“All right, Shepherd. You’ve made your point.”

“Have I?” he asked, with a half smile.

Turned out, Jason’s half smile was even more deadly than the full, dimpled grin. The half smile was drowsier—almost ridiculously handsome.

“You did,” I finally said.

We stared silently at each other for a moment before he bobbed his head toward the door. “I guess I should join Scout and Michael?”

He made it a question, as if he didn’t want to leave, but could sense my nerves. Heart pounding fiercely in my chest, I stopped him. “Actually, one more thing.”

He raised questioning brows.

“When we were down there in the basement. When I got hit. I thought—I thought I heard a growl. Like an animal.”

His eyes widened, lips parting in surprise. He hadn’t expected me to bring it up, but I couldn’t get the sound out of my mind.

Jason hadn’t yet given me an answer, so I pressed on. I knew the growling hadn’t come from Scout—she’d admitted to being a spellbinder. And I didn’t think it had come from earthquake girl or firespell boy. Jason was the only other person there.

“That sound,” I said. “Was it you?”

He gazed at me, a chill in his blue eyes, shards of icy sapphire.

“Scout gave you the simple answer about Adepts,” he finally said. “She told you that we each have magic, a gift of our own. That’s a short answer, but it’s not entirely accurate.” He paused, then wet his lips. “I’m not like the others.”

My heart thudded so fiercely, I wouldn’t have been surprised if he could hear it. It took me a moment to ask him. “How much not like them?”

When Jason looked up at me again, the color of his eyes had shifted to green and then to a silvered yellow, like those of a cat caught in the light. And there was something wolfish in his expression.

“Enough,” he said, and I’d swear his voice was thicker, deeper. “Different enough.”

He turned to go.

My heart didn’t stop pounding until the door closed behind him.

10

The room was quiet after the triplets left, at least for a few minutes. The doctor finally visited and looked me over, and reached the same conclusion that had been passed along earlier—I was fine. Notably, he didn’t ask me what threat sent me from an all-girls’ private school to a hospital.

Whatever he knew, I had hours yet to kill in the hospital. For the first ten minutes, I flipped my cell phone over and over in my hand, trying to gather up the nerve to call Ashley. But she was probably still in class and, besides, what was I going to tell her? That I’d met some magical weirdos who’d managed to rope me into their shenanigans? I wasn’t crazy about the idea of that conversation, or how I was going to explain it without sounding completely loopy—so I put the phone down again and glanced around the room. Since no one had brought me homework—and I wasn’t about to ask for any—I turned on the television bolted to the wall, settled back into the bed, and had just started watching a reality show about bored, rich housewives when there was a knock at the door.

I had no idea who else would visit—other than brat packers hoping to gloat about their victory—but I pointed the remote at the television and turned it off.

“Come in,” I said.

The door opened and closed, followed by the sound of heels clacking on the tile floor. Foley appeared from around the corner, hands clasped before her, a tidy, pale suit on her slender frame, ash-blond hair tidy at her shoulders. Her expression was all business.

“Ms. Parker.” Foley walked to the window, pushed aside a couple of the slats in the blinds, and glanced out at the city. “How are you feeling?”

“Good, considering.”

“You lost consciousness,” she said. Said, not asked.

“That’s what I hear.”

“Yes, well. I trust, Ms. Parker, that you understand the importance of our institution’s reputation, and of the value of discretion. We, of course, do not wish to elicit untoward attention regarding the hijinks of our students. It would not serve St. Sophia’s, nor its students or alumnae, for the community or the press to believe that our institution is not a safe place for its students.”

I don’t know what she knew about what went on—or what she thought went on—but she was certainly keen on keeping it quiet.

“I also trust that you understand well enough the importance of caring for your physical well-being, and that you will take sufficient care to ensure that you do not lose consciousness again.”

That made me sit up a little straighter. What did she think—that I was starving myself and I’d passed out for lack of food? If only she’d seen the private moment I shared with the pudding cup earlier.

“I take care of myself,” I assured her.

“All evidence to the contrary.”

Okay, honestly, there was a tiny part of me that wanted to rat on Scout, Jason, Michael, and the rest of the Adepts, or at least on the brat packers who threw me into harm’s way. It would have been satisfying to wipe that smug expression from Foley’s face, and replace it with something a bit more sympathetic.

There were two problems with that theory.

First, I wasn’t entirely sure Foley was capable of sympathy.

Second, I had to be honest. I hadn’t gone downstairs because Veronica and the rest of her cronies had forced me. And I’d made my way down the other hallway—and into the Reapers’ path—because I’d decided to play junior explorer. I’d been curious, and I’d walked that plank willingly.