by Jayla Kane
“Not really.”
“Yeah you did,” she said softly, and I blinked at her in the rearview, startled. She gave me an uneasy smile. “I’m not like Raven,” she said quietly. “I can just tell by the way you looked when you saw him.”
“How much do you know about what happened?” I didn’t want to specify; I wanted to see what she thought I meant.
“Not a lot,” she said, her voice quiet and thoughtful. They were alike, I guess. I didn’t really know her, not personally; I just knew her from school. “I know he feels guilty about putting you in some kind of danger. I know what happened.” That hung in the air between us for a second. “I know your power helped him get better when he was sick.”
“That’s pretty much it,” I said, but she shook her head, her face solemn.
“That’s none of it,” she said, watching me closely. “All of that is… All of that is the sanitized version, the version he’s cooked up to protect me from something.”
“If it is, and that’s what he wants to do, I’m not the one who’s going to say more,” I told her, my mouth tight. I’m a terrible liar. Absolutely one of the worst. I used to think that was a family trait but Zelle has turned out to be one hell of a secret-keeper, and we all knew that was my mom’s primary M.O. from day one. The Keller clan was full of secrets, but I’m the outlier. As usual. “I’m sorry, Molly, but if he hasn’t said more than I definitely won’t.”
She was silent for at least ten minutes. I thought that was the end of it, and then she goes, “You must like him too.”
“Yeah,” I said. Bad at secrets, little miss true confessions, that’s me.
“A lot?”
“Yeah,” I mumbled, knowing she could still hear me.
“That’s good,” she said softly, and when she didn’t talk again for another couple minutes I hoped it was over. It wasn’t exactly embarrassing to admit I liked Hunter to his little sister; it just made me poke at the mess of emotions laying underneath the very bland title of ‘like.’ I didn’t just ‘like’ Hunter. I felt… A lot of things about Hunter. And I wasn’t ready to deal with any of them, not even a little bit. After another five minutes went by I realized she was still watching me. When I finally peeked at her again, she caught my eyes and gave me a small smile. “He’s never had a girlfriend,” she said, and I gave her a sharper glance. “He’s… A lot of girls like him, kind of, but he’s never brought one around.” After a brief pause she continued. “I’m not… I’m not telling you that to be a jerk, or whatever. I just… I’m happy that you like him, and that he likes you.”
“It’s not… We’re not…” I had no idea how to finish that sentence.
“It doesn’t matter,” she said, finally turning her face away from me, turning those eyes away, towards the rain-streaked window. “I don’t know if he’s told you anything about… About our dad, or… My mom. What it’s like at home. How people treat him, even the women who—” She stopped short and bit her lip, eyes still averted, and I was glad; I felt like I could infer the rest of that sentence and I didn’t like the way it made my gut twist. Hunter was a massive, incredibly handsome tattooed mechanic. He was practically a walking porno prop. “It doesn’t matter. It’s just really nice to see him looking forward to something.”
“What’s he looking forward to?” I couldn’t help myself.
“You,” she said simply, her face still turned towards the window; I watched her expression in the reflection for a second, the rain tracking across it and blurring the lights of the cars on the highway. We didn’t speak again for the rest of the trip, the music soft on the stereo, the heater steaming up the car while our feet froze. It was a surprisingly pleasant drive, after that.
“Molly.” We pulled into the school’s parking lot, and I couldn’t help thinking of the day I saw Hunter parked there, watching me at practice. Just before he kidnapped me, before everything changed, everything I could think of, and most of it in ways no one could have predicted. “Listen. I know we’re not in the same classes—”
“You’ve always been nice to me,” she said softly, gathering her books and peeking up at me from under her bangs with those huge dark eyes. Hunter’s eyes. Would I ever be able to look at her face without thinking his name? “I know we’re not friends, but I… I always noticed when you stopped them from—”
“We’re friends now,” I said firmly, meeting her gaze. “And not just because I like your brother, and he likes me.” She blinked. “I like you too. Always did. You reminded me of Raven.”
“Really?” She stared at me with dawning wonder, as if I’d told her she’d won the damn lottery. It made me laugh out loud, and the sound startled her for a second before she smiled again. I opened the door to the car and the cold rushed in, frosting our breath immediately. “That’s… That’s so cool—”
“Alright, alright, Baby Booknerd,” I said, and was glad when that made her grin widely; I never knew if I was going to be able to say things in the right way now, to keep things light enough, funny enough, to move the conversation along. “Don’t tell her I said that, or how cool you think it is, okay? You’ll give her a fat head, like she needs the help.” She nodded, suddenly as cute as a puppy and about as eager to please. I felt like she might start wagging her tail. “Listen, kiddo. I got the whole speech from Tristan. Keep your phone on you, on vibrate, at all times, even if you have to lie about it to your teacher—”
“I know all this stuff,” she said, suddenly confident. I raised my eyebrow at her. “I have an alert set up on my laptop and put a crawler in the school’s main server so that—”
“Okay, literally none of that makes sense to me, but I take it to mean you have a way to let me know if something crappy is going on and for me to reach you if I see something crappy going on, right?”
“Oh yeah,” she said, nodding vigorously. “And if something crappy is happening on the school’s security system, if a new student enrolls, anything.”
“Wow,” I said, impressed, “okay then.” She grinned up at me, and I thought, not for the first time, that one day she would be absolutely, heart-breakingly beautiful. “Let’s get a move on, nerd.”
I knew she got it right away. She was like Raven; her sense of humor was as clever as the rest of her, and before long she’d probably have a snappy nick-name for me, too. She bounded off towards the entrance hall while I lagged behind and met up with the squad, dismissing their questions with a wave of my hand. By the end of the day, Molly’s life was going to be different; she was going to have the high school experience Jake stole from my sister. Cool, untouchable, beloved. And deservedly so.
I hadn’t meant to pass the crown to a geek, but I had liked her, once upon a time, when I didn’t know I would also need her. Still liked her, now that I actually knew her.
And I didn’t know how long I could stand it at the top of the high school food chain anyway. When Markeyla made an underhanded comment on my hair I snapped at her and everyone who snickered to keep them in line, then told them all we were having an extra practice that afternoon, no misses or you sat out at the next game. They all shut up. Cheerleaders aren’t all really super cool or anything; it’s not like the movies. But they all definitely love cheer; they love competing. The threat was real.
I didn’t even want to go to the next game.
But I guess I had to keep myself entertained until I figured out what the hell I was doing with what was left of my life.
Chapter Four
Baby
Molly and I gossiped on the way home; I felt like shit about it at first, because I was just saying hateful things about girls who wanted to impress me to another girl who had once wanted to impress me. Molly knew who everybody on the squad was, of course; everybody did. She also knew the rest of the senior class, and everyone I’d ever dated or sat next to or side-eyed. She sat and waited patiently with a crew of her own cute little geeks until I came and got her from the library, after I made everybody do a couple extra rounds of suicides and
squats in the gym. It felt good to sweat out some of my anxiety and aggression and to see her sweet face afterwards—with those eyes, goddamnit, every time—but, real talk: I hated my life right now. I hated having to speak to all the insipid people I’d climbed over to claim the title of Queen Bee, having to wrangle their insecurities and resentments, having to absorb all the sideways looks about my new ‘pet’ and my new hair. Maybe I’d just cut it all off. I found myself wondering if Hunter would still think I was pretty if I did, and hated myself so much I almost decided to do it out of spite. I made a list of the girls who called Molly my pet and made one of them cry by the end of the day, just with some casual observations about her ex-boyfriend; I didn’t give a shit who he was dating now, and never really had, if I was being honest. But I did like having someone for target practice.
The rest of them backed off. Real quick.
Being around Molly actually cheered me up a little bit, because she was so oblivious, still, to how rotten a lot of people are. She was lucky. Hunter had worked his ass off to keep her safe, and he’d succeeded; I knew she wouldn’t necessarily agree with me though. I knew for a fourteen-going-on-fifteen year old girl she was probably pretty frickin’ ecstatic not to be locked up in that trailer any more, hidden from her dad, even if it meant she had to be locked up on the plantation with the rest of us freaks. The drive home went by fast, even with the rain.
When we walked in through the side door—there’s only one, which I used to think was strange given how big the place is, but now I’m glad it’s such a fortress—we went down to the kitchen and got spoiled by Anna for a moment before going upstairs to finish homework or whatever. I was having a hell of a time caring about school. I had to keep my chin up because my sisters would keep talking about therapy if I didn’t, but I couldn’t think of anything worse than sitting down with a stranger and having to think of new mental gymnastic moves to explain the rape without mentioning witches. Fuck that. Fuck telling some newbie about my mom, about my sisters, about why the hell we were all living in someone else’s house now. The whole thing made me tired. And that would all just be more crap piled on top of learning cheers I didn’t give a shit about and doing homework to pass classes I didn’t give a shit about.
I just felt so… Tired.
“Hey,” Raven said, all bright and buttery from whatever fuckathon she’d just wrapped up with Jake; her cheeks were red and she had a new hickie, but when I asked she said she’d been in class all day. I just rolled my eyes and stared down at the book in my lap, pretending it was for school. The library was our meeting place now, which made sense, because the downstairs had never really been our thing. There was a gorgeous sitting room, a completely epic dining hall, and something called a ‘parlor,’ but we’d always played up here, where the boys’ bedrooms were. The library was a particular favorite of Raven’s, of course, along with the kitchen, which had another huge table big enough for all of us and the incredible bonus of Anna’s cooking. Not gonna lie, it was nice having her skills on hand.
I was surprised when she sat down next to me. We were alone in the room; Zelle barely came by, but true to form she harassed me via text all day and monitored my location via GPS so we were fine. Raven was usually busy these days. She’d always been busy, but now she was busy with Jake, magical research, or actual college stuff. She hadn’t done a shift back at the Witch’s Brew since the summer, and I wondered if she was still in touch with Christa. “What’s up?”
“I just wanted to see how you’re doing,” she said, and I caught myself just before I rolled my eyes.
“Fine. School sucks. Situation normal.”
“Are you sure about this trip with Hunt—”
“Don’t,” I snapped, surprising both of us with the vehemence in my tone. “I don’t want to go over it again. I’m just going to go and be back, and you won’t even be able to tell until you see me smiling on Monday morning.”
“Smiling, huh,” she said in that old familiar sarcastic way she had, and I let my eyes linger on her new hickie.
“Yeah,” I said. “Smiling.”
“Really, Baby?” She tilted her head. “Him?”
“What is the deal? Why do you—”
“You sound like Jake,” she said, making me want to punch her, but her eyes were soft. “He must be a good guy. I like his sister. I mean, as much as I can—she barely talks.”
“Until she’s comfortable,” I said pointedly. “Can you imagine what it would be like to be her? All of a sudden, her brother is dead, then not dead, then she’s whisked off to live with a bunch of notorious—”
“Alright,” Raven said, waving me off. “Point made. I get it. And I… I don’t necessarily see the appeal of Hunter, given what little I know about him, but I’m sure if we ever had a real conversation I’d understand. You and Jake seem pretty damn smitten.”
“Please stop using his name and mine in the same sentence,” I said, a little too sharply. I softened it with a grin when she glared at me. “I’m just saying. I’ll be nice about your psycho boyfriend if you’re nice about mine.” Hunter was hardly a psycho, and he wasn’t my boyfriend. I didn’t want to dwell on that right now, though.
Before she could reply the door opened again and Tristan stepped inside; he always looked like he was in a hurry these days, as if we were catching him halfway between his destinations. He looked back down the hall and then in at us one more time, then stepped inside and nodded at us. “Tristan? You okay?” Raven was taking her new position as official peacemaker pretty damn seriously.
“Yes, Rae, thank you,” he said, and I realized he didn’t even notice that he’d used her nick-name when he kept right on talking. “I was actually looking for Baby.”
“Here here,” I said, waving a hand at him and stretching my knees. I guessed he wanted to run over some protocols with me for Molly and I’s high school. Maybe I’d been thinking about Hunter a little too much; that was the kind of thing he’d worry about. “What can I do for you?”
“I was wondering if you’d be interested in a little training,” he said carefully, and I raised my eyebrow at him.
“Training in what?”
“Did you just sleep through the whole meeting we had?” Raven didn’t bother berating me in the comparative privacy of our heads. “Seriously, Baby, can you—”
“Shut up, Rae,” I snapped, then backed off when I heard how harsh I sounded. “Sorry.” I stood up and stretched, then marched over to Tristan, leaving my sister frowning down at the place where I’d been sitting. “I think getting some exercise would be a good idea,” I told him, then turned back to my sister and met her dark gaze from across the room. I’m sorry. I’m just tired.
You promise?
Promise. Just tired. I’ll be fine tomorrow. This was a lie, of course, but I didn’t let myself dwell on it. I just wanted to get outside before she saw it in my mind. When I turned away from her, Tristan was watching me closely. “Listen, you’re not my big brother, no matter how close we might’ve been when we were kids, so before you say anything—”
“I wouldn’t,” he said quietly, and I left it and followed him out of the room.
Tristan is always looking around for Leo, although from what I understand Jake is responsible for wrangling him most of the time, just because he’s the new ‘Head of the Household’ or whatever weird-ass title Sarah used to describe the job. Raven hasn’t given me all the ins and outs of where the rest of the Warfields are, but everyone’s getting a little impatient for Morgan to come home so they can talk to him about… All of this. Tristan is still technically dead, but Leo is supposed to declare him lost-and-found once they work out a backstory. Apparently. Sounds like tabloid fodder to me, but okay, whatever. My mom has been vanishing and reappearing my entire life and no one seems to give a shit, so maybe they’re right and it won’t end up on the news.
There’s a lot everyone’s not saying. I know, because I can practically feel the irritation radiating off of Zelle and the worry from
Raven and even, if I’m honest, some anxiety from Jake, although I do not care about him at all. Not even a little bit.
But I like Tristan, and most of the time he seems fairly calm. He’s the only one that knows what the hell’s going on with magic, anyway, so maybe that’s why.
He led me through the house, downstairs, and out to the front driveway. It wasn’t what I was expecting, for some reason. “Isn’t there some like, secret wizard room or something in your house that’s full of crazy potion bottles and weapons made of rusty metal?” He gave me one of the only amused looks I’ve ever seen on his face. It made him look almost young.
“I’m afraid not,” he said, then considered for a moment, his eyes raking over the burned trees in front of us. “Then again, what would I know? I’ll ask Jake to refer to Sarah.”
“Since she’s the butler and all.”
“She’s whatever she is, like the rest of the house,” he said, not registering my sarcasm, or at least not reacting to it. He gave me a long look over his shoulder, so long that it actually started to make me feel a little uncomfortable. It was just so… Penetrating. Like a teacher who knows you’ve been cheating. “Baby, have you deliberately tested your powers since we brought Hunter back to life?”
“Um, no,” I said, eyeing him like he was crazy.
“Why not?”
“Because as far as I know no one’s died? Did we off somebody else?”
Another vaguely amused look, and then he turned back to stare at the trees some more. “Not that I know of.”
