A Hideous Beauty Read Free Page B

Couldn’t. “Oh yeah?” My voice quivered as I tried to break free. “Well . . . I’ll find a way to stop you . . . somehow. Count on it.”
    I began to panic. Maybe I was overreacting, but losing control of the ability to move my legs has that effect on me. “I . . . I . . . don’t . . . know what you’ve gotten yourself mixed up with, Shepherd . . . but I’ll expose you . . . I’ll alert the Secret Service . . . I’ll phone the media . . . I’ll . . . I’ll . . . I’ll tell the principal!”
    I’ve never been good at trash-talking. It always comes out sounding like a two-year-old’s tantrum.
    Shepherd chuckled. It was a deep, throaty rumble that made the cinder-block walls shudder and the picture frames rattle. “You can’t stop us,” he said. “We’ve been doing this for millennia.”
    About now I was wishing I’d taken the high road and left immediately following the assembly. I didn’t know how Myles Shepherd was doing this, but I was obviously no match for it. I kept throwing verbal jabs, hoping one of them would land. “We . . . you keep saying we,” I said. “I suppose now you’re going to tell me you’re part of some ancient brotherhood, like the Knights Templar, or the Illuminati, or some other puerile organization of losers with secret handshakes, blood-drinking initiations, and decoder rings. Do you know how perverted that is, Myles? Most of us grew out of that stuff in junior high.”
    Shepherd’s smile faded. As it did, the room grew darker, which was odd because it was nearly noon. Behind me, the sun streamed into the classroom. But it stopped at the office threshold, as though afraid to come in.
    A movement caught my eye. High in the corner, above thefile cabinet, wedged between ceiling and wall, grotesque figures took shape. Three-dimensional shadows with sunken eyes leered at me like medieval castle gargoyles. One of them dropped silently onto the top of the file cabinet and clutched the tennis trophy like it was a doll.
    I blinked and they were gone.
    â€œSomething wrong, Grant?” Shepherd asked. “Where’s that smug superiority you brought with you into the room?”
    I swallowed hard. Every instinct within me screamed for me to run. My heart banged against my chest, desperate to get out of the room, with or without me.
    â€œI suppose you should feel honored, Grant,” Shepherd said. “We’ve been grooming you for this task most of your miserable, pathetic life. You’ve been the perfect pawn. Predictable to a fault.”
    The shadow gargoyles reappeared. There were more of them this time, clustered in the corner, shoulders pressed against greasy shoulders. They glared at me with intense, hungry eyes, straining to get at me like hounds on a leash.
    Clouds of darkness billowed across the ceiling while the fluorescents continued humming happily. Standing beside his desk, Myles Shepherd appeared to have grown a foot taller and twice as handsome—with a radiant glow.
    I found it increasingly difficult to concentrate. I stood transfixed, my eyes locked on Shepherd. I couldn’t turn my head aside, nor could I close my eyes. Myles Shepherd wanted me to see something, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to see it. “What’s happening to me?” I cried.
    Shepherd laughed. It was a laugh not of this world, sounding like a thousand wind chimes of such clarity and tone it brought tears to my eyes; a laugh that spawned laughter, bubbling in my gut, rushing to the surface in an explosion of guffaws. I couldn’tstop it. I laughed like a madman. I laughed so hard I thought my belly would burst.
    My ability to speak—the only weapon I had left—was being swallowed by convulsive spasms of mirth. I had to fight it. Somehow, I had to