your father has.”

“Really?” I couldn’t have sounded less impressed. “Did you ever consider that if there’s a tape of us getting Alex out of that coffin, there’s also a tape of you putting him in there, Seth?”

He did blink, then. But only once.

“Listen, you crazy whip-carrying bitch. Your cousin is dead, so he’s not testifying about shit,” he said. “And even if you did have a copy of that tape, there’s nothing on it. We checked. Lightning must have fritzed out the cameras or something ….”

I laughed again as his voice trailed off, and he realized his mistake.

“I thought you didn’t know what I was talking about,” I said.

The thunder outside was nowhere near as menacing as the expression on Seth’s face looked as he demanded, “What makes you think anyone would even believe you? Everyone knows why you moved here in the first place. You killed your teacher back east.”