No Angel Read Online Free PDF Page B

the entire building to myself, though the other half dozen rooms were locked. I gazed out the window at the distant lights of the main school complex, just visible through the tangled woods. Nice and private. Far away from all the teachers. That could come in handy.
    Another tap at the door interrupted my thoughts. Wondering if HiRaffimynameisClaire had mustered the courage for another hit-and-run sentence, I opened it again.
    Same bouquet. Same expression. Different girl.
    “HelloRaffimynameisLouisewelcometotheschool-you’rereallyfitbye!”
    I was left with yet more flowers and a deepening expression of bemusement. With a shrug, I added the latest tribute to my impromptu vase. I had to admit, the way the girls had decided to greet me was pretty cute.
    By the tenth knock on my door in thirty minutes, it was getting a lot less cute.
    “Look,” I snapped, wrenching the door open yet again and glaring down at the latest admirer, “this is all very flattering, but you guys are starting to pi—”
    I stopped. I was yelling at a very short, chubby, plain-faced girl clutching a wilting dandelion and looking utterly petrified.
    Way to go, Raf.
    From down the corridor, I heard a small, muffled snigger. Glancing up, I caught a glimpse of a couple of young girls quickly ducking out of sight around the corner.
    Uh-huh.
    I stared hard in the direction of the unseen onlookers for a second, then returned my attention to the girl, who was edging away as if preparing to bolt. “No, wait.” She froze like a deer in headlights. “What’s your name?”
    “L-lydie,” the girl whispered at the floor. Her knuckles were white on her tattered dandelion.
    “Hi, Lydie. Is that for me?”
    Lydie looked at her pathetic flower, then hid it behind her back, her face going red. “I’m sorry.” Her barely audible words overflowed like the tears brimming in her big blue eyes. “I picked nicer ones, like the others told me to, but then they didn’t let me keep any of the good ones. They said I still had to come, and this was all I could find.”
    “Thanks,” I said warmly, plucking the flower from her fist. Lydie stared up at me, mouth and eyes round, as I tucked it into my buttonhole. I crooked a smile at her. “Yellow’s my favorite color, you know.”
    I got the tiniest, shyest, briefest of smiles in return, before her nerve broke and she was off like a rabbit down the corridor. Well, at least now she hopefully wouldn’t grow up thinking that all guys were total bastards.
    The warm glow of a good deed well done was cut short by yet another knock at the door. Bloody hell.
    “Your future boyfriends can thank me for not giving you all complexes,” I muttered under my breath, shoehorning a smile back onto my face. I swung open the door—and discovered I was doing my best Prince Charming impression at the Headmistress.
    “Chrysanthemums, Mr. Angelos.” For one horrific moment, I thought that she too was about to offer me a love token, but her hands were empty. Despite the late hour, she still wore her neat black skirt suit, but she’d now accessorized it with a long raincoat and a peeved expression. “What do you know about them?”
    When my dad had said that they’d make me work here, I hadn’t thought that meant late-night pop botany quizzes. “Uh . . . they’re a flower?”
    “Yes, Mr. Angelos.” The steel-capped toe of her shoe tapped dangerously. “A flower that provides delightful late autumn color in the garden. My garden.”
    Oh.
    And also: Uh-oh.
    “Except,” the Headmistress continued, as my stomach sank in anticipation, “that my prize specimens now appear to instead be providing autumn color to your window. Since I find it difficult to believe that you have taken up flower arranging, I suggest you tell me who gave them to you.”
    “Um.” Lydie’s tiny, terrified face floated up in my mind. Damn . “Actually, I did pick them. I didn’t know they were yours. Sorry.”
    “Really.” The Headmistress’s