Cassie and Melissa exchanged a small smile before Cassie turned to look up at him, her eyes gleaming with a teasing light. “I won’t make you coordinate, but you probably will win king.”
Devon started, his hands tightened upon her. He glanced back to where Marcy still stood, tuning his ears in order to hear what they were saying. He had to sort through all of the background noise before pinpointing the exact conversation. It took him only a second to do this, but no human ever could. It was not within their capabilities. Only one of his kind would be able to pick up the conversation, and Cassie most definitely was not a vampire. The sweet blood pumping through her veins was a constant, tortuous, tempting reminder of that fact.
He glanced back down at her. Her head was resting trustingly against his shoulder, her hand on his waist. She could not have heard that conversation, it was impossible; it was only a coincidence that she had mocked Marcy’s statement.
“Marcy always did want it though,” Melissa said softly.
“Yes,” Chris agreed.
“And now she has it. Good for her, she’ll do better with it than I would.” Cassie uncurled her hand from his waistband as the bell rang loudly, echoing throughout the parking lot. “Time for school.”
He gathered her books from the roof of the car, tucking them beneath his arm as he led her into the large brick building. Students stopped to watch as they passed, they whispered loudly behind their hands. Melissa walked beside her, her shoulders thrown back proudly, her dark eyes raking over the worst offenders. Many of them shrank from her scathing glare.
Cassie walked proudly beside him, her chin thrust defiantly forward. She stared straight ahead, not bothering to look at anyone else. If it weren’t for her death grip upon his hand, he would have thought that none of this affected her at all. But her tight hold, and the small tremor wracking her, told him that she was hurt by the cold hostility of her classmates.
It took all he had not to destroy every one of them.
***
Cassie walked stiffly through the cafeteria. She tried to ignore the whispers and comments that followed her, but most people were not discreet. In fact, she knew that every one of them wanted her to hear what they had to say. And none of it was good.
She had been called every name in the book today, a few of which she had never even heard of. Titters and whispers preceded, and followed, everywhere she went. Though she tried to play it off as if it didn’t bother her, inside she was a mass of raw emotion and seething nerve endings. She had never been hated before; she had never expected to be hated. Disliked, maybe, but not hated.
And she was hated. It beat against her in waves of anger that made her stomach turn, and her body ache. She hadn’t thought that people could turn against someone so quickly, and so effectively. And she didn’t even know what she had done wrong. Mark had attacked her, not the other way around. She had done nothing to merit this treatment, and because of that fact she was swinging between fierce bouts of anger, and trying hard not to cry as she struggled to keep up a nonchalant appearance.
Her hands shook slightly; she had to take a calming breath in order to steady her tray. She was greatly relieved that Chris was already at the table, his distant gaze scanning the crowd. Dropping her tray on the table, she slid limply into the seat beside him. His tray was loaded with mounds of food that he had not touched yet, which was highly unusual for him.
“You look exhausted,” he said softly.
“Rough day,” she muttered, shoving the tray away from her. She wasn’t in the least bit hungry; other than habit she didn’t even know why she had bothered to stand in line.
“And these are the people that you want to stay and protect.”
Her eyes widened at the cynicism, and anger, in his voice. “Chris.” He turned toward her; the bleak look in his eyes was almost more than she could bear. “They need us,” she finished lamely.
“And they are showing you that need now.”
“Chris, you wanted to stay too.”
“That was before.”
“Before what?”
“Before I saw into what is out there, before I saw into a soul of pure malice and deviance. Before all these people turned against you like a pack of rabid, hungry hyenas.”
She was stunned breathless for a moment, too shocked to move. “You want to leave?” she managed to choke out.
His hard gaze scanned the cafeteria one more time. Finally, his shoulders slumped as he shook his head. “No, I don’t want to leave. I don’t understand what is going on with everyone, but we have to protect them. I know that, I’m just aggravated with these idiots.” He turned back to her, his hand clasped hers tightly. His action caused the buzz in the cafeteria to increase, becoming a dull roar in her ears that was impossible to ignore. “But I also caught a glimpse of what that monster is out there Cass, and all it wants is to play with us, torture us, and then kill us. There is no stopping that kind of determination.”
A chill swept down her back, her hand tightened around his. She could feel the fear that ran through him. What he had seen last night had changed him. It had permeated his bones, seeped into his soul. Her hand tightened around his, trying to give him strength as she sought desperately to ease the pain he radiated.
“We can,” she said more firmly than she actually felt. “Together, we can do anything Chris. We have survived so much, we can, we will, survive this.”
“When did you become the optimistic one?” His smile was wan, but she saw an easing in his eyes that relaxed her slightly. She laughed softly as she leaned against his side.
“How many men does she want?”
Cassie turned at the nasty hiss, her gaze locked fiercely with Marcy’s. Deliberately, defiantly, she lifted Chris’s hand and squeezed it harder. She turned slowly back around, trying to control the anger humming through her body as she focused on Chris again.
“Sure you want to stick around?” Chris’s eyebrows were raised inquisitively, a teasing light reappeared in his sapphire eyes. No matter how awful this day had been for her that gleam in his eyes made it all worth it.
“I’m sure,” Cassie replied, grinning brightly.
“Jerks,” Melissa muttered slamming her tray on the table. “Bunch of idiotic, useless, jerks!”
Cassie and Chris grinned at each other before turning toward Melissa. Her jaw was locked tight; her eyes spit black fire as she glared around the cafeteria. “Tell us how you really feel,” Chris said, issuing the first laugh Cassie had heard from him all day.