Lee Nichols

“He crossed toward me, a grin curving his mouth-then he stopped. "Should I get the other blade?"I looked at the sword in my hand. "I'm waiting for the Rake."He raised a brow. "The Rake?"Oh, right, we'd never talked about him. "He's a ghost. Your ancestor. The Bennett you're named after.""What?" Bennett laughed in surprise. "Here? When did he show up?""Um...a couple days after you brought me here from San Francisco.""Why didn't you tell me?""He's private. And you're both Bennetts. It'd be like...I don't know. Traveling back in time and meeting yourself.""And you call him 'the Rake'?""Well, he's all swagger and devilish charm," I explained."In that case, how can you tell us apart?”

“He's gone," Sara said. "I can feel it. This time for good."Natalie hugged her, and she started to sob. Then Harry shattered the silence with a pained yell, hurling his thermos into the woods. With tears in his eyes, he said, "I want a drink."I hugged him fiercely. "It'll have to be one of my special chais, Harry. Have I made you a dirty one yet?""I want mine filthy," he said. We trudged back to the museum together, and toasted Coby with dirty vanilla chai lattes.”

“At school, Max searched the archives alone-Edmund had stopped appearing, and I didn't have the heart to summon him. Kylee was still acting timid and injured, and the ghost jocks were even more outrageously annoying-trying to cover their underlying nervousness, I thought.Harry and Sara couldn't feel anything wrong, but they took their cues from us, and searched the student lounges with a wariness that I'd never seen from either of them. Britta was as sneering and mean as ever, completely unchanged, and I wanted to kiss her.I managed to restrain myself.”

“He stripped to his trunks, then dove into the pool. We all watched as he broke the surface and climbed from the water, his muscles slick and wet, his green eyes glowing in the half light of the glass ceiling. I heard Natalie and Sara both sigh, and Harry murmur that it almost made him want to go gay. Coby stretched out on a chaise beside me and asked, “So you still sorry you moved here?”

“Your chimp?" Bennett asked with a half laugh."Despite what you might think, that is not a term of endearment for your girlfriend!" Harry explained, raising his hands in a placating gesture. "Even though she has monkey toes.”

“Well, something's wrong," Max said, his brow knit with concern. "After twenty minutes alone with Bennett, she's still wearing her shirt.”

“Sex with a woman who wants to please a man is nothing compared to sex with a woman who wants to please herself.”

“All I know is that I'm in love with you," he said, almost angrily. "That the sight of you, the scent of you, the sound of your voice - I can't help myself, I can't stop it, I can't think of anything else. You've made me completely useless.”

“He really was perfect.If only he was perfect for me.”

“And I wanted that - to come first in somebody's life. Isn't that what we all want?”

“Besides, how could I trust them, when I couldn't even trust myself?”

“I knew you liked him," Henry said. "Ever since he tied your tie.”

“A message had been sent to EmmaVaile at an account I didn't recognize. It was from BennettStern at the same network.Four words: "I'm grateful for you.”

“Lukas grinned at me. "I didn't know how badass you are. That's kind of hot.”

“We've got girls like that in Boston," he said. "Fake as her nails.”

“Because it's still a heartache. And nothing makes you want to die more than that.”

“I'm just a--" I looked at Yoshiro. "An unimpressive girl who doesn't want to battle ghosts and kill wraiths. There's only three things I want. To find my family. Dispel Neos. And to--" I stopped suddenly, and didn't know where to look."Yes?" Yoshiro said. "The third thing?""To be with me," Bennett said.”

“Where else do you want to be kissed?”

“I fell, okay?""Then clawed your way out like a bad zombie movie?”

“This was bad. This was toss-Emma-back-into-the-mental-hospital-bad.”

“You know you've got a problem when baristas greet you by name. You know you've got another problem when it's the warmest social interaction of your day.”