Dad tapped his desk with his knuckles and sat back down in his chair. “I need to get some work done here. But the three of you should get to bed. You’ve all got school in the morning.”
“All of us?” Daniel asked.
Gabriel tugged on his collar.
“Meet Pastor Saint Moon, junior pastor and your new religion teacher,” Dad said. “Gabriel will be taking over Mr. Shumway’s religion classes and covering for me at the parish if I need to leave again.”
“He’s the new religion teacher?” My mind couldn’t really wrap itself around the idea of an eight-hundred-something-year-old Catholic monk turned werewolf teaching religion classes at a Protestant private school for teenagers. But the part that bothered me was that my mental decision to never talk to Gabriel again wasn’t going to work if he invaded my school life—and especially not if he was going to be my freaking teacher.
“This’ll be interesting,” I said, a little too much sarcasm in my voice.
“I agree.” Gabriel grimaced. “But do I have to wear this stupid collar? Makes me feel like a dog on somebody else’s leash.”
“Get used to it,” I said.
“Grace,” Dad snapped, with a very knock-it-off tone. “You should get home. Daniel, will you see Grace back to the house?”
I glanced at Daniel and crossed my arms in front of my chest. I wasn’t in the mood to go anywhere with him, but I’d already learned it was of no use to protest this sort of thing.
“Actually, sir”—Daniel got up from his chair—“I really need to speak with Gabriel—alone. It can’t wait any longer.”
Dad glanced from Daniel to me, as if noticing the tension between us for the first time. “Very well.” Dad picked up a book and put it in his bag. “I’ll finish up here as quickly as I can and then she can go home with me.”
Daniel nodded. He picked up his duffel bag and motioned for Gabriel to go with him outside. He didn’t even glance my way before leaving.
Gabriel put his hand on my shoulder. “We’ll become fast friends yet, Grace.” He gave me an ancient smile. His eyes crinkled with age in his otherwise smooth, youthful face. “You look so much like Katharine, you know. At least what little of her I can remember.” He tapped his forehead and then let go of my shoulder. He followed Daniel out of the office.
“I’ll just be a few minutes,” my dad said.
I nodded and leaned against the door Gabriel had just closed behind him. I held my breath and concentrated as hard as I could, listening beyond the thick metal door. My ears burned only slightly—it was getting easier to call on this power—and then I heard Gabriel’s voice.
“What is it, my boy?” he asked Daniel. They sounded like they were a good twenty feet from the door.
“I don’t know,” Daniel said. His voice was even farther away now. From the sound of it, they were walking toward the back of the parish. Probably back to Don’s apartment. I assumed that was where Gabriel would be staying. “I’m not sure what—”
“Gracie,” Dad called from his desk.
I jumped. It sounded like he’d screamed into my oversensitive ears. I shook my head, and my superhearing dissipated.
“Go call your mother and tell her you’re with me. I imagine she was expecting you home a while ago.”
“Oh. Yeah.” I hesitated for a moment and tried to hone in on Daniel and Gabriel’s conversation again, but then a sneaking voice filled my mind.
Already using your powers for ill? Spying on the person you love? Good for you.
I clutched my hands to my head and stepped away from the door. How could I let myself think such disturbing things?
SCHOOL, THE NEXT DAY
Pretty much everyone was in a flurry about the new religion teacher on Monday. Considering the median age of teachers at HTA was well over forty, having such a young (if only by appearance) new teacher was something to talk about.
“I hear he’s cute,” April said as we walked to senior religion studies—the last class of the day.
I was glad for her company, since Daniel and I were apparently avoiding each other today. Or at least I was, considering the fact that I’d chosen to sit next to April in the back of the art room since her tablemate was out sick. April had spent most of art class sketching out costume designs for me. Even though I didn’t much care for wearing a violet-purple cape with a big sequined WG (for Wolf Girl!) on the back, I didn’t have the heart to tell her I’d been grounded from training—and if Daniel, Gabriel, and Dad had anything to say about it, I’d never have a need for any of her designs. But now I almost wished April would go back to the subject of optimal crime-fighting footwear, because debating the finer points of Gabriel, or Pastor
Saint Moon, or whoever he was supposed to be, wasn’t exactly something I wanted to do.
April sighed as we walked through the classroom door. “Yep, he’s cute all right. Actually, I think handsome is more the word for him, don’t you think? Cute implies a certain boyishness, but …”
I leaned in close to her ear. “You know he’s, like, an eight-hundred-and-something-year-old werewolf, right?”
“What?” April asked about ten more questions in a single breath, but I have to admit I tuned her out.
Gabriel stood next to Daniel’s desk. They both looked over a piece of paper in Daniel’s hand. I knew I could switch on my superhearing—it really was getting quite easy to control that power—to overhear what they were saying, but I didn’t like the idea of using my abilities to spy on Daniel. I also knew I could probably just walk right over there and ask what they were up to. I usually sat next to Daniel anyway. But I honestly wasn’t ready to talk to either of them yet. And since Daniel hadn’t made any effort to try to talk to me since last night, let alone apologize for lying about his whereabouts and then turning his back on me, I pulled a babbling April to the opposite side of the room.
“Hey, Grace,” Miya Nagamatsu said after I sat down in front of her.
“Hi.” I smiled at her. Mostly because her presence meant April stopped asking me questions about Gabriel’s were-status.
“We never see you around anymore.”
I shrugged. That was the thing about when April and I stopped being friends. It was as if we’d had an unspoken agreement that she’d get to keep all our other friends, like Miya, Claire, and Lane. They usually ate lunch together at the Rose Crest Café while I stayed back in the art room to work with Daniel and sometimes Katie Summers. Only today, Daniel had taken off as soon as the lunch bell rang, so it was just Katie and me working on our paintings—and she’d definitely been less talkative without Daniel around.
“Yeah,” said Claire. “We miss you.”
“Thanks, guys.”
“Did you and Daniel break up or something?” Miya pointed at Daniel across the room. “You guys are usually glued at the hip.”
As if on cue, Daniel looked up at me. Our eyes met for a moment, and he gave me half a smile. More sadness laced his expression than I’d expected to see. It made my heart feel hollow.
What is going on with him?
“No,” I said to Miya, “I just felt like a change today.” But I suddenly felt the urge to close the distance between Daniel and me. Yes, Daniel had lied, and he hadn’t backed me up when I needed him, but he was obviously going through something. I hated myself for being stupid and petty and not being there for him now.
But just then Katie Summers slipped into the empty desk next to Daniel, where I usually sat. She leaned over and asked Daniel a question. He took his eyes off me and answered her.
The bell rang. I begrudgingly turned my attention to Gabriel as he introduced himself to the class. He wrote the words Pastor Saint Moon on the dry-erase board at the front of the room. I wondered why he used that name. It was his sister’s married name—not his.
“I’m new to Rose Crest, but I imagine some of you knew my uncle, Donald Saint Moon. Though most of you probably knew him as Don Mooney.”
I almost let out a short laugh. The idea that Don had been Gabriel’s uncle was somewhat amusing—it was more like he was his great-great-
great-multiplied-by-ten grandnephew.
“I want to jump right in where Mr. Shumway left off. Who remembers what you discussed last week?”