Hunted (33 page)

"Hey,
Mathews, how about you stop talking to the skirt and get your head
back in the game before I bench you."

"Just
a sec, Coach. Trust me, taking care of this will help me keep my head
in the game."

His
coach, a massive guy who looked like he'd probably played on the line
back in his glory days, was obviously not very happy about the fact
that Tristan was blowing off the game to talk to me, but apparently
he felt like he could only push his star quarterback so far.

"I
don't want to get you in trouble."

Tristan
waved my concern away. "The defense is doing their thing, my
watching isn't going to make much of a difference. Besides, the worst
that could happen will be that he'll bench me for a couple of games
which would just mean that we'd lose. He's not going to do that
without a lot more reason than this."

Tristan
put the phone back up to his ear—apparently he'd remembered the
number and it was dialing.

"Hey,
Brad, I need a favor. Yeah, I know it's the middle of the game, but
did you drive? Okay, do you have room for one more person? Great,
that's even better. Tell Sally that I'm sorry, but I need you guys to
leave right now. Yeah, do you know Adri Paige? Right, she'll meet you
on the far edge of the bleachers in like two minutes. Thanks, man, I
owe you."

Tristan's
smile was worried as he handed my phone back to me. "That's the
best I can do right now. Brad's a stand-up guy and his girlfriend
Sally is actually pretty nice. They'll get you home right now so that
you don't have to be worried anymore."

I
tried to put on a brave face, tried not to let him see just how
terrifying the thought of sitting home alone was right now, but he
could tell something was wrong.

"Oh,
crap. Your parents are still gone, aren't they? Do you want to just
go to my house instead?"

"Yeah,
they are gone until Sunday, but I shouldn't get you anymore involved.
It's…well, it's not safe."

Tristan
closed his eyes for a second and when he opened them the arrogant
teenage quarterback had disappeared and been replaced with someone
serious, someone who
felt
dependable in every way.

"If
you tell me that you need me to blow off this game, I'll do it. It's
going to suck, but I'll do it. What do you need? My parents are out
of town too. You and I could go up to the cabin my parents bought
last month. We'd be safe there; nobody at school even knows where it
is. Dad bought it using one of his corporate fronts to keep it quiet,
so there's probably a grand total of six people in the entire state
who even know how to link it to us."

I
desperately wanted to take him up on his offer, but I knew just how
big a price he might end up having to pay if he left with me right
now. He'd be off the team and he'd probably have to move to another
school if he wanted to play next year. It might cost him a college
scholarship, maybe even a future as a professional athlete.

"No,
I can't ask you to leave right now, but maybe you could come get me
as soon as you get back from the game."

My
insides were quivering at the thought of spending even that much time
alone, but I willed my face to keep that secret, to do what I asked
for at least once tonight. It was a calculated risk, but Jackson
would be riding back on the bus so he wouldn't be home any sooner
than Tristan would be.

"You're
sure?"

"Yeah,
it's the best compromise, just hurry every chance you get. Here are
my keys, just in case. I'll let myself in with the spare one that
we've got hidden outside."

"Right,
no overtime. I'll see you soon."

"Thanks,
Tristan. I misjudged you."

A
hint of his normal humor and cockiness crept back onto his face.

"It's
easy to do. I like to keep people guessing a little."

I
leaned in and gave him a kiss on the cheek and then turned and headed
towards where he'd told Brad to meet me. Tristan had just bought me
some time, but I wasn't under any illusions when it came to my
safety. I wasn't going to be safe until I'd found someone bigger and
scarier than Jackson, someone who could go toe to toe with all of the
other supernatural creatures out there.

I needed Alec.

I'd
never met Brad before, but he turned out to be a six-one giant who
looked like he belonged out on the offensive line keeping the other
team away from Tristan. Apparently my look of surprise wasn't
anything new for him.

"I
know, right? I actually played football for half of a season my
freshman year. I took a really hard hit during one of my games and
tore my rotator cuff. My mom freaked out and still won't let me
play."

"I'm
sorry to pull you away from the game, it's just…"

I
wasn't actually sure how to explain the craziness I'd just been
through, at least not without sounding like a complete head case, but
he just shrugged.

"It's
not a problem. If Tristan likes you then most of the rumors floating
around school can't be true. Besides, we all know he's just going to
throw four more touchdowns and destroy the other team."

Sally
turned out to be exactly the kind of girl you'd expect a football
player to date. She was tiny like Sheree was tiny. She wasn't just
short, she also had the kind of super-small frame that meant she'd
look skinny even if she was ten or fifteen pounds overweight. She
wasn't overweight at all though, so she just looked like she was made
out of plastic like some kind of perfect blonde Barbie doll.

She
didn't say much, but she smiled at me and seemed to actually mean it,
which was more than I normally expected to get out of girls who
looked that good. I was just as skinny now, but I still kind of felt
like most of the really attractive girls looked at me and figured I
was too far beneath them to bother getting to know.

Almost
before I knew it we were in Brad's blue Pathfinder and headed home.
He made a couple of valiant attempts at carrying on a conversation
with me, and I really did try to reciprocate, but things just kept
petering out after a minute or two.

We
were both making a legitimate effort, but the fact of the matter was
that we just didn't have very much in common and I was having a hard
time focusing on anything other than the fact that Jackson was going
to come for me as soon as the buses got back into town.

"…can't
believe that you've managed to resist Tristan's charms for so long. I
think this is some kind of record."

I
looked up and realized that Sally had decided to help draw me out.

"I
can't really take full credit there. My sister has wanted to date him
for a couple of months now and he didn't exactly make a good
impression by telling me that he didn't care whether she got hurt as
long as he got what he wanted."

Brad
winced a little. "I knew that was going to bite him in the
butt."

Sally
punched him in the arm. "You're a complete jerk. I still think I
gave him the right advice. Maybe he screwed up the execution, but he
needs to stop just dating whomever chases him or he'll continue to
have one bad relationship after another with girls who like him more
than he likes them. He needs to tap into his inner jerk a little more
or he's never going to be happy."

Brad
shrugged as he changed lanes to pass a red Miata. "I don't know,
I still think he just needs to go somewhere new and make a fresh
start. He's tried to keep things low-key here, but there's a couple
of girls on the cheerleading team that I'm pretty sure have figured
out who his dad really is. Even if they haven't, he suspects the same
thing, which means every time they look at him he thinks they are
seeing dollar signs."

I
felt my eyebrows start to creep up in astonishment. I'd always
figured that Tristan's family was rich, or at least moderately
well-off. You didn't buy vacation cabins without at least bringing
home somewhat big bucks, but Brad and Sally seemed to be hinting at
lifestyles-of-the-rich-and-famous kind of wealth.

"Just
how rich is Tristan?"

The
two of them looked at each other for a couple of seconds and then
Sally sighed. "Tristan said he was going to take you to his
cabin, right?"

"Yeah,
he invited me there a couple of weeks ago and I turned him down. I
think that's where we're going tonight though."

"Okay,
don't tell him I told you this or he'll be mad, but it's not like you
wouldn't have figured it out for yourself as soon as you saw their
new place."

"You've
seen it? I thought he told me that nobody else had been there yet."

It
was silly of me to ask the question. I was interrupting her in her
response as to just how wealthy Tristan was, but it was almost like I
didn't really want to know even though I'd been the one to ask.

"We
haven't been there, but he showed us pictures that they shot when
they went up there the first time to check it out. It's ridiculous,
in a good but still over-the-top way. Are you sure you really want to
know this?"

"Yeah,
it's always best to know what you're getting into."

"The
truth is I don't know, but I'm pretty sure that they are billionaires
by now. His dad is pioneering that new technology to project images
from your phone onto another flat surface. He's some kind of
super-genius. Everyone is saying that the technology is still a year
or two away from mass production, but Tristan said his dad cracked
the power consumption problem and figured out how to fit it all into
a small enough footprint to make it viable."

Brad
changed radio stations without turning it up and then jumped in with
his two cents. "It's all pretty much way over my head too, but
Tristan said that it's one of the key steps in turning our phones
into real mobile computing platforms. It's crazy stuff, like all you
need is your phone and a desk. You'll put your phone down, it will
project a keyboard onto the desk and then his dad's invention will
project a display onto the wall at eye level."

"So
you just sit down and type? No more desktops, no more laptops?"

"Yeah,
pretty much. The other tech companies are going wild over it. He's
got money pouring into his company already in advance orders and
licensing agreements like you wouldn't believe."

It
was almost too crazy to contemplate.

"Why
is he going to our school instead of some snotty private school?"

Sally
looked at Brad like she didn't know the answer either and was curious
to see what he'd say.

"His
dad offered to put him in any school he wanted, including some that
have wicked good football teams, but he wasn't interested. I think
Tristan figured that it would just paint a bigger target on him
because people would know he had to be rich in order to be going
there. Here he's stayed pretty incognito up until now. He's really a
pretty good guy when you get right down to it."

Sally
snorted, but even that was a delicate sound. I wouldn't have said
that there was such a thing as a ladylike snort, but if there was,
she managed it.

"He's
almost too good if you ask me. You've only managed to ever even get
him drunk once and he still only had like two beers."

"Yeah,
he can be a bummer at parties sometimes, but I can't really blame
him. A girl like Missy or Wendy is totally not above getting him
drunk and sleeping with him just to get pregnant so she can get her
hands on some of his dad's money."

"So
why did he give in and let you get him drunk that one time then if
he's held strong up until now?"

I
managed to make the question sound casual, but the truth was it was
anything but. I knew when he'd gotten drunk, it had been for Cindi's
party, and Sally was right—he hadn't really been drunk, more
like he'd just had enough to take the edge off.

Sally
suddenly went bright red. Interesting. I would have said that nothing
could throw her off like that. Brad frowned at her. "Now you've
done it. She wasn't supposed to find out about that."

"Find
out about what?"

"Brad's
right, I wasn't supposed to say anything, but Tristan isn't nearly as
self-confident as he seems. He hates parties. Really, any group
bigger than four or five makes him uncomfortable. He doesn't usually
go to that kind of stuff and when he does, he always feels like he
just stands there and looks like an idiot. So…Brad convinced
him to have a couple of beers as a way of relaxing a little and being
more himself around you. Did it work?"

"I…well,
I'm not sure, not really. He was more aggressive, he pretty much
backed me into a corner of the room so that I didn't have any choice
but to listen to him. Then he told me that we should date because I
needed someone to help me navigate the social waters now that I was a
cheerleader and that he needed someone who was cute but not as…witchy
as the other girls."

Sally
turned an even darker shade of red and Brad's smile spread from ear
to ear. "Only he didn't say 'witchy', did he? You can thank my
sometimes big-mouthed girlfriend for that. He was pretty much quoting
her directly."

"Well,
it's true. Adri was in over her head, and Tristan needs a nice girl,
but he should get a nice girl who's also attractive. Can you imagine
the inferiority complex an ugly girl would have if she dated him for
very long? Not only is he gorgeous, but once she realized that he was
rich enough to buy a small country she'd start expecting that he was
going to cheat on her because she couldn't compete with the kinds of
girls who would constantly be throwing themselves at him."

Brad's
sigh was pretty eloquent. "Give the guy some credit. He doesn't
just care about looks."

"I
know, but most girls aren't going to think like that. We
automatically think that we're not pretty enough or smart enough or
skinny enough to be with a guy like Tristan. Besides, you have to
admit it would still be a temptation for him."