Five: Out of the Dark by Holli Anderson Read Free Book Online Page B

in instant sweat. I looked down at my feet to make sure they were still in contact with the ground—it sure felt like I was floating. I could not keep the smile off my face as we walked hand in hand, fingers entwined, through the lamp-lit streets of Seattle. Butterflies sprang to life in my stomach. Johnathan stopped and looked down at me.
    “Is this okay? That I hold your hand?”
    I swallowed. He bit at his bottom lip. Was he really so clueless as to think it might
not
be okay with me? I really did try to answer him verbally, but the words stuck in my throat, so I just smiled, nodded, and squeezed his hand tighter. He must have understood my voiceless reply because he let out a relieved breath and smiled back at me. Ooh. That smile did things to me. And the butterflies. His dimples were like a super-mega jolt of caffeine to those puppies.
    The warmth of his hand and how perfectly mine fit with his made me forget about the ache in my feet during the long walk. We actually talked about things other than fighting Demons and stuff.
    “What would you eat if you could have anything you wanted right now?” Johnathan asked.
    “Steak, and crab legs, and garlic mashed potatoes. What about you? What would you eat?”
    “Hmm … steak, definitely. I’m not so sure about crab legs, though. I’d have to go with fried shrimp, and a baked potato with tons of butter and sour cream.”
    We laughed about not being able to watch movies or use cell phones or other electronic gadgets because there was something about magical powers that seriously messed with newer technology.
    Before I knew it, we were standing in front of Edwards High School. The darkness was thicker around the school—most of the outside lighting was turned off, or just wasn’t working. Johnathan let go of my hand to fish his channeling rod out of his belt. I grabbed mine, too. We didn’t necessarily
creep
toward the school, but we did step carefully. The closer we drew, the more uneasy I started to feel. My stomach dropped when I looked over at the school’s marquee and saw a giant pile of flowers, posters, notes, and stuffed animals in a makeshift memorial to the students who had killed themselves.
    We tried the front doors first. They were locked tight and we couldn’t see any lights on inside the school. That seemed a little odd. Didn’t they usually leave a couple of lights on even when no one was there? We made our way around the side of the school, trying each door as we went, and peering into windows for any signs of … I’m not sure what signs we were looking for, really. My main goal was to stay close to Johnathan.
    We reached the back of the building, where there was a fenced-in area for the metal shop supplies. It looked more like a prison yard than a school, though. The chain-link fence was reinforced with barbed wire spiraling across the top; three chains with heavy-duty locks kept the large gates closed. Johnathan aimed his
star-bright
through the fence and gave it an extra dose of his will to make it shine further. Nothing there seemed out of place; all we saw were just the usual oxygen tanks for welding, scrap metal and sheets of metal, various tools, and half-finished projects.
    Johnathan’s light fell on a couple of metal tanks hooked together with coils and wires. It resembled something from a chemistry set—on a much larger scale. There were also some glass beakers attached to one side and some sort of carvings around the base of the entire contraption, carved into the metal there. Beneath it all, stood a couple of big propane tanks hooked up to some heavy-duty burners to heat whatever was in the metal tanks.
    “Wow. What is it?” I turned my head sideways to observe it from a different angle. “I’m trying to picture what experiments you would do with beakers and Brunson burners that big. Imagine the damage an overzealous freshman could do with a lab gone terribly wrong.”
    “We need to get a closer look at that thing,” Johnathan