Demon High (11 page)

“So now we know for sure who we’re dealing with,” I said, pulling my gaze from the face on the screen. Somehow I’d thought the knowledge would make me feel better, more prepared or something. It didn’t.

I walked to the island and set the book on the granite countertop. Old and worn as the volume was, it looked right there somehow. Seemed to become less shabby as I stared at it, as if it was absorbing its surroundings. I wanted to pick it up and press it against my chest. Just holding it made me feel safe, as if I was in control. I curled my fingers into my hand and forced myself to leave the volume where it lay.

Brittany moved past me to rummage in the refrigerator. She stepped back, two bottles of fizzy fruit-flavored water in her hands. She twisted the lid off one and slid it toward me.

“Did you actually talk to either of them?” I asked.

She shook her head. “I didn’t have a chance. The offs were around the whole time.”

I gripped the edge of the countertop behind me. It was cold, but that wasn’t the cause of the chill that shot through me. “I think we have to. That or try and exorcise them.”

Her bottle froze halfway to her lips. “You can do that?”

I reached for my own bottle. My hand shook as I picked it up. I pretended not to notice. “I don’t know. I could try, or we could go to a priest or something.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” Her hand moved to a bump under her shirt. I’d forgotten Brittany’s family was Catholic, realized she must wear a cross.

“They’d have access to stuff and skills I wouldn’t.” Like the ability to bless objects on the fly, call on faith, all kinds of nice little extras.

“But, a priest? What do we say when he asks how the demons got here?” Her face tightened.

I was surprised by her reaction. I’d never seen any authority cow Brittany.

“Priests forgive, right? Isn’t that what they do?” I didn’t really like the idea of confessing what we’d done to a priest either, but I wasn’t Catholic. I didn’t really have much faith at all. And priests were who you thought of when you said “exorcism.” It seemed like we should at least consider it.

“Do they forgive? Kind of. I guess it’s acceptance they’re stingy with.” She turned to the side and took a drink of her water.

I watched her swallow it.

As she sat the bottle down, she said, “I just don’t think going to a priest is the right choice, okay?”

“So, no priests,” I replied.

“No priests,” she agreed and seemed to relax.

I relaxed a bit too. Going to a priest and trying to convince him two students at Caldera High were demons would not have been easy. Very likely it would have been impossible.

I picked up my water. “Well, that leaves us with three choices. We exorcise them ourselves.” I held out one finger. “We call up Kobal or some other demon and ask him to suck them back into hell.” I held out a second finger.

Brittany curled her lip, mirroring my own thoughts on that option.

“Or we talk to the two of them, see if we can find out what they’re doing here, and if they know anything about your cousin and his friends.”

“And then what?” Brittany asked.

I just stared at her. Once again, she had me stumped.

o0o

Oscar and Nellie were both in my first period history class. How appropriate, them being an average of two-hundred-fifty years old and all. Brittany was in the class too, now. She’d worked her magic and got herself transferred.

While Mr. Nelson handed out last week’s tests, I studied the pair, looking for some reason for their appearance at Caldera High. Nellie saw me watching her. She chose that moment to drop her pencil on the floor and lean over. Her cotton shirt gaped, revealing Hooter-girl cleavage. When she sat back up, every male eye in the room was on her, including Mr. Nelson’s.

She ignored them all and stared at me instead. “My lead broke. Could you lend me a pencil, Lucinda?”

We hadn’t been introduced. Her way of telling me she knew who I was and wasn’t afraid of me.

Like I’d thought she would be.

“Ahem.” Mr. Nelson clearing his throat and swallowing his tongue. He didn’t think I noticed, but I did. “There’s a pencil sharpener in the front of the room, Miss Gwynn.”

Still in her seat Nellie spun, her shoulders moving first then the rest of her body following; finally her hair swung forward too. The whole thing was like watching some kind of slow motion clip, like from a music video—except the girl would be dripping wet, water slinging from her hair in a seductive dance only males seemed to get.

But I was selling them short—the males I mean. Not a one of the boys in class, or Mr. Nelson for that matter, seemed to miss the water. Their eyes were locked on Nellie without so much as a spritzer bottle in sight.

Obscenely aware of her audience, Nellie slid from her chair and wandered toward the front. Beyond annoyed with her performance and the males’ reaction to it, I waved my hand in the air.

Mr. Nelson shook himself out of his stupor enough to call on me. “Lucinda?” he croaked. Before I could come up with a question, Brittany jumped in.

Her gaze guilelessly on his face, she said, “We were wondering, will we be studying British history this semester? We’ve been reading about the restoration period. It’s fascinating.”

Her bullet hit. Nellie spun on the ball of her foot. She tapped the pin-sharp tip of her pencil against her chin.

Mr. Nelson simply looked shocked. “You’ve been reading? I mean…you’ve been reading about history?”

Brittany’s eyes narrowed, another confirmation that her stupid act was just that, an act. Then she smiled. “Actually, I saw a movie. It was about King Charles. He had a mistress, you know.”

“Brittany, I’m sure that is fascinating, but hardly—” Mr. Nelson’s lecture was cut off by Nellie who had sashayed her way back to her desk. A few feet from Brittany she stopped, placed her hands on her hips and leaned forward. I thought her boobs were going to tumble out onto Brittany’s five-subject notebook. “A mistress. Say what you mean.
A whore
. The King had a whore. And I assure you the job was totally to her liking.” Then she tilted her head and winked. Shane Bollock caught the full force of that gesture. His jaw dropped an inch.

Brittany bared her teeth in a smile that verged on predatory. Afraid she was forgetting exactly what Nellie was, I jumped out of my chair and stepped in front of her desk, blocking her view of the female demon.

Mr. Nelson frowned. “Lucinda?”

“Oh, I…I just wanted to say, I saw the movie too, it was good, but like you said probably not at all appropriate.” I looked like an idiot. The look on Mr. Nelson’s face confirmed it. I could feel a flush moving up my neck and over my cheeks.

“Why don’t you return to your seat, Lucinda?” He used that “calm” voice, the one that told us he was counting in his head. A couple of football players snickered. Normally I would have just slunk back to my seat, but this time I had bigger things to worry about than what a few jocks thought of me.

As Mr. Nelson turned to return to the front, I bumped into Brittany with my hip and shot her a “this is not helping” look. She flicked her gaze to the side, but settled down after that, no more mentions of Kings or whores. It was about all I could ask for.

The rest of class went smoothly. There was one bump when Nelson announced our next projects were research papers—bios on people from history we thought made a significant impact, but got left off the pages of history books. We had to justify why they were deserving of the notice and then give our opinion on why we thought they were left out.

Shane Bollock turned around and faced Brittany. “Can you give me the name of that movie? I’d like to do a little research on that wh…” Mr. Nelson gave him the eyeball. “…mistress you mentioned. She sounds like my kind of woman.” He flicked his gaze to Nellie.

She ran her index finger down her neck and smiled.

The bell rang, and I shoved my way past all of them. Outside the room, I waited for Brittany. The two football players strutted by. I met their gaze. They immediately shifted theirs to the side and scurried off. I’d forgotten them before they made it past the first line of lockers.

Brittany appeared and I squeezed next to her in the rush of students, matching my steps to hers. “What were you thinking? Don’t you realize Shane Bollock is going to think it’s odd that this ‘mistress’ has the same name as our newest student?”

Brittany stopped, forcing everyone behind us to quickly change route. Completely ignoring their pissed-off glares as they stomped past, she said, “So what?”

So what? I…I bit off the retort that had started to zip from my lips. She was right. So what?

“You think Shane’s going to put whore and slut together and come up with demon?” Brittany asked.

“Ooo, nice.” Nellie’s slinky voice caused me to jump. She slid icy fingers down my arm. I fought the urge to rub my hand over the trail of her touch. “Whore plus slut equals demon.” She tapped Brittany on the nose with the eraser end of her pencil. “I like you. I’ll destroy you if you get in my way, but I like you.” She smiled, her eyes angling in cat-like slyness as she did.

“Leave them be, Nellie.” Oscar Mullin snapped his hand around the pencil that was still posed inches from Brittany’s nose. With a smile, Nellie released her hold on it, and sighed. “You are such a bore, Oscar.”

The expression on Oscar’s face didn’t change; he didn’t even acknowledge her comment. He just opened his hand and let the pencil fall to the ground. Then he took a step forward, between Nellie and Brittany, and strode off.

He seemed so bold and uncaring of what others thought. I couldn’t see how anyone could believe he was actually one of us. Realizing I’d been staring, I glanced around to see if anyone else had noticed. Both Brittany and Nellie were watching him too, not with the same fascination I had been but at least their attention was on Oscar and not me. Relaxing a bit, I continued to watch him walk away. As he passed down the hall, people stopped. He didn’t say anything, and he didn’t look at anyone. But every single person looked at him.

I rubbed my hands over my arms; goose bumps had popped out.

“Such a waste.” Nellie shook her head, then raised a brow at my hands still moving methodically up and down my biceps. “You don’t want a bite of that, kitten. Better to stick to something that won’t bite back—especially your first time.” She angled her gaze to Brittany.

Brittany’s face paled, then her brows lowered. Embarrassed that Nellie would pull her into an insult intended for me, I jumped in. “Why are you here, Nellie? What do you want?” Realizing it would have been wise to be more subtle in approaching the demon, I bit the inside of my cheek.

I let her get to me.

Nellie twisted her shoulders forwards and back, tilting her neck as she did. Then she squared her gaze. “Ah, kitten, I don’t think it’s any secret what I want. Home is a cold lonely place. Can you blame a girl if she wants to get out and play every four hundred years or so?”

“So, you’re what? Vacationing?” Brittany asked.

“Well….” Nellie shifted her gaze to the battered lockers behind us, then at a group of pimply smart cards (computer geeks). “This isn’t the most luxurious place I’ve spent a holiday, but it does have a few perks.” Her gaze had lit on something over my shoulder. I turned and corrected myself—
someone
. Shane Bollock was leaning against a locker three classrooms down watching us. When he saw us looking, he glanced away, but his attempt at cool jock was totally shot.

“Shane? You’re here for Shane?” Brittany asked. She looked at me. “I say we let her have him.”

I watched the demon. Pure sexual desire flamed to life in her eyes, and I realized, it was always there, simmering, to some degree.

“She isn’t here for Shane,” I murmured. “Any male will do.”

“Ah, kitten.” Nellie placed her hand on my arm, and again trailed her fingers over my skin. I swallowed, uncomfortable, my body reacting in a way that wasn’t natural—not to another girl. Nellie laughed, then leaned forward and whispered in my ear. Her breath was hot and moist. Her breasts brushed against mine and I shivered.

“Don’t sell yourself short, kitten. I can teach you something too, if your friend won’t.” Then she pulled back, slanted those damned cat eyes at me and sauntered off.

“Lucinda? What happened? What did she say?”

I must not have looked too good. Brittany grabbed me by the shoulder and jerked me toward the water fountain. I stared at her fingers, wrapped around my arm. Then I released a laugh.

I was letting a demon get to me. I knew better, but at least I’d learned something during the exchange. I’d learned what Nellie was.

A handful of icy water droplets splashed on my face. “What is it?” Brittany demanded.

I rubbed my fingers across my eyes. Good thing I hadn’t tried my new eyeliner this morning. With my face dry and my mind clear, I blew out a breath. “I know what Nellie is. She isn’t what we thought. She was never human. She’s a succubus.”

Brittany took a step back, into traffic. I lost her for a second in the rush. The halls of Caldera High between first and second periods were definitely not the best place to be talking sexual demons. When she made it back to me, we decided to split up and get back together at lunch. This time I didn’t even question the invitation.