“Okay, you guys can’t leave me alone with him. I mean it. Oh, and Tyler, if you say one thing in front of him, I swear on all that is holy that I will kill you. And not in a nice way either.”
“What’s not in a nice way?” Curtis asked with interest as Emma shot Tyler a telling glare, in response to which he pretended to zip his lips, even going as far as to throw away an invisible key. Great, now Curtis would think they’d been talking about him.
“Nothing,” Emma quickly assured him. “So I heard you’ve got the books on banishment spells for me to look at.”
“Yes,” Curtis agreed as he patted the backpack that was slung over his shoulder with casual ease. “So should I get them out here or are we all going over to the library to look at them?”
“Actually”—Loni slid out of the booth and grabbed Tyler before he could protest—“I’m going to try and make some wards that might work against the darkhel and Tyler’s going to check to see if that program’s finished running yet. So it’s just going to be you and Emma on study duty.”
Then without another word Loni and Tyler disappeared toward the exit. Emma glared at their retreating backs before turning to Curtis and studiously ignoring his face, since she definitely didn’t want to have an encore performance of last night.
“It’s okay. You don’t need to help. I’ve got it covered,” Emma quickly assured him. Curtis tightened his jaw for a moment and looked frustrated.
“Of course I want to help.”
“I said it’s fine,” she repeated in a tight voice.
“Look,” he finally said. “I know you’re probably pissed at me for last night, and I’m sorry. I should never have let things get that far. I screwed up.”
However, Emma, through lack of sleep and stress, suddenly felt something inside her snap as the events of the last week started to catch up with her.
“Oh, right. The big secret thing that you can’t tell me about.” She sniffed as she grabbed her slaying kit and slid out of the booth, careful not to touch him as he moved out of her way.
“Jones—” he started to say, but Emma cut him off.
“No, you know what, Curtis? I’m sick of everyone having secrets. My mom, the darkhel, and now you? It’s too much. So whatever your stupid secret is, I don’t care. Keep it to yourself because I’ve got bigger things to worry about.” Then without another word she hurried toward the exit before he could see that her cheeks were burning like they were on fire.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Of course the main problem with a big, dramatic exit was that it made things awkward if you then had to sit in the same room with the person and go through a heap of books looking for ways to banish an invisible fairy. Emma reached for another one of the books that Curtis had unceremoniously dumped into the middle of the table when they’d arrived at the library half an hour ago. As she did so, she was careful to avoid his gaze since right now talking to Curtis Green wasn’t on her agenda.
The book she picked up was one that she’d collected from her own house on Wednesday night, but since then Curtis had gone through it and flagged some of its pages with miniature Post-it notes, which were now sticking out in what appeared to be some sort of color-coded order. As she flipped to the first marked page, she discovered that in his small neat handwriting, he had jotted down the pros and cons of each banishment. She turned to another page and it was the same. For some reason she found this annoying, and she reminded herself that just because someone was organized didn’t make him nice.
“So, Jones, do you have the pendant?” he suddenly asked as she realized he was looming over her. It was the first time he had spoken to her since her dramatic exit. “I want to ask Gretchen if she has any information on mysterious jewelry that could banish creatures back to the other side of the Gate of Linaria.”
“Oh, right.” Emma slid the pendant across the table, careful not to touch his hand. He picked it up and headed off, but returned ten minutes later with a frustrated expression on his face.
“She said no. Actually she said it five times. Twice in German in case I was having difficulty understanding her the other times.”