CHAPTER 1
Lo
What. The. Fuck?
Did I just… drive into something?
How tired am I?
The airbag hits me with a punch to the chest, and for a second, all I hear is the high-pitched ring of my own poor life choices. My body snaps forward, then back, seatbelt cutting into my collarbone.
The engine dies with a pathetic cough. Glitter flutters through the air, confetti in a slow-motion nightmare.
I blink.
Outside the cracked windshield is a sea of feathers, fake flowers, and… are those papier mâché bees?
Oh.
Oh no.
Ohgodno.
I didn’t just hit something.
I hit a float.
A freaking parade float. I shove the door open, stumbling out of the car on wobbly legs. My boots crunch over broken plastic and shredded streamers. It smells of cotton candy and burning rubber.
People are shouting. Somewhere, a band is still playing.
And that’s when it clicks.
I drove straight into the Winterfest Parade.
Voices ring out around me, muddling together in the cold, biting wind that seems to carry the glitter in my direction.
Great. I’ve destroyed a float, and now I’ll be wearing the evidence in my hair for days.
“Oh my god!”
“No, she didn’t.”
“What isshedoing here?”
“Is that…”
“LoMarsh?”
That last voice makes the blood drain from my face.
I look up, bracing for the worst, and there she is.
Sylvia Hammond.
The town’s Beta queen of passive aggression and my mother’s former best friend turned personalhater-in-chief.
Her face twists into something between shock and glee.
