A/N: Thank you to those who reviewed! Hope you guys enjoy this update. Oh, and I've been really clean in terms of language before this chapter. I'm not saying this chapter has a lot of swearing, but a few here and there. I figured a warning couldn't hurt. I haven't started writing it yet, but the next chapter should be more interesting than this one, I know chapter ten's a little dry.

DISCLAIMER: I don't own the Covenant. I don't own Romeo and Juliet.

IN MY DREAMS

CHAPTER TEN – MAKES CIVIL HANDS UNCLEAN

"Abbott! What're you doing here?" I'd just gotten back from class. Maybe. I didn't remember being in American Lit, but the vague impression I got was that I was supposed to be there – so I must have been. Past and present all seemed to be rather hazy at the moment.

Aaron Abbott was in my room. What the hell was he doing here? I moved forward, about to grab him by the collar, but I never quite got there.

His face contorted in anger and hate, and then heat and pain exploded at my navel. I looked down, and Abbott was pulling a knife from my gut. The son of a bitch had stabbed me.

"Stay away from my sister." And then he was gone.

I could barely see. Pain. Blood. Goddamnit. I fell to the ground, pain exploding at my knees, and clutched my stomach. Blood was everywhere. Everything I touched turned red. My hands began to shake, my chest convulsing, and I groaned.

"Fuck." I closed my eyes and clenched my jaw shut. When my eyes opened again, they were black. Within a matter of seconds, the wound closed up. Not even a scar was left.

--

Reid jolted awake, almost crying out. He blinked several times before sitting up and pulling his sheets back. Nothing. No blood, no torn clothing, no pain. That was weird. He'd woken up to flooded bathrooms, shattered windows, and slamming doors, but the one dream that had actually scared him…and nothing.

He spent most of his day zoned out more than usual. All Reid could think about was his dream. Stay away from my sister.

Maybe Caleb was right. Maybe Rachel was more trouble than she seemed.

"So where's Caleb?" Kate asked, sitting down between Pogue and Sarah and squeezing in her tray of pasta and salad between theirs. By the time lunch period started, Reid had practically slept through his day.

Sarah shrugged, opening her can of Coke. "He needed to help his mom with something. Said he was going to be back by next period." Reid and Tyler sat across from them, digging into their lunch.

"So you're going to the Winter Formal with Caleb, right?"

Sarah nodded. "Yeah. Maybe we'll actually get to go to this one." Ah, the Fall Fest. That felt like a lifetime ago.

"We should go dress shopping…"

Reid looked around, trying to seem as casual as possible. She wasn't here. She usually sat with that Snider kid, but the Junior nerd table was all-male this time. Why did Josh bother him so much? Reid had never actually spoken to the guy. The only time Reid had actually noticed him was when he was hanging all over Rachel.

"Hey, check out that Rachel chick," Tyler said. The entire table turned in the direction he had gestured to. Reid startled, pulling back from the table and knocking his fork to the ground in the process. It clattered noisily against the wooden floorboards, but only his table seemed to notice.

They all turned from Rachel, to Reid. Tyler and Pogue looked shocked and confused, but Sarah and Kate smiled mischievously. The two girls shared a glance, as if they knew something the others didn't. Reid frowned, bending down to pick the fork up and straightened just in time to see the girls turning their attention back to Rachel.

"What?" Reid muttered. He glanced sideways at Tyler. How had he been able to find Rachel so easily?

"Uh," his friend glanced back and forth between Rachel's table and his own. "I just meant that she was sitting by herself."

"Usually she sits with Aaron, right?" Sarah said.

"Yeah," Kate nodded. "Or with Kira's little brother."

"Who cares," Reid muttered, tossing his fork to the middle of the table and digging into his lunch with a spoon. Kate and Sarah smiled again.

"She looks kind of down," Sarah observed. Reid was the only one at their table who wasn't staring at Rachel now. He forced himself to concentrate on his lunch. After what had happened over the weekend, Reid couldn't quite bring himself to risk making eye contact with her.

Reid cursed himself silently. He'd Used this weekend – properly, that is. All he'd done was levitate a trashcan. He was just going to hurl it across the alley, maybe dent Abbott's car and make some noise. Random violence to soothe his nerves. But he'd been interrupted by Rachel, and she'd almost caught him.

So instead of lying and brushing her off, he'd grabbed her. Attacked her, almost. What had he been thinking? But of course, he hadn't been thinking. Reid was just riled up because of Caleb, and at himself for actually giving into temptation. And now Rachel was suspicious. And Reid was in big trouble.

"We should invite her out shopping with us," Sarah suggested to Kate. "What do you think?"

Her friend nodded, agreeing silently.

"I think you should just leave her alone," Reid growled. He stood up, dumped his tray in the garbage and left the dining hall in a huff.

--

"Rachel!"

She looked up, regretting it when she saw who was approaching her. "Hey Aaron." For a few minutes, they walked in silence, climbing the stairs to her floor.

"So are you okay?"

Rachel sighed. Over the weekend, Aaron or Josh had taken turns watching her carefully, always lingering around her. She'd been quiet and unresponsive, never saying more than a few words at a time. Finally they sent Kira in to talk to her, but not even girl talk could lighten Rachel's mood.

"Fine, Aaron."

He considered this for a second, and then his expression darkened. "Does this have anything to do with Garwin?"

They reached her dorm, entering without pausing. "Reid? No. Why?" What did Aaron know about her and Reid? Not that there was anything to know. Just a few weird looks and a strange conversation outside of Nicky's.

"Josh said he was looking at you funny the other night." In the fluorescent lighting of Rachel's dorm room, the angles of Aaron's face looked much harsher than usual. He didn't seem pleased at all. "He didn't try anything, did he?"

Rachel paused, raising an eyebrow at her stepbrother. "Reid Garwin would have to be going through a serious dry spell to be interested in me." She turned around and pulled off her blazer and vest. "Besides, I've got enough problems without having to deal with jackasses like him."

Aaron narrowed his eyes. "What's going on with you, Rachel?" She exchanged her pleated skirt for a pair of jeans, and began searching through her wardrobe for a shirt.

"It's nothing."

He just stared at her, waiting. Relentless. They really could've been related.

"Just a guy, back in California."

"And he's been bothering you?" Aaron asked immediately. He'd caught onto the big-brother role quickly.

Rachel shook her head and shrugged at the same time. "We used to be together, and now we're not. Because I'm here." Technically it was true.

"And you miss him," Aaron stated. "So why don't you go visit him during the winter break? It's in a few weeks."

Rachel swallowed. "That would be a bad idea." Her voice shook. For a long time Aaron just sat there, on the end of her bed, watching her. Rachel could almost feel his brain working overtime.

"He didn't treat you right," he said finally.

She was silent, frozen. Aaron glared down at his hands. Rachel wasn't quite sure what was going through his mind, but it couldn't have been anything pleasant. A knock sounded at the door. Rachel slipped on a tank top quickly and went to open the door.

Sarah and Kate stood there; all smiles and girly excitement.

"Hi," she greeted tentatively. The two girls bubbled with energy, and Rachel didn't seem to have any nowadays.

Kate began talking immediately. "So you know the Winter Formal's coming up, right? Sarah and I were gonna go into town and go dress shopping."

"Oh," Rachel murmured. She glanced back at Aaron. He was staring at the two girls, not quite noticing them. He seemed preoccupied.

"You wanna come?" Sarah asked jovially. Neither she nor her friend noticed the tension in the dorm.

"Oh." Rachel could hear Aaron standing up. "I wasn't even going to go to the Formal. Plus, dresses are kind of expensive." Back home in California, this statement would have been accepted with ease. Her friends would have simply suggested window shopping, or raiding their old wardrobes for something to wear. But here, standing in a Spenser dorm room with two of the richest people in Ipswich, Rachel couldn't help but feel embarrassed.

"Here." Aaron shoved a shiny black card under her nose. Rachel began to shake her head. She couldn't take his money. "It's Dad's," he explained. "A dress wouldn't even dent it. The last thing I bought with it was a new sound system for my car."

Rachel's dark hazel eyes flickered from the card, to the possibility of new friends standing before her.

"Come," Sarah urged. "Please."

Rachel didn't know why, but her stepbrother seemed just as enthused for her to go shopping as the girls were. So she pocketed her stepfather's charge card, grabbed her jacket, and followed them out to Sarah's car.