“I can’t believe this,” he said, raking his fingers through his thick, dark hair. He hadn’t put any gel in it—Brett was always begging him to go product-free—and this was the first time all night she’d noticed. “This is more of your jealous bullshit, isn’t it?”
“She hangs all over you!” Brett protested, but her voice sounded weak even to her own ears.
“For the record,” Sebastian snapped, “I didn’t wake up one day and think it would be cool to hang out with the girl. It was a Perfect Match thing. Aren’t you matched up with her brother? Do you see me freaking out? Even though, let’s face it, you have been acting shifty and weird lately.”
Brett had to look away from him then, because she didn’t know what to say and she was afraid she might burst into tears.
“But it doesn’t matter, does it?” Sebastian’s voice was bitter. “You’re so fucking insecure that you plotted to embarrass her, just because I was nice to her.”
“No…” Brett protested, but there was no force behind the word. She felt almost frozen. She couldn’t seem to do anything but look at Sebastian’s disappointed face while he stared down at her.
“I can’t keep doing this,” he said, the ring of finality in his voice. Brett’s heart kicked in her chest, and her stomach dropped to her knees, but she still couldn’t seem to speak. “I can’t be with you if you’re going to act like this all the time. What’s next? Are you going to go after my lab partner because we share the same table? I just… I can’t take it anymore.”
He didn’t give Brett a chance to defend herself or to explain. He just brushed past her and walked away.
26
A WAVERLY OWL KNOWS THAT THE TRUTH WILL SET
HER FREE—IF IT DOESN’T KILL HER FIRST.
Jenny sat with Isaac on one of the red couches that had been pushed back from the main crowd in the atrium. The slideshow had left a bad taste in Isaac’s mouth, he’d said, and he’d drawn Jenny away with him. She was happy to go. The whole Isla montage was weird and regrettable, but it hadn’t made a dent in Jenny’s good mood. Isaac had been so sweet and romantic all night. Everyone had gone to the ball with their Perfect Matches, but even though he was technically Brett’s date, he’d made it clear he was with Jenny from the moment they got to the ball, handing her one red rose. Julian had taken one look at the two of them, given Isaac that boy-head nod of acknowledgment, and left to go hang out with his buddies. Now Jenny was twirling the rose between her fingers, waiting for the one thing she’d wanted all along: a Valentine’s Day kiss.
“Poor Isla,” Isaac said, shaking his head. Jenny reached over and put her hand on his, and he smiled at her, warming her up from the inside out until she was sure she must have matched the pink blush of the Marc Jacobs dress she’d borrowed from Callie’s closet.
“She’s changed so much,” Jenny ventured to say. She knew what it felt like to be on the receiving end of Tinsley’s hatred, so she couldn’t help but feel a little sorry for Isla. Then again, Isla wasn’t exactly angelic. She’d lied to get Tinsley in trouble.
But this was Isla’s brother, after all. Hardly an impartial observer.
“She was obsessed with it,” Isaac said, leaning back against the red couch. “The minute Dad got the new job, she decided that she was going to completely reinvent herself. She was, like, on a mission.”
Jenny felt a reluctant stirring inside, knowing that she, of all people, could relate to that idea. But then a memory tickled at her, and she frowned. “Wait,” she said. “I thought you told me that you had to leave your old school because Isla did something bad…?”
Isaac sighed. “If you mean she maxed out a credit card buying ridiculous clothes in New York City.” He shrugged. “When we first got here, she kind of wanted to let people think that she was trouble, you know? So… I sort of helped. In reality, she’s a good girl. We really just moved here for my dad’s career.”
“I guess it’s nice that you helped her out,” Jenny said. She smiled at him. “But I’m glad you’re telling me the truth now.”
She felt as if a little glow surrounded them. They really were a real couple, because he was telling her the truth about things. Jenny decided she was proud of them both.
“I’m sorry I lied about it,” he said. He turned slightly so he was facing her, his green eyes serious and his mouth curved into an adorable smile. His dark jacket hung open over his crisp white shirt. “It just… it was so important to her.”
Jenny’s heart melted. Isaac was such a good guy. He took care of his sister. He’d looked worried sick during the slideshow.
“I understand,” she said. “Family has to come first.” She thought of her brother, Dan, and how worried he got about her sometimes. He would have freaked out if someone had put on a slideshow just to humiliate her. And it wouldn’t have been hard to do, given how much trouble she’d gotten herself into back at Constance Billard and even here at Waverly.
“My older brother is totally overprotective,” she said, taking Isaac’s hand between hers. She shrugged, smiling. “That’s his job.”
Isaac’s lips moved into a grin and his hand tightened on hers. “I guess I just think I should have taken better care of her.”
“I’m sure she knows that,” Jenny assured him. “Little sisters always know that their brothers are looking out for them.”
Isaac’s smile deepened. Jenny felt the rose between her fingertips, happy that there were no secrets between them now. She leaned closer into him. A remote couch in a semi-dark corner wasn’t just a great place for sharing secrets—it would also be a great place for a kiss. She hadn’t been able to get their last kiss, in the English building the other day, out of her head. She swayed closer. Isaac’s mouth curved, and he leaned toward her.
“Isaac?”
Jenny blinked and turned toward the voice. A girl stood a few feet away from the couch, frowning ferociously. Talk about throwing cold water on a moment. Jenny wondered what the unfamiliar girl wanted and pasted a polite smile on her face. But next to her, Isaac went rigid, threw Jenny’s hand off his, and jumped to his feet.
“Molly!” he cried in a voice Jenny barely recognized. Did he sound… nervous?
She stood up, too, frowning at the girl. Molly was slender with chocolate brown hair to her shoulders and bright, quizzical brown eyes. She wore jeans and an emerald green sweater with a puffy black parka unzipped and hanging open and a thermos in her hands. She looked from Isaac to Jenny and then back again, her brows knitted in confusion.
“What are you doing here?” Isaac asked, stepping closer to the other girl and farther away from Jenny. A shiver went down her spine, but she ignored it.
“I couldn’t not see you on Valentine’s Day,” Molly said. Her worried brown eyes shifted to Jenny, who felt more and more exposed and uncomfortable the longer the moment dragged out. The girl’s eyes flicked back to Isaac. “I know you hate being sick, so I brought you some of your favorite chicken soup.” She indicated the thermos she clutched between her hands. “But you’re… um… all dressed up. At a dance.”
She didn’t say with this girl, but Jenny was pretty sure they all heard it anyway.
“Isaac,” Jenny said, choking a little bit on his name, “what’s going on?”
She knew. She just didn’t want to know. She didn’t want to believe it—but it was literally standing right in front of her. It was the way the other girl was looking at him, the expectation and confusion and hurt in her brown eyes. Jenny could think of only one reason a girl would show up at a ball, dressed so casually, bearing chicken soup for a guy who wasn’t even sick.
Her stomach hurt.
“Um, this is Jenny…” Isaac said, gesturing toward Jenny. His words trailed off.
“I’m Molly,” the other girl said, cocking her head slightly as she looked at Jenny. Her eyes traveled over Jenny’s curls, her large chest, down the sleek front of her dress to her shoes and right back up again. Her gaze darkened. Jenny knew what she was going to say ne
xt in the same way she knew that the sun was going to come up in the morning. “Isaac’s girlfriend.”
“You have a girlfriend.” Jenny couldn’t get the words to make sense. She felt tears threaten her eyes. “I can’t believe you!” She could hardly breathe. “Is this the ‘thing you had to take care of’? Which you obviously didn’t. It was a total lie.”
“And you’re definitely not sick, Isaac,” Molly said, her voice sharpening. “You told me you thought you were dying. You said you were stuck in bed and probably would be for the rest of the week, and that’s why you couldn’t come visit!”
“No, no,” Isaac said hurriedly. “Wait, you don’t understand!”
Jenny took a step away from him and suddenly everything made a horrible kind of sense. Isaac’s noticeable weirdness when she’d mentioned the Valentine’s Day Ball in the first place. Had he been worried about his girlfriend then? When had he told Molly he wasn’t going to go see her? She was willing to bet it was right around the time he started acting normal, sweet, and attentive again.
Jenny shut her eyes for a moment, afraid the room might start spinning in time with her head. Why was she so consistently, repeatedly wrong about guys? Epically, tragically wrong?
“I didn’t want to tell you I was feeling better,” Isaac was telling Molly. “I didn’t think I could drive all the way there….”
He was still lying. Was there anything he hadn’t lied about? Jenny backed away from the two of them, her stomach twisting, tears pricking the backs of her eyes. How could she be so blind, over and over again? So completely clueless?
Her eyes scanned the party, desperate to find a shoulder to cry on. Her gaze landed on Brett’s distinctive hair in the crowd. Brett was standing almost inside the plants near the windows, all alone. They met each other’s gaze across the sea of pink-lit ferns. She started to move toward her friend.
But then something occurred to her. Brett’s strange reaction to Jenny’s use of the word boyfriend. Her deflating words at the Three-Legged Race. She’d seemed so wary, even concerned… almost as if she’d known the truth about Isaac.
It hit Jenny like a tidal wave: she’d known. There was no almost about it. Her supposed friend had known Isaac was two-timing her, and she’d lied right to Jenny’s face.
Which meant that Jenny hadn’t just lost a boyfriend—she’d lost a friend. Isaac was a liar, but maybe her entire life at Waverly was a lie, too.
She glared at Brett and then ran away before all the liars and cheaters and backstabbers could see her cry.
27
A WAVERLY OWL KNOWS EXACTLY WHO HER
FRIENDS ARE.
Tinsley didn’t exactly retreat into the bathroom. She wasn’t one for slinking off. But she couldn’t deny that when she did go to the bathroom, at an unhurried pace that would not have looked out of place on a catwalk, it was a relief to get a break from the collective evil eye that was trained on her.
Oh, well. All publicity is good publicity, her father always said. Better that everyone should be talking about her than failing to notice her, she told herself, and she tried to make herself believe it. She really did.
She looked at herself in the mirror as she washed her hands. Truth be told, she would rather be adored, but she’d make do with what she had. Not like you have much choice, an inner voice whispered. Tinsley slapped off the faucet and reached for a paper towel.
A stall door opened behind her, and Isla walked out. For a moment, they just stared at each other through the bank of mirrors.
Isla recovered first. She raised her brows and walked toward Tinsley, stopping at the next sink over.
“I guess we’re even,” she said, but she didn’t sound triumphant. She sounded resigned.
Tinsley smiled wanly. Were they even? Isla had sold Tinsley out, consigned her to a month of hard labor, and then captured the attention of all the guys at Waverly. And she hadn’t even done it by being cute and bubbly and genuine, like Jenny Humphrey had. She’d done it by beating Tinsley at her own manipulative, backstabbing game. What had Tinsley done except expose Isla’s past—which, if the reaction was anything to go by, was only going to make her more beloved and adored? Tinsley didn’t think they were anything close to even.
But she also had no real interest in taking the game to another level. No wonder she felt so strange. Resignation wasn’t a feeling she’d ever encountered before.
“I shouldn’t have done that to you,” Isla continued in a low voice. She didn’t look at Tinsley as she washed her hands. “I kind of took the whole bad-girl thing too far. I just really wanted to start over, and I was trying way too hard.”
Tinsley opened her mouth to say something suitably cutting but shrugged instead. “If it’s any consolation, I never would have suspected,” she said. “Your transformation is pretty stunning.”
“Thanks,” Isla said. She looked at Tinsley then, her expression wry. “I think.”
“Sure.” Tinsley flipped her hair back from her face. “I fully believed you were a devious, manipulative, scheming party girl, and had been since birth.”
She didn’t say like me. But Isla smiled anyway. “That’s the nicest thing you could have said to me.”
Tinsley laughed softly and then nodded toward the door, motioning for Isla to walk in front of her. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer, she thought, keeping an eye on Isla’s back as they walked into the party. And maybe it wasn’t beyond the realm of possibility that dork-turned-schemer Isla Dresden, Tinsley’s biggest challenge yet, might be both.
“Ladies,” Heath said as they emerged, stepping forward with a glass of punch in each hand, “I hope you didn’t get into a catfight in there. And if you did, I certainly hope you filmed it.”
Isla winked at Tinsley before gliding off toward a group of Owls from the jazz ensemble who were gazing at her in open adoration. They actually did erupt into spontaneous applause when she approached, but then, Isla’s transformation was probably their communal wet dream.
“Cheers,” Heath said, handing Tinsley a glass of punch and redirecting her attention to his wicked cheekbones and Armani-clad body. “Drink up. You look seriously sober.”
“I thought I’d be on your shit list after my slideshow,” Tinsley said, staring at the glass in her hand. “Is this drink spiked?”
“Of course the drink is spiked,” Heath replied, his green eyes twinkling. “But why do you say that like it’s a bad thing?” He clanked their glasses together. “And I thought that slideshow rocked. Who knew such hotness could come from such tragic origins? I might have to pay closer attention to the loser contingent around here. Who knows what’s lurking under all that bad hair and all those baggy clothes?”
Tinsley considered him for a moment. “You thought it was funny?”
“Of course I thought it was funny. Please. She looked heinous,” he said.
“But she’s your precious little Isla,” Tinsley said, her bitterness more apparent than she’d intended. “You rushed over to ask her if she still had her stupid costume!”
Heath gazed at Tinsley, his handsome face amused. “Imagine how hot that costume would be on her now,” he said. “The tutu, particularly, especially if she wasn’t wearing any—”
Tinsley rolled her eyes and started to turn away, but Heath reached over and touched her arm. She stopped and looked at him. The music was blaring, and a pack of drunken seniors had their arms flung around one another’s shoulders as they sang along—but all Tinsley could see was Heath.
“Anyway,” he said more quietly. His gaze was warm. “She’s not my precious anything.”
“Uh-huh.” Tinsley took a careful sip of her drink, savoring the fruity punch and the kick of rum beneath, a Ferro specialty. “You’ve been slobbering all over her like a rabid dog.”
“I slobber all over everyone,” he said matter-of-factly with a shrug. “I don’t like her or anything.” He smiled. “But you thought I did, didn’t you? Finally, after all these years, I got your attention.”
Tinsley shook her head at him dismissively. But she was secretly more pleased than she wanted to admit. “How old are you?” she asked, pretending to scoff. “You were mean to me to get me to notice you? What’s next, throwing sand at me in the sandbox? Stealing my crayons?”
“Give me a break, Tinsley,” Heath retorted. He smirked. “Besides, it worked, didn’t it?”
“Not at all,” she lied. They both smiled. Tinsley tossed her hair back. “It just made me wonder what was wrong with you that you thought that wannabe was so captivating. After all,” she said loftily, “I know who you lie awake at night and fantasize about.” She moved closer and let their shoulders brush before drawing back. “You always have, and you always will.”
Heath leaned in and traced a finger down Tinsley’s bare arm. She shivered involuntarily. “We can take that out of the fantasy realm any time you like, babe. Just say the word.”
“The word is no, you idiot,” Tinsley said with a laugh.
But she didn’t feel the need to walk away just yet, either.
28
A WAVERLY OWL FACES CONFLICT HEAD-ON, EVEN
WHEN SHE WANTS TO EAT A BOX OF CHOCOLATES
AND CRY.
Brett pushed through the heavy glass doors and out into the cold night, leaving the noise of the dance behind her. She didn’t think she could possibly feel worse after Sebastian had walked away, leaving her standing by herself. Until she saw the way Jenny looked at her.
Jenny had taken off before Brett could do more than stare at her, leaving Brett to try to piece together what had happened. Searching the crowd, she’d spotted Isaac with another girl and instantly figured it out. Clearly, Isaac hadn’t broken things off with his girlfriend, and the whole thing must have come crashing down pretty quickly. Jenny obviously blamed Brett, and how could Brett even argue with that? Look what she had done! So she did the only thing she could—she went after Jenny. She ran all the way across campus, trying to catch up with her.