Sweet Evil (The Sweet Trilogy #1)(7)

Using my extended senses to find that stupid hot dog smell had put my thoughts in a jumble. A mile from my apartment I allowed my eyes to search, and then linger on a dark, abandoned house as we passed it. I stared at the boarded-up windows singed black, and the roof half-caved by devouring flames from long ago. If I let myself remember, I could probably still smell it and taste it like a mouthful of ash....

I was awoken at two a.m. a week before my ninth birthday with the powerful smell of smoke burning my nose. Our home was on fire. I got down just as I’d been taught and crawled through the darkness to Patti’s room, feeling like I might hyperventilate.

“Wake up,” I said. “There’s smoke!”

Patti jumped from her bed in a panic, running into the hall. And then she just stood there as I coughed and choked. She rushed through each room, and even went outside to peek at the nearby complexes.

“There’s no fire in the apartments, honey. Must have been a bad dream. Climb in bed with me tonight, and I’ll take care of you.”

It had been a bad dream, but not in the way she meant. For the family a mile away whose burning home I could smell as if it were our own, it had been a real-life nightmare. It had been a long, painful night for me as well: the night my five senses began to enhance.

“Dreaming of Kaidan Rowe, huh?”

I looked up. We were parked in front of my building.

“No,” I muttered. “I was not thinking about him.”

Jay laughed and I backhanded his big arm once again.

I sighed, imagining how he would react if I told him that I had the nose of an überhound and eyes like binoculars. He was totally cool with my being eccentric, but he didn’t know the extent of it.

“Thanks for taking me tonight,” I said. “I had fun.”

“For real? I knew you’d like it! So, I’ll pick you up for school on Monday?”

“Yeah, see you then.”

I climbed out and headed up the steps, feeling resentful toward that Kaidan kid for making me open my memory to things that were better off boarded up.

CHAPTER TWO

GOOD-GIRL SYNDROME

Patti was frying eggs in our small apartment when I came in from my jog on Monday morning. I leaned over the counter to watch. She used her wrist to push a strawberry blond curl from her face. When the strand fell again, I reached over and wrapped it behind her ear. A translucent, pale yellow emotion swirled around her chest, wafting warmly toward me.

She flipped the egg, tsking when the yolk broke. Watching her at the stove, I wished she were my real mother so I could have inherited some of her genetics. I’d love to share her thick curls and soft voluptuousness.

Of course she’d waited up for me to get home Saturday night, then hounded me for details, pretending to be excited for me when I could see she was overflowing with anxiety. I gave her the G-rated version, leaving out the bits about lying to people and having strange encounters with a boy. She’d bitten her lip as I spoke and searched my face, but then accepted my story and relaxed.

Patti handed me a plate and shooed me off with a wave of the spatula. I sat at our round dining table, pushing aside a pile of unpaid bills and photo proofs from her freelance photography jobs.

“What are you up to today?” I asked her.

“The Dispatch hired me to shoot a press conference with the governor this morning. I should be home around four.”

Noticing the time, I scarfed down my breakfast and hurried to get ready.

Fifteen minutes later I kissed Patti, preparing to dash out the door, but she cupped my cheek with a gentle hand to still me.

“I love you, sweet girl.” Light pink love fluttered around her body.

“Love you, too,” I said. She patted my cheek and I left.

Jay always picked me up for school at exactly 7:10. He was prompt. I liked that.

“’Sup?” he said when I climbed in the car. His eyes were still puffy from his having just rolled out of bed.

“Mornin’, sunshine,” I said. It took two hard pulls on the creaky car door before it finally slammed shut. I twisted my wet hair and hung it over my shoulder. It would dry straight and I’d pull it back.

We usually drove to school in silence, because Jay wasn’t a morning person, but we hadn’t had a chance to talk since he brought me home Saturday night.

“I always wondered what your type was, but I never imagined it would be a hard-core rocker!”

Here we go. I had been hoping he’d be too sleepy for this conversation.

“He’s not my type. If I had a type it would be... nice. Not some hotheaded, egocentric male slut.”

“Did you just call him a male slut?” Jay laughed. “Dang, that’s, like, the worst language I’ve ever heard you use.”

I glowered at him, feeling ashamed, and he laughed even harder.

“Oh, hey, I’ve got a joke for you. What do you call someone who hangs out with musicians?”

He raised his eyebrows and I shrugged. “I don’t know. What?”

“A drummer!” I shook my head while he cracked up at his joke for another minute before hounding me again about Kaidan. “All right, so you talked about my CDs, you had some cultural confusion with some of his lingo, then you talked about hot dogs? That can’t be everything. You looked seriously intense.”

“That’s because he was intense, even though we weren’t really talking about anything. He made me nervous.”