Sherrilyn Kenyon - Infamous

Nick’s home was considered a safe zone since they’d set up protection symbols and sealed the apartment. However, the school was a public building with hundreds of people in it—including some known preternaturals who were supposed to be there, and who posed no threat to him. There was no way to make it completely safe without banning those students, too.

Nick sat down at the same time Caleb shot to his feet. “Something wrong?”

Caleb narrowed his eyes as he made a slow circle around his stool, scanning every corner of the room. “There’s something here. Can you feel it?”

“I thought I saw a shadow in the hallway a few minutes ago.”

Caleb’s eyes flashed orange.

Nick glanced around to make sure no one else had seen him do that. “Yo, D, the freak eye thing? Dead giveaway, man. Sit down before the wings pop out, and we both end up in a real science lab, under the microscope.”

“Malphas?” their teacher snapped. “You have trouble finding your seat?”

Caleb turned at Mr. Tendyk’s question. “No, sir.” He sat down beside Nick.

The bell rang.

After closing the door and dimming the classroom lights, Tendyk turned on the overhead projector that displayed his desktop for everyone in the class to see. Nick sucked his breath in sharply while the rest of the room erupted into chaos.

Instead of the boring icons they were used to staring at on a vomit green background, Tendyk’s desktop wallpaper was a montage of Brynna Addams naked, doing extremely lewd things.

Tendyk almost broke his computer as he fumbled to turn it off. “Who’s responsible for this?” he demanded angrily.

Utter silence rang out.

Until Stone laughed again. “From the looks of it, I’d say Brynna Addams. Who knew that was hidden underneath all those high buttoned shirts and sweaters?”

Laughing, Mason high-fived him.

Pandemonium returned as everyone had a foul or gross comment to make. Everyone except Nick and Caleb. Nick was too horrified by how Brynna would react once she found out about it. And he was sure some snotwit would beeline right to her with the news. There was nothing the goobs in his school loved more than to be the bearer of really bad news, especially to the person it related to. It was like they enjoyed seeing the misery it caused, firsthand.

He turned to Caleb. “That wasn’t Brynna, was it?”

Caleb shook his head. “That was someone’s idea of a sick joke.”

Speaking of sick, Nick felt ill over it. His stomach heaved in sympathetic agony for her. “Can you tell who?”

He did that weird head cock move as if he were listening to a song only he could hear. “No idea. But it was done for sheer malice.”

“Brynna will die when she finds out.”

“I know.” A tic started in Caleb’s jaw. “Can you feel the hatred behind it?”

“Now that you mention it … is that what the icky tickling is down my spine?”

Caleb nodded.

Nick sighed heavily. Well at least he knew what was causing that symptom. “Is it demonic?”

“No. This is human evil. Demon hatred comes with a distinctive odor to it.”

“Yeah, well, this stinks, too.” Nick was repulsed by whoever had done something so vicious to someone so kind. Why would anyone hurt Brynna so? In all the years he’d known her, he’d never heard Brynna say a mean thing about anyone.

Not even him.

“All of you!” Tendyk snapped. “Line up in the hallway and be silent. Stone, I want you to go to the office and tell Mr. Head that I need him down here, pronto.”

Laughing, Stone went to obey.

Nick reached for his backpack.

“Leave it, Gautier,” Tendyk snapped. “No one is to take anything out of here.”

Nick hesitated. His grimoire and pendulum were in his backpack, along with his Malachai dagger. If his bag was searched and they happened upon those …

It would get ugly, especially since his grimoire was written in blood. Granted, it was his blood. But adults didn’t seem discriminating when it came to kids bleeding on things during school hours.

I’ve got it covered, Caleb said in his mind.

Releasing a relieved breath, Nick headed outside with everyone else.

Caleb crossed his arms over his chest as they lined up against the wall of bright red steel lockers. “You know what the only thing worse than an evil demon is?”

“My mother when she’s really ticked off at me, especially when it’s justified.”

Caleb snorted. “No, Nick. Human cruelty. All the centuries I’ve lived, I’ve never understood it. Instead of banding together, your kind seems ever determined to tear each other down. And for what? Jealousy? I just don’t get it.”

And coming from a demon, that pretty much said it all. “You’re not seriously telling me that demons are never cruel?”

“Some are. But you know who they are, and you see them coming. You can smell them from days away. Humans, on the other hand, are insidious. You don’t see it coming until they’ve stabbed you in the back and through the heart.”

Nick scowled at his implication. “What are you saying, Cay?”

“I can’t tell who did this, but I can tell why they did it. This was meant to shame Brynna and hurt her to the deepest level.”

And as those words left Caleb’s lips, Nick became aware of the conversations around him.

“I told you Brynna was a slut. My mother said her mama was one, too.”

“I always knew her goody-two-shoes persona was an act.”

“Man, I wish I’d known she’d do that. You think she’s busy Saturday night?”

Nick cringed at their ugliness. “It wasn’t Brynna,” he said defensively.

Mason scoffed at him. “You’re an idiot, Gautier.”

“Yeah,” another student concurred, “didn’t you see that in there?”

“With farm animals, too! Oh my God, I’m so disturbed.”

“You are? Imagine how that horse felt.”

They all burst out laughing.

Nick started to respond, but Caleb stopped him.

“Let it go.”

That was easier said than done. “Brynna’s my friend.”

Before Caleb could comment, the principal stalked past them and into the room. Nick stood on his tiptoes so that he could see Tendyk show the principal the horrific montage through the window in the classroom door.

His pocket started vibrating. Nick pulled out his Nokia 9000 and flipped it open to see he had a new e-mail. As he tried to access it, his phone blew up with texts about Brynna and the photographs. Apparently, their classroom wasn’t the only one spammed with that filth.

An instant later, a door down the hallway opened. Brynna ran out, sobbing hysterically. Laughter from her classroom rang in the hall and mixed with the laughter of the jerks around him. Laughter that was only drowned out by a few dickweeds making offers to her.

His heart aching, Nick started to go after her and calm her down.

Caleb caught his arm in a tight grip. “I can’t stress enough to you that you need to stay out of this.”

“Why?”

“Use your powers, Nick. Look at what’s about to happen.”

Nick glanced around until he found something shiny enough to use for scrying … the silver on the water fountain. It wasn’t very big, but it was enough that he could focus his powers with it.

And there in that small, two-inch strip, he glimpsed the horror that was about to become Brynna’s life over this single act of cruelty.

In that moment, he completely disagreed with Caleb. “She needs a friend.”

“Yes, she does. But right now, the administration is looking for someone to blame for this. You walk in there too soon and this will be hung around your neck. Trust me.”

That would be his luck, too.