a junk store. I’m wearing aviator sunglasses and trying to look staunch while Mackenzie pokes her tongue out at the camera. That day I peeled back the Ice Queen and the real Mackenzie shone through like the sun.
I run my fingers over her smiling face. I wonder if that smile still lurks somewhere inside Mackenzie, somewhere beneath this cold, calculating monster.
How does Mackenzie command the loyalty of a gang of thugs who can break into more than ten Emerald Beach mansions in the same night?
She burned her initials into Alec’s forehead… that’s fucked up.
Someone broke her. Someone snuffed out Mackenzie’s sunshine so completely she’s a stranger to me now. And I have a feeling I know exactly who it was.
Mackenzie’s right. I was supposed to protect her, and I didn’t. I couldn’t. I was only thirteen. But I’m not thirteen any longer, and no matter what it takes, I will make sure she knows that I still see the sunshine inside her.
I pick up the phone again just as Noah winds up his tirade. A chill ripples down my spine at the venom in his voice. Vowing to protect Mackenzie may mean going up against my best friend, and I can’t do that. Not after everything he’s been through. But I had to.
“Mackenzie Malloy is going to pay,” Noah hisses. And I wish, more than anything I’ve ever wished for, that I could save him from himself. “I’m going to kill her for this.”
30
Mackenzie
School the next day is… interesting. When I step into the corridor, students fall over themselves to get away from me. The fear rolls off them in waves, and it’s intoxicating.
They wanted to know where Mackenzie Malloy has been all these years.
They wanted answers.
I can’t be held responsible if they couldn’t handle the truth.
I should have started with this power move, I think as I reach my locker and shove my books into my bag. A note flutters out. I unfold the paper and read the neat handwriting.
“Watch out for Noah,” it reads. I glance up. Eli’s down the opposite end of the corridor, in a circle of jocks. He looks up, his eyes meeting mine, and I feel that now-familiar zip of lightning through my veins, like I’m plugged into a power socket. I think of the last time our eyes met, across his pool as he took in my surprise. I needed him to see me there, to know I don’t need his protection.
That’s what the note is really about. Eli nods at the paper in my hand. He’s trying to get in my good books again, to remind me he’s looking out for me.
Message received.
I roll it the note into a ball and shove it into my mouth, chewing it with gusto.
I don’t need you to protect me anymore, Eli Hart.
Something that might have been sadness flickers in Eli’s ocean eyes. It’s gone in a moment, replaced with that too-pretty smile. He wears his mask as I wear mine.
Eli turns back to his friends. I spit out the note into a trash can and get to class. Gabriel sits next to me and asks how I managed to cover his double-height windows in an enormous drawing of a dick when I’m so short. I smile enigmatically and ignore him for the rest of the day.
Stares and whispers follow me everywhere, but no one says a thing to my face. Alec isn’t at school – he’s probably still recovering from surgery – and Cleo doesn't offer more than a few violent glares. At lunch, I take my tray and walk past the royal table. No one stops me or yells anything, but there’s an audible release of tension when I leave the dining hall and enter the outdoor courtyard.
George sits in the corner, earbuds dangling from her eyes. I make a beeline for her, but she quickly dumps her tray and races back inside. I sink down into the spot she left, feeling her warmth against the seat, wishing I hadn’t been such a bitch in my old life so things could be different.
The entire school is afraid of me. I’m powerful. I’m untouchable. And in this noisy place surrounded by others, I’ve never been more alone.
Mrs. Anderson is so keen to have me on the cheerleading team she invites me to try out at Friday’s before-school practice, since I missed last week’s official tryouts. Just the thought of walking into that gym filled with Cleo and her snakes makes my skin break out, but