Invincible Chronicles of Nick - By Sherrilyn Kenyon Page 0,27
were worried about us making it to State this year with the team down and the coach arrested.”
Stone …
It took all Nick’s willpower not to curl his lip at the mention of that pig. No, dog. He’d just learned last night that Stone was a shape-shifting werewolf who was a pig in both incarnations.
Not wanting to think about Stone and his running crew of imbeciles, Nick turned Casey back to their original discussion. “What did you hear?”
“Oh, there’s been a rash of thefts at school. Tanya went in to get her homework this morning from the office, and she overheard the secretaries talking about it. A bunch of lockers were broken into, and some things were taken out of classrooms.”
“No kidding?”
“She said it was a bad scene. Hope you had nothing in your locker worth stealing.”
He snorted. Yeah, right. He didn’t own anything of value. “Just books. They’re free to take as many of those as they want.”
“I hear you. Oh, and she said we have a new principal they’re bringing in from Baton Rouge. His name is—get this—Richard Head.” She burst out laughing.
Nick winced as he saw the detention train a-coming. Dick Head. Ah man, that was so wrong to have a name like that and to go into education on a high school level. Twisted, twisted, twisted. “And I’ll bet he has no sense of humor about it.”
“You know it. But then again, you can call him Dick Head all you want and say you were only using his name.”
“True. Man, his parents must have hated his guts.”
“Makes you wonder, doesn’t it?”
It did, indeed. “Well, I guess I better get going. I need to check in with my mom at work.”
Casey frowned. “Can’t you call her?”
“It’s her first day on this job, and I don’t want to get her into trouble.” If he got her fired again in less than twenty-four hours of losing her last job, she would absolutely kill him. Better to go poke his head in the door to see what she was up to, then head over to Kyrian’s to work. “I’ll catch you later.” He started toward Ursuline.
“You mind if I walk with you?”
Nick’s eyes widened as a total state of befuddled huh possessed him. Was he in the Twilight Zone? “You want to walk with me?”
She smiled a smile that warmed him completely. “Do you mind?”
“Uh, no.”
“Cool.” Then she did the most peculiar and amazing thing of all—she stepped forward and wrapped her arm around his good one so that they could walk arm in arm. “So, Brynna told me you have a job. Aren’t you young to be working?”
Am I in some alternative universe? Was his evil doppelgänger going to shoot out of the alley and attack them like some character in a video game?
All right, Grim. What’s going on?
Grim didn’t answer. No one did.
Casey stared up at him expectantly with a pair of goo-goo eyes that made his insides quiver.
C’mon, Nick. Answer her question. “I’ve had a job since I was twelve.”
“Really?” Her eyes brightened. “That’s so impressive.”
For the first time in his life, he actually felt proud. “Well, I’m the man of the house and I have to take care of my mom. I like buying her nice things, and I don’t want to spend her money on her—that just seems wrong to me.”
“You know, it’s so rare to find a boy who thinks that way. Last Christmas, Stone gave me his sister’s earrings their mother had given her that she didn’t want. I was so angry when I found out, I didn’t speak to him for two whole hours.”
“Wow, two whole hours. You really punished him.”
She screwed her face up at him. “Are you mocking me?”
“I would never mock the homecoming queen, especially not when she’s holding on to me. Why are you doing that, by the way?”
She rubbed her hand up and down his biceps in a way that made him really uncomfortable. “You have nice arms. Manly.”
Yeah, right. He had arms like the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Hardly manly. More like thin and stringy.
She started stroking his biceps.
Nick jumped away from her. “Um, Casey. I’m kind of seeing someone.” Though they weren’t technically going together, he had feelings for Nekoda, and he didn’t want her to think he was two-timing her even though he wasn’t single-timing her either. Okay, that didn’t make sense.
Still …
Casey put her hands on her hips. “Since when do you have a girlfriend?”