I doubted she expected me to follow a single thing she’d just said. But her patronizing vocabulary was no match for my previous education or the well-read parents who’d raised me. I wished I hadn’t followed what she’d said. I wished I didn’t know what she thought. My heartbeat thumped in my ears, and I dug my fingernails into my palms to stop angry tears before they even gathered. Glassy eyes would make me look weak.

‘You think … I’ll contaminate the other students.’ My voice scraped its way out of my throat, betraying the emotion I’d intended to suppress, but she didn’t seem to notice. She was too startled.

Her eyes widened, but somehow, that didn’t counter the beadiness. She was the scariest woman I’d ever met. Her hands flattened on the desktop. ‘Well, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I’m merely making certain you understand the notion of zero tolerance, Mr Maxfield.’ My back teeth ground against each other. She stood, so I did, too. I didn’t want her staring down at me. ‘Simply follow my rules while you’re in my house … or you’ll be out on your butt, mister.’

My first day of high school, and I’m being threatened with expulsion?

I decided not to give her any more information about what I could or couldn’t follow. She was the type who shot first and asked questions later. If ever.

I nodded once, a jerk of my head, and she dismissed me.

It had been 339 days since my mother died.

It felt like years. It felt like hours.

LUCAS

I stood unmoving, eyes on the back doorway, while my conscience and an obsession I couldn’t seem to bring under control began a throw-down battle in my head.

This might be my only chance to ever talk to Jackie Wallace. I’d not seen her – on campus or off – a single time since she quit coming to class.

But what the hell would I say to her?

And then there was the guy who’d followed her outside. She clearly knew him. Maybe they’d decided to meet up, away from prying eyes. Or he’d been waiting for a chance with her, too, and unlike me, he was taking it – instead of wasting time with pointless internal arguments.

Maybe she’d just decided to leave early, and so did he, with no relation between their actions.

Or maybe I was squandering valuable seconds doing nothing.

My inner adolescent was growing enraged at my reticence. Put that rancid cup of crap down, follow her outside and say something – anything, dammit.

First thought – I could tell her I was the tutor in the class, and I noticed she’d missed a number of class days, including the midterm, but hadn’t dropped. Right after trailing her into a dark parking lot. I’d be lucky if she didn’t knee me in the balls first and ask questions later.

The last drop date was three days away, though. I could save her from an F on her transcript, if nothing else. Propelling my ass off the wall, I abandoned the supposed conversation I was having with the whiny semi-bombed chick in the middle of her rant.

Walking straight to the back door and out, I told myself that if Jackie Wallace and the meathead vampire were getting chatty – or worse – I would arc round to the front, get on my bike, and forget she ever existed.

Sure you will. All those meticulous details you’ve spent the past nine weeks analysing and burning into your brain will just dissolve away. No big deal.

Shut up.

For a few seconds, I was afraid I’d missed her. There was a threat of storms overnight, and the wind blew the gathering cloud cover, deepening shadows and making illuminated areas infrequent and short-lived. I spotted her by her glowing cell phone. She was texting someone, winding through the cars and trucks at the far end of the lot. Her vampire friend was between the two of us, and he sure looked like he was shadowing her. He didn’t call out to warn her, though, the jackwad. He was going to scare the shit out of her if he just popped up out of nowhere.

I took a deep breath, shuffled down the back steps and started slowly in her direction, prepared to turn round on a dime.

Likelihood I was about to regret this entire night? Ninety-five per cent.

On the very back row, she unlocked the door of a shiny dark truck. Interesting. I wouldn’t have pictured her driving a pick-up. Maybe a little sports car or a compact hatchback. Her friend came up behind her and they both moved into the space on the other side of the open door. I couldn’t see either of them clearly, and I had zero desire to witness them tonsil-checking each other.

Time to turn round. Except – the fact that he’d never called out to her bugged me. At best, he thought scaring women in deserted parking lots was funny. At worst –

She screamed. Once, cut off abruptly.

I stopped dead. And then I ran.

I’ve rarely allowed my temper free rein in the past three or four years, because I know too well the potential consequences of doing so. But when I saw his body on top of hers across the seat of her truck and heard her sobbing, begging him to stop, I lost it. No amount of self-restraint would have prevented the outcome – assuming I’d been inclined to calm myself.

I wasn’t.

Grabbing two handfuls of his shirt, I yanked him from the truck. He was kinda drunk. The degree of drunk that makes idiots think, I’m cool. I can drive – no problem. Just enough to slur a word here or there. Just enough to render him ineffectual in a fight against anyone who knew what he was doing.

I knew what I was doing.

I was going to kill him and worry about the consequences later. This was not a hope or an opinion. This was a fact. He was a dead man.