The Initial Insult - Mindy McGinnis Page 0,74

I look up, blushing, aware that I’d gone into a reverie about one boy while another one had his hand on my leg.

“You and Huge,” Patrick repeats. “That a thing? You came out of the bathroom with his jersey on, so I figured, you know . . .”

I think of Hugh, how kind he is, how nobody knows that—and how I doubt he’d be willing to buy Oxy for me. “Not a thing,” I say.

“Cool. I wouldn’t want to cross him.” Patrick’s hand tightens on my knee, and his phone goes off. “We’re up.”

I follow him to the trailhead, swatting at mosquitoes. He takes my hand as we walk and reaches back to steady me when we cross a stream, my sandals slipping off a wet rock. “Those aren’t quite trail shoes,” he tells me, and I swat at another mosquito.

“You didn’t exactly tell me we would be hiking,” I shoot back, and his eyebrows come together. Patrick doesn’t like girls who talk back. I make a note, filing it away. He’s still got ahold of my hand when we come around the corner, and there’s Tress Montor. I drop it, backing away like we’ve crossed paths with a bear.

Funny thing, I reflexively put him in between me and her.

“Tress, what’s up? You got my girl covered?” Patrick says, and I close my eyes. Despite all of Brynn’s warnings, I did end up acting like a fucking idiot. Maybe not last night, but definitely today. Tress isn’t a wild animal about to kill me on the trail, and she’s not here by accident, either. Tress is Patrick’s dealer.

“Your girl, huh?” she asks, eyes on me. I try to shake my head, try to show her I’d never be with a guy like that. Try to be the Felicity I used to be.

Instead, I just stand there.

Tress has no use for me; her attention is entirely on Patrick as she produces a baggie of weed, and he opens his wallet for cash. My head is spinning as I watch Tress count it off—twice—before trading him.

This is how Tress makes money.

I didn’t know.

I mean, I’d overheard plenty, Mom and Dad wondering aloud how Cecil kept the lights on and the water running up at the zoo, because everyone around here who wants to see it has already gone, and nobody outside of Amontillado comes here. My parents had their own ideas about the Montor income and hadn’t had too much compunction about telling me it’s an open secret that Cecil grows weed out there. But they never said he was using Tress to sell, and I truly am a huge fucking idiot because it never occurred to me that she was.

Because that kind of thing would never happen in my world.

I step forward. “Tress, I . . .”

Her eyes come to mine, green and hard. Unblinking. “What do you need?”

I need to tell her to stop this. I need to tell her to come with me. I need to tell her to ditch the drugs and I’ll ditch Patrick and we’ll walk out of the woods together, and everything will be the same again.

But it won’t. I may be an idiot, but I’m not completely stupid. It can’t be the same again. Her parents are still gone, and I still don’t know what happened, and I can’t do anything to help her except . . .

I’m digging in my jeans, pulling out a wad of cash that Mom handed me when I went out the door with Patrick.

“Oxy,” I say, handing her the whole roll. “Whatever you’ve got.”

Chapter 59

Tress

Sophomore Year

Felicity cleaned me out. I’ve got customers coming and nothing to give them, but I can’t pass up ready cash. Not with Cecil’s medical bills piling up.

The cat took his eye about a week ago. He’d been due for worming, and I’d shot the cat in the upper shoulder with the tranq, just like usual. The cat had screamed at me for it, tore the dart out with his teeth and climbed his tree, only to fall out seconds later. I’d winced when he hit the ground, a puff of dirt landing on his glossy coat.

I don’t trust that animal, but it doesn’t mean I don’t respect him.

Cecil had approached him with the wormer vial, cautious, ready to bolt if he needed to. The cat had twitched when he shoved the tube down his throat, gagged when he pushed the depressor. But the job was done, and the cat was still down when