The Dark Divine(80)

Daniel rubbed his hand across his face. “So what do you think we should do?”

“Take me with you. We have to find Jude. We have to get him away from all these people. If he sees us together, then we can lead him away from here.” Then what, I had no idea. “Maybe I can calm him down. If only we had another moonstone.” I looked at his pendant. “Could you …?”

“No, Grace. Not tonight. Not under the full moon. I don’t know if I could control it—not with you even in the same county.” He gripped the pendant between his fingers. “I might destroy everyone.”

“Then there has to be another way.”

Multiple sirens blared into the parking lot. There was more than the sheriff and deputy on their way. The city police from the crime scene must be coming, too.

“We need a plan,” Daniel said.

Car doors slammed outside the window.

“There’s no time.” I grabbed his hand, and we ran out of the room.

The echoes of our footsteps were lost in the music as we got closer to the gym. The dance seemed like the most logical place to start looking for Jude. I didn’t know who had called the police—Pete? Don?—or who exactly they’d be looking for; all I knew is once they entered the dance, we’d lose our chance to get Jude away from everyone else.

Daniel pushed open the gym doors. Red and green streamers reached across the room in a zigzag pattern. Balloons bobbled in the air. A strobe light bounced off the dancers, who twirled and swayed to the music—completely oblivious to what was going on. How we’d be able to pick out one person in this din seemed impossible.

We slipped inside the gym, and I hugged Daniel to me, linking my arms around his neck so it looked like we were dancing, quite intimately.

Daniel stared down at me. He raised one eyebrow.

“My dress is a mess.”

Daniel, clad in jeans and a white shirt, stood out enough in a room full of suits and slacks, but we definitely wouldn’t be able to search for my brother incognito if anyone noticed my bruises or Pete’s blood smeared across my white dress.

Daniel wrapped his arms around my waist. And for a fleeting moment, I felt safe to be in his strong embrace—like it was a promise that everything would turn out the way it should.

Daniel rested his chin on my shoulder. I heard him inhale deeply, holding the breath in the back of his throat, mulling it for tastes. The room wafted with so much sweat and perfume, could he really pick out one person’s scent? Daniel lifted me off my feet and twirled us toward the center of the crowd. His movements were lithe and graceful, navigating us through the other dancers without disturbing anyone. For a second I forgot to breathe—forgot why we were even here.

“There,” Daniel whispered into my ear.

I followed his gaze. I could see the top of a dark, disheveled head moving beyond the wall of dancers, following Daniel and me as we glided across the room toward the locker-room doors.

“We just need to keep him following us,” Daniel said. “Get him out of here before—”

The music stopped and the lights flipped on. We halted as the crowd came to a standstill.

“May I have your attention?” Principle Conway said from a microphone near the DJ. “Please, stay where you are. Stay calm. There’s been a crime near the school. The police are locking us down until they have the situation under control. No one will be allowed to leave….”

Cries of concern went up in the crowd as uniformed officers moved toward all the exits. Someone shouted and stumbled, as if she’d been knocked aside. Her cry was followed by the clanking of one of the metal exit doors as it swung open and shut. Three officers ran to the door, shouting. The dark head that had been following us was no longer in the crowd.

Daniel cursed. “That was an outside exit.”

He looked at the door to the men’s locker room. The guard there was distracted by the commotion. Daniel swept me up in his arms. He flew at the door and knocked the officer flat before he even knew we were there. Daniel whipped the door open and lunged into the locker room.

“Stop!” someone shouted behind us. “Freeze!”

Daniel jumped on top of a bench. He grabbed an open locker door, used it to launch us up on top of the row of lockers, slid across, and landed on a bench on the other side. He bolted down its length, and jumped to an exit that led us into a long corridor. He ran, holding me to his chest. Shouts filled the corridor behind us, and then ahead of us around the corner. I heard the buzzing of police radio static. Daniel skidded into a stairwell entrance and lunged up the stairs. Up and up we went until we made it to a heavy-looking door marked ROOF ACCESS. Daniel kicked it, the lock crunched, and we burst through the doorway into night.

Daniel took in a deep breath. The air had chilled since I was last outside. Clouds smothered the moonlight. A storm was coming.

Voices echoed way down in the stairwell. Daniel hitched me up in his arms.

“What are we going to do?”

“Hang on!” He squeezed me tight and sprinted toward the edge of the roof—running at his full speed toward open air. Before I could cry out, he jumped off the edge, sailed over the alley where Don had stabbed Pete, and landed with a thud on the parish roof. Daniel wrapped his arms around me, protecting me as we rolled on impact across the sloping roof. He scrambled to his feet and pulled me with him up and over the apex of the roof. We crouched behind the steeple. I started to speak.