Conspiracies - Mercedes Lackey [114]
As Spirit stood there, nursing her soda, she felt someone come up close beside her. She turned. It was Mandy, the girl-geek from Breakthrough, and she had a guy with her. A guy who was pretty much a dead ringer for Jensen Ackles from Supernatural, except with a pair of wire-rim glasses that made him look even hotter. If that was possible. Spirit’s Spidey-Sense went off the scale, because Breakthrough could not possibly have picked someone more like what her Dream Guy would have looked like … a year or two ago.
“Hey,” Mandy said, far too casually. “This’s Clark, he’s another codehead. He saw you in the dining hall and wanted to meet you, so I said I’d introduce you. Clark, this is Spirit.”
“Hey,” Spirit said, forcing herself to look pleased. “My so-called date kind of ran off on me.”
“Yeah, I saw,” Clark said, with a far-too-ingratiating grin. “Well, it’s supposed to be a Sadie Hawkins thing, right? So, can you pick someone else instead?”
Way to go with the subtle hints, bozo, she thought. “I don’t know,” she replied hesitantly. “I mean, he—”
“You do know he’s gay, right?” Clark interrupted, getting a little closer as Mandy vanished into the crowd around the soda table. “I mean, I could tell when I walked in, and … uh, magician here. Sorry.”
If Loch hadn’t told her himself— If they all hadn’t known what the Breakthrough people were doing— Spirit shut those thoughts away and concentrated on acting like this was a confusing—and unwelcome—surprise.
“Wait, what?” she said. “What do you mean? He’s—”
“I mean, if you think he accepted your invite for any other reason than to drool over the other guys, Spirit, I’m sorry.” Clark moved even closer. “Don’t think I’m gay-bashing. I’m not. But I thought you had the right to know in case you were going to fall for him. And I think whatever the rules for this thing are, if he didn’t tell you he wasn’t really interested, that pretty much undoes you inviting him, doesn’t it?”
Now Spirit was actually beginning to feel a little alarmed—first that this “Clark” was coming on so strong, and second that if she wasn’t nice to him, he’d out Loch, right here at the dance. She really didn’t know what to do, and her apparent confusion was very real.
“Come on, try me out with a dance,” Clark coaxed. He took her hand and gave her no alternative other than to pull away—which was no alternative at all, if she wanted to keep up the pretense of being the shy little hippie chick.
Which was right when Burke swooped in from out of nowhere and saved her.
“Hi, this is my dance, I think,” he said, cutting in. “Besides, I bet there are a lot of Breakthrough gals closer to your age who’d appreciate someone who can dance.”
Clark colored a little. “Look, kid, just because you’re one of the Big Bad Jocks—”
“Seriously, didn’t anyone ever teach you that you don’t try and make moves on a girl who’s going steady?” Burke said, with a mocking tone to his voice Spirit had never heard before. “Oh wait—you’re a code-monkey, and that sort of etiquette goes straight over your head, right? Well, here’s your fast education. You don’t haul someone else’s girl off for a dance, and you don’t ever mess with a jock’s steady. Got it? Great. Buh-bye.” He made a little finger-wiggle at Clark, who slunk away, muttering. Then he put his arms around Spirit and they started slow-dancing away from the Breakthrough geek corner. Before the crowd hid them, Spirit saw Clark arguing with Mandy.
“Um. Thanks,” Spirit said, feeling awkward. “The only thing is, that wasn’t true.”
“I know,” Burke replied, and flushed as he looked down at her. “But would you like it to be?”
All she could do was look up into his eyes and say, “Um—”
Which was precisely when the lights went out, the temperature dropped down to freezing, and the terror descended.
The terror wiped away her astonishment at Burke’s question. Before the terror could take hold, she took a deep breath and yelled into the silence: “Rave! RAVE!”
Burke bellowed the same word as he seized