I gazed down. I was absentmindedly rubbing my thumb over the daggers. Oh. Well. “They comfort me.”
Reeve gasped and stomped on the brake. The car jerked to a stop, throwing me forward as much as the belt would allow.
“What the—”
“Bronx,” she screeched, tearing off her belt and stepping into the daylight.
Just in front of her car, right in the middle of the road, was Bronx’s old, rusted truck. He leaned against the hood, arms crossed.
I should have expected this.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she demanded.
“What do you think you’re doing?” he spat. “Sneaking out in the middle of the night, meeting some strange guy and going to his place. Do you know how dangerous that is?”
“How did you—argh! It doesn’t matter.” She grabbed a rock and threw it at him.
Reflexes honed, he ducked.
She shook her head, as if she couldn’t believe what she’d just done. More calmly, she said, “He’s not some strange guy, he’s my boyfriend, and what I do with him isn’t your business.”
“Everything about you is my business.”
Her back went ramrod straight. “Screw you. I’m not doing this with you, Bronx. Not anymore.” She turned.
He grabbed her arm, spun her around. “Did you sleep with him?”
Very calmly, she said, “I told you. What I do with him is none of your business.”
“And I told you everything about you is my business, but neither of us seems to be listening.”
The forced calm vanished as she jerked away. “You can’t do this to me. Can’t pretend you care. Tomorrow, after I’ve dumped him, you’ll change your mind.” She shoved him, a puny action, really, when comparing a six-foot-five gigantor to a five-foot-five fairy princess, but he released her anyway.
“Does Daddy Dearest know about him?” he asked quietly.
She pointed her finger in his face. “No, and you won’t say a word. You don’t get to play any part in my love life. We’ve been sniffing around each other since junior high. You were so sweet to me at first. You made me things. You were my first kiss. Then suddenly you wouldn’t look at me, wouldn’t even talk to me—until I turned my sights to someone else and tried to move on. You’d come on strong, and I’d always fall back into your arms, but it wouldn’t take long for you to start ignoring me all over again, and I’m tired of it.”
I shouldn’t be listening to this. I would have hated it if anyone had heard my arguments with Cole, especially the final one.
Trying to distract myself, I turned up the radio. Taylor Swift, “I Knew You Were Trouble.” Fitting. I texted Nana. Can we talk later? Just U & me?
If my emotions started to go haywire, I’d adios.
Her: I would love that.
Me: I’m sorry I’ve been so weird lately, & I’m sorry about the fight w/the girl.
Her: We can talk about the reason at dinner. And just to make you happy, I promise I won’t spend too much on groceries.
I laughed.
Her: BTW, do you want to tell me why I found a note in your room saying “Did this to myself”? WHAT DID YOU DO?
Uh-oh.
Me: Almost @ school. Gotta go. Love you!
Hey. Not a word of that was a lie.
“—can’t be with you the way I want,” Bronx was saying, drawing my attention back to the conversation.
“Why?” Reeve demanded. “For once, give me a straight answer. You do, and I’ll never see Ethan again.”
Bronx pressed his lips together.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” Bitterness tinged her tone.
Reeve stomped to the car. Bronx stomped to his. His tires squealed as he turned the vehicle around. Dirt sprayed as he shot forward.
“That boy,” Reeve said, her body trembling.
“He cares about you.”
“Yeah, just not enough.”
I reached over, patted her hand. “Believe me, I get it.”
She tossed me a sad smile before resuming the drive.
A few minutes later, she was parking in her usual spot. The lot could be overflowing, but no one, not even teachers, would dare encroach on her territory. Not because of her or her father’s money, but because of Bronx. I heard someone made the mistake of parking here only once; Bronx had hot-wired the car and crashed it into the trees the students had spray-painted gold and black to proudly display our school colors.
Silent, we strode over the tiger paws mowed into the grass and headed inside the building.
Trina and Mackenzie were leaning against a locker, snarling at anyone stupid enough to approach them. When I walked past—never said I was smart—they pushed away from the wall and flanked my sides, shouldering Reeve out of the way.
“You have to talk to Cole,” Trina began.
“I never thought I’d say this,” Mackenzie said, “but I want you to do more than talk to him. I want you to seduce the hell out of him. I don’t know how much more post-Ali drama I can take.”
“O-kay. Cue my exit,” Reeve said, branching away from us. “See you at lunch, Ali.”
“Yeah. See ya.” I sighed. “What’s the problem?”
Trina twisted the ring in her eyebrow. “For starters, he’s meaner than my stepdad’s Yorkie.”
“Your stepdad has a Yorkie?”
Mackenzie slashed a hand through the air. “Forget the tiny terror dog. Cole lashes out at everything we say, and has for weeks.”
For weeks?
Until two nights ago, he’d shown me only his gentler side.
“He busted Lucas’s nose during training,” she continued. “Last night, he punched a window and needed eight stitches.”
Last night? While he’d been with Veronica. “It has nothing to do with me,” I assured them. If I’d had claws, I would have scraped them over the lockers.
Calm.
“I happen to think it has everything to do with you,” Trina said. “I’ve seen the way he watches you when you’re not looking.”
“And I swear vessels burst in his forehead every time Gavin mentions your name,” Mackenzie said, nodding.
“Guys. Cole broke up with me. I told him I’d work on being his friend, and I will, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to stroke his...uh, ego and make him smile.”
“Fine,” Trina replied. “We’ll stop trying to convince you to sex him up, but you still gotta talk to him. You’re the only one he’ll listen to.”
“I don’t think that’s true.”
She ignored me, saying, “He disappears for hours at a time. No one knows where he goes. He’s paranoid we won’t keep detailed records about what we find on patrol. He gets phone calls from blocked numbers and steps out of the room so no one will overhear his conversations. Before, he kept us in the loop about everything.”
So he was still spying on the slayers. But what was it, exactly, that he was trying to uncover?
I reached my destination, freed the lock on my locker and stuffed my bag inside. “I’ll talk to him about his weirdness, but that’s all I can promise.”
Mackenzie shocked me to my bones when she hugged me. “Thank you. We, like, seriously owe you one.”
As if our conversation had summoned him, Cole turned the corner and strolled down the hall toward us. He was wearing a red baseball cap and had his hands in his pockets. I couldn’t see his newest wound. He walked past us, nodding at Trina, then Mackenzie—avoiding me. My chest constricted.
“Or maybe I won’t be talking to him,” I muttered, and took off for my first class.
Just before Cole turned the corner, he looked back at me; our gazes locked. I tripped over my own feet. No vision. But I saw hunger. Fury. Regret. Remorse. Fear. Then he was gone.
Someone laughed, breaking me from the spell he’d woven. Dazed, a little angry with myself—calm, dang it—I looked to see what was so funny. Wren and Poppy stood with a group of girls making fun of a tall, skinny redhead with freckles and braces. Wren and Poppy weren’t laughing, but they weren’t stopping the taunts, either. The redhead was doing her best not to cry.
I stomped over and, to a chorus of “Hey” and “Watch it,” shoved the girls out of the way. Glaring, I said, “You have five seconds to leave, and then I get mad.”
I wasn’t ever going to be a sedative, was I?
They might not know how good I was with my fists, but they certainly knew the people I ran with, and, paling, they left without another word. Poppy cast a remorseful look over her shoulder. Wren, too. Only she mouthed, Thank you, baffling me.
“Thank you,” the redhead said, then swallowed a sob. “My shirt... I didn’t bring a jacket today, so I can’t cover up.”
It was white and soaked with water, revealing every stitch on her bra. “Why don’t we trade?” I didn’t want her sitting in the cold and the wet and thinking about what had happened. “Your shirt goes better with my jeans.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
She brightened, and we raced to the bathroom.
“Thank you so much,” she said after we’d made the switch.
“Don’t worry about it.” Shivering, I darted to class to avoid a tardy I couldn’t afford.
To my surprise, Justin was waiting at the door. “Hey, Ali.”
“Hey.”
He opened his mouth to say more, closed it. Opened it. Snapped it closed. Finally he settled on “How are you?”
“I’ve been better.” I headed toward my seat, and he followed me. “You?”
“Fine. I’m fine.”
I studied him, saw dark circles under his eyes, gaunt cheekbones and lips that had clearly been chewed. He wasn’t fine. “I know you told me nothing abnormal had been happening to you. Is that still the case?”
His brow furrowed, becoming a slash of anger. “Want to tell me what’s been happening to you? Because something has, right?”
