Siren's Song Read Online Free Page A

“And BU will die to have you after you pull this off. You can skip the spring musical, but we need you for this competition.”
    I look down at the Band-Aids on my foot, half-covered by my strappy flats. “I’ll think about it.” Geez, I promised I wouldn’t sing. And playing the lead role in a musical would require singing. The part of Christine would be fantastic, full of drama, and I practically know all the songs already. Mom would have been so excited for me. Would have.
    Madison’s eyes move to Luke. “Who are you?” Coming from someone else, that probably would have been rude. But Madison has a dizzying ability to say whatever she wants with such open and friendly body language that people don’t care.
    â€œLuke.” His casual voice holds a smile. So Madison can charm the scowling, invisible-tats guy, too. “I’m new.”
    â€œSee ya later,” I call to whichever one of them is listening and step into the fluorescently lit chemistry lab. Black, tacky-topped tables with stools run in two long columns up the room. At the back sits Taylin, her coal-blackened eyes widening with her grin. She must have spotted Luke, because the expression certainly isn’t for me. I slide onto a stool toward the front. Luke stops beside me and my heart takes off again, pounding as I glance up.
    â€œYour…Taylin is back there.” I thumb toward her.
    â€œYeah,” he says, and I see him nod. “She’s my cousin.”
    â€œCousin? You must have a close family.”
    â€œWe haven’t seen each other for a long time. She’s a bit… darker than I remember her.”
    I laugh quietly at his reference to Taylin’s goth wardrobe–all black. “See ya.” He walks past.
    Kiara slides onto the empty stool next to me. “Hey, Jule. Seat taken?”
    â€œIt’s all yours.”
    â€œSorry.” She grins and glances over her shoulder.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œI thought for sure Mr. Hot Bod would sit with you. I saw you two walking in the hall, and he was giving off definite territorial signals.”
    â€œSignals? No.” I shake my head. “I was just showing him where the room was.”
    â€œWhatever.” She flips her dark cascade of tiny, tightly beaded braids over one shoulder. “He’s sitting with dark, angsty Taylin, but staring at you. Did you see those bandages on her wrist? Word has it she tried to off herself a week ago. They say she’s some sort of witch.”
    I barely pay attention to Kiara. The last thing I’m interested in is gossip. It could just as easily be about me.
    â€œHer birthday is on Halloween; creepy, huh?”
    Goosebumps rise on my arms as the air conditioning, swooping down from the vent, wars with the heat flushing through me. I feel eyes locked on me, Luke’s gaze like a heat lamp touching my back.
    â€œLuke and Taylin are cousins,” I mumble and open to the page Mr. Perkins wrote on the board.
    â€œKissing cousins? It’s legal if they are at least third cousins out.”
    â€œGross, Kiara.”
    She shrugs and taps her pencil on the page. “I’m just saying, he’s sizzlin’. If he was my cousin, I’d kiss him.”
    I shake my head and Mr. Perkins starts to review the scientific method, cutting off any more discussion. Sizzling? I let out a long breath and rub my arms. Definitely.
    So, if my life is hell and Luke Whitmore is sizzling, does that make him Lucifer? I drop my pencil and bend to pick it up, casually glancing under my arm toward him. His dark eyes follow me down as he scoops up his own #2. I jerk up and face forward, a shiver running from the roots of my hair to the tips of my ice-blue toes. Definitely devil material.
    * * *
    â€œLet me see your schedule,” I demand when Luke shows up in my PE class. First chem, then English, now PE? “Are you a stalker?”
    â€œNever been convicted.” He gives