"Come on, mate! There is no way that they will win."

"Tom, they are one of the best teams in the league." Alex and Tom stood outside Ms. Parker's room. It was right after lunch on Alex's first day back, and neither of them were over eager to get back to work.

Exactly as Alex had suspected, all of the kids gave him weird looks and asked way too many questions, but somehow, he found the entire experience tolerable. He had only seen Alicia once today, and she had been surrounded by a group of giggling girls. He was supposed to have his history class with her next, though.

"So, Alex, have you talked to Alicia lately?" Alex somehow overlooked the all-knowing smile that crossed his lips.

"Uh…yeah," a light flush was rising Alex's cheeks. "She, uh, came over to help me with some work that I missed."

Tom let out a hearty laugh, "Work! Wow, mate, I thought you would be able to come up with something better than that."

"We were working."

"I'm sure you were. At what, I'm not so sure…" Tom repressed another laugh, as Alex playfully punched him on the arm.

In a much more serious tone Alex continued, "We actually did do some work."

"I bet," Tom snorted and rolled his eyes. "Alicia isn't exactly the sharpest crayon in the box. If you really want help with your work, you sure as hell don't ask her."

Alex had to mentally agree with Tom, though he would never vocalize this particular opinion, for at that moment Alicia rounded the corner.

"Speak of the devil," Tom muttered almost inaudibly.

Alicia walked confidently down the corridor toward Alex and Tom, surrounded by four or five extremely pretty girls. Alex couldn't help but noticed how many of the guys' heads turned as they passed. One, a tall, burly black boy named Jeff even whistled at them. The other girls hung back as Alicia walked up to Alex and kissed him lightly on the cheek.

Tom gawked at a curvy blonde girl to Alicia's right, "Alicia, who is that?"

Alicia looked as if she was about to respond, but the blonde cut in, "My name is Devin. Would it really be that difficult to ask me?"

Tom looked taken aback. The girl tossed her perfectly curled hair over her bare shoulder and flashed a brilliant white smile that mocked as much as it seduced. "Isn't Devin a boy's name?"

"It can be. But obviously it can also be a girl's name. I'm living proof after all." Tom looked like he was finding the mini skirt clad girl less and less appealing with every word that came out of her mouth.

Tom opened his mouth to say something but the girl once again cut him off, "Well, I have to go. I have a calculus class that started," she glanced up at the clock on the wall, "five minutes ago."

This really made Tom's jaw drop, "You take calculus?"

Devin didn't say a word. She just stomped off down the dreary hall toward her class.

"Alicia, your friend is a bitch!" Tom looked like he was about to start smoking at the ears. A situation that was not remedied by the group of giggling girls that had just watched Devin and Tom's little exchange.

Alicia waggled a pink manicured finger at him, "Maybe she is, but she is the smartest girl you will ever meet."

Alex slid his arm protectively around Alicia's tiny waist as she toyed with a beautiful silver pendant that hung around her neck. Alex couldn't help thinking that she looked amazing in her low cut lilac tunic and dark wash skinny jeans. She leaned her head on his shoulder as he whispered softly in her ear how amazing she looked. With a white smile she gave him yet another soft kiss on the cheek.

Tom looked sulky and miserable surrounded by the bunch of giggling girls.

"Oh, Tom. Cheer up! I'm sure there are plenty of other pretty blonde girls around here," Alicia flashed him one of her signature dazzling smiles.

Tom opened his mouth to speak when he was suddenly cut off (That sure seemed to be happening to the poor guy a lot) by a sudden explosion somewhere in the east wing of the school. It was quickly followed by what Alex recognized as machine gun fire. A lot of machine gun fire.

Alicia shrieked and threw her arms around Alex. "What's happening? What happened?"

A million ideas raced through Alex's head, every one crazier than the last. MI6. CIA. ASIS. SCORPIA. What could any one of those organizations be doing here? At his school. Finally he settled on the truthful answer. "I have no idea…"

There it is! I really hope you liked it. I know it is short...

I think I will be concentrating on Secrets Kept for a while. I want to get that finished by summer. I would like to have a few chapters of the sequel done as well, but I don't know if that will happen.

Once, again, I'm sorry for the wait….

-Marissa