Crossfire - a sizzling slow burn with supernatural powers

Friends

It was my first real kiss. I had kissed Gavin Huang on a dare at a movie night in sixth grade, but kissing Brandt in the woods was the real thing. I touched my lips again. They were swelled up, smoother than usual, and tingly. The kiss didn't stop at our lips. I felt it all over. The kiss pulled strings to my heart and stomach, feeling his arms around me. Standing chest to chest and still wanting to be closer still.

I couldn't help the smile on my face. My cheeks hurt, especially the bruised one, which was yellowing at the edges, but the smile was stuck.

In school, I looked at Andrea, hoping to see the same smile on her face, after kissing Dylan at the party on Friday. On the contrary, she looked bummed.

"Andrea, are you alright?" I asked her, as we switched textbooks at our lockers.

"Yeah," Andrea answered with a tight lip.

Penny touched Andrea's arm.

"That was a rhetorical question. You are not okay."

Andrea sniffed and hugged the textbook in her hand.

"That does it." I exclaimed, "we are ditching the next class." Andrea and Penny looked at me wide eyed. We never skipped class. We may not be picture perfect straight A students, who enjoyed school, but we weren't complete baddies, who rebelled against the institutional system of public education.

The bell sounded and we scurried down the hall and through the classroom for art to the room in the back with art supplies and shelves with drying ceramics. We sat down on the floor, and Penny and I waited. Andrea was the tough one of the three of us, but within a minute, tears rolled down her cheeks and she used her sleeve to dry them.

"I like Dylan. I like him so much it hurts. And he seems to like me, but he doesn't do relationships. That's what he said. I went over to him here at school, and he told me, that we weren't a school couple, I should forget about it." Andrea sobbed into her sleeve.

Penny and I moved closer to Andrea and consoled her as well as we could, but there was nothing we could say or do, that would take Andrea's heartache away. Right now, she needed to feel her feelings, even though it hurt.

My cheeks finally relaxed and my smile dimmed. What if Brandt was the same? I mean, Neil Duncan had ordered us to keep our distance in no uncertain terms to protect his business and family. I knew how much I missed Brandt, when we returned from Setter Hill. I thought I would go crazy and it would be worse now after this weekend. I had fallen for Brandt, and I would be as broken as Andrea, if he turned me away. The lump in my throat grew.

"I'm sorry you're in pain," I tried. I wish my power allowed me to absorb the hurt, Andrea was feeling. I rested my palm on her knee and discreetly tried, but I couldn't absorb emotions.

Andrea cried, she voiced the plethora of feelings she carried, and Penny and I listened.

"Enough of this," Andrea said when we heard the next bell, drying her tears with both sleeves.

"Are you sure?" I asked, "we could stay here or just leave."

Penny looked at me gobsmacked, as if I had told her I was plotting a murder.

"Yeah, I am not cowering in the art supply closet while he walks the halls." Andrea said proudly.

"Attagirl!" Penny almost jumped. This was the Andrea, we knew. Proud, independent, and definitely not a pushover, even with a broken heart. The three of us rose and Andrea pulled us into a rare hug.

"Thanks."

"Anytime," Penny said, "well, hopefully not anytime, but you know what I mean." She blushed. Andrea gave a small smile and nodded.

Through all of high school Penny, Andrea, and I were just the odd ones out. We didn't fit into any of the groupings that our classmates formed and identified with. We were just different in our unique ways. However, these last few months, I had changed my perception of us from three misfits, who tolerated each other to friends, best friends. I felt lucky to know both of them.

After school Andrea, Penny, and I walked out together, heading for the school bus. Across from the bus stop a woman with long, dark hair was exhaling smoke, which dissolved in the air around her. Between her fingers, she held a cigarette and she radiated an equal measure of alluring beauty and annoyance. Every student was looking at her, parked in a no parking zone with a cabriolet no less, looking stunning and not given no attention to anyone, until she saw me. She took off her sunglasses and squashed her cigarette under her boot.

"Get in the car, Harper," she commanded as she grabbed my elbow. I shook off her hand. Levina.

I should have expected something like this. At least, it wasn't the two suit clad security guards. Actually, I didn't know if being picked up by Levina was better or worse.

I nodded a farewell to Andrea and Penny and got in Levina's car. I didn't really think I had a choice. Neither had Levina. She wasn't picking me up voluntarily, Neil Duncan had demanded her to do so.

Levina sped off and I thought I heard of the collective sigh the male student body behind me, as Levina and/or the cabriolet disappeared from their view.

"You enjoyed that performance and exit, didn't you?" I rhetorically asked.

Levina laughed out loud with locks of her hair flying up behind her from the wind. Of course she did. Her smile disappeared just as quickly as it appeared.

"What I don't enjoy is being a courier, especially when you're the package."

There was no easy path between Levina and I. She did not like me and she made it evident in our every interaction or proximateness.

"I understand. At least, I'm not a normie," I tried, only to receive an eye roll from Levina.

"What is your power by the way?" Now it was my turn to do an eye roll. Levina chuckled.

We drove in silence after that exchange towards the Duncan mansion. The churning knot in my stomach was a symptom of my immanent meeting with Neil Duncan. Hopefully, Brandt would be there too.

"Any idea what I'm walking into?"

Levina glanced at me, contemplating her answer. She twisted her hand around her hair to contain it from the onslaught of wind. Wisps of it were still loose.

"My dad is furious. He sent Brandt away last night on an assignment. They had a massive argument. I heard parts of it. My dad is furious that Brandt confronted the smokers on Friday, tying the Duncan name to the smoke incidents. He is just as mad that one of the smokers got away. And you, you're just the icing on that cake of insubordinate behavior."

I took out my phone and texted Brandt. Levina noticed my actions.

"I've tried to get a hold of him, but there is no response."

Levina turned and drove up the road to the Duncan mansion. The knot in my stomach churned and my hands were clammy. I put my phone away before it slipped out of my hands. My head was spinning when we parked by the main entrance after the sound of wind and the powerful motor of Levina's cabriolet had ceased. We walked up to the entrance.

A security guard came up to us.

"Mr. Duncan is in the dome."

Levina paled beside me,

"Shit."