Whispers at Moonrise (Shadow Falls #4)(51)

"People? You mean people outside of the camp? People outside of Shadow Falls are talking about me?"

He looked put on the spot, but he nodded. "Just the supernaturals."

Just the supernaturals? "So, the whole supernatural world knows about me?" The thought made Kylie want to find a hole to climb into. It was bad enough knowing the campers were always on "Kylie alert," waiting to see what her wacky brain pattern was going to do next, but to think she was the subject being discussed everywhere made her supernatural butt extremely uncomfortable.

"Perhaps not the whole supernatural world," he said as if trying to console her, and then hesitated as if reconsidering the wisdom of his answer. "I mean, I couldn't say if everyone-"

"Oh, it probably is everyone," Miranda said. "My mom said they were talking about you at Witch Council last week in Italy. And they didn't even know you were a witch then. You can imagine how they are talking now."

Kylie didn't want to imagine. Her chest suddenly felt hollow. "They were talking about me in Italy? You didn't tell me that." She bit down on her lip. "I'm such a freak that-"

"That's why I didn't tell you," Miranda said. "I knew you'd get all weird about it. And you're not a freak," she added. "You're a protector. And being a protector is huge. Very newsworthy like a natural disaster. Not that you're a disaster. I mean, like good news."

Nothing about this felt good. It felt more like a disaster. Not even a natural one.

"Word of a protector would be something people would talk about. But Miranda's right, it's not a bad thing." Burnett looked at Kylie and obviously read her erratic heartbeat and motioned to the crowd of teachers. "They just want to say hello. Not interrogate you."

Say hello to the camp's natural disaster, aka the freak. Kylie's heart raced.

"It's not a big deal," Burnett said.

Right. Only it felt like a big deal to her. Especially when she looked up and noted all three of the teachers gawking at her. Two were even twitching their brows, checking out her pattern-and their actions had encouraged several of the campers to do the same. She could almost hear the roar of thoughts. Hey, anyone want a good laugh? Check out Kylie's brain pattern again.

She heard someone say something about her still being a witch. Kylie supposed she should feel happy she had a pattern to check out-instead of one of those screwball shifting patterns that really freaked people out. But even knowing that didn't make her anxiety subside. She hated being in the spotlight.

Burnett, looking baffled at Kylie's emotional dilemma, leaned closer and whispered, "If you really don't want to meet them-"

"No, I ... I'll do it." It was crazy not to. And she felt like an idiot for letting her insecurities be known. It wasn't that she completely hated meeting people, she just hated meeting people who already had a preconceived notion about her. And she sure as hell didn't like knowing that people in Italy were talking about her. Probably in Italian, and she couldn't even understand it.

Stiffening her backbone, she plastered a smile on her face, hoping to appear less like a freak than they considered her to be. It was, however, the same fake smile she wore when her mom took her someplace she didn't want to go-like to one of those mother/daughter days at work, or to one of those stuffy volunteer luncheons. What was it that her mom had said about that smile? Oh yeah: You look like you just swallowed a mosquito.

Yup, she was going to look like a freak, all right.

Chapter Seventeen

Kylie, practically holding her breath, suffered through Burnett's introduction of all three teachers. First was Hayden Yates, aka Mr. Yates to the students, who gave her a nod and a more than uncomfortable stare. The new half vampire, half fae science teacher shook her hand and held on for a second longer than she'd liked.

Considering his fae half was dominant, she was surprised she didn't feel any emotion-altering warmth from him. And although he didn't strike her as a pervert, something about him gave her just a bit of the creeps. She wasn't sure what it was, but she didn't like it, or him. Odd, because Kylie normally didn't make rash assumptions about people-with the exception of her mom's new boyfriend, of course. But that was a special case. That guy wanted to dirty up the sheets with her mom and that just wasn't okay.

Ava Kane, aka Ms. Kane, wore the title of English teacher. She was half-witch and half-shape-shifter, with shape-shifter being her dominant species. She seemed nice enough, but the way she kept twitching her brows, trying to see something different in Kylie's brain pattern, made Kylie uncomfortable. Exactly what did she think she'd find?

Collin Warren, a half-fae, half-human, was the history teacher and a geologist who came off as the quiet type. Odd, for someone with fae blood, because they usually seemed to have a certain amount of natural charm, but then again, perhaps not all half-fae inherited that talent. Kylie had heard that, on rare occasions, some human supernatural blends tended to be more human than supernatural, so perhaps that was the case with Mr. Warren.

Nevertheless, he smiled, said the proper things-"Nice to meet you"-but Kylie got the feeling he was as uncomfortable being put on the spot as she was. Which made her wonder why he'd want to be a teacher.

After everyone knew everyone's name, Kylie stood there, her smile still spreading her lips tight, and waited for something to end the awkward moment. Burnett finally intervened. "Well, I'm glad you all met."