“Nova?” Zoe’s voice through the door. “You okay in there?”
I open it.
Zoe’s eyes go wide. “Holy shit.”
“It’s too much.”
“It’sperfect.” She grabs my shoulders and turns me toward the mirror outside the dressing room. “Look at yourself. Actually look.”
I look.
The girl in the mirror doesn’t look like someone who sleeps in alleys. She doesn’t look like someone who learned to be invisible. She looks like someone who could walk into a room and make people stop talking.
She looks like someone who belongs somewhere.
“We’re getting it,” Zoe says.
“I don’t need—”
“This isn’t about need.” She’s already pulling out Kyron’s card. “This is about want. When’s the last time you let yourself want something?”
I… I don’t know.
We’re halfway back to the house, bags in hand, when I finally ask.
“Zoe?”
“Yeah?”
“The thing you said. About your guys. About your skin feeling like it was on fire.”
She glances at me sideways. “Yeah?”
“Does it ever stop?”
She laughs—not mean, just surprised. “No. It just starts making sense.”
I don’t know what that means. But I’m still thinking about it when we get back—the fire under the skin, the wanting to be near them even when it’s terrifying.
That’s exactly how I feel.
And I have no idea what to do with it.
Chapter 17
Locke
I’m sitting on the front steps for no reason.
That’s the lie I’m telling myself. The truth is I’ve been out here for twenty minutes watching the path like she’s going to appear on it. Like the impatient stalker I am who knows she’s gonna be done shopping soon only because the stores are about to close and I want to be the first one she sees.
The others are inside. I told them I needed air.
No one believed me. No one said anything either.
I see them before I hear them. Two figures coming up the path—Zoe’s dark hair, easy stride. And next to her—
My chest locks.
