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“Oh!” she says, almost clapping her hands together with happiness. “He did?”
Gemma throws a triumphant look at her friend. The redhead is frowning slightly, but doesn’t say anything.
“Speaking of Leo,” I say to Gemma, “have you congratulated him yet?
“No . . .”
“You should.” I thrust the drink into her hand. “Give him that—it’s his favorite. See if he wants to toast with you.”
Now she’s eager. “Okay!”
She hurries off across the sand, carrying her drink and the one I laced. I watch closely to make sure she gives Leo the right one.
She puts it right in his hand, babbling something up at him. Leo listens with a bemused expression, then grins and shrugs and holds the drink aloft for a toast. His tight little group of friends cheers him, and then they all raise their glasses to their lips. Leo swallows his drink down in one draft.
The redhead watches all this just like I do. Then she turns to me, her pale green eyes fixed on my face and her scowl deeper than ever.
She says, “Leo didn’t tell you that.”
I give her a cold look. “How would you know?” And walk away from her.
As I pass Anna’s speaker, I knock it with my elbow, as if by accident, and I kick a little sand over it with my heel as I keep on walking.
12
ANNA
You want to go to the party together?” Chay asks me.
She’s already dressed in tight leather pants and a half-dozen layered necklaces. She looks antsy and excited. I know she’s got a crush on some beefy British Enforcer, and she’s hoping to make a move on him tonight.
“You go ahead,” I say. “I’m not even close to ready.”
The real reason is that I want to walk down with Leo, just the two of us. But I don’t want to say that to Chay.
“You mind if I borrow your speaker?” she asks. “We wanna have music.”
“Help yourself.”
“I should have snuck one in too,” she grumbles. “I was scared to break the rules. The acceptance letter was so terrifying . . . I wish I brought more clothes, too.”
“You only got one bag—where would you have put them?”
Chay already brought twice the clothes of anyone else. Her suitcase was bursting at the seams. She didn’t bring a single pair of pajamas, in favor of stuffing dozens of vintage band Ts into her bag, plus eight different pairs of heels. She wears stilettos toclass every day, along with an assortment of studded bracelets and chain belts that clink when she walks.
“I could have worn at least five more outfits if I layered,” Chay says mournfully. “I could have gotten on that boat wrapped up like an onion.”
“You would have died of heatstroke,” I remind her. “It was boiling that first day.”
“Worth it!” Chay is vehement. “Anyway, I’ll take this down now, if you don’t mind.”
“Go ahead.”
She grabs the speaker and I head down to the showers.
I spend a lot more time than usual getting ready for the party.
I wash and dry my hair, which takes fucking forever. It’s three feet long, poker straight, and fine as spider silk. But the work is worth it, because when it’s clean and loose, it glides across my skin and glimmers like metal where the light hits it.
