Forbidden, Tempted Series (Book 1) Read Free Page A

tray away, her nerves taking up too much space in her stomach for her to think about eating right now.
    Feeling a strange need to redeem herself, she said, “But we just moved here from LA.”
    “Ooh, wicked.” Abel grinned and sucked loudly on the straw of his chocolate milk. “I’ve been a couple of times. Loved the Whiskey, you ever go there?”
    Flint laughed, forgetting about the hot press of eyes on her back thanks to Abel’s inquisitive gaze. The Whiskey a Go Go on the Sunset Strip, the hottest club for up-and-coming rock bands. You were the epitome of cool if you could get in. But you could never get in. Not unless you could find somebody to hook you up with tickets.
    “Umm, no... It was always sold out. How did you get in there, anyway?”
    Abel wiggled his dark brows. “I gots my secrets, girl.”
    Laughing, she popped a green grape in her mouth, its sweet juices bursting on her tongue. Rearranging her plates of food, she opened her carton of milk. This school wasn’t so different from all the others she’d ever gone to.
    Perky blondes and smoky-eyed brunettes sat at the center tables, reigning like a bunch of queen bees as the jocks and studs circled them like sharks. Beside them were the cool—but not quite cool enough—groups of boys and girls. Dressed in nice clothes with the latest haircuts, eyeing the squealing cheerleaders with green-eyed envy. At the fringes were the outcasts. Some tables consisted of one boy or girl, bent over a book, eating and reading and pretending the rest of the world didn’t exist.
    Then there was her side. The dark side. She snorted and took a sip of the lukewarm milk. Grimaced— gross —but she was thirsty.
    It was an appropriate title though. Totally strange, but most of the kids on this side were dressed darker. Not all of them sported black head to toe, but they weren’t in the bright, cheerful colors of the other side, except for Janet.
    She was a special kind of snowflake.
    But only the ones sitting with Cain wore the shades. Unlike him, however, they were both blonds and looked eerily identical—from the full bottom lips, to the strong, aquiline noses, right down to the slightly cleft chins. They must have been twins. But even they weren’t the strangest things sitting on the dark side.
    The table closest to the lunchroom doors was full. Eight heads tipped forward, whispering low, barely pausing to eat as they obviously discussed something of monumental importance.
    Like maybe what kind of hat Justin Bieber wore on the Letterman show last night. Probably not though. With their washed-out complexions and formless, baggy clothes... they were likely plotting what would be the best time to bomb the school.
    Flint shivered at the thought.
    One of the heads popped up and Flint flinched as the bloodshot gaze lasered across the room and landed square on her face. Several tables sat between them, but the girl was studying Flint without blinking, making no bones that Flint was the bug under her microscope. And then it dawned on her; it was the same girl who’d bumped into her that morning.
    Flint hadn’t gotten more than a fleeting look at her then.
    Her skin was a sickly brown. With a little sun, she’d probably look like a bronzed goddess, but the heavy purple bags under her eyes ruined the effect. Her hair—cropped short to her head—gave her elfin features a hard edge. Those bloodshot eyes narrowed, and Flint sucked in a sharp breath—no, she was not crazy. It wasn’t her imagination that suddenly she felt pressure pulsing against her body, a choking sensation stealing the breath from her lungs and making her dizzy as she tried desperately to gulp air into her starved body.
    Flint broke eye contact first and could finally take a deep breath of sweet air, hands shaking as her body flooded with adrenaline. What had that been about? And what was up with psycho chick?
    Then a terrible thought popped in her head. Were they dating? Cain and psycho? Or maybe exes?