The message bar comes up. SEEN. I stare at the screen until the words blur together. There’s no reply. I slide my phone into my bra and turn toward the windows just as Gabriel snaps a picture. Noah catches me and spins me under his arm, and between his dark smile and Gabriel singing a drinking song about hating the Irish, and George and Isaac staring adorkably into each other’s eyes, and Eli not being here, I feel raw and strange and untethered.
“This is your night,” Noah whispers, touching his lips to my forehead. His fingers stroke fire down my bare arms, threatening to undo me completely.
My night. Myright. But not truly mine. Only by wearing Mackenzie’s skin can Claudia August’s dreams come true.
“Our ride’s here,” Gabriel announces. He tugs me to the door. That giddy smile of his drags me out of the strange dark place I’d spiraled into. “Wait until you see this.”
Sitting on the road in front of the house is a 1928 Cadillac 341A sedan – the car Al Capone used to drive around in. This was a perfect replica, right down to the armored plating on the sides.
I turn to Gabe in amazement. “You are ridiculous.”
“It seemed appropriate,” Gabriel grins. “Look, there’s even an authentic-looking bullet-hole in the rear window.”
Gabriel climbs up front with the driver, while George, Noah, Isaac, and I squeeze in the back. The car drives us around the city while Gabriel pops a Champagne bottle and sloshes it all over us trying to get it into our glasses. George turns the music up, and she and Gabe and Isaac get into a heated battle about their favorite underground LA bands while the city speeds past the windows in a blur of light and color.
I lean back into Noah’s arms and wonder if this is what being a normal teenager feels like. It feels pretty sweet.
Then the car pulls up outside the Harrington Hills Country Club and Antony yanks the door open. I can see the outline of his holster through his suit, and I know I’ll never get the chance to be normal.
“Satan save me from teenagers,” he hisses as he ushers us along the lantern-lined walkway into the club.
“I thought you were happy about this gig.” I grin. “All that unfettered cleavage…”
“Don’t you start,” he growls. “I’ve been groped so many times already tonight that I’m thinking of lodging a sexual harassment suit.”
“What can I say? Ladies love a man in a suit.” Antony looks every bit like a future Emerald Beach housewife’s wet dream in his dark suit and blue tie that matches his dangerous eyes. If he wasn’t my cousin I’d be all over… ew, no, it’s too gross to think about—
“Save a dance for me, Mr. Jones.” Cleo blows him a kiss as she and her minions slither out to the open courtyard. Antony looks petrified, and I burst out laughing.
I hold out my arms, and Noah and Gabriel take one each. Antony throws open the ballroom doors, and I step into an underwater wonderland.
The theme is ‘Under the Sea.’ Gabriel hooked the dance committee up with the owners of Midnight Grotto so he could score extra homecoming king points. The ballroom has been transformed into a mini version of the club, complete with bobbing lanterns, shimmering lighting, a shell-encrusted photo booth, and towering coral sculptures as table centerpieces. We move through the dance floor as smoke curls around us and men dressed as Poseidon in loincloths offer shimmering emerald drinks and tiny fish cakes skewered on pitchforks.
Under the bobbing lights, the faceless terrors that are my classmates have been reborn as sea creatures – nymphs and ocean gods, pirates and sirens and water spirits and… Chad is dressed in a giant, fluffy, hammerhead shark costume. A DJ on stage plays annoying house music, but on the stage behind I can see a band setting up.
“The music is terrible.” George’s cheeks glow with happiness. She leans in close to Isaac, and he looks at her like he’s the luckiest guy in the room. I hope they name their firstborn daughter Mackenzie in my honor.
I spy Eli immediately in the middle of a big group of his friends. He looks insanely good in a dark grey suit that’s cut to show off his lean muscle. Daphne sashays up to him in a slinky designer dress with the fabric folded over her breasts to look like stylized conch shells. She whispers something in Eli’s ear and places a necklace of shells over his shoulders. He searches the room until his blue eyes meet mine.
The whole room disappears. It’s just me and Eli, and the vast ocean of lies between us.
I’m the first to turn away. I can’t bear reading his pain anymore. It feels intrusive – like I’m hunting around in his private things. His pain doesn’t belong to me. I thought giving him that diary page would help him see how important he was to Mackenzie, how much she needed him. I know that’s all he ever wanted – to protect her and be part of her life. I want to give him a piece of her for every piece I’ve destroyed.
I shouldn’t have sent him that text. He holds my life in his hands and I don’t even care. I should be trying to convince him not to reveal me as a fraud, but all I want is to see the light in his eyes again.
Daphne leads Eli toward the dance floor. He looks back over his shoulder at me, and the edge of his mouth wobbles. The Golden God is crumbling, and it’s all my fault.
Noah squeezes my hand. “Come on. We’ll make you forget about him.”
Gabriel and Noah lead me onto the dance floor. We hang out close to the front as the DJ is ushered off so the band can start their set. Gabriel hooked the school up with his friend’s band, Broken Muse. The lights go down, smoke billows across the floor, and three fucking delicious men run on stage. One makes love to a grand piano with bold, sweeping scales. A huge guy bends over a cello, stabbing at the strings with his bow like he’s a warrior on a battlefield, while an Ice King with cheekbones that could cut glass pours out his soul on his violin. A girl with a tumble of dark hair appears behind a mixing board, looping their tracks and adding atmospheric samples. The music is this insane mash-up of classical, heavy metal, and industrial. It’s wild, reaching right into my bones and jangling them about. I wish Gabe was on stage with them until his hand brushes my hip. I don’t want him to ever stop touching me.
“Claudia.” He whispers my name against my skin, letting the punishing beat drown out my secret. His body moves against mine, swaying and dipping in time with the sweeping violin. His hands roam freely over me, lighting trails of fire along my skin, and when I grind my ass back against him, I can feel his cock hard for me.
Not to be outdone, Noah sweeps in, his hands closing over Gabriel’s as his shadowed, inky scent steals the air from my lungs. I place my hands around his neck, pulling him in close. He claims my lips in a sin-laden kiss as Gabriel presses his against my neck. Their hands roam unchecked over my thighs, hitching my skirt up.
Bodies swirl around us, and I fancy I catch cruel whispers in the air. But the music pounds and thrashes in my skull, casting a spell over us that won’t allow anything else inside. Just me and Gabriel and Noah. We’re not dancing so much as fucking with our clothes on. But no teacher dares make us stop.
I’m a passenger in my skin, trapped by the magic they weave with their bodies, their scents. I’ve been on this dance floor for five minutes and I’m wet and panting for them. If one of them rolled my dress up over my hips, bent me over the edge of the stage, and entered me with a swift thrust, I wouldn’t have the power to stop him, even if I wanted to…
