The Hunt by Amy Meredith Read Free Book Online Page B

with a demon around is with the Deepdene Witch.’
    Before Eve could reply, her mom called to her from the church steps. ‘Eve, we need to get going.’
    ‘OK,’ Eve called back. She turned to her friends. ‘I’ll text you about getting together.’
    ‘Demon, prepare to have your ass kicked,’ Jess said. ‘Or do you think there might be more than one?’
    ‘Maybe there’s not one at all,’ Luke replied. ‘But it doesn’t matter. Road-tripping mountain lion, mutant dog, demon – we can handle the kicking of any of those asses.’
    ‘Eve,’ her mother called again. Patience wasn’t high on her list of virtues.
    ‘Gotta go,’ Eve told Jess and Luke. ‘Bye.’ She hurried across the courtyard towards her parents, but something made her pause. She wanted to see Luke’s faceone more time before she left. Somehow, when the madness got going, he made her feel strong. She glanced over her shoulder – and found him already looking at her.
    His expression was gripping, sending a quiver through her body from head to toe. Eve found it hard to turn away from his intense gaze. She tore her eyes away from him, but her mind was whirling.
    What on earth was that? she wondered.

Chapter Five
    ‘Substitute in math. Ms T is out,’ Ben told Luke as they passed each other in the hall before last period on Thursday, almost a week after Kyle’s funeral.
    Cool , Luke thought. Ms Taylor could be kind of a hardass. It would be a nice break to have a sub. Often, a sub meant a chance to get some homework done in class. That would free up time after school to keep working on translating the papers that had been hidden in the church. It had been more than a week since Kyle was killed, and Luke still hadn’t found anything useful on the new demon, if a demon was what they were dealing with.
    There hadn’t been any more attacks, so he was starting to hope it had been some kind of strange animal, maybe one that was lost and hurt and scared and so it attacked Kyle before it crawled off onto the beach and got washed away.
    It didn’t seem likely.
    There were still a lot of Latin pages to get through. Somewhere in them could be some vital info. Even though Luke’s dad had insisted that Luke start studying Latin in elementary school – he claimed it was the basis of pretty much everything – it was still taking for ever to work his way through the material.
    Eve was already in her seat when he walked into the room for math. He flopped down at the desk across the aisle from her. Ms Taylor wasn’t a hardass about stuff like who sat where, just about turning in homework on time and actually learning the material. You got behind in Ms T’s class and you started getting private tutoring from her, whether you wanted it or not.
    ‘Hey,’ Luke said to Eve, glancing at the sub, who was standing awkwardly at the front of the room, waiting for the bell to ring. She didn’t seem to know what to do with her hands, putting them in her pockets, then clasping them behind her, then almost immediately pressing them against her sides. Most subs were a little nervous, but this one seemed like she was ready to bolt from the room.
    ‘Do we look that scary?’ Eve whispered.
    ‘You do,’ Luke answered.
    Eve automatically reached up to smooth her hair. Luke smiled, until he noticed the scorch mark on the side of her hand. ‘How did you do that?’ he asked. The bell hadn’t rung yet to start class, but this wasn’t a conversation anyone else should be hearing. ‘Was it …?’ He wiggled his fingers, pantomiming power shooting out.
    ‘Kind of,’ Eve admitted. ‘I was practising , and I accidentally set my bed frame on fire. Just a little section. I got this’ – she flexed her hand – ‘putting it out. I think I’m going to move all future sessions to the bathtub.’
    ‘At least you’re getting a little control. Were you … emotional when you lit up the bed frame?’ Luke had the urge to reach over and try to smooth away the burn mark