Shadow Lake Vampire Society - Wendi Wilson Page 0,6

won’t bring it up again. I promise.”

I nodded with tight lips before turning to climb from the car. By the time I met Coco by the front bumper, I had my emotions under control. Time and necessity had taught me how to regulate my inner demons. I had to be able to maintain a calm and perfectly sane façade if I didn’t want to live my life under observation, sedated with anti-anxiety meds.

“God, you’re good,” she said with a smirk. When that drew a real smile from me, she laughed. “There’s my Bubbly Piper.”

She hooked her arm through mine and pulled me toward the old brick building that housed our town’s only high school. I noticed several girls staring at me, small smiles playing on their lips before a blonde stepped in front of us, blocking our way.

“Hey, Piper,” she said, her eyes wide with emotion. “I just wanted to thank you for stepping in last night.”

She lifted a hand to scratch at the opposite bicep, a nervous habit that I, myself, was a victim of. The thought of what might have happened had I not interfered was weighing on her. Remembering the crazed look in Travis’s eyes and the confident smirk of his buddy, I had no doubt she’d been right to be scared.

“You’re welcome, Tiff,” I said, her shortened nickname rolling off my tongue without a thought.

I knew who she was. I used to have friends, and we’d shared some mutual ones. Before the… incident in the cabin, I had a life. I’d hung out at the lake on hot, summer days, laughing with the girls as we dodged cold splashes from goofy boys. I had sleepovers and pedicures, first dates and Friday night football games.

After my dad died and I lost my mind, all of those so-called friends vanished. I was a weirdo—quiet, depressed, and scared of my own shadow. Too much drama for them to deal with.

Except for Coco. She stood by my side, unwavering. She suffered with me, guiding me through to the other side. Even when I emerged as a darker, quieter version of myself, she didn’t desert me. She loved the new me just as much as she’d loved the old one.

Maybe even more. Because she knew the new me needed that love and constancy more than the old me ever did.

I made it through the whole day without running into Travis Brickley or his creepy sidekick. Maybe they were intentionally avoiding me. Maybe they were just absent, Travis tending to his tender balls. I didn’t know, and I didn’t really care. I was just relieved I didn’t have to suffer through some pissing contest in which those boys tried to prove they were tougher than me.

As I walked out of the fluorescent-lit hallways of Watercrest High, into the bright afternoon sunshine, I heaved a sigh of relief. Only three days left of school, and then I’d be free.

My steps faltered, my mood dropping as those words echoed in my head. Free? Free to what? Hide in my room all summer, hanging out with Bagel while stuffing my face with potato chips? Lay in my bed at night, living vicariously through Coco as I obsessed over her social media accounts?

That’s what I did last summer, but that was different. With Dad’s murd…death hanging over me like a fresh slice of hell, no one begrudged me the alone time to mourn.

No one in my life was going to be so passive about my choices this summer. It had already begun—Mom teaming up with Dr. Whitley to ship me off to some camp for troubled kids, Coco agreeing with them—and I knew they would only turn up the pressure if I dismissed it out-of-hand.

“Hey, is everything okay?” Coco asked, searching my face as I reached her car. “You didn’t have any run-ins with skeezy, pimple-faced morons, did you?”

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “I was just thinking.”

“Uh-oh.”

“Shut up.” I laughed, shoving her toward the driver’s side of the car as I turned in the opposite direction. Once we were inside the car with the air conditioner running, I admitted, “I was thinking about maybe giving that summer job a try.”

“Really?” she asked, hope shining in her eyes.

I arched one brow. “Are you that eager to get rid of me for two months?”

“No. Of course not,” she huffed, throwing the car into reverse and backing out of the parking space. “I just worry about you, Pipes, and it seems to me a few weeks in a