No messages.
No missed calls.
I dialed Daniel’s number. He picked up on the fifth ring.
“Hey, what’s up?” he said a little too casually. He sounded like me when I was trying too hard to seem normal.
I could hear faint music and a ticking sound—maybe that cat clock of Maryanne’s in his apartment?—in the background. I also heard what sounded like someone else speaking in a hushed tone.
“Where are you?” I asked.
“Home.”
“Is somebody there?”
“No. Just watching TV.” I heard him cough and then the sounds of the music, and the voice died away.
“You didn’t call. You promised you’d call, but you didn’t.” Never mind the fact that I wouldn’t have been there to answer—but still.
“I’m sorry,” he said. No explanation offered.
“So where were you this afternoon? I sat there waiting for you for almost an hour. I thought you wanted to help me with my application.”
“I do, Gracie. But something came up, okay?”
“What? What could possibly come up that you’d forget? You didn’t even call.”
Daniel sighed. He stayed silent for a moment. “Katie called me this morning. She was freaking out because her little brothers got into her room and trashed all the posters we’d made for the fund-raising booths. She came over so we could make all new ones, and it was so much work … I guess I just lost track of time.”
“Wait, you’re telling me that you stood me up because you were with Katie, alone, in your apartment, and you lost track of time? What the hell were you two really doing?”
Daniel swore under his breath. “It’s not like how it sounds. You know me better than that.”
“Do I?” I hated myself for getting so mad. I mean, if I told him what I’d been up to this evening, it would sound just as bad. But what I’d done was all in the name of finding Jude. It had a higher purpose behind it—unlike Daniel, who had just blown me off to paint pictures with another girl. Something that used to be our thing. “You’ve been hanging out in bars, lying to me, running out on dinner, and standing me up. I feel like I barely even know you anymore.”
“Gracie, please …”
“I’m starting to think that your dodging me like this is your way of letting me know you’d rather forget about me and go to Trenton with Katie.”
“Don’t, Grace,” Daniel snapped.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t ever think anyone or anything in this world could really make me forget about you.”
I sighed. “Then why are you avoiding me?” I remembered that text message that sent him running from dinner. He’d claimed it was from Mr. Day. But did Mr. Day even know how to text? “Is there something else going on? Just tell me, please.”
“I can’t.” He took in a deep breath. “I just need some time. I need you to be patient with me.”
“But—”
“I just need some more time. That’s all I’m asking for.”
He’d all but admitted there was something wrong, and he wanted me just to drop it? But wasn’t that what I wanted, too? Just a little more time before I told him about Talbot training me? It felt so different when he was the one keeping secrets.
“How much more time, Daniel? Because I don’t know how much longer I can wait.”
“I don’t know. I really don’t know.”
My heart ached. I could feel something pulling and straining between us—about to break. It had been only a week and a half since we’d lain together on a bed of grass, watching the stars fall around us, but it suddenly felt like a lifetime ago.
I wanted to be in that place again. Wanted nothing to come between us. Wanted to spill all my secrets so he’d tell me his.
But he doesn’t trust you.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” I said before I hung up the phone.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Final Exam
THE NEXT DAY
I barely slept at all after I got home from the club. I regretted leaving before the SKs got there, but at the same time I knew that I had needed to get away from Pete. And I wondered if I’d done the right thing by not just telling Daniel everything.
But I still couldn’t do it.
If Talbot had found and followed those SKs last night, then it meant we’d be closer than ever to finding Jude. And I couldn’t risk anyone interfering with that.
Daniel and I sat next to each other in AP art like usual. He passed me my pastels when I asked him to, and I nodded when he suggested I use a darker blue than the one I’d selected. But you’d think we were two strangers forced to share the same table, the way our eyes barely met when we talked.
I couldn’t help letting out a small growl when Katie came over to the table to ask Daniel if he still had one of her brushes. I hated the way she looked at him. I hated her shiny hair, her too-cool haircut, and her vintage-style headband with the funky ribbon flower just above her ear.
Daniel opened his bag and pulled out her brush. I wondered if he’d borrowed it while they were working together in his apartment yesterday. And did she just touch his fingers when he handed it her?
“You okay, Grace?” she asked.
I didn’t answer.
I welcomed the bell ringing to signify that it was time to move on to the next class, and I could barely wait for the last period of the day, when I could get away from this school and all these people and head out to the Good Samaritan project. I wanted to see Talbot. Talk to someone who understood me. But mostly I needed to know if he’d found those SKs last night.
I stopped at my locker on my way to the bus. I couldn’t find the stake Talbot had given me, and I wanted to look for it one more time. It wasn’t there. I slammed my locker door shut and was about to go when I saw Katie again. She carried a box of poster paints in her arms, headed toward the main hall.
She was probably on her way to make more posters with Daniel.
It seemed like good luck for her that her brothers had ruined most of the posters—she’d get more undivided time with my boyfriend. It was convenient, actually, and the timing all too suspicious. She’d been in the art room when Daniel and I had made plans for our picnic, and now I was supposed to believe her little crisis just happened to come at the exact same time?