White Cat (32 page)

Lila. My best friend, who I thought I killed.

“I’m not talking about her,” I snap. “Not with you.”

I think about Lila’s wide, expressive mouth turning up at the corners. I think about her spread out on my bed, reaching for me.

With one touch of her hand, Mom made Lila love me. And made sure I could never, ever have her.

“Hit a nerve?” Mom says, gleefully cruel. “It’s amazing you actually thought you were good enough for Zacharov’s daughter.”

“Shut up,” I say.

“She was
using
you, you stupid little moron. When everything was said and done, she wouldn’t have given you the time of day, Cassel. You would have been a reminder of Barron and misery and nothing more.”

“I don’t care,” I say. My hands are shaking. “It would still have been better than—” Better than having to avoid her until the curse fades. Better than the way she’ll look at me once it does.

Lila’s desire for me is a perversion of love. A mockery.

And I almost didn’t care, I wanted her so much.

“I did you a favor,” my mother says. “You should be grateful. You should be thanking me. I got you Lila on a silver platter—something you could have never in your life had otherwise.”

I laugh abruptly. “I should be thanking you? How about you hold your breath until I do?”

“Don’t talk that way to me,” Mom roars, and slaps me, hard.

Hard enough that my battered head hits the window. I see stars. Little explosions of light behind the dark glasses. Behind my eyelids.

“Pull over,” I say. Nausea overwhelms me.

“I’m sorry,” she says, her voice seesawing back to sweet. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. Are you okay?”

The world is starting to tilt. “You have to pull over.”

“Maybe right now you’d rather walk than deal with me, but if you’re really hurt, then you better—”

“Pull over!” I shout, and something about the urgency of my tone finally convinces her. She steers the car abruptly onto the shoulder of the road and brakes hard. I stumble out while we’re still moving.

Just in time to heave my guts up in the grass.

I really hope no one at Wallingford wants me to write an essay on how I spent my summer vacation.