The Casquette Girls (37 page)

Never trust a vampire.

Tires screeched to a halt. Lights flashed. Doors slammed. A voice on a megaphone told everyone to vacate the garden. Detective Matthews
.
Dammit. This is way worse than being busted out past curfew. You didn’t do anything else wrong,
I reminded mysel
f.
A plainclothes cop started shooing people away. I eagerly took the opportunity to exit with the crowd.

“Adele!” Detective Matthews accidentally said through the megaphone. Everyone looked at me as I stopped in my tracks. He hustled over. “Were you the first one to arrive at this scene?”

“Um… Not exactly.”

“Oh my God! Look at his throat!” Annabelle shrieked as the cops lifted the corpse. The neck of the victim had been ripped open.

The crowd gasped. It was Wilson the Wolfman Washington, the DJ who, on that very evening, had warned the city to keep their eyes peeled. My back stiffened.
This could not be a coincidence. This was not a random act of violence.
Both of his eyes had been plucked out. Blood dripped from the empty sockets.

Detective Matthews began to interrogate me, going back and forth with his partner, asking me a hundred questions. All I could think about was Désirée. Warmth spread through my body, making me shake. Just as I was about to explode, an arm pulled me backwards.

“What the hell is going on here, Terry?” my father asked, pushing through a couple of forensics.

“I’m sorry, Mac,” said the bleary-eyed detective. “I’m just following protocol.”

“Well, my daughter is a minor, so all of your protocol can go through me from now on. Got it?” There was more aggression in his voice than I’d ever heard before.

“Of course, Mac, I think we’ve gotten everything we need. Why don’t you take little Addie home
?” He patted my shoulder and walked back to his team. My fingers twitched. One minute I was being grilled like a murder suspect, and the next being treated like a toddler.

“Adele, where the hell have you been? I have been calling and texting you for the last—”

“I’m sorry, Mac. She was with me.” Isaac was staring straight at me, offering me an out.
How long had he been standing there?

“Dammit, Isaac—”

“I know, sir. I’m sorry. We were just sitting by the river talking, and we lost track of time.” Isaac looked at the leather jacket I was huddled into and the shirt hanging out below it. He knew exactly whom they had come from. He turned back to my dad, blinking away the sting.

“I expect more from you…,” my father proceeded to yell.

Isaac quietly accepted the lashing.

When he finished, Isaac wouldn’t even look my way. Another wave of guilt washed over me.

The body bag was zipped. My gut told me I was responsible.

And vampires.

My lungs pinched.

Where the hell is Désirée?

October 28
th

“Your hair is amazing, Adele,” said a girl with a faux tan and diamond-hooped earrings. “Did you do something different?”

“Ugh, thanks?” I replied, hoping she would turn back around and leave me alone. There was definitely nothing different about my hair, other than that it was dirty and genuinely disheveled rather than purposefully styled into a messy bun.

I could have played hooky today, considering the circumstances, but I’d decided to escape to school rather than stay home with my father – we’d had a huge fight after our walk home last night (currently unresolved). Now that I needed pencils to hold open my eyelids, I regretted my choice, but I couldn’t just blame my father. A multitude of other things had stolen my remaining few hours for sleep. For starters, the beady-eyed crow had perched on our neighbor’s balcony all nightlong. Even after the curtains were drawn, it gave me an immense sense of paranoia. Then there was the fact that Désirée was still M.I.A. She hadn’t returned any of my texts, nor had she picked me up for school. Lastly, and this was horrible given the circumstances, I couldn’t stop thinking about Nicco. So, I knew that I looked terrible, and this girl’s fake compliment made my foggy brain want to ooze out of my ears and flee.

Maybe I was just delirious, but out of all the bizarre things that had occurred over the last few weeks, today was the most confounding. A guy had helped pick up my spilled books, and a girl had complimented my necklace, which was hardly fashionable. At least half a dozen other upperclassmen had smiled, waved, or told me hello in the hallway. All before first period.

I waited for Mr. Anderson to turn his back, and then leaned close to my lab partner, the younger Drake sister, who was carefully pouring a clear liquid from a plastic bottle into a glass cylinder.

“What is going on today?” I whispered. “What is wrong with everyone?”

“What do you mean?”

“Why is everyone being
nic
e
to me?”

“Because you have something they want,” she said without looking up. “Something that not even their parents’ money can buy them.”

“Huh? What?”

“Permanent entrance to the coolest underground club in town, duh.”

“Ugh!” I yelped and suddenly the Bunsen burner ignited on its own. I didn’t know what was worse – everyone in school knowing about Le Chat Noir’
s
illegal operation, or that they were being nice to me because of it. Katherine looked at the Bunsen burner and back to me with confusion. There was nothing I could do to cover up the blatant magic except shoot back the exact same “What just happened?” face.

“What’s wrong with you?” she asked, staring at the blur my pencil was making as I frantically tapped it.

“It’s nothing.” I wiped my clammy forehead with the back of my hand. The bell rang, and I leapt from my desk to avoid further questioning. “See ya later.”

I ran to get my French book and was surprised to find the elder Drake sister waiting at my locker.

“Good morning, sunshine,” she said. She seemed to radiate some kind of post-night-out glow, totally unfazed by the fact that we had witnessed a murder scene mere hours ago.

Next to her, Tyrelle shot me a look, denouncing my traitorous behavior.
Oh, now we’re on the same sid
e
?
Lacking the energy to show restraint, I shot him a snarky look back, and my locker slammed shut on its own. Pain shot up my arm after I reflexively slapped it as a cover-up.

“Dammit!”

Tyrelle slowly shook his head as if I was the biggest spaz on the planet, and, luckily, Annabelle was too far off in lala land to notice the locker. I checked my phone for the umpteenth time as I rubbed my hand.

“Have you seen Désirée?” I asked, too concerned to process the fact that Annabelle Lee Drake and I were now walking down the hall together.

“No, but she can’t ditch French because of our midterm. That wench didn’t respond to any of my demands for details of her night with the hottie.”

“Bonjour, Mesdemoiselles.”

“Bonjour, Madame Wilson,”
we chimed in unison, as we walked into the classroom.

And there she was. Désirée. Giving her best deviant smile to the other minions.

I exhaled loudly as Bri shrieked, “You know you’re gonna have to give us more details than that!”

I never imagined I’d be so elated to see Désirée Borges, but now that I knew she had a pulse, I became agitated. I dropped my stuff on my desk with a loud thud. They all looked over.

“What the hell? I’ve called you like fifty times. I thought you were dead!”

Bri’s mouth hung open at my total disregard for social order.

“Yeah, Dee,” Annabelle demanded. “Time to spill it.”

I glared at Désirée. What she did or didn’t
do
with Gabriel Medici was
no
t
what I wanted to know about, and I was pretty sure she knew that.

“Chill, Adele. Obviously, my father was alerted when the Wolfman’s body was found, so he was waiting up for me when I got home. He freaked and took away my car and cell.”

The bell rang, shrieking through my dehydrated head.
Ugh. I am never drinking agai
n
.

“You could at least have found me this morning,” I whispered. “Are you sure you’re okay?” My eyes frantically scoured her neck. She seemed perfectly normal. In fact, she seemed better than normal. She seemed, dare I say, happy. It must have been the Gabe effect. “I’m sorry. I just really thought you were in trouble… or something.”

She leaned over and said with absolute authority, “I do
not
have trouble with boys.” Her eyes locked with mine.
Wait… Do we actually understand each other? Does Désirée know vampires are roaming the street
s
?
My fingers went to my necklace, as did Désirée’s gaze
.
Does she know about me?

“Take your seats, and put everything but a pencil away,” Madame Wilson instructed in French.

Everyone scrambled with varying groans. I threw my books underneath my chair, and when I looked back up, there was a note on my desk.

We need to talk. VP 6 p.m.

Désirée looked back at me for a moment, and I nodded in affirmatio
n.
The message momentarily calmed me – suddenly I didn’t feel so alone
.
She knows somethin
g
,
I thought as I slipped the note in my pocket and resumed my pencil-tapping.

Dixie walked in late
. “Désolée, Madame Wilso
n
.
I wasn’t feeling very well this morning.”

“
Ça va bien, Mademoiselle Hunter
, you look rather pale?”

“I’m fine. I mean,
très bien
.” The French words sounded completely ridiculous with Dixie’s thick drawl.

She clutched the chair as she lowered her body into the seat in front of mine, and then shot us all a smile before turning to her exam. She looked like she hadn’t gotten much sleep, and her skin tone was more emo than her usual Malibu Barbie.

My pencil-tapping came to a complete halt when I noticed the
Gucci
neatly tied around her neck.

“Nice scarf,” I whispered, leaning forward.

“Thanks. It was a gift.” She smiled smugly.

Désirée’s gaze moved from her test, to the scarf, and then to me.

“So Dixie,” I whispered, trying to sound casual, “where’d you get off to last night?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know!”

“
Je demande le silence!”
Madame Wilson threatened.

Was Dixie’s hostility warranted?
I had kind of left her hanging at the bar. A twinge of guilt pained my chest.
I
coul
d
have helped her past the bouncer.

I tried to concentrate on the test questions, but fear for the other freshmen distracted me.
Ugh, why do I even have to take this class?

Focus, Adele.

I shut my eyes, took a deep breath, and pushed everything out of my mind.

* * *

It was strange walking down the silent halls. Even though I was only scheduled for half a day, my step quickened, as if I was going to get caught skipping.

Finally free from French, it took about ten seconds for my mind to wander back to Nicco.
How was it possible to reveal so much about myself to a stranger in one night?
I’d never felt so comfortable with someone in my life, and yet he had told me not to trust him.
What the hel
l
—
?
I opened the grand front door, and it nearly smacked a girl.

“Sorry!”

“Adele!” she returned with glee, although smiling appeared to be a struggle for her. It was one of the freshmen from last night… the one who’d worn the god-awful moo-moo. I felt bad that I didn’t even know her name.

“Hey, are you just getting to school?”

“Yeah, I wasn’t feeling so well when I woke up, but I’m okay now.”

Her skin gleamed as if her fever had just broken, and her arms were wrapped tightly around her torso.

“So where did you ladies get off to last night?” I asked, loathing the fake pitch that rang from my own voice.

Her eyes lit up. “Are you my Big Sister?”

Guilt washed over me – great job I had done guiding the freshmen.

“Um… I don't think any decisions have been made yet, with all the commotion last night.”

Her weight shifted, and I sensed uneasiness at the allusion to last night. She adjusted the pink silk scarf that was fashionably knotted around her neck.
What th
e
…
?
My hand automatically reached for it, but her eyes widened, and she hopped a quick step back.