The Hunt by Amy Meredith

and pink kisses. His feet were bare. ‘I’ve dreamed about it!’
    Luke rushed over. ‘What’s going on?’ He tightened the knot on the drawstring of his grey sweatpants. His chest was bare.
    ‘The animal – it’s out there. The one that killed Kyle and Ms Taylor!’ Vic burst out.
    ‘It wasn’t even … It had a face!’ Jess added. She kept saying that. Eve wasn’t even sure what she meant.
    ‘Girls, girls. You didn’t have to make up a story to come in here,’ Bill Salvatore told them. ‘We understand that you’ve been dying for a peek.’
    ‘No, it was real,’ Victoria told him. ‘If we wanted a peek, we would have gone to the nearest college, where the guys have actually matured.’
    ‘You really saw something?’ Dave asked from a bench in front of one of the lockers. His face looked almost grey, and Eve knew he was thinking about Kyle.
    ‘Yes!’ three or four of the girls answered at once.
    Eve knew that she had to get back out there. Her eyes met Luke’s, and a second later they were running from the locker room.
    ‘I’m coming!’ Jess called, racing after them. It sounded like the whole football team and all the cheerleaders were coming too.
    ‘Where was it?’ Eve cried, her hair whipping across her face as she ran.
    ‘Down by the far goalpost,’ Jess answered. ‘Be careful,’ she added as they tore across the grass. ‘It’s huge.Huge as a horse. But furry like a dog. And with a face!’
    Luke skidded to a halt at the goalpost and started scanning the area. Eve and Jess stopped next to him and started looking around too. ‘Is it gone? I think it might be gone,’ Jess said breathlessly.
    ‘Maybe all that squealing and screaming scared it off,’ Luke joked. ‘It scared me a little when you came into the locker room.’
    Eve glanced over at him, and her eyes snagged on his broad shoulders and tight abs. He was seriously hot. So not the time , she told herself, forcing her gaze away from his bare chest. She turned in a slow circle, looking for the creature. Everybody else was wandering the field searching for the beast too.
    ‘You said it was as big as a horse, but hairy like a dog?’ Luke asked Jess. He sounded doubtful.
    ‘Uh-huh,’ Jess answered. ‘And it had this horrible face. Not a dog face. A little like a monkey’s. And its eyes were red!’
    Supposedly , Eve suddenly thought. ‘Jess, do you think …? We were kind of freaking each other out with those stories about Creepy and the cannibals. Do you think maybe you guys just saw a regular dog, a big one, but since you were already scared you—’
    ‘No,’ Jess said firmly. ‘It wasn’t a dog.’
    ‘There’s nothing out here,’ Bill called from partway down the field. ‘It’s like I said. They wanted a look at our chiselled bodies, but they were too shy to say so.’
    ‘I’m not shy,’ Jenna answered loudly. She reached over and pinched his butt. ‘He does have nice glutes,’ she added.
    ‘Does anyone want to test mine?’ Eli shouted. ‘My butt is available for pinching, squeezing, whatever. Just form a line. No shoving. Everyone will get a turn.’
    ‘It really was here,’ Jess said to Eve and Luke. ‘And it wasn’t … It wasn’t anything you could find anywhere on Earth. The red eyes. It was like they had a fire in them, way down inside.’
    ‘I believe you,’ Eve assured her. Luke nodded.
    It was confirmed. They had another demon in their town.
    ‘Friday night. Woo-hoo!’ Eve muttered to herself as she got in the car next to her mom. She and Luke and probably Jess – she was still working on getting a yes from her parents – had decided to meet up for more research and woo-woo practice. Luke had been really psyched about the diary entry written by Eve’s greatgreat-great-grandmother. He was eager to find out what else Eve could do with her powers.
    Usually Eve and Jess and the rest of the girls did what they called ‘the prowl’ on Friday nights, just the whole group of them going out