So moody, Kaitlyn thought.
It was a very long, very dull evening. Kait listened to the other psychics stagger up to their various rooms, then a TV blared from one room, a stereo from the other. It spoiled Kaitlyn's concentration for the one thing that might have relaxed her: drawing.
And this room depressed her. All her possessions had disappeared from it-thrown away when the new students came in. Anna's raven mask was lying in a corner. Like a piece of garbage. Kait didn't dare hang it up where it belonged.
Finally, she decided to take a bath and follow Lydia's example. She had a long soak, curled up in bed-and then there was nothing to do but think.
Scenes from the day kept floating through her mind. The face of the red-haired man . . . Gabriel's face in the dawn light. Mr. Z's silhouette.
I've got to make plans, she thought. Mysteries to investigate. Ways to find the crystal. But her mind couldn't focus on one thing, it kept skipping.
Joyce defended me ... I fooled the fooler. And what convinced her was that Rob and I had broken up ... because Rob liked Anna.
What an idea. How odd. And Gabriel fell for it, too.
She must be sleepy. Her mind skipped again, her thoughts becoming less and less cohesive. I hope Gabriel isn't really angry with me. I need him. Oh, God, all the things I said to him . . .
Was that wrong? To let him think I'm in love with him? But it wasn't completely a lie. I do care about him. . . .
As much as I do about Rob?
It was a heretical thought, and one which jerked her fully awake. She realized she had been half-dreaming.
But the thought wouldn't go away.
In Canada she had discovered that Gabriel loved her. Loved her in a vulnerable, childlike way she could never have believed if she hadn't seen it, felt it in his mind. He had been completely open to her, so warm, so joyous . . .
. . . the way he was this morning, her mind whispered.
But in Canada she hadn't loved him. Or at least she hadn't been in love.
You couldn't be in love with two people at the same time. You couldn't. . .
Could you?
Suddenly Kaitlyn felt icy cold. Her hands were cold, her face was cold. As if someone had opened a window somewhere inside her and let a glacial wind blow in.
If I loved Gabriel ... if I loved both of them ...
How could I choose?
How could I choose?
The words were ringing so loudly in her head that she didn't notice the very real noise in her room. Not until a shadow loomed on the wall beside her.
Terror swept her. For an instant she thought it was Mr. Z-and then she saw Gabriel beside her bed.
Oh, Lord, did he hear my thought? She groped for shields, found she didn't have any. She was burned out.
But Gabriel was smiling, looking at her from under heavy eyelids. He would never have smiled like that if he had heard. "Ready to try out the balcony now?" he asked.
Kaitlyn looked at him, slowly regaining her composure. He was looking particularly gorgeous, and dangerous as darkness. She felt a magnetic pull drawing her to him.
But she was exhausted. Unshielded. And she had just discovered a crisis within herself that threatened to bring the world crashing down.
I can't go with him. It would be insane.
The magnetic pull only got stronger. She wanted to be held. She wanted him to hold her.
"Come on," Gabriel whispered, and took her hand. He caressed the palm with his thumb. "Kiss me, Kait."
Kaitlyn was shaking her head at him. What on earth could the girl mean?
Gabriel could tell she wanted to come. He'd read the line in some old book somewhere, probably during one of his stints in solitary. "She trembled at his touch." Reading it, he'd sneered-but now he was seeing the real thing. When he reached down to take her hand, Kaitlyn trembled.
So what was the problem?
I'm tired, she projected in a whisper.
Oh, come on. Sitting on a balcony is relaxing.
He could tell she was going through some struggle. Mad because of the way he'd acted after dinner? Or...
Did it have something to do with what he'd seen this afternoon?
His mood darkened. Is there something wrong? he asked silkily.
"No, of course not," she said very quickly. On the other bed a lump under the comforter stirred. Gabriel eyed it with distaste.
Kaitlyn was getting up. Gabriel's lip twitched at the sight of her nightgown-it was flannel and tentlike, covering her from throat to ankle. Quite a bit different from Frost, who had pirouetted in front of him dressed in what looked like a transparent red handkerchief the first night he'd met her. She'd made it clear, too, that she didn't mind if he took the handkerchief off.
Kaitlyn, by contrast, was holding the neck of her nightgown closed as she briskly walked to his room.
She paused there to look at the walls. "You do the graffiti?"
He snorted. Mac. He was living here.
"And what did he think when you asked him to get out?"
Gabriel said nothing, waited until she turned around. Then he gave her one of his most disturbing smiles. I didn't ask.
"Oh." She didn't pursue it. She stepped through the open sliding glass door onto the balcony. "It's a nice night," she murmured.
It was'-a soft moonless night, with stars showing between branches of the olive trees. The air was warm, but Kaitlyn had her arms wrapped around herself.
Gabriel went still.
Maybe it was the simplest explanation after all. Maybe he'd been wrong about her trembling-or wrong about the reason. Not desire . . . but fear.
"Kaitlyn." Instinctively, he used words instead of thoughts, giving her the distance she seemed to need. "Kait, you don't have to ... I mean, you know that, don't you?"
She turned quickly, as if startled. But then she didn't seem to know what to say. He could search her thoughts-he could sense them even now, like silver fish darting and gliding in clear water-but he wouldn't 't. He would wait for her to tell him.
She was staring at him, breathing lightly. "Oh, Gabriel. I do know. And I can't explain-I'm just... oh, it's been a hard day."
Then she put her hands over her face. She started to cry, with her hair falling around her, and little quick intakes of breath.
Gabriel stood transfixed.
Kaitlyn the indomitable-crying. She did it so seldom that he was too amazed at first to react. When he could move, he could think of only one thing to do.
He took her in his arms, and Kaitlyn clung to him. Clung tightly-and after a moment lifted a tear-stained face to him.