Every anonymous text. Every whispered rumor. Every sleepless night trying to figure out who hates me enough to dismantle my life piece by piece. It’s been months of this crap. Threatening my brother is the last straw.
I’m so tired. I’m so tired of being afraid and I want it to stop.
I push her hard enough that she stumbles back. Her messenger bag swings with the momentum.
Aubrey’s eyes are round and then they narrow. She’s not the kind of person who backs down.
She pushes me back just as hard, and my spine connects with the concrete wall. Pain jolts my shoulder blades.
I lunge forward and grab the strap of her messenger bag with both hands. I yank sideways. The strap catches her neck and she spins, trying to stay balanced. I yank again, harder, and pull the bag strap over her head. The force sends Aubrey to the ground. Her hip hits the concrete hard and she lets out a sharp cry that bounces off the loading dock walls.
My hands are shaking. I open the bag then flip it upside down and dump everything. Textbooks hit the concrete. A makeup pouch. Pens. A crumpled receipt.
And a small emerald leather book. My diary.
It lands face-up between us as the air leaves my lungs. There’s nowayshe can deny everything now.
Aubrey is on the ground, propped on one elbow, staring at the diary. Her expression doesn’t match guilt. Her mouth is open and her eyes are locked on the leather cover like she’s seeing it for the first time in her life. She blinks rapidly, as though she’s trying to make sure it’s real.
I snatch my diary off the ground and toss the empty messenger bag at her. “Stay out of my life. If you come near me or my family again, I’m calling the police and getting a restraining order.”
Aubrey’s voice is weak. “June, I… I didn’t…”
Cinna steps forward. She bends over Aubrey, grabs a fistful of dark hair, and smacks her across the cheek with an open palm. The sound cracks through the loading dock.
Aubrey screams. Her hand flies to her face and she curls in on herself, knees drawing up, the scream dissolving into loud, ugly sobbing.
I’m frozen.
Cinna straightens and walks back to me. Her face is a version of my best friend I have never witnessed. Her eyes are flat, emptied of everything warm, and the set of her mouth sends ice through my veins. This isn’t the girl who braids my hair during movie nights or the person who cries at dog videos.
“You didn’t have to take it that far,” I whisper.
“I knew you wouldn’t,” she says, adjusting her silk pink blouse, “so I did. The bitch deserves it.”
She links her arm through mine and steers me away from the loading dock. My legs move because she pulls me forward.
Behind us, Aubrey’s sobs fill the corridor. “I didn’t do anything,” she’s crying. “I didn’t. I swear…”
The adrenaline leaves my body and I crash hard. The fire in my blood cools, and what replaces it is worse than any rage I’ve ever felt.
I glance back.
She’s still on the ground. Still holding her face. Still crying the same broken sentence over and over.
If she did this, she would have admitted it by now. That’s who Aubrey is. She doesn’t hide behind tears. She doesn’t grovel. If I’d caught the real Aubrey doing the real thing, she would’ve looked me in the eye and said, “Yeah, I did it, and here’s why.”
But she looks like I just broke her heart.
Guilt is a nasty beast inside me. I hug the diary against my stomach. I should feel vindicated because the evidence was in her bag. Case closed.
All the proof points to Aubrey. So why does everything about this feel wrong?
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
AERON
Another frat house party at Hargrove. Oh joy.
