Smokeless Fire by Samantha Young, now you can read online.
Prologue
The Stars are Not Wanted but the Sky Will Submit
Her eyes attempted to overcome him. Everywhere he glanced those eyes of a thousand nights, eyes that had made love to every spectrum of color this realm and the others had to offer, were refracted on the cold glass and black marble of his home. He imagined those eyes had prevailed over many a worthy foe. Tonight he would pretend they had prevailed over him.
What happened after that was of no interest to him.
It would be of no interest to him unless He willed it so.
PART ONE
~1~
Ghost in the Soul
Ari’s eyes followed the swipe of Mr. Dillon’s eraser across the board, wiping out the poor chalk-figure hangman who had met his full and complete death — a head, torso, limbs and all — when the senior class had failed to figure out the blanks equated to accumulated depreciation . The last week of school. Business class.
Ari hid a yawn behind her hand and glanced worriedly out of the classroom window to the trees behind the parking lot. She wondered if he was out there already.
“God, I thought this class couldn’t get any more boring,” Nick Melua whispered across to her. Ari made a sympathetic noise and nodded in agreement. Waiting for graduation was a slow torture in hell. That the waiting room at present happened to be Mr. Dillon’s Business Studies class only increased the banality.
Ari winced. She better get used to it. She would be heading off to major in Business at Penn after summer break. Pushing the future and the host of angry butterflies the thought of it created in her belly out of her mind, Ari concentrated on worrying about Charlie. Was he out behind the parking lot? Again?
“Miss Johnson?”
She groaned into her wrist and flicked her eyes up at the board. “W,” she guessed without thinking and immediately felt the heat of the glares from her classmates.
“Nope.” Mr. Dillon shook his head. “Nick?”
“E,” he threw across the room belligerently and was rewarded with grateful smiles as the word became clearer.
“Entrepreneur!” Staci Pike shouted out with such enthusiasm you could be fooled into thinking she cared. Ari smirked over at her and rolled her eyes at Staci’s sheepish shrug. Staci hated making anyone feel bad and the perspiration rolling down Mr. Dillon’s face that told them he knew he was failing miserably at keeping them entertained, and was beginning to feel the pressure, was not something Staci could just sit back and watch.
Mr. Dillon smiled gratefully. “Correct. Do you want to come up, Staci, and choose a word?”
Ari grinned at her. See, that’s what happens when you’re nice.
Staci narrowed her eyes on her as she swept by her table. “Meanie,” she murmured loud enough to make Ari snort.
Fifteen minutes later the class grew more fervent in their irritation as they struggled to figure out Staci’s word. Finally Mr. Dillon sighed. “I’m afraid the hangman is definitely… dead. You’ll have to tell us your word, Staci.”
Her dark eyes were wide with disbelief. “You guys are terrible at this game.”
“Aw come on, Staci!” Nick beat his fist against the table, his voice climbing to a whine. “Just tell us.”
“Fine,” she huffed. “The word or words, rather, are ‘Bill Gates.’”
Ari immediately began to laugh as the class exploded into an uproar.
“I still don’t see what the big deal was.” Staci shrugged as they headed towards their lockers.
“You were supposed to use a business term .” Ari chuckled, plucking a spit ball out of Staci’s hair and flicking it to the ground. She grimaced, wiping her hand against her t-shirt.
“Bill Gates is a businessman, hellllooo!”
“Hello to you too,” a warm voice purred, an arm wrapping around Staci. She was pulled back into the solid embrace of her boyfriend A.J. Half Japanese (on her mom’s side) Staci’s slight frame was swallowed up in the stocky shadow of A.J.’s wrestler’s body. Her almond-shaped eyes widened slightly before she relaxed into him, tilting her mouth up to his for a kiss.
Ari sighed and turned away from them, yanking her locker open with more force than she had intended.