Sanctuary by Meg Cabot Page A

as usual, was already taking charge of the situation.
    “What’s the connection?” Rob wanted to know. “What does Krantz say?”
    All I wanted to do was hang up the phone, go upstairs to my room, and climb into bed. Yes, that was it. That was what I needed to do. Go back to sleep, and wake up again tomorrow, so that all of this would just seem like a bad dream.
    “Mastriani!” Rob yelled in my ear. “What’s the connection?”
    “It’s the symbol, okay?” I couldn’t believe he was yelling at me. I mean, I wasn’t the one who’d shot a cop, or anything. “The one that was on Nate’s chest. It’s the same thing that was spray-painted onto the headstones at the synagogue.”
    “What does it look like?” Rob wanted to know. “This symbol?”
    Look, Rob is my soul mate and all, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t times when I don’t feel like hauling off and decking him. Now was one of those times.
    “Jeez, Rob,” I said. “You were there in that cornfield with me, remember?” This caused a pointed look to be exchanged between my brother and his girlfriend, but I ignored them. “Didn’t you notice what Nate had on his chest?”
    Rob’s voice was strangely quiet. “No, not really,” he said. “I didn’t … I didn’t actually look. That kind of thing … well, I don’t really do too well, you know, at the sight of …”
    Blood. He didn’t say it, but then, he didn’t have to. All my annoyance with him dissipated. Just like that.
    Well, love will do that to you.
    “It was this squiggly line,” I explained. “With an arrow coming out of one end.”
    “An arrow,” Rob echoed.
    “Yeah,” I said. “An arrow.”
    “An M? The squiggly line. Was it shaped like a M, only on its side?”
    “I don’t know,” I said. “I guess so. Look, Rob, I don’t feel so good. I gotta go—”
    Then Rob said a strange thing. Something that got my attention right away, even though I was feeling so lousy, like I was going to pass out, practically.
    He said, “It’s not an arrow.”
    I had been about to press the Talk button and hang up the phone. When he said that, however, I stopped myself. “What do you mean, it’s not an arrow?”
    “Jess,” he said. The fact that he used my first name made me realize the situation was far from normal. “I think I might know who these people are. The people who are doing this stuff.”
    I didn’t even hesitate. It was like all of a sudden, the blood that had seemed frozen in my veins was flowing again.
    “I’ll meet you at the Stop and Shop,” I said. “Come pick me up.”
    “Mastriani—”
    “Just be there,” I said, and hung up. Then I threw down the phone, got up, and started for the stairs.
    “Jess, wait,” Michael called. “Where are you going?”
    “Out,” I called back. “Tell Mom I’ll be home soon.”
    And then, after struggling into my hat and coat, I was tearing off down the street. I couldn’t help noticing as I jogged that while our own driveway was still full of snow, the Thompkinses’ driveway had been shoveled so clean, you could practically have played basketball on it. All the snow that had been shoveled away was piled along the curb, as neatly as if a plow had pushed it there.
    But it hadn’t been the work of a plow. Oh, no. It was the work of a person. Namely, my brother Douglas.
    Love. It makes people do the craziest things.

C H A P T E R
10
    C hick—owner and proprietor of Chick’s Bar and Motorcycle Club—looked down at the drawing I had made and went, “Oh, sure. The True Americans.”
    I looked at the squiggle. It was kind of hard to see in the dark gloom of the bar.
    “Are you sure?” I asked. “I mean … you really know what this is?”
    “Oh, yeah.” Chick was eating a meatball sandwich he’d made for himself back in the kitchen. He’d offered one to each of us, as well, but we’d declined the invitation. Our loss, Chick had said.
    Now a large piece of meatball escaped from between the buns Chick