Read Online Envy - 2 by Robin Wasserman - Free Book Online Page A

immediately by an utterly humiliating blow-off.
    What a loser he’d been. He saw that now. It was too late, of course—he’d done it, this huge, horrible thing that weighed on him, crushed him, and yet stil flickered through his fantasies, taunting him with what he couldn’t have yet stil , in some deep part of him, wanted.
    Beth had wondered why he suddenly stopped fol owing Kaia around and inviting her out with the group, but she had no fond feelings for Kaia herself, so hadn’t wondered very long or very loudly. And maybe she didn’t want to know.
    Stil , it was a smal school, and he’d been bound to bump into Kaia eventual y. He just hadn’t counted on a literal col ision.
    “Oh, sorry!” he exclaimed, after spinning away from his locker and slamming into someone rushing past him down the hal . Then—“Oh, it’s you.” Suddenly, the split-second col ision became, in his mind, an embrace, as if he could stil feel the ghostly touch of his body pressing against hers, their hands and chests and hips awkwardly rubbing against each other, her silky hair whipping across his face.
    “And it’s you, too,” she pointed out. “Where’ve you been, stranger?”
    “Far away from you, which I thought was how you wanted it.” Her words to him at their last meeting echoed through his head. And the mocking laughter.
    “Oh, Adam, I hope I didn’t hurt your feelings.” She placed a soft hand on his chest—he pushed it away. “I don’t know what I’d do if I thought you hated me!”
    “Give it up, Kaia,” he said harshly. “I’m not fal ing for your crap again. Find someone new to screw over.” Kaia rol ed her eyes. “Oh, right,” she scoffed. “You’re such the wounded victim, used and abused, right? You didn’t seem to mind the screwing part so much.”
    “Shut up,” he hissed, suddenly aware of the students swarming around them. Watching. Listening? “I thought we agreed you weren’t going to tel anyone about that.”
    “Oh, calm down. My lips are sealed. Why would I do anything to get between you and your precious Beth?”
    “I appreciate that, Kaia.” He tried to ignore the disdainful edge to her voice. Kaia, he’d decided, was like a venomous snake—you just had to be very careful, stay very stil , and wait her out until she got bored and went away.
    “Of course,” she added, smirking, “maybe I’m not the one you need to worry about.”
    “What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked, against his better judgment.
    “I saw your blushing rose getting cozy in the coffee shop with your supposed best friend the other day. Just thought you’d want to know.”
    “Old news,” he said, affecting nonchalance. Ignoring the taste of bile. “She’s tutoring him for the SATs. I know al about it. And it’s completely innocent.” And this he believed wholeheartedly, he told himself. He had to, right?
    “So I heard. Such a sweet girl, to commit her time to helping him, when she’s oh so busy. But total y innocent, of course,” she assured him, voice dripping with false sincerity.
    “I’m sure you’re right. Just another platonic extracurricular, like any other: yearbook, newspaper, party planning …” She narrowed her gaze suggestively and Adam felt the tips of his ears turn red. It was, after al , planning a party that had brought Adam and Kaia together in the first place. A few weeks’ worth of purely platonic meetings culminating in one night of il icit but extraordinary passion.
    “I’m sure you have nothing to worry about, though,” she said after a moment of silence. “I mean, you’re in love, right? And that’s what love is al about—trust.” Trust. Right.

    If Beth’s love for him proved as trustworthy as his love for her, they were in for some serious problems.
    Job well done , Kaia congratulated herself. Adam had, of course, walked away from her in disgust, but she could see the beginnings of doubt in the nervous twist of his lip and the tiny rivulets of sweat that