“I wanted to pull away, remind him that I was a big girl, a highly trained operative, a spy – that I’d been training for this mission my entire life, and I wasn’t going to be left on the sidelines. But in the dim space with Zach pressed tightly against me, only one thought came to mind. I kissed him – longer and deeper than I ever had before. The school was not watching us this time. There was nothing playful in the tone. We were just two people kissing as if for the first time, as if it might be the last. And then I broke away. “So,” I asked, as if I got kissed like that all the time (which, believe me, I don’t), “where is it you’re taking me again?” “The tombs.”

“You wouldn’t have taken Rose to such a place, would you?””Of course not, but she is a little girl, and I’m-“”My life”, he interrupted quietly. “You’re my entire life. If anything ever happens to you, Holly, there is nothing left for me.”

“I’ll follow you to the next life if I have to,” he whispered harshly in her ear. “You’ll never be free of me. I’ll chase you through heaven and hell and beyond.” He continued to whisper without stopping while his hands gripped her body close to his. “You stay with me, Holly,” he muttered savagely. “Don’t do this to me. You stay, damn you.”

“Somebody knows.”

“So I hear we get to go to town this weekend. Want to catch a movie or something?–ZP.S. That is, if Jimmy doesn’t mind.Translation: This weekend might be a good chance for us to see each other outside our school in a social environment, free of competetiton. I do not view other boys as threats, and I enjoy making them seem insignificant by calling them the wrong names. (Translation by Macey McHenry)”