He hit the button. A ball came flying. He swung.

Crack.

“Well,” she said from behind him, “I saw what you did to Tyler last week.”

What he’d done. That was rich. “Yeah, poor Tyler.”

“He said you jumped him after school.”

Michael couldn’t even turn around. Fury kept him rooted until the next ball shot out of the machine. He swung hard. This one hit the nets and strained the ropes.

Of course Tyler would make him out to be the bad guy.

He tossed a glance over his shoulder. “I’m sure you got the whole story.”

She hesitated. “If you’re just coming here to hassle me, I’ll tell my parents.”

From any other girl, it would have been an empty threat. The kind of threat you stopped hearing in third grade.

From her, it meant something. Emily Morgan’s parents could cause serious problems for his family.

Michael gritted his teeth and made his voice even. “I’m not doing anything to hassle you.”

Ball. Crack. He brushed the sweat out of his eyes.

She was still standing there. He could feel it.

“Here,” she said.

He didn’t turn. “What?”

She was close enough now that the earth whispered to him about her presence. “I’ll get today,” she said. “For trying to kill you and all.” Then the fence jingled, as if she was fiddling with it.

Another ball was coming, so he couldn’t look. He swung and sent it flying.

She’d get today? What did that mean?

He turned to ask her, but she was already slipping through the tinted door into the office.

But strung through the fence was his crumpled five-dollar bill.

CHAPTER 2

Emily pushed rice and chicken around her plate and wished she hadn’t mentioned Michael Merrick to her parents. Because now they had a new topic to argue about.

As if they needed one.

“You’re going to quit that job,” said her father.

“I need my job,” she said.

“Oh, you do not,” said her mother. “What could you possibly need a job for? We give you everything you need.”

In a way, they did. She had her car, a hand-me-down sedan she’d gotten when she turned sixteen and her father decided he wanted something new. Her parents covered insurance. She always said she’d pay for her own gas—but they’d given her a gas card for her seventeenth birthday.

But she doubted they’d pay for a security deposit on a new apartment in New York City after senior year. Having a stash of cash meant freedom to do what she wanted to do.

“He didn’t bother me,” she said. “I think he was just as surprised to see me—”

“The last thing the Merricks need is leverage,” said her father, gesturing with his fork. “This deal was a bad idea from the beginning, before we knew how powerful that boy would get.”

Emily sighed. “I’m not leverage.”

“You could be,” said her mother. “I’m not having you come home looking like Tyler.”

Emily peeked through her bangs across the table at her brother. He wasn’t eating, either—his fingers were too busy flying across the face of his phone, his own mode of ignoring their parents. He was two years younger, but already stood about four inches taller than she did. He’d spent freshman year growing into his features, and now, for the first time, he looked older. The bruising on his cheek had turned yellow and purple, sharp and striking against his pale skin and white-blond hair. She studied the injury, remembering Michael’s sarcasm from the batting cage.

Poor Tyler. I’m sure you got the whole story.

“Take a picture,” Tyler muttered without looking up. “It’ll last longer.”

“Original.” Along with the height, he’d grown into a crappy attitude, too. “Who are you texting?”

“None of your business.”

She didn’t really care, but it was easier to bicker with Tyler than to fight with her parents. “Sounds like a girl.”

He shot her a glare over the phone. “Well, you sound like a—”

“Tyler.” Their mother’s voice sliced through his coming insult. “No electronics during dinner.”

He made a disgusted sound and put the phone in his lap.

But Emily knew he’d be back at it as soon as their folks were distracted again.

“What did he say to you?” said her father.

“Nothing.” She pushed the food around her plate again. She hadn’t mentioned her own actions with the putter—and didn’t plan on telling them now. “He just came in to use the batting cages. It was fine.”

“Convenient,” snapped her father. “Your first day of work, you’re alone, he comes in there—”

“He said he goes there all the time!”

Her parents went still. It was the wrong thing to say.

“I don’t want you going back there,” said her mother, her voice hushed.

“It’s fine—”

“The hell it is,” said her father. “I’ve been talking to Josh Drake. He thinks we should just take care of the problem ourselves.”

Tyler rolled his eyes. “Seth’s dad says that every time he cracks open a beer.”

Though he was a few years younger, Seth Drake was Tyler’s best friend. He was an Earth Elemental like his dad—and like Michael Merrick—but the Drake abilities stopped at pulling strength from the ground they stood on. Emily had no idea where Michael’s abilities stopped.