Perfect.

Gale held up her palm. "Okay, so you are emancipated because..."

Garcia nodded. "I know why," he said quietly. "It gets that restraining order moved into permanent status."

Jade didn't say anything, she just nodded. My hands itched to draw her in next to me.

Ached with it.

I stood there doing nothing instead. It sucked pretty good. Then the distraction of the J's were upon us.

Jonesy bulldozed into the room and said without preamble, "What's with the cop huddle?" His hand was fisting two cookies and chewing with his mouth open.

Jade laughed and the tension slid out of me a little. If the J's were here... my main dudes made the cop pill go down a little better.

Nobody answered and Jonesy bellowed, "Huh?"

Garcia flinched and said, "Give a person a chance to respond, Jones."

"Right, like you were doing any of that."

Garcia's brow shot up and John interjected, "Answering, Detective Garcia."

Tulle huffed saying, "I do not think I need Misters Jones and Terran here as well." She looked at them, daggers flying out of her eyes. John paled a little, making his freckles stick out like golden measles on his face but Jonesy said, "Why not?" and shrugged. He was gonna make her answer.

Cripes.

Jade looked down at her feet while Tulle sputtered, "I do not have to explain myself to an uncouth young man such as you," she stabbed her finger toward the threshold of the door and continued, "you may find your way out on your own accord."

Jonesy gave Tulle a speculative look. Finally he said, "Okay, chillax... but, you still didn't tell me why."

Oh. My. God.

"Jonester, can you just..." I made the motion for him to get out again.

"Listen, let's take this somewhere more private," Garcia said. He approached Tulle and said, "We'll be in touch. Thank you for alerting us. We'll have a tech team here to evaluate the lock." She nodded, thanking him and giving us kids a stern look. "Maybe a little distance from the company you keep may be a thing to consider, Mr. Hart."

That pissed me off. Nobody dissed Jonesy. Who hadn't noticed he was being disrespected yet.

"I like the company," I said. She glared at me and I glared right back.

Jade pulled me into the hall before one of the three of us said something really bad.

The cops made their whispered goodbyes with Tulle and she shut the door of her Domain, the pissed off crescent of her face showing until the last second.

Jade sighed and looked at Jonesy. "That didn't go well!" she hissed at him.

He shrugged. "Just showing support, Jade. Can't help it if you got an uptight Empath teacher."

Jade rolled her eyes and the rest of the gang showed up.

Wonderful.

Garcia and Gale took in the loose group of teens. "We are going to say the bare minimum here but as of now, there is no crime."

"Yeah there is," Jonesy interrupted and I about died. This was getting uber-complicated.

Garcia said, "Enlighten us, Mark," he said with a ghost of a smile.

Jonesy frowned, nobody called him his real name. "That was random, Garcia. Yeah, back on topic: we already know that someone sucked up the sample incognito-like."

John stumbled back at the use of Jonesy having vocabulary, the rest of the group was similarly stunned.

Gale recovered first. "Who blew the whistle? We just got here. No one should have known about the stolen sample."

Jade made a small sound and gave Sophie a guilty look. "It was just a really small pulse," Jade said, holding her index and thumb very close together.

Gale sighed. "Okay kids, let's go outside so we don't have any more spillage."

We trooped out there together to where the Dreaded Cruiser sat. The same one that we sat in a lot last year. I used my hand to shade my eyes and peered in the back. Yup, still gross.

"Caleb?" Garcia asked, bringing me back to the present. I backed away and turned to them.

Gale looked at the kids assembled. Now that it was after school, Bry was here, Mia, Alex, Sophie and...Tiff came walking up.

"Huh, what's goin' on?" she snapped her gum. Then a manic light came into her eyes. "I know," she snapped her fingers in delight, "Carson Hamilton got hit by a semi-truck and even now invites us to his death bed to make amends." She searched our faces and Garcia groaned.

"I will pretend I didn't hear a comment that sounded like you were gleeful about someone else coming to harm," Gale said.

"But..." she began and Bry said, "Can it, Tiff," not unkindly.

Her mouth snapped shut and she began to work over the mound of gum buried in its depths.

Alex said, "Why not? I mean, I just read that having a vivid fantasy life keeps people from committing various atrocities in real life," he said, pushing up his glasses.

Gale looked at him, way up at him. "You're a very strange guy, Alex."

He grinned, he wasn't strange to himself and seemed untroubled that others thought he was. Like Jonesy in a macabre sort of way.

The guys smiled and so did Tiff. Jade and Sophie looked at him like he had a third head.

"Okay, so here's the thing," Gale began, her eyes flicking once more to Alex, then shaking her head. "We return here when the school is closed, do a routine scan," she looked at Jade for confirmation and she nodded, "then, after our Empath gets a 'feel' for who broke the pulse-security, we can go from there."

That's interesting. "Where's the 'from there' part?" I asked. A little vague for my liking. Using my girlfriend for whatever.

Hated it.

Garcia gave me a sharp look. I'd hit on something.

"We're going to get a baseline for who may have been responsible for the break-in, then, we're going to take a field trip to the other schools."

"What?! Like where other kids can see her?" That's all we needed, is the attacker getting an eyeful of Jade. Yeah, that really worked for me.

"Give me a little credit, Caleb." Garcia gave me level eyes while Sophie looked at Jade nervously. "School will not be in session when we have Jade scan."

"What if she finds DI in more places than one?" John asked logically and Jonesy gave him a knuckle bump. Terran had the goods.

Jade said, "From what Tulle tells me, I'll recognize his... signature."

I saw her discomfort and didn't hesitate this time, I pulled her in tight against me, her head against my chest, my arms wrapped around her. The tiny thing she was, she just fit against me perfect.

The cops didn't say anything.

"So, Jade will know it is the perpetrator..." John began.

"Instead of some random slug," Jonesy finished.

Nice.

"Hell, let her do a sweep! Clean out the schools, Jade." Jonesy fist-pumped the air.

Gale hid her smile and Garcia said, "That's enough Jones. I give you quite a bit of latitude..."

"Because of my awesomeness, I know," Jonesy said without guile.

"No..." Garcia began.

But Gale said, "Raul, give it up."

He tapped his notepad and shook his head. "Right." He slapped it shut. He turned to me, ignoring Jonesy who smirked in triumph. "Caleb, I want you to talk with your parents so when I show up at your house it doesn't come as a shock."

I grinned. "I don't think my parents are easily shocked."

A random image of Clyde languishing around the trash separators outside the house came to mind. I think my parents are mainly on board for the weirdness that was my life.

"Right," Garcia said with a sigh.

Jade stepped away from the cradle of my body. "Wait."

They turned, Garcia's thumb on the pulse-lock.

"When- when will you be...?" she trailed off.

"In the next day or two."

"Okay," she said.

We watched the cruiser pull away.

*

Tiff turned to Jade and I. "So, does this have anything to do with that AP dickless that's running around trying to ravage all the girls while they're in their," she waved a vague hand around, "comas or whatever." She snapped a series of bubbles with her gum. It sounded somewhere between a gun and firecrackers.

Bry scrubbed his face. "Tiff... shit, could ya be just a little sensitive?"

Tiff looked at Sophie and Jade, their faces held identical pinched expressions. Sophie's was the worst. Her skin had a pallor to it, she was slightly ashen under her normally light coffee skin.

"Hell, soooorrry!" she stomped off.

Bry mouthed sorry to us and walked off after her.

Jonesy nodded in semi-approval. "Tiff says it like it is." Then he looked at Sophie and his face sobered in a hurry. Tears chased each other down her face and he said, "Come on, Soph, that's just Tiff. She has a hole under her nose and a perpetual case of diarrhea." He held out his hands in supplication.

"Amen," Terran said, Alex nodding in agreement.

I could hear Tiff and Bry yammering in the background.

Jade put her arm around Sophie, careful not to touch her skin. "It's gonna be okay."

Sophie looked up, her swimming aqua eyes underscored by dark circles that looked like bruises framed them. "It's not Tiff. I know she doesn't have a filter. It's just... the threat of something I can't protect myself from."

I hit on something. "What about your boyfriend? Buddy? Isn't he... can't he be The Man here?" I said, trying my damnedest not to let sarcasm drip from every syllable.

I guess I wasn't really successful because Sophie's tears dried up and Jade gave me The Look.

Well hell.

Jonesy grinned. "I think his man status is in question."

Tiff came stomping back with Bry on her heels just as Mia rolled up in her car with a soft honk. Bry whipped his head around and stared. She smiled back at him and he was temporarily dazed.

Even I wasn't that bad.

Terran saw me looking at the pair and said, "You're gone too, Hart."

Nice, busted.

Tiff stomped over to Sophie, who was a few inches taller and said, "Sorry Soph, I wasn't trying to pee in your Wheaties or anything."

Sophie smiled. "It's okay. I'm just scared is all," she said, tucking her cloud of hair behind her shoulder.

Jonesy hovered around uselessly at her elbow and she swatted him away like the fly he was. He walked off a few paces, grumbling.

Tiff smiled. "I just wanna kick that guy's ass," she said, smacking her fist into her palm.

John and Alex frowned, taking a look at the Intimidation Factor of Tiff.

There was none. She was bigger than Jade but not by much. She couldn't really hurt anyone. Her mouth was her biggest weapon. I'd say that was finely honed.

Bry finally woke up and turned on her. "K... that's enough Tiff. I know that you hold your own around the house but don't go off half-cocked thinkin' you can take on some sleazy dude that's trying to hurt girls. No."

The guys looked at Tiff. "I don't need a man to protect me. You oughta know, bro. When it comes to take downs I do okay."

"You sure do, for your size. But look at us all now, Tiff." He swept his palm out at the loose group of guys.

She looked around at the J's, me, Alex, whose muscles looked like tumors or something, and finally settled on Bry. Then her eyes shifted to Jade (who had finally topped out at five-three), Sophie and Mia. Among the girls, Sophie was the "biggest" and she was still a couple of inches shorter than Jonesy, the shortest of the dudes at five-ten.

Tiff huffed in frustration. Bry's eyebrows came together. "Heard you were busy getting under Hamilton's skin?"

She shrugged, her blue hoodie moving with her shoulder, a bubble popping. "What about it?"

"Did you seriously say they didn't have dicks?" he asked, incredulous, suppressing laughter.

"Nah," she said.

The guys all looked at her.

"What?" she squeaked.

"You sorta did. You can't tell them stuff like they can't see it and it would be easy for them to scorch it off, without them getting a clue on their lacking proportions," John said by way of clarifying.

"Yeah, whatever, they don't scare me. Let 'em try!" She crossed her arms defiantly.

John and Bry's eyes met. "Was he gonna hurt her?"

John's eyes didn't waver. "Maybe."

"Definitely," Sophie said.

"It's okay, pal," Jonesy said, clapping Bry on the back, "Brett, that ass hat, said he'd take it out of your corn cob, or one of your brothers." Jonesy stepped back, spreading his arms wide.