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?” I had to keep my voice down because a bunch of the gardeners were around, all helping to set up the decorations for the feast of Father Serra, which was happening on Saturday, the day after Brad’s hot tub bacchanal.
    “Well, Susannah,” Father D. said. “You couldn’t have expected to keep Jesse a secret forever. Your family was bound to find out sometime.”
    Maybe. What I couldn’t fathom was how Brad, of all people, knew about him when some of my more intelligent family members—like Andy, for instance, or my mom—were totally clueless.
    On the other hand, Max, the family dog, had always known about Jesse—wouldn’t go near my room because of him. And on an intellectual level, Brad and Max had a lot in common…though Max was a little bit smarter, of course.
    “I sincerely hope,” Mrs. Elkins said, when she’d released me and my fellow prisoners at last, “that I won’t see you here again this year, Suze.”
    “You and me both, Mrs. E.,” I’d replied, gathering my things. Then I’d bolted.
    Outside, it was a clear, hot September afternoon in northern California, which meant that the sun was blinding, the sky was so blue it hurt to look at it, and off in the distance, you could see the white surf of the Pacific as it curled up against Carmel Beach. I had missed all of my possible rides home—Adam, who was still eager to take anyone anywhere in his sporty green VW Bug, and of course Brad, who’d inherited the Land Rover from Jake, who now drove a beat-up Honda Civic but only until he obtained his dream car—and it was a two-mile walk to 99 Pine Crest Drive. Mostly uphill.
    I’d gotten as far as the gates of the school before my knight in shining armor showed up. At least, that’s what I suppose he thought he was. He wasn’t on any milk-white palfrey though. He drove a silver BMW convertible, the top already conveniently lowered. It so figured.
    “Come on,” he said, as I stood in front of the mission, waiting for the traffic light to change so I could cross the busy highway. “Get in. I’ll give you a ride home.”
    “No, thank you,” I said lightly. “I prefer to walk.”
    “Suze.” Paul looked bored. “Just get in the car.”
    “No,” I said. See, I had fully learned my lesson, insofar as the whole getting-into-cars-with-guyswho’d-once-tried-to-kill-me thing went. And it wasn’t going to happen again. Especially not with Paul, who’d not only once tried to kill me but who had frightened me so thoroughly while doing it that I continually relived the incident in my dreams. “I told you. I’m walking.”
    Paul shook his head, laughing to himself. “You really are,” he said, “a piece of work.”
    “Thank you.” The light changed, and I started across the intersection. I knew it well. I did not need an escort.
    But that’s exactly what I got. Paul drove right alongside me, clocking a grand total of about two miles per hour.
    “Are you going to follow me all the way home?” I inquired as we started up the steep incline that gave the Carmel hills their name. It was a good thing that this particular road was not highly trafficked at four in the afternoon, or Paul just might have made some of my neighbors mad, clogging up the only pathway to civilization the way he was driving.
    “Yes,” Paul said. “That is, unless you’ll stop acting like such a brat and get into the car.”
    “No, thanks,” I said again.
    I kept walking. It was hot out. I was beginning to feel a little moist in my sweater set. But no way was I going to get into that guy’s car. I trudged along the side of the road, careful to avoid any plants that resembled my deadliest of enemies—before Paul had come along, anyway—poison oak, and silently cursed Critical Theory Since Plato , which seemed to be growing heavier and heavier in my arms with every step.
    “You’re wrong not to trust me,” Paul remarked as he slithered up the hill alongside me in his silver snakemobile. “We’re the same, you