When the Shadows Fall by Elise Noble

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER 29 - SKY

“SKY, CAN I borrow your highlighter?” Vanessa asked.

“Borrow anything of mine you want. What are roommates for?”

I’d spent the past three days settling into the new normal. Since I caught Asher on Wednesday night, he’d kept his word and studied with me and Vanessa before dinner each day, although he hadn’t let Vanessa in on his secret. I’d covered for him a little. Read the odd sentence out loud, leaned over and corrected a word or two when she wasn’t looking, that sort of thing. Yes, he’d cheated his way through the biology test yesterday, but so had I, just in a different way. Asher was trying.

He was easy to get along with too. The three of us had taken to studying in his apartment. I figured that with Vanessa there, the rumours wouldn’t start to fly, although one of Asher’s dorm buddies had made a crack about a threesome. Asher glared at him until he held his hands up, apologised, and backed away.

Those evenings were oddly pleasant. They made me realise what my teenage years should have been like if my father hadn’t been an abusive arsehole and I hadn’t been forced onto the streets to survive. But what was the point in dwelling on the past? I couldn’t change it. And now Emmy had given me a second chance. I was getting paid to glue jelly beans onto canvas and run around a sports field and learn about chemistry. Perhaps even more than one kind of chemistry.

If only I’d known that this was the calm before the storm.

The wind began whipping up the next day. Labor Day. Also known as a day off to celebrate work. How ironic. Half of my fellow students had gone to the mall to take advantage of the discounts, and the other half were lying around on the lawn, making the most of the bumper picnic the catering staff had prepared. At that point, the sun was still shining.

And we were still studying. The workload was getting heavier, and we had another test on Thursday. Chemistry this time. I’d spent the afternoon studying alcohol, but the boring kind you couldn’t drink. Vanessa was making little notecards for us all, hence needing the highlighter, but Asher had already looked alarmed when she waved one in his face and asked him what he thought. Yes, he’d praised her efforts, but I knew he wouldn’t use them. And after dinner, when he said he needed a few hours to himself, I knew exactly what he planned to do.

“No,” I whispered, and Vanessa gave me a curious look.

“I need to.”

“Need to what?” Vanessa asked.

I was gonna go to hell for lying. “Asher sometimes has a sneaky beer in the evenings. He’s meant to be quitting.” I swivelled to face him, arms folded. “Aren’t you?”

“I’m cutting down.”

Vanessa’s hesitant smile was at odds with Asher’s glower. “You have beer here?”

“Sure, you want one?”

“No!” I said. “No beer for either of you.”

“Aw, Sky, don’t be such a stick-in-the-mud. I really need a beer today.”

“Why? What happened?”

Vanessa quickly back-pedalled. “Nothing. Forget I said a word.”

Asher tried too. “Vanessa, just tell us.”

“Honestly, it’s no big deal. Deandra elbowed me in the ribs, that’s all. It might even have been an accident.”

An accident. Right. “Did she say anything?”

“Not a word. But I think maybe… Maybe it was a reminder that she hasn’t forgotten about the toilet incident. Was that you? She told people it was, but then Tiffany said Deandra didn’t see the person’s face, just said that they were really strong, so I guess it could’ve been a guy.”

I shrugged. “It’s a mystery.”

Beside her, Asher rolled his eyes, and I kicked him under the table. We’d finish discussing this later.

“Later” turned out to be just after ten. Past curfew, and definitely way too late for an argument over the wisdom of breaking into Dr. Merritt’s office. I caught Asher creeping up to the side door of the main building.

“Boo.”

“Fuck!” He clapped a hand over his chest. “You scared the shit out of me.”

“You should be more aware of your surroundings.”

Gah. Now I sounded like Rafael.

“Hey, it’s not as if I do this for a living.”

No, that was me.

“You’d be terrible at it.”

Emmy was on duty tonight, and she agreed with me. “Bloody hopeless.”

“Agreed,” Asher conceded. “But if you’ve come to stop me, then don’t bother.”

“I haven’t come to stop you from pilfering another bloody test paper. I’ve come to stop you from getting caught.”

Asher’s expression softened, and he brushed a stray lock of hair away from my face. That one touch made my skin tingle all over.

“That’s the sweetest thing anyone’s ever done for me. But I’ll be fine.”

Maybe, maybe not. I didn’t like taking chances. And although I’d never admit it, I wanted that chemistry paper too. It was the one subject Rune couldn’t help me with in real time, and half of Vanessa’s notecards appeared to be written in Swahili.

“Dr. Merritt’s office is at the end of a hallway. You need a lookout.”

Asher tilted his head to one side. “How do you know that?”

Oops. “Mr. Rosenberg introduced us on my interview day. Get a move on—we can’t stand out here all night.”

I didn’t have to tell him twice. He swiped his pass card, and a quiet beep let us know the door was open. Mack had already investigated the locking system, and it was basic. Each entry and exit was recorded as an event, but user names weren’t registered. And the internal doors still used old-fashioned keys, the staff offices included. What else would we expect from a gang of thieves whose primary method of communication was the US Postal Service?

Asher caught my hand in his as we stole through the hallways. Enough lights were on that we didn’t trip, and we both knew the way in any case. Left, right, left, left, right. It didn’t take long for us to reach the door we needed, and Asher produced a slim leather wallet from his back pocket. Lock picks. Nice.

When he saw me looking, that brilliant smile came back. “Told you I was good with my hands.”

Just for a second, the twinkle in his eye turned to something altogether more intense, and I wondered what else those hands could do. Then I gave myself a mental slap. Wrong time, wrong place, Sky.

A quiet click, and the door swung open. Asher had managed that even faster than I would have. Nobody would ever beat Ravi, but nonetheless, I was impressed.

Although I was playing lookout, I needed a few seconds inside. Why? Because I had an ulterior motive. I hadn’t yet managed to bug Dr. Merritt’s office, so I figured I’d kill two birds with one stone. Using a mains-powered widget was out of the question, but Nate had supplied me with smaller ones too, tiny dots that I could attach anywhere. The batteries would only last a couple of weeks, but if this job took any longer than that, we’d have bigger problems than a lack of power. The number of staff Blackwood had committed to the operation wasn’t sustainable indefinitely.

While Asher headed to the filing cabinet, I took a quick look around, used a fingernail to activate the bug via its tiny switch, peeled the backing off the adhesive pad, and stuck the thing under the desk.

“I’ll wait at the end of the corridor,” I whispered.

“Five minutes.”

It turned out we only had two.

Footsteps sounded, the distinctive clip of leather-soled Oxfords on wood. I waited a moment, listening for the direction. Shit! Someone was heading towards us, a man, and one who belonged there. No hesitation in his steps. I scooted back to Asher.

“We have to go.”

“I need another minute.”

“We don’t have another minute. Somebody’s coming right now.”

“Just two more pages.”

“Sky, get out,” Emmy ordered.

But I couldn’t. I couldn’t leave Asher.

“Hurry up!”

Time seemed to slow, and every tick of the clock squeezed a metal band around my chest tighter, tighter, tighter as Asher stuffed the test paper back into the filing cabinet and eased the drawer shut. We made it out of the office and got the door closed, but it was too late. Whoever was coming, they were right there. Five more steps and they’d walk around the corner.

My brain went into overdrive. We needed an excuse. An excuse for being where we shouldn’t have been, doing things we shouldn’t have been doing. Hmm… Things we shouldn’t have been doing… It was worth a shot. Truth be told, we didn’t have much choice.

“Kiss me,” I hissed.

“What?” Asher’s eyes saucered.

I didn’t bother to explain, just flung an arm around his neck and stood on tiptoes. A lightbulb pinged on as he finally understood, and the scoundrel actually had the presence of mind to squeeze my ass. He’d pay for that later. But for now, his gaze met mine, then his lips, and as Ezra Rosenberg appeared, Asher’s tongue joined the party. I might have sighed if I hadn’t been holding my breath.

“What’s going on here?”

The overhead light flickered on, and I blinked a few times, but otherwise my body was frozen. Asher and I both slowly turned our heads, but he didn’t let go of me. If anything, the arm around my waist tightened. I didn’t have to fake my trepidation. Emmy started laughing, the bitch.

“What are you doing in here?” Ezra asked.

“What does it look like?” Asher countered.

“This area is off limits, and so are the other students. We spoke about this. And you, Sky… I’m disappointed. This isn’t how we behave at Shadow Falls Academy.”

“Sorry,” I mumbled, relief flooding through me that he seemed to have bought our act.

“Go back to your rooms, both of you. We’ll deal with this in the morning.”