He sauntered off, pulsing open his car and roaring off.

Sophie turned around and faced the group. We all stared at her and she shrugged nervously. "What?"

"That was a cluster," Tiff said, wading into the conversational fray as usual.

Bry shrugged. "People need to go out with who they want. We can't pick who we're attracted to."

Tiff turned on him like a barracuda. "Oh, and that worked out so well for you last year with Barbie," she voiced with dripping scorn.

Bry flinched and Mia gave a small smile. I hadn't thought about Christi in a long time. I wonder what the skank was up to?

So did Jonesy. "Yeah, what's gorgeous bitch up to now?" He looked around the group with interest. His focus was shifting to something more neutral. The whole group notched down. It was definitely a safer topic than Jonesy and Sophie's issues.

Mia shrugged and said, "We're in the same grade and I see her around but..." she looked down at her shoulder, deliberating. Her expression took on a made-up-her-mind look. "I hear she still likes Bry."

All our faces swung to Bry and John said, "No way Weller."

"Yeah man, what Terran said," Jonesy said and Bry narrowed his eyes on him.

"I don't listen to you about chicks, Jones," Bry said.

"That's gives me butt-hurt ya know," Jonesy said with a small grin.

"Whatever," Tiff said with a swift eye roll.

"Okay," I said, holding up my hands. They looked at me, Alex swiveling his neck to get the kinks out. I knew he was in pain from growing. His muscles and size were outstripping his energy and stamina. As if on cue he said, "Did you remember the food, Caleb?"

I nodded. "As I was saying, let's get in the hideaway and not stand out here for the world to notice..."

John was already thumbing in the number combo of the great lock at the gate and pushing it open.

The rest of us trooped after him with Jonesy and I carrying a great bundle of food.

Once inside the hideaway, we laid out the banquet and sat around on the milk crates, talking about everything when Sophie (Jonesy keeping a safe distance while covertly staring at her every other second) began talking about her AP class.

She shrugged, her zebra top undulating with the movement and Jonesy kept pace, yes indeedy. "It's like I said, the drug will be tested on us Astral Projection peeps then it will go from there."

John palmed his chin thoughtfully. "Has that been FDA-approved?" He directed the question at Sophie but it was Alex that answered, "Yes. All the right-wingers are freaking out about the 'sleep potential' for paranormals."

Jonesy got a puzzled look and Alex gave an indulgent chuckle, hitching up his glasses, which didn't belong on that face anymore. Alex was an ugly duckling that had become a swan. It was just like the fairy tale.

"Jones, remember when we were talking about that drug they were going to shoot us up with to safeguard the mundanes when we slept?" He quickly looked at John and clarified, "Nulls excluded."

John rolled his eyes. "Right, thanks. I was really unclear on that point."

Alex smiled. "Anyway... it would stop the numbnuts of the world..."

"Like Carson," Tiff interjected helpfully. Alex nodded, laughing.

"From torching people in their sleep...or..." he shrugged his shoulders to his ears, momentarily looking like the Alex that I remembered from a year ago. Then he lowered them and the image was lost like smoke.

"What about corpse-boy here?" Jonesy asked, jerking a thumb toward me.

"Hey!" Tiff yelled.

Jonesy leveled a stare at her. "Cool it, Tiff."

Bry glowered. "Knock it off Jones or I'm gonna beat some manners into ya."

"Try it, Weller."

Bry stood.

What was this shit? Testosterone Central?

Jonesy stood as well, his emotional net still poised to snap. "I can't tell your sib to put a lid on it without you tearing another hole outta my ass?"

Bry thought about it. "No. I can do it but you can't."

Tiff said, "I forgive you, Jonesy." She gave a look to Bry. "Chill Bro, I'll live. I'm just easily offended by Jonesy. He's always peeing in all the corners and I don't wanna clean up his mess."

Wow, did Tiff have a way with words.

Jade had a stunned look and Sophie began again in the middle of the tangled conversation. "Anyway, there's a reason why they're beginning with us."

She had a Tone, Mom would've spotted it a mile away. But her tone was different, edgy. I looked at Sophie, really looked at her. Beneath the careful artifice of her make-up lay circles under her eyes.

I watched as Jonesy recognized it too and struggled to appear indifferent.

Jade walked over to Sophie and knelt down in front of her, she was careful not to touch bare skin. She rubbed a jean-clad knee. "What's going on, Soph?"

Sophie had been looking down at Jade but lifted her face to the group and all of us sucked in a breath at the standing tears in her turquoise eyes.

"The police are after a rapist," she whispered into the room and every guy tensed, our collective breath trapped in our lungs, the girls' eyes like saucers.

Jade recovered first, "That's terrible but, how does this affect you and what does it have to do with the drug?" she asked, trying to make sense of the pattern.

Sophie looked at everyone and said something unexpected, "I'm really glad you guys came here today. I'm glad that you have my back," her eyes avoided Jonesy's and he stood, striding over to her.

"I don't hate you, Soph," he said, more serious than I'd ever seen him.

"I know," she whispered.

He put a hand on her shoulder, so black against the zebra print of the shirt. "Is someone trying to hurt you, Soph?" he asked in a low voice. Every guy there heard the threat in his tone, the menace.

"Buddy?" he said, not able to rein in the clench of his free hand that didn't touch her.

Jade's eyes got wide and she looked at Jonesy. Somehow, even though she wasn't touching him he was leaking pretty good on her. I walked over and stood next to Jade where she still held onto Sophie's knee in a death-grip.

She shook her head, her soft hair flying around her face. Jonesy unconsciously stroked her shoulder.

"Then what?" he asked so softly everyone leaned in to hear.

She raised her head again. "He's a teenager. He's going after the AP girls first, cuz it's easy. But the cops think he'll...." she covered her face with her hands and Jade instinctively pulled her hands away from Sophie's face.

Jade's scream had me wrapped around her protectively in about three seconds.

Everyone rushed to Jade and she stared at Sophie in horror. "We know him..." Jade said.

Sophie shook her head no.

I turned Jade in my arms and shook her slightly. "Who is this creep, Jade?"

"I...I...think he's the same guy as the clairvoyance sample I worked on yesterday."

Alex came forward. "What? You mean that one of your samples matches up with the AP attacker?"

John said, "How would you know they're the same, Jade?" He spread his hands out, like, explain please.

I was pretty damn curious myself. It's not that I didn't care about Sophie. But Jade was my priority. I looked again at Sophie's dark circles and suddenly an idea occurred to me.

"Hey...wait a sec..." her face turned to me."You can't sleep, can you?"

She shook her head.

John snapped his fingers as realization struck him between the eyes and Alex said, "Of course. The perv uses his AP to attack the girls while they can't get away."

"But, the AP girls could just get back into their bodies," Jonesy stated with his logic.

Which was damn fine as logic went.

Sophie said, "No," she looked at him in despair. "If the drug becomes mandatory, we'll be trapped there. With him."

The guys looked at the girls assembled in the room and wondered how to fight something we couldn't see. Someone that could be everywhere at any time, harming girls we cared about.

Alex's raging strength wouldn't help.

My corpse-affinity wouldn't.

Jonesy could light the world up like a strobe and it wouldn't matter.

Trapped.

Jonesy's eyes met mine. The raw emotion standing there for all of us to see, his hand left its spot on Sophie's shoulder and wound around the back of her neck, pressing her face against his leg.

Her shoulders trembled as she cried.

The girls were trapped.

Beginning with Soph.

CHAPTER 4

I walked Jade to her Empath class first block. She'd be there for an hour and a half while I was with Smith and Tiff "learning" about Life Transference in Theory. Dad told me I shouldn't say that I actually was the proof behind the theory. I'd have to get into all the nastiness of sucking the life out of that assassin and all the explanations that would mean for me.

No.

Jade twirled into my arms, giving me a quick peck, looking for Griswold or someone like her. Seeing we were in the clear, she brushed the softest velvet caress against my lips. We clung for a moment then I let her go, reluctantly.

I hung onto her arm when she would have gone inside and her black eyebrows arched in question.

"Find that sample, Jade."

She shuddered. "I don't want to touch that again."

I gave her steady eyes. "If you don't do this, he can go after Sophie... other girls. Eventually, he could get to you too. The sooner we get a handle on who he may be, the faster the cops can nab his sleazy ass."

She rubbed her hands up and down her arms, gooseflesh rising in aggressive bumps.

Her luminous eyes met mine. "It was so awful," she whispered, biting her lip.

I waited. I hated to press her about something that I knew was hurting or frightening her, but the alternative sucked ass so here it was.

Slowly, she nodded. "I'll try."

"Good," I said, relieved as I pressed her head underneath mine and met Tulle's angry eyes over her hair.

"Thank you for seeing Miss LeClerc off so thoroughly," she said with thinly veiled sarcasm.

I scowled, letting Jade go. As Jade walked through the door I said, "Why don't you tell Miss Tulle what's going on. Maybe she'll catch a clue."

Tulle stomped out into the hall, trying to look intimidating (she had nothing on Griswold) and said, "You're so clever, Mr. Hart. Why don't you enlighten me about what was so important you had to stand out in the school hall pawing Miss LeClerc and making her tardy?"

I thought about an expected response that wouldn't get my nuts in the cruncher.

A safe answer.

Instead, I did a Jonesy.

"Actually, that really isn't me pawing. Pawing is much more intimate, Ms. Tulle."

Jade stood behind Tulle and rolled her eyes at me. She couldn't believe I'd said that.

I couldn't either. But, I was an okay student (okay, not stellar) and didn't cause trouble, so why get up my ass?

Her eyes shifted back and forth, gauging my expression. "I think Ms. Chen needs a little visit from you, Mr. Hart."

I groaned. "I'll miss AFTD."

Like I cared.

"Tough, you should have considered that consequence when you got all mouthy."

Nice. "Fine."

She pointed her finger in the direction of the principal's office and I stalked off, silently thanking her for the directional clue. I totally didn't know where the office was. Retarded.

*

Ms. Chen sat across from me in all her black sternness, leg swinging her stiletto pump back and forth, back and forth.

"Mr. Hart... Caleb..." she began, spreading her palms on either side of her, the width of them swallowed by the mondo desk that she sat behind.

"Yes?" I asked, looking mild and innocent. Jonesy could have never pulled it off.

She looked down at her pulse and depressed her thumb, then lifted it, sliding it across the desk to me.

"Please tell me what you see there." She tapped a white-tipped fingernail on the front.

I looked:

Claudia, Caleb Hart keeps jamming his tongue down the throat of my sophomore Empath, Jade LeClerc. Normally, I don't butt my nose in too much but he hovers around the girl so much that I think his powers of distraction linger even after the bell rings. Will you get him to cool it? They behave in a very mature way that is not becoming to the student body as a whole.- Tulle, Megan, KPH

I slid it back to Chen. Yeah, that was definitely Jade and I, dry humping in the hall. Couldn't Tulle gnaw on someone's ass that was really causing problems? Like Brett... or better yet, that creeper that was stalking the chicks. Yeah, him. I felt my blood start to boil and made a conscious effort to loosen my hands and wrap them on the armrests of the chair I was sprawled in.