Merlin & Meli by M.J. Garrett & Meli J. Nightly (best thriller books to read TXT) 📕

Chapter 1

He sat across the room and watched her petite body and thick black hair slumped over her desk. Peacefully wrapped in her dreams, she would periodically jerk, waking herself up. She raised her head off the desk and surveyed the room to see if anyone had noticed. Seeing no one paying attention, she took her hand and wiped the drool from her face and off the desk. Drying her hand on her faded jeans, she placed her elbow on the desk and propped her head up with her hand.


The teacher, Mr. Lancaster, in all his knowledge and self absorbed rhetoric, kept writing gibberish math figures on the board as the squeaking dry erase markers began to infuriate Meli to the point of wanting to just walk out and never return.


He kept writing, mumbling, and even laughing at his own genius. “There! See that wasn't hard.” The teacher looked around the room and noticed that most of the class of 80 was either asleep or playing paper football. “Guys! Come on, at least wait until I'm done with the lecture.” He capped the marker and then threw it into the crowded students, hitting Merlin who wasn't asleep, but busy sketching a picture of the girl who slept across the room.


“Do you mind tossing that back now that I have your attention?” Mr. Lancaster knew what a drag math could be, so he tried to entertain as much as possible. With the finals and summer vacation right around the corner, he knew that it would be hard pressed to teach them anything.


Merlin smiled at the teacher and tossed the marker back to him. He glanced over to get another look at the sleeping beauty, but to his dismay, he caught the backside of her walking out the door. She has been here for 3 weeks and he knew how hard it was transitioning from another school. He too had come from another school, but it was at the beginning of the year, not the end.


He quickly gathered his books and headed toward the door as the professor just looked at him in amazement. “Really?” Mr. Lancaster said as he squinted his eyes and raised the palms of his hands toward the ceiling.


“Sorry, but I have to...you know...go?”


“Fine, but you do know what you're getting into, right?” Mr. Lancaster raised his eyebrow as to hint of her reputation.


“I've gotta go!”


Mr. Lancaster enjoyed having Merlin in his class. Not the most dedicated student, but definitely one of his best. He smiled as he watched Merlin jog toward the door, struggling to carry his books and shoving a pencil between his teeth as he reached for the door handle.


“Later, Mr. L!” he yelled as he darted out the door.


*


Meli faced her open locker and shuffled through books and binders. Trying to find a way to keep her messy locker from spilling out onto the floor, she could hear the sound of running feet coming from down the hallway. Holding the wretched mess in the locker with one hand, she quickly slammed the door shut as she removed her hand from the carnage. Turning to see who it was that was running, she noticed the guy that sat across their classroom.


“Hey! Meli?” he said as he came to a stop and panted to catch his breath.


“What do you want?” she said as she crossed her arms across her chest and pushed her hip to one side.


“Sorry, but I think you dropped this.” Holding out a half chewed pencil that he knew wasn't hers, he smiled and tried to put on his friendly face. Glaring at him through her hair, that seemed to cover the best features of her face, she tilted her head back and blew her hair to the side.


“I dropped that?” she asked as she pointed to the mangled chewed pencil with the look of skepticism in her eyes.


“Uh...yeah?” he said as he raised one eyebrow and smiled, trying to ease the tension.


“That chew toy has your name on it.” she said with a snarl.

"What? Where?" he asked as he ignorantly searched the pencil.

"There. See? M-E-R-L-I-N that's your name, right?" She stood there and glared at him.

"I guess...that could...possibly be..." he stuttered while examining the pencil.

"Yeah...that's what I thought." she said as she rolled her big brown eyes.


“Well, do you want it? You can have it if you want it.” He stood there holding this pencil out to her with one hand and with the other tried to keep his books from sliding down his stomach and spilling onto the floor.


Looking at him with her skeptical eyes squinted, she blurted out, “You're an idiot.”


Standing there, with his pencil extended and holding his books to his hip with a binder trapped between his legs, he watched her walk away and loved every minute. He didn't know what it was about her, but he really liked her. While walking away, she lifted up her hand to show him her middle finger and how she really felt when the bell rang and students poured into the hallway. Their voices filling the air, he stood there smiling as if he had some sort of heroic breakthrough with the mysterious girl he drew a hundred times in his notebook.


He stood about 5 ft 8 inches tall. He was only about 150 lbs soak and wet, but planned on changing that this summer. He was going to hit the gym hard...of course, he promised himself that every summer. His shaggy black curly hair was thick and sometime hid his eyes from the rest of the world. Dressed in a plain white t'shirt, faded boot cut jeans, and black Chuck Taylor shoes with the white toe, he found himself somewhat smitten by her mystic rebellious attitude...and he liked it.


“So....” he tried to yell over the crowded student body “...I take it you don't want your pencil?”


Chapter 2

Was that shaggy haired moron seriously trying to come on to her with a chewed pencil? Meli smiled at the thought as she walked home. She was not about to admit it to herself, but deep down inside she found what he had done was kind of cute. However, she would deny it over and over if she had to. She knew her sister would have a hoot if she told her the tale about Merlin, the guy who tried to woo her with a chewed pencil. “Nelly,” she said out-loud unconsciously.


Her sister, Nelly, was the reason she decided to ditch the last class. Apart from the fact that she hated math and Mr. Lancaster was kind of insane in her eyes, she had gotten little to no sleep the night before. It had been a month since they had moved into this new town. Due to her father’s job, moving has become a common occurrence. She hated it. The school, the people, and most of all she hated that she was now farther away from her sister.


The buzz from her cell phone made her jump. Her eyes gazed quickly at the new message and she became very worried. She received the first message while in class, just before she decided to leave. “You need to come quick, Nelly is having a fit and she might be getting herself into some trouble :( “

As she reached her cookie cutter two-story house, she noticed her mother and father’s Mercedes parked outside. In a sense, it was both good and bad.

“What in the world are you doing here?” her mother questioned her as she was fixing her green silk scarf, looking like she was about to head out.

Her father was still in his suit and had his suitcase resting on the kitchen counter. She could not look more out of place within the household. Her parents were so different from her. The second question as expected came from her father, “Aren’t you supposed to be in school? You had another hour left until I went and picked you up.”

It was embarrassing enough that they had drop her off and pick her up, but they went overboard when they requested the Dean to have her day-to-day schedule. It's not like she was some little kid that needed a babysitter.

“I-” Meli began, but as always, they did not even let her speak until everything had been said on their part.

“We had a deal, Meli! This was your last chance! You have already been kicked out of every single school possible. You cannot continue to do as you please!” He reprimanded her, his hands flying everywhere in his usual dramatic way.

Her mother simply rubbed her temple as if she was trying to avoid yet another dreadful headache. “Seriously, Meli. You cannot continue to grieve us with such trivial problems.” She sighed and reached for her purse. Her hand blindly searched until she pulled out a small orange bottle that held her beloved prescribed pills.

Meli just shook her head. While her father escaped with alcohol every night, her mother found comfort in her pills. They had always tried to play the perfect family. The family without any problems. The farther they were from their problems the better. But, she was not about to run away from Nelly like her parents did. “It’s about Nelly! She might be in trouble...”

This caught both her parents off guard. Her mother had a quizzical look about her. “How could you even possibly know that she is in trouble?”

Her father interjected, “Don’t tell me this is about the ‘twin psychic’ bullshit you tried to pulled off last time.”

Meli rolled her big brown eyes. Sure she had lied about her being able to read her sister’s mind, but it was the extremes that she had to go to in order to grab anyone’s attention. “No! Lacy, the girl who works there...she sent me a text saying she’s really upset. She might really be in trouble this time. Can we please go see her?” She hated asking her parents for favors but she had no choice.

There was a pause and the silence in the room was so palpable, it became uncomfortable for all the parties involved. Her mother looked at her husband, afraid to say the wrong thing, though something about her said that she also was concerned about her daughter.

“No! Out of the question!”

“But, dad!” Meli pleaded, her eyes filled with anger. She turned to her mother for support, but she too gave her a look of defeat and just turned away from her daughter. “Unbelievable! You bring me into this God forsaken hick town just so we can act like Nelly doesn’t exist! She is still your daughter!