What did she want from him?
Why did he even care?
His father wanted him to confess, and had already made it clear that he’d throw Reed out of the house if he got expelled.
Then what?
Reed wished he could light up a joint, since that was the best way to drive the questions away. A few puffs and he could sink into the worry free zone and forget it all. But you didn’t sneak into an old mine and light a match—not if you cared about staying alive.
There were other ways to forget. Reed closed his eyes—though there was no light to shut out—and leaned his head back against the wall. He could almost hear the sounds of an earlier time: pumping, clanging, chugging, grunting, rhythmic grinding of steel on steel. That was why he liked it here: The place was full of ghosts, and it was easy to imagine you were one of them, fading into the past, all your problems long solved, your decisions made, your life lived.
Reed knew he’d eventually have to get up, walk out, and do something. He couldn’t just hide there in the dark, waiting for his problems to pass. But it was tempting to imagine the possibility, just for a while.
He’d never been afraid of the dark, just like he’d never been afraid of dying. As far as he was concerned, darkness was easy. Leaving it all behind was a piece of cake. The hard part came when you turned on the lights and had to face the day.
chapter
11
Kaia wasn’t sure she owed Powell an apology, and she hadn’t decided whether she wanted to give him another chance or whether the time had come to make a clean break from both of the men in her life. All she knew was that she needed to see him, and didn’t know why.
The uncertainty had driven her straight to his doorstep.
“Kaia, ma chérie.” He swung the door open before she had a chance to knock. “I’ve been expecting you.”
The last time Kaia had been in the cramped bachelor pad—every time, in fact—she’d headed straight for the bedroom, which was large enough to fit Powell’s sagging mattress and not much else. This time, she sat on the futon. It was burnt orange, inherited from the previous tenant. Powell squeezed in next to her, and Kaia willed herself not to inch away.
There was one question answered: She didn’t want him back. His pathetic threats had twisted Kaia’s attraction into an instinctive repulsion.
“I knew you’d be back,” he leered, fondling a strand of her hair.
She slapped his hand away. “I didn’t come here for that,” she informed him.
“What, then?”
“It’s over,” she told him. She was certain now of what she wanted, but uncertain about too many other things—like why she’d felt so safe with Reed, even knowing what she knew, and why, sitting here on this familiar futon with her horny but harmless ex, she felt a shiver of danger.
Powell sighed. “Haven’t we danced to this song before?”
“Don’t be—”
“Cute. I know.” He tried to put an arm around her, and she jumped up off the futon, unsure why she felt so jittery, but willing to trust her instincts. “What? Are you still going on about that stalking thing? I told you, not my style.”
“No, I know it wasn’t you …”
“And you can’t seriously still think the Sawyer boy is a reasonable option—not after what happened yesterday.”
“How do you know about—”
Powell shook his head, his eyes twinkling. “I was there when they tossed him out of school. Very sad case, that. So tragic to see a young man just throw his life away, and all on a nasty little prank.”
Now Kaia sat back down again, taking Powell’s hands in her own and trying to smile. This had all worked out a little too well, especially for him. “Jack, tell me something.” She raised a hand to his temple and wound a finger around one of his chestnut hairs, curling it idly as she spoke. “How did you know about me and Reed, really?”
“I told you, ma chérie, I just knew. I could tell.”
She leaned toward him, brushing her lips lightly against his cheek, trying not to gag on the overpowering scent of his cologne. “You were watching, weren’t you? It’s okay, you can tell me. It’s kind of a turn-on.”
“Well, since you put it that way …” Powell traced his fingers down the side of her face and began lightly massaging her neck. Kaia tried not to jerk away. Then his fingers closed down on her skin, pinching her shoulder. He pushed her away from him, holding her in place like a vise. “What kind of an idiot do you take me for? ‘Oh, Jack,’” he simpered in imitation, “‘tell me all about how you love to watch me when I’m alone, how you’ve been following me, how you love to see me weak and scared. Tell me everything, Jack, it’s such a turn-on.’ If you want to know something, Kaia, just ask.”
“You took the photos,” Kaia said. It wasn’t a question.
“No point in lying now, is there?”
“And the car.”
“Mea culpa.”
“You planted the spray paint in Reed’s locker,” she realized, the pieces all falling into place.
“A master stroke,” Powell preened. “And yet you waltz in here ready to toss me away anyway, still loyal to that piece of scum no matter what he does. ‘Stand by my man’ really doesn’t become you, dear.”
“You’re going to fix it—you know that, right?” She couldn’t let them throw Reed out of school, especially now. The memory of pushing him away the day before rose in her like bile. “You’re going to get him out of trouble.”
“Or what?”
It was funny. Yesterday, when she’d thought she’d learned the truth about Reed, she’d felt empowered. But now, confronting the real threat, it was all she could do to force herself not to flee. “Or I sic my father on you. At school, it may be your word against mine, but if Daddy Dearest finds out that some perv has laid a finger on his darling daughter, what do you think he’ll do?”
“Come at me with a baseball bat?” Powell sneered. “I’m trembling.”
“Come at you with a team of lawyers,” Kaia corrected haughtily. “Get you fired, deported, jailed—he’ll get whatever he wants. He’s just like me that way.”
“Is he really ready to drag his baby girl’s name through the mud?”
“Wouldn’t be the first time. Though I doubt he’ll have to, once his team figures out how you ended up in Nowheresville, USA, in the first place. We all know it wasn’t by choice. What are you willing to do to keep that skeleton safely hidden in the back of your closet?”
Powell flinched, and Kaia suppressed a smile. Her hunches were never wrong. Jack Powell had obviously stuck his hands somewhere they didn’t belong—and gotten burned.
“You really care about this loser so much?” he asked.
“I think the real question is, do you?” Kaia stood up. “Are you willing to risk it all, just to screw with him?”
“I’d rather screw with you,” Powell said. “It would be a much more pleasant way to handle this.You stay here with me now, and in the morning, I’ll smooth things over for your little playmate.”
Kaia darted her eyes toward the bedroom. “You’re suggesting … ?”
“Don’t play coy, mon amour. You know exactly what I’m suggesting. Just think of it as—what’s that they say here? ‘One more for the road.’”
It would be nothing she hadn’t done before … and it would be a much easier way of getting Reed out of trouble than involving her father, who was sure to make a huge deal out of everything, but—
Even the thought of touching Powell again filled her with revulsion. She couldn’t whore herself out like that, even for Reed.
“Thanks, anyway, but I’ll pass.” She grabbed her purse from the couch, but he curled his fingers around it as well, suddenly yanking it toward him and pulling her off balance. His other hand clamped down on her wrist and pulled her back down to the futon, onto his lap.
He leaned over and kissed her, mashing their lips together and thrusting his tongue against her teeth, which were gritted togethe
r so hard, she thought they might snap.
“I told you to be nice to me,” he growled, his breath sour and hot on her cheek. “I gave you every opportunity.”
They wrestled for a moment, Kaia squirming and pulling, Powell’s hands locked tight on their prey, his muscles—the ones she’d so admired, compact, but like steel—forcing her down on her back, knocking the back of her head against the metal bar of the futon, pinning her arms behind her head.
“One more for the road,” he repeated as an unfamiliar sensation swept through her. Panic. “I think I deserve that much.”
Adam did his best to behave himself at basketball practice—but once practice ended, he was ready to step out of bounds. Forget trying to earn back a certain someone’s trust—he was done with women.
Correction: done with relationships. They’d done nothing but cause him pain, and all because he’d been thinking of other people when he should have been thinking about himself. He’d been slow to learn his lesson, but he’d learned it well.
Look out for number one—and right now, number one wanted some fun. Lucky for him, practice had been pushed back two hours since half the team was stuck in detention all afternoon. That meant missing dinner—but it also meant sharing the court with the cheerleaders. And now that he was back on the market, he was already their top priority.
Time to make someone’s day, Adam thought. The inner voice, cocky and cruel, didn’t sound like him. It sounded like … Kane. So much the better, Adam resolved. Kane was happy. Kane didn’t lie awake nights cursing the way his life had turned out. And Kane, his only previous competition, was mysteriously absent from practice.
More for me.
As the coach blew the final whistle, Adam scooped up the ball and dribbled it down toward the bouncy bimbos, who had just finished their last tumbling routine. He heard a few hoots of encouragement from the guys before they headed into the locker room.
“Adam, you were playing so great out there today!” one of the new cheerleaders gushed. She was cute, with an almost frighteningly wide grin, and seemed vaguely familiar.
“Totally awesome!” another chimed in. She, too, seemed familiar, but he couldn’t place her. “We almost screwed up our cheers because we were so busy watching you. Oh—” Her face turned red, and she burst into giggles. “I mean … we were watching the team.”
It was the “we” that gave it away. Individually, they had cute but totally forgettable faces. Together, Adam would know them anywhere as the joined-at-the-hip sophomores who’d been following Harper around all year, worshipping at the feet of their goddess of cool. Harper claimed to detest them, and refused to learn their names, instead, dubbing them Mini-Me and Mini-She. Adam had always suspected that she loved the attention they lavished on her, vapid and giggly as it might be. They were her clones, her property—
They were perfect.
“Glad you liked the show,” Adam said. Smile, he instructed himself, struggling to dig up the flirting skills he’d once had, before Beth. His mother had always told him he was a charmer—though she’d never made it sound like a good thing. He’d put that part of him up on a shelf somewhere for two years, but now it was time to dust it off, get back in on the action. “But you know, it’s a team effort.”
“Oh, the team would be nothing without you!” Mini-Me gushed. (Or was it Mini-She?)
“You’re the star.”
Adam sighed. Something about this felt wrong. You’re just out of practice, he assured himself. After all, he’d thrived on this kind of attention for years before meeting Beth; there was no reason he couldn’t turn back the clock and enjoy some meaningless fun. Or, at the very least, there was no reason he couldn’t go through the motions and pretend he was enjoying himself—sooner or later, it would have to turn into the real thing, right?
“So … I guess since you girls go to all the games, you must see all our mistakes,” he said, flashing a modest smile.
“No way!” Mini-She protested.
“You guys rock!” Mini-Me swung her pom-poms in the air, as if that should decisively settle the point.
“Still, I bet you could give me some pointers—you know, as objective observers,” Adam said. “How ’bout I treat you both to some pizza and you can tell me what you think?”
“Us?” the Minis gaped at each other.
“You want to take us out?”
“You want to hear what we think?”
“Now?”
“Both of us?”
Adam nodded. Two girls—double your pleasure, double your fun, right?
(This isn’t you, a small voice inside him pointed out. Shut up, he told it.)
“I’ll go get changed and meet you back outside the school in fifteen minutes, okay?”
They nodded, too dumbstruck to say anything. Then, simultaneously, they turned and raced toward the girls’ locker room, ponytails and pom-poms flying out behind them.
Adam trudged back toward his own locker room and tried to think eager thoughts. But all he could think of was the looks on Harper’s and Beth’s faces if they saw what he was doing.
Beth would be disappointed.
Harper would be disgusted.
By the time he’d showered and changed, Adam was both—but it was too late to back out now. He wasn’t the kind of guy who made a date and disappeared, even if it was a date his kind of guy should never have made in the first place.
They were already there waiting for him when he pushed through the front doors, each dressed in a tight-fitting skirt he was sure he’d seen Harper wear and discard a few months earlier.
“We were afraid you’d changed your mind!” Mini-Me chirped, her face lighting up when she spotted him.
“Ready to go?” he asked weakly. Mini-Me linked her arm through his.
“Three cheers for pizza!” Mini-She squealed, and grabbed his other arm.
Too bad Adam had lost his appetite.
Beth fidgeted in her seat by the corner of the stage, fuming. When the principal had asked her, as a special favor, to participate in the governor’s assembly even though her speech hadn’t been chosen, she’d figured it was a decent enough consolation prize. Some prize.
It turned out that “participate” had meant “introduce Harper and tell the school what a wonderful girl she is.”
Upon realizing that, Beth had been too horrified to back out—she’d just frozen, bobbing her head up and down in response to the principal’s babbled comments about poise and eloquence.
There wasn’t enough poise in the world to pull this off, Beth thought, glancing to her left, where Harper was playing with a long thread fraying off the pocket of her jeans. The principal had insisted on having a run-through before the main event—and it wasn’t like Beth had anywhere else to be. After all, work wasn’t an issue anymore.
Get out, her manager had said. Take off your uniform, leave your time card, and get out.
All those months of sucking up to him, with his bad breath and greedy comb-over, all those late nights and double shifts, all wasted in a single, fatal failure of her impulse-control system. She’d trashed everything just because Kane Geary couldn’t leave her alone and, for once in her life, she couldn’t just grin and bear it.
Part of her believed it had been worth it, just for the look on his face—at least, the patches of his face visible beneath the dripping milk shake. But the other part of her knew she needed the job: for her family, for college, for keeping herself on track, and sane.
Still, it had felt good.
“Beth?” the principal called. “You’re up.”
“Good luck,” Harper whispered.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Beth snapped.
“Just … good luck,” Harper said with no trace of a smile. “I’m, uh, sure you’ll be … great.”
Beth stared at her, waiting for the punch line, but there wasn’t one. Harper had never said a friendly word to her—not without an ulterior motive—and there was no reason to think she’d start now. ??
?Don’t talk to me,” she hissed. “I don’t want to hear it.”
Beth walked slowly toward the podium at the center of the stage, thinking that something was wrong here. It should have been Harper delivering the saccharine opening lines, forced to stroke Beth’s ego and choke on her words. It should have been Beth welcoming the governor, awing the auditorium of students and faculty and media with her stunning prose.
For a moment, Beth wondered: If she tried hard enough, could she wake herself up to find that she’d fallen asleep in Adam’s arms three months ago, and all this was just a bad dream, brought on by pre-SAT stress?
“Ms. Manning? Any day now will do,” the principal said dryly.
If it was a nightmare, it wasn’t ending anytime soon.
Beth unfolded the small sheet of paper she’d brought with her, a two-paragraph intro she’d jotted down the night before. She took a deep breath and faced the sea of empty seats. “Thank you, Principal Lowenstein. And thank you, Governor, for visiting Haven High School. We’re all so honored to have you here.” Pause for applause, Beth told herself. But she was just delaying the inevitable.
“I’m now pleased to introduce one of Haven High’s most distinguished students, someone who deeply cares—”
Beth stopped. This was a joke. As if Harper Grace had ever deeply cared about anything except herself.
But they were just words, she reminded herself. Lies, yes, but not important ones. She just needed to talk fast and get it over with.
“Who deeply cares about the future of this school. As everyone knows, Harper Grace—”
She stopped again. She may not have had the nerve to speak the truth, but she didn’t have the stomach to tell the lie.
“Are you okay, Beth?” Harper called from the side of the stage. At the sound of her voice, Beth only felt weaker.
Principal Lowenstein walked over to the podium and put a hand on Beth’s shoulder. She flinched away. “Is everything all right?”
No.
When was the last time the answer hadn’t been no?
“I’m just not feeling very well,” she said softly. “I think … I think I need to go, if that’s all right.”