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shining brown curls cascading over her shoulders, her dark brown eyes wide. But she cast them down at her desk the instant she saw him.
    He crossed to the opposite side of the room and sat down, all the while reaching over the rows for her thoughts. He tried to read her mind, jonesing for the tingles that had spread through him when he’d read minds the night before. He wanted that feeling from her . But she kept her head down, poring over their Shakespeare textbook, with hardly a sideways glance at the guy she’d just dumped.
    He opened his own book. His life wasn’t over, he assured himself. He would keep his grades up, pull his weight on the lacrosse team, make the most of high school despite his illness, and try his best not to worry his mom. Only one thing had changed irreparably since yesterday: there was nothing left between him and Holly but regret.

2
    PRESENT DAY
    Kaylee Michaels saw Holly walking toward her across the casino floor and felt her face light up. When Mr. Diamond had taken in Kaylee a year ago, he’d made her head of security at the casino though she’d been only twenty-one years old at the time. She was at the height of her mind-changing powers, the strongest person seeking refuge at the casino besides the many teenagers and twenty-somethings drugged with Mentafixol. The burden of the responsibility weighed on her every second, but she accepted it, seeing her job as a way to atone for the terrible things she’d done while she was at the Res.
    Holly was her window onto the carefree life of a college girl. When Kaylee had first arrived, Mr. Diamond had encouraged her to befriend Holly and rent an apartment with her. He pointed out that, during her senior year of college, Holly would get the freedom from her parents that she’d longed for, yet Kaylee could still keep her safe. What had started as a business transaction had unexpectedly turned into Kaylee’s closest relationship ever. Despite herself, Kaylee had let her defensive walls crumble in front of this bubbly girl, and they’d been the unlikeliest of best friends since.
    Now Holly glimpsed Kaylee and galloped toward her between two rows of slot machines, long brown curls bouncing, somehow looking even more glamorous in jeans and sandals than she ever did in her magician’s-assistant getup. She was leading a man by the hand. A handsome, clean-cut man about their age, but still. Even as Kaylee switched her bag of Thai food to her left hand and put out her right to greet him, her senses went on alert.
    She poised to strike him with her power if she detected the slightest danger, ready to change his mind about getting close to Holly. Just because a guy had asked Holly on a date didn’t mean he was from the Res, but the timing was suspicious. For the past few days, the mind readers on the casino floor had whispered that they’d sensed people from the Res passing through, plotting to take over the casino.
    He’d better not be one of them.
    “Kaylee Michaels,” she introduced herself over the electronic music of the slot machines, looking hard into his brown eyes.
    “Rob Price.” With no guile in his voice, he wrapped his hand around hers.
    At the same time, Holly was effusing, “This is Kaylee, my roommate and the head of security at the casino. See, Rob, I told you we might find her on the floor somewhere. And Kaylee, this is Rob. He asked me out and he still wants to go, even after I told him my roommate is like the Secret Service.”
    “Why is that?” Rob asked Kaylee. “Have you had security problems?”
    “Well . . .” Kaylee puzzled over the strange question.
    “You can tell Rob,” Holly said. “He’s a cop.”
    “Oh, really?” Kaylee asked suspiciously, dropping his hand.
    Rob drew his wallet out of his back pocket—slowly, as if he understood other cops and people in security didn’t like sharp movements, especially out of pockets—and showed her his Clark County Sheriff’s ID. She’d seen a lot of those cards in