“Thank you,” I said at last, taking the device off my desk and putting it into my book bag. Where had he found it? I knew I lost it sometime last night, but it could’ve been anywhere.
“Oh, you might want this back as well.” Reese lifted up something else in his hands I hadn’t noticed. My jacket. He’d gone back to the alley and found them both…for me?
Okay, something was up. Either Reese was suffering from some kind of brain damage after last night, or Mr. Hyde had decided to let the dear doctor make a rare appearance today. Because this was beyond freaking me out.
Reese was actually being…nice. Shell-shocked, I opened my mouth to say something else, but there weren’t any words.
“Try to stay out of trouble, Princess.” And just like that, Reese swept out of the seat, giving me a wink Carly and V were sure to misinterpret, before heading out the door.
“Holy crap on a cracker!” blurted Vanessa. “Seems you did have a busy night.”
Chapter 11
Angry Angel
For the first time ever, I couldn’t be happier to get to English class. I planted myself into a seat in the far corner of the room, relieved that none of my friends shared the period with me.
The last I needed was more of Carly and V’s interrogating. Why had I run out on Car? When did Reese and I get so chummy? And most importantly, how the hell did he end up with my clothes? They had a million questions, to which I had not one reasonable answer.
The fact that rumors were already beginning to spread didn’t make things any easier. In no time at all, things had snowballed out of control. Even with only the handful of people who had overheard my conversation with Reese, the story mutated all too quickly into a beast of its own. What started simply as a recalling of me meeting up with Reese at the mall somehow turned into a raunchy tale on how Blackburn and I had apparently gotten down and dirty in a boutique dressing room. Yep, people officially sucked.
And of course, there were so-called “eye-witnesses.” Always a friend of a friend of a friend. In consequence, I was doing my best to zone out as much as possible.
“Skank.” The word emanated into every corner of the room, and I turned toward the commentator to see the Queen Bee herself, Ava Ashford, looking back at me from the opposite side of the classroom as she continued in her discussion with some other cheerleaders.
I settled back in my seat and focused my attention on the blackboard, trying to ignore the remark.
“You know she was sleeping with Blaine,” Ava continued. “My aunt lives across the street from the Ryder’s estate, and I saw Kat’s car parked in his driveway from Friday night till Saturday morning the weekend before the accident. And you’ve seen the way she’s like with Adam. No way are they still not hooking up. She was screwing them both. And you hear about her and Blackburn? Stacey overheard the two of them talking last hour about how they hooked up at the mall or something. Montgomery’s burning through men faster than a kid playing with sparklers.” Her voice was so loud that I swear the Biology department could hear her!
“Yeah, but she doesn’t really seem like the type though,” said Erica Shiffer, thankfully coming to my defense. “If she was hooking up with Blackburn, then why would she bother stringing Adam along?”
“’Cause the girl’s obviously effed up,” remarked Ava.
A tingling sensation rippled up my left arm. I refused to meet her gaze as I looked around the room, dumbfounded by the fact that no one else seemed to be paying attention to this blatant, loudmouthed discussion. Was everyone deaf, or were they just trying to pretend like they didn’t hear any of it?
“Apparently, she’s going anywhere she can for a good lay,” Ava continued, “even if it is with trailer trash.”
“Excuse me?” The words pierced through the air and they caught everyone’s attention. It took me a second to even realize that they had come out of me!
Ava and her posse looked at me confusedly, as if I shouldn’t have been privy to their brash discussion.
“What’s your problem now?” Ava scoffed at me, like I had no right to address her.
“What did you just say?” My voice had become unusually harsh, to the point that it didn’t even sound like me.
Ava glanced over at the other girls with a surprisingly puzzled expression. Everyone was looking at me like I had just Hulked out and smashed through the wall.
“She heard us?” whispered one of the girls to another.
“You’ve practically got microphones taped to your hands,” I remarked, seeing all their faces with the exception of Ava’s go pale. “Please, share that last thought again.”