Chaos (Kardia Chronicles) (Entangled Teen) Read online

  Weird.

  Like I wanted him in a way that made no sense. Like I was drawn to him even though I knew almost nothing about him. And when he looked at me a little too hard, and his smile was always sort of mocking… I wanted to grab him tight and smack the shit out of him all at the same time. Yeah, weird. Enough that I wanted to turn away the second our paths crossed. But that was before. Those days were over.

  If anyone should be uncomfortable now, it was him. Because I didn’t care about his body or his stupid face anymore. I was about to get medieval on his ass.

  Libby continued chattering from behind me. “At least if he does go public with his column, he didn’t name you in his response. Maybe he’ll keep it to himself.”

  I didn’t get my hopes up because although she was right so far, there was still a very real chance that he’d blow my cover whenever it suited him.

  “Maybe he just wants to make more friends and thinks this will make him popular or whatever,” Libby said, not even bothering to hide her disgust at that theory.

  Libby was like the patron saint of nerds, which was pretty odd if you were on the outside looking in. Blond, beautiful, funny, with a body from long-distance running that made most of the cheerleaders want to rush to the bathroom and hork up their chicken nuggets and tater tots after lunch. She was exactly the type of person you’d think would be all about her image and what people thought.

  Not even close.

  Libby was a theater geek, with a passion for woodwind instruments and Victorian literature. She loved clothes and dressing up but always seemed to miss the mark, with kooky stuff like berets and leg warmers making appearances, sometimes simultaneously.

  Today she had on a pink puffy skirt with matching flats and her blond hair was secured in a bun at the top of her head with a pair of chopsticks. All in all, she looked like either the prettiest girl to ever escape a mental hospital or like she’d jacked a ballerina on the way to school and stolen her gear. And she didn’t give a crap. She was entirely unconcerned about popularity, so the idea that Mac had stooped to some stealth attack on me to gain street cred had made her even more indignant on my behalf than she’d been before.

  I rounded the corner to the east wing and was about to shoot down her theory about Mac, since in the few months he’d been at Crestwood, he’d amassed a shitload of groupies and a bunch of male imitators. He might not hang out with the jocks or be part of the way “in” crowd, but he was definitely on everyone’s radar.

  And now he was on mine. Literally. I zeroed in on his annoyingly broad shoulders covered in that dumb too-fitted tan jacket he always wore and cut a path toward him. Libby slowed and called after me. “I, uh, guess I’ll see you in Mr. Weston’s class. Be careful, Mags…”

  Another thing about Libby: she always knew when I was going to make a scene and magically seemed to melt into the background. I didn’t blame her, but I didn’t respond either. I was too focused on my target.

  “What the hell, Finnegan?” I spat when I was close enough for him to hear.

  He turned around casually, like it was every day that an irate female came from behind and bitched him out in the hallway. Who knew? If he treated the girls at his old school the way he was treating me, that was probably the case. And even so, I still felt the odd little pull in my stomach.

  Want.

  I shoved it back and glared at him.

  “Hey, Maggie.” His gray eyes seemed to twinkle with a challenge then flickered lower. Was he seriously checking me out right now? I scowled at him harder and his lips twitched a little before his face went blank and his gaze zeroed back in on mine. “What can I do for you?”

  He said it like, “Fer ya,” in that accent that both irritated me and always somehow made me want to repeat him out loud, which made me even madder.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” I bit out through gritted teeth.

  “Just now?” His brows drew together. “I was thinking how they must have some shirts in the girls’ section and wondering why you opted to get yours from the guys’ department instead.” He leaned back against his locker and shrugged. “Then I decided to be polite and keep my thoughts to myself.”

  My mouth dropped open, because WTF, and I barely resisted the urge to tug on my standard-issue vintage concert T-shirt that, aside from being a little big, looked just fine, thank you very much. “Do you have a specific problem with me, or are you just a pain in the ass in general?”

  He tipped his head to the side like he was considering each word. “Hard question to answer, but I’m going to have to say no on both counts, although my mother might disagree on the latter.”

  “Don’t play stupid. You know what I’m talking about. I got your little letter in my locker.” I jammed a hand on my hip and tried not to let my voice go all shrill, like it did when I got really pissed. It was a short trip from that to the prepubescent boy cracking stage, and that always felt like it undermined my credibility.

  I glanced around at the thinning crowd and hissed in a furious whisper, “The advice column thing is my deal. You starting your own is bad enough, but doing it just to argue with my points is crossing the line. And the name calling… What the hell?”

  I tapped my booted foot in a furious beat on the scuffed black-and-white linoleum. I started to say more, but his brow was furrowed like he was deep in thought. Maybe that was all that needed saying. Maybe he hadn’t realized what a dickwad he was being, and now that I’d pointed out the error of his ways, he’d stop and—

  “Thing of it is, Maggie…your column is shite.”

  My brain booted down, and I stopped tapping, staring up at him in shock.

  “What did you just say?”

  He shrugged a ridiculously wide shoulder and shook his head, sending a lock of brown hair slipping onto his forehead, which he shoved away impatiently. “Come on. It’s the ranting of an unhappy, boyfriendless teenage girl with no real understanding of relationships or guys at all. Not to mention the terrible, Dr. Phil advice you always give. That’s not real life.”

  He shifted his pile of books to his other arm and slammed the door of his locker shut as I stood there, speechless, still trying to process what he was saying. But he wasn’t done yet. “They’d be better off cracking open a fortune cookie and getting an answer there. I’m just trying to offset your damage.”

  My jaw was still swinging when the bell rang and he walked away.

  Walked. Away. Seriously? If I was mad before, this time, the anger that tore through me was a living thing, with breath and pulse and depth and color.

  Red.

  When I called after him this time, my voice was the furthest thing from shrill, and it echoed down the now-empty hallway. “Don’t move, Finnegan. Or else.”

  He slowed and then stopped, but he didn’t turn to face me. Instead, he shifted to peer at me over his shoulder. “Or else what, Maggie?” The icy look in his eyes made me pause, but only for a second.

  My nails dug deeply into the palms of my hands as a thousand ancient curses I didn’t even realize I knew flew to my lips, unspoken.

  That should have been a good thing, the unspoken part. Problem was, they didn’t need to be spoken. All I had to do was…nothing. I didn’t have to do anything. It was there. Ready. Waiting. I just had to take the cap off and let it flow. It would be a relief I only knew when I was sleeping. Even earlier, my little locker meltdown had only been the barest minimum leak. The finest of cracks in the eggshell, with a trickle of power allowed to ooze out.

  If I really let it go—

  “Get to class, Mr. Finnegan. Miss Raynard.” Hortense’s stern voice called from the open doors of her classroom.

  Mac finally turned then to face me fully, and his gaze held mine for what seemed like an eternity but was probably only a second. What I saw there confused me enough that when Hortense repeated herself, I obeyed without argument. Disgust? Challenge? Hatred?

  The haze that had clouded my vision dissipated as more questions floode
d my already overloaded brain, but I dragged my ass down the hall to my next class, refusing to give in and look over my shoulder to see if someone was still watching me.

  Who was Mac Finnegan, and why did it feel like he knew me? Like, knew me knew me. The way Libby and my mom and my grandma knew me.

  And why did it feel like he had so much loathing for me?

  It might have made sense if he knew what I was. That I had this power living inside me that had been fighting its way out for the past six months. The thing that had indirectly almost killed a boy…

  But he didn’t know that. He couldn’t. Still, the shame that came every time I thought of Eric filled me, and I fought the slick of nausea battering my belly.

  By the time school ended, I’d talked myself in mental circles only to come to the realization that I was being paranoid. Mac was a jerk, but it was nothing more than that. Still, I was totally wrung out. I felt like I’d gone to the dentist for ten fillings, stopped by the doctor for a tetanus shot and some stitches, and then took a midterm all in the same day. When I pushed through the heavy metal doors to the outside world, the icy air that hit me was a relief.

  “Hey.”

  I tensed but then was relieved to see it was only Bink swaggering toward me. I couldn’t take another run-in with Mac right now without imploding.

  “Hey yourself. How was your day?” I asked, working up a grin. Bink wasn’t what I’d call intuitive, but he had a sixth sense when it came to my moods, and I wasn’t in any shape to answer questions or discuss a certain arrogant asshole. Not yet.

  “Pretty good. Coach says if I ace my English paper, he can start me again next game.” His face broke into a wide smile, and a group of girls walking by stared at him. I could hear their whispers when they passed, and the words “hot” and “dimples” were definitely in the mix.

  It was hard to judge objectively after fifteen years of friendship, but I stole a glance up at him as we strolled side-by-side toward the parking lot. At six-one, 210, he was a wall of muscle capped off by a mop of dirty blond hair and the chronic chin stubble that had some girls referring to him as Thor behind his back. He was one of those kids who had looked like a man since eighth grade but whose maturity level hadn’t quite caught up with the rest of the package.

  That aside, he was easy to look at. I probably should have been affected by it, but most of the time, I saw him as the same scrawny kid I used to catch salamanders and share PB&Js with during long summer days.

  I was no fashion model, but the old Bink hadn’t really cared what he looked—or smelled—like when we were kids, and he was pretty ripe most days. While I didn’t miss that, there was one thing I did miss…

  Being able to tell him everything. Because the fear of him knowing? The fear of him looking at me differently? It was more than I could stand. With all the changes going on in my life, he was one of the few constants, and I needed us to be exactly what we’d always been. Only we weren’t.

  I wished I could’ve blamed the recent change on our respective social standings at school. Before the “incident,” I was pretty much invisible. Then, I became all too visible.

  The past few months, since I’d started the column and some time had passed from the thing with Eric, I’d slipped back into a semi-comfortable state of anonymity. Sure, girls liked the column, but they didn’t know I wrote it, and even if they did, I doubted I’d ever be really popular.

  Despite having overheard my mom’s friend say that my black hair and green eyes made for some “striking coloring,” anything notable about my looks stopped there. I had a decent figure, but it wasn’t what I’d call standout. My nose wasn’t small and it wasn’t big. My cheekbones did their job as advertised and held my face up adequately, but they weren’t going to cut glass or anything. My lips weren’t Jessica Alba plump or Kate Middleton thin. I was pretty with a lowercase p. As for standing out in other ways, well…I just didn’t.

  I was a decent student, but I was nobody’s valedictorian or any kind of laude. I didn’t play a sport or have the urge to put on a short skirt and shake plastic tassels for anyone who did. In fact, aside from the whole semi-god thing, I was basically regular.

  But Bink? Bink was not only gorgeous, he was fun to be around and also the starting quarterback of the football team, which all the girls seemed to like even more than my column. Through it all, though, he hadn’t changed much.

  When push came to shove, he’d not only have my back, he’d also keep a watch on the front, side, top, and bottom if I needed him. If anyone had changed, it was me.

  I had secrets now that hurt too much to tell. I had done things…terrible things, and the thought of seeing the disappointment in his eyes if I said them out loud made me keep my piehole shut. And this was creating a thin but very real wall between us that I fucking despised but felt helpless to stop building. Maybe some quality time with him was exactly what the doctor ordered on a craptacular day like this one.

  “Do you need help with your paper? I have some time tonight if you want.”

  He turned grateful baby blues on me and nodded. “That would be excellent, thanks.”

  We slowed as we reached his car, a red classic Firebird that looked way better than it ran. We’d had to get my mom to jump it that morning when it wouldn’t start before school, and I crossed my fingers that we didn’t run into the same problem again. It had already felt like the longest day in history.

  “So what’s your paper supposed to be about?”

  “Jane Austen. I tried to read the books, but jeez, Mags. They’re so boring.” His brow wrinkled, and he looked pained. “How could anyone like that crap?”

  I shrugged and tugged open the passenger door. “You’re asking the wrong girl.”

  Although Bink and I were the same age, I was a better student and had taken a lot of the classes he was taking now the year before, so I’d already choked down my dose of Austen. My taste ran more toward Veronica Roth and Sarah Dessen, so it hadn’t been fun times.

  “But we don’t have to like it to write a paper on it. We’ll make it fun. No worries.”

  He slid into the driver’s seat, and we both held our breath as he turned the key. It sputtered but then caught, and the engine roared. Maybe things actually were looking up.

  “Sweet,” he murmured under his breath and clicked on his seatbelt.

  It wasn’t until we’d pulled out of the lot that I managed to let go of some of the tension that had knitted my neck into knots since I’d found Mac’s little note. I had a reprieve. Another sixteen hours or so before I had to go back there. Before I had to face him again.

  It wasn’t long enough, but I’d take it.

  Determined to make the best of the afternoon, I turned to Bink. “I heard some gossip today. Talk to me. What’s up with you and Ally?”

  His cocky smile made his response unnecessary, but I let him crow about it anyway. “I asked her out at lunch and she said yeah. She’s going to see family in Vermont this weekend, but next weekend we’re going to the movies to see House of Demons. I figure I’ll pull the old ‘it’s okay, I’ll protect you’ arm around the shoulder move and see if I get a chance to touch her boob.”

  He looked at me expectantly, and I gave him the patented deadpan eyes he’d set me up for, which made him laugh.

  “Speaking of which, Libby wants to go out tomorrow and see the new Spiderman movie. You down?” He turned hopeful puppy dog eyes on me, and I nodded.

  “You and Libby, eh? Sure I won’t be cock blocking you?” I teased. Bink and Libby were always arguing, and I’d been teasing them for years it was pent up sexual tension. Neither of them had taken the bait yet, though Bink’s face turned an interesting shade of pink all of a sudden.

  “Yeah right. Libby?” He coughed. “Not likely. So you down or what?”

  I stared at him hard, for the first time wondering if maybe there was something weird brewing between the two of them. I didn’t know how I’d feel about that either. Probably not good.


  “Sure,” I said.

  I was down. It would likely do wonders for my mood to get out and be around people who loved me. And who knew? Maybe today was just a fluke. Not an omen of a lot of crappy days to come, but only one crappy day. Maybe Mac would forget about whatever he’d been trying to pull and leave me alone altogether and tomorrow would be better.

  Then again, maybe not.

  Chapter Two

  When I got home that afternoon, my mom was already back from work, and she and my gram were sitting in the living room watching repeats of The Golden Girls on The Hallmark Channel.

  “Hey, kiddo, how was your day?” Mom stood and ran a hand through her platinum blond hair and gave me a strained smile.

  Gram didn’t look up from her nest of blankets, and the house was about a thousand degrees. Already I could tell it had been a rough day at Casa de Raynard, and the stress that had finally started to dissipate on the ride home with Bink came rushing back, tightening like a band around my neck.

  For the past year, Gram had been suffering from a form of dementia that came and went, and today had clearly been a “came” day. I think it would have been easier to handle if she’d been able to verbalize what was happening, but along with her memory, she also lost the ability to form coherent phrases when she had an attack. Her ever-escalating whimpers of terror and panicked babbling left everyone in the room exhausted and emotionally shot. Luckily, there were still more good days than bad, and Mom and I had vowed to keep her home with us for as long as possible.

  But I knew right away today wasn’t the time to complain about my jumbled feelings for the new guy at school or my advice-column woes. I pasted a grin on my face and waved to the room at large. “Awesome. How are you guys doing?”

  The apple fell damn close to the tree and Mom smiled back, the strain around her mouth making my heart ache a little. “Pretty good. There’s a container of peach frozen yogurt in the freezer if you want. I know it’s almost December, but I had a hankering for spring this morning, so I ran out and bought some, then cranked the heat hoping it would put me in a warm-weather mood.”