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she whispered
back.
    “ Shake my hand.”
    Kylie furrowed her brow. “Don’t you mean
‘pull my finger,’ and are you really gonna fart in the middle of
class?”
    Jenna stifled a laugh. “Just shake my
hand.”
    Jenna held out her hand, concentrating on not
crushing every one of Kylie’s bones. They made contact, squeezed
briefly, shook and separated.
    Jenna smiled. “Thanks.”
    “ What was that
for?”
    Jenna had to lie. So she joked. “It’s for the
mother ship in space. You’ve been tagged. You’ll be taken and
probed thoroughly. You can thank me later.”
    Kylie went to smile, but then her face fell.
“Tagged? Did you just get me sick with whatever you have?”
    Jenna shook her head. “No, no. You’ll be
fine. Trust me.”
    But Kylie took precautions anyway. She went
in her backpack and pulled out a small bottle of hand sanitizer.
She thoroughly cleansed her hands, even up to her lower arms.
    “ Sorry,” she said, putting
the near-empty bottle back in her bag, “but I can’t stand to
puke.”
    “ Sorry, again.”
    “ It’s okay. Why’d you wanna
shake?”
    Jenna didn’t have a truthful answer—and
thankfully, she was interrupted from conjuring up another lie—as
the door to the classroom opened with a loud creak!
    “ Ah, our new student,” Mrs.
Quinn announced with a smile.
    Everyone stared as they always do at
something or someone new.
    But Jenna stared the hardest:
    Tall.
    Muscular.
    Caramel skin.
    Raven black hair.
    Flaming blue eyes.
    He was gorgeous, exotic, and somehow
dangerous.
    Jenna loved and hated him.
    “ Sorry, I’m late,” he said
with an indistinguishable accent, handing the teacher a slip of
paper from the main office.
    Mrs. Quinn took it and gave him a smile.
“That’s all right.” She turned to the class. “Please welcome
Malcolm King, newly arrived from Egypt.”
    The class was silent, staring. Even the
Stuck-Ups were speechless. Malcolm held his head down, looking shy.
He nervously adjusted his red backpack, his hand wringing around
the strap against his chest. He was wearing black sneakers, blue
jeans, and a white T-shirt.
    It was all very casual, but somehow staged as
well. To anyone else, it seemed that he’d thrown on whatever had
been lying on his bedroom floor—but Jenna sensed that he’d
meticulously thought over each article of clothing—down to his used
backpack that had threads hanging out.
    “ Why don’t you take a seat
next to Jenna?” Mrs. Quinn turned to her. “Jenna, hold up your hand
so Malcolm can see you.”
    But Jenna’s hands were clasping the edge of
the table, trying not to tear it to crumbs.
    Kylie lightly jabbed her in the ribs.
“Jen!”
    Jenna came back to reality. She was in
school. Act normal, she told herself. She raised her hand, but
Malcolm had already been staring at her. He gave a slight smile and
walked to the lab table next to her—with no partner. He sat on the
wooden stool, laid his backpack down on the table, and smiled when
Mrs. Quinn delivered his chemistry textbook.
    The lecture went on and everyone forgot about
Malcolm King—all except Jenna.
    She just kept staring at him.
    Malcolm had been copying the lecture notes,
but he stopped, and turned to Jenna. “Hi, how’re you?” he greeted.
She now recognized his accent to be hard clipped English mixed with
a soft lingering Arabic. He smiled, all very polite, but there was
apprehension written all over his gorgeous face.
    Jenna stared at his blue eyes, unlike
anything she’d ever seen. They reminded her of the visions—except
the people who she’d killed had red eyes—like fiery wreaths around
black pupils.
    “ What’s wrong with your
eyes?” she bluntly asked him.
    Malcolm’s fiery blue eyes widened. He looked
nervous.
    “ Jenna,” Mrs. Quinn called
out to her from the front of the room. “Could you pay more
attention to me and not Mr. King?”
    Daniela and Emma giggled. The whole class was
staring at her. Kylie looked concerned about her friend’s