The quip is so unexpected—so what I’m used to from his texts but not in person—that I can’t help staring at him. Then again, everything about this morning has been unexpected—especially the dynamic among the members of the Order. Every time I’ve seen them, they’ve appeared so tough and unapproachable. So unfeeling.

But sitting here with one another—and no one but Macy and me to witness it, since Cam and his group took one look at who was sitting with us and headed in the other direction—they’re just like any other group of friends. Except funnier. And way, way hotter. Knowing he’s got friends like this—and that he can be a friend like this—makes me like Jaxon even more.

Jaxon catches me staring and raises a questioning brow in my direction.

I just shrug at him like it’s no big deal and reach for my glass. Then nearly choke at the look in his eyes as he watches me. Because there’s a craving there, a dark and devastating desperation that has my breath stuttering in my chest and heat blooming deep inside me.

He holds my gaze for one second, two. Then he slowly blinks, and when he opens his eyes again, the emptiness is back.

And still, I watch him. Still, I can’t look away. Because there’s something just as beautiful—and just as devastating—in their emptiness as there is in their heat. Eventually, though, I force myself to look down. Mostly because if I don’t, I’m afraid I’ll do something foolish like throw myself at Jaxon in front of the entire school.

Turning away from him, I forcibly yank my attention back to the conversation at hand, just in time to hear Luca say, “Hey, now. How was I supposed to know Angie was a soul-sucking demon?”

“Ummm, because we told you so?” Mekhi answers.

“Yeah, but I thought you were biased. You didn’t like her from the start.”

“Because she was a soul-sucking demon,” Liam repeats. “What part of that are you not getting?”

“What can I say?” Luca gives a careless shrug. “The heart wants what the heart wants.”

“Until what the heart wants tries to kill you,” Rafael teases.

“Sometimes even then.” The words are quiet, spoken from the haunted-looking guy sitting to Macy’s right.

“Seriously, Byron?” Mekhi grouses. “Why you always got to shut the conversation down?”

“I was just making an observation.”

“Yeah, a depressing observation. You need to lighten up, man.”

Byron just stares at him, lips twisted in a tiny little smile that makes him look like a modern-day embodiment of his poet namesake.

Mad, bad, and dangerous to know.

The famous quote from Lady Caroline Lamb goes through my mind. But I’m not focused on Byron’s wavy black hair and dimples when I think about her words. No, in my head, they’re all about Jaxon, with his scarred face and cold eyes and smile that borders on cruel at least half the time.

Definitely bad. Definitely dangerous. As for mad…I don’t know yet, but something tells me I’m going to find out.

When I think of him like that, I wonder what the hell I’m doing even contemplating feeling the way I do. After all, in San Diego, dark and dangerous wasn’t exactly my type. Then again, maybe that’s because I never ran into the genuine article back home. Here in Alaska… Well, all I’m saying is, there’s a reason half the girls in the school are swooning over Jaxon.

Besides, there’s more to him than meets the eye. No matter how angry he is, he’s never been anything but gentle with me. Even that first day, when he was so obnoxious, he still never did anything that made me uncomfortable. And he’s certainly never hurt me. To everyone else, he might be as dangerous as Macy warns. But to me, he seems more misunderstood than malicious, more broken than bad.

Besides, Byron called it when he implied the heart wants what the heart wants, even when it’s bad. And no matter how many warnings I get about Jaxon, I’m pretty sure he’s what my heart wants.

Suddenly, a weird kind of chiming sound cuts through Dvořák’s “The Noonday Witch” (if I’m not mistaken) that’s currently playing over the cafeteria’s loudspeakers. “What is that?” I ask, looking around to see if we’re suddenly being invaded by a bunch of triangle-playing guerrillas.

“The bell,” Macy says. They’re the first two words she’s managed to choke out since the Order took up residence next to us, and all seven of us turn to her in surprise. Which just makes her flash a small little smile before shoving half a Pop-Tart in her mouth.

“You still didn’t eat,” Jaxon says. And then he picks a Pop-Tart and hands it to me.

“Seriously?” I take it, because I know he’s just going to stand there holding it until I do. But I’m still going to call him on it. Because I’m smart enough to know that if I let him get away with the small things, he’ll try his best to steamroll me with everything else, too. “I’m pretty sure I can figure out for myself if I’m hungry or not.”

He shrugs. “A girl’s got to eat.”

“A girl can decide that for herself. Especially since the guy sitting next to her didn’t eat anything, either.”

Mekhi lets out a little whoop. “That’s right, Grace. Make sure he doesn’t walk all over you.”

Jaxon gives him a look that sends a chill right through me, but Mekhi just rolls his eyes, although I notice that he does shut his mouth for pretty much the first time since he sat down. Not that I blame him. If Jaxon looked at me like that, I think I might run for the hills.

“What classroom are you going to?” Jaxon asks as we maneuver our way through the suddenly bustling cafeteria. It’s easier than it should be, considering the mad stampede toward the doors that is currently going on. But as long as Jaxon is in the lead, the sea of students does more than just part. It pretty much leaps out of the way.

I fumble for my schedule again, but before I can so much as pull it out, Mekhi answers, “A246,” right before he disappears into the crowd.

“Apparently, A246,” I repeat, tongue firmly in cheek.

“Apparently.” He moves slightly ahead of me to push open the door. As he holds it for me, not one person darts through. Instead, they all wait patiently as I walk through, and I have the fleeting thought that this is more than just popularity, more than just fear.

This must be what royalty feels like.

It seems absurd to even think something so bizarre, but I make it through the door and down the hall without another body—besides Jaxon’s—coming within five feet of me. And I don’t care whether I’m in an elite boarding school in Alaska or a crowded public high school in San Diego, that is not normal.

I also realize that the same thing happened yesterday before the snowball fight. No matter how crowded the hall got or how much jostling went on, no one so much as touched Jaxon—or Macy and me, as long as he was standing with us. “So what do you do to deserve all this?” I ask as we move toward the staircase.

“Deserve all what?”

I roll my eyes at him, figuring he’s messing with me. But the blank look he gives me says otherwise. “Come on, Jaxon. How do you not see what’s going on here?”

He glances around, clearly mystified. “What’s going on?”

Because I still can’t decide if he’s playing with me or if he really is this obtuse, I just shake my head and say, “Never mind.” Then plow ahead and pretend that I don’t notice everyone staring at me even as they scramble to get out of my way.

So yeah, that whole blending-in plan I hatched in San Diego? Officially dead on arrival.

28

“To Be or Not to Be”

Is a Question,

Not a Pickup Line

Jaxon walks me right up to my classroom door—which we get to in what I’m guessing is record time, considering there’s no one else in the room, not even the teacher.

“Are you sure this is the right place?” I ask as we step inside.

“Yes.”

“How do you know?” I glance at the clock. Class should start in less than three minutes, and still nobody’s here. “Maybe we should check if it got—”

“They’re waiting for me to either sit down or leave, Grace. Once one of those things happens, they’ll come in.”

“Sit down or—” I goggle at him. “So you were just messing with me in the hallway? You do notice how people treat you?”

“I’m not blind. And even if I was, it would still be hard to miss.”

“It’s madness!”

He nods. “It is.”

“That’s all you’ve got to say about it? If you know how bizarre it is, why don’t you do something to stop it?”

“Like what?” He gives me that obnoxious smirk from the first day, the one that made me want to punch him. Or kiss him. Just the thought has my stomach spinning and has me taking a cautious step back.

He doesn’t like the added distance, at least not if his narrowed eyes can be believed. And the way he takes two steps toward me before continuing. “Stand up at the pep rally and reassure everyone that I’m not going to eat them if they get too close? Somehow I don’t think they’ll believe me.”

“Personally, I think they’re more worried about being thrown in high school jail than getting eaten—”

The smirk is back. “You might be surprised.”

“Well, then, you should reassure them. Be friendly. You know, show them that you’re harmless.”

I feel ridiculous even before that left eyebrow of his goes up. “Is that what you think? That I’m harmless?”

Jaxon doesn’t sound insulted so much as astonished, and really, I can’t blame him. Because I’ve never met anyone less harmless in my life. Just looking at him feels perilous. Standing next to him feels like walking a hundred-foot-high tightrope without a net. And wanting him the way I do…wanting him feels like opening a vein just to watch myself bleed.