The Wild (Book Four The Hayle Coven Novels) Read online

  “Syd,” she said as she finally leaned back. “It’s going to be okay, honey.”

  How did she know what I was thinking about? Because. She was my mom. And it’s not like I thought about much else these days.

  I bobbed my head, feeling the mountain of my hair sway in one solid piece. The familiar frown creased her forehead as I did, her fingers reaching for a pin. I backed up before she could attack me with it.

  Saved by the limousine engine. Mom dropped the pin and came forward, sliding her hand under my elbow to help me out and down the stairs.

  Stairs and heels are nasty. Nasty. Thank goodness she was there or I’d have resorted to sliding down the steps on my satin-coated ass.

  As we reached the bottom, Erica rushed out of the kitchen. She pressed a small silver purse into my hands.

  “Essentials.” She winked and I blushed. Erica had odd ideas as to what was necessary for something like this. I remember she included an actual negligee for me one time she was responsible for sending me to a sleepover. So embarrassing. Don’t believe me? I think I was ten.

  I’d have to go through the stupid purse in private and make sure she didn’t put something even more humiliating in there. But I hugged her and kissed her anyway.

  I drew a breath and squared my shoulders, trying to think attractive thoughts. Not so pretty was my language on the way down the hall as I tripped three times over those cursed shoes.

  Dad stood with Brad in the kitchen. They both looked a little uncomfortable. I met my father’s eyes as he looked over and smiled at me.

  “Syd,” Dad said. “Cupcake, you’re gorgeous.”

  Cupcake. Did he do it on purpose? The whole embarrassment thing? I was positive he did.

  Brad turned around when Dad spoke. My eyes shifted to him and I felt my cheeks flush.

  He looked fabulous, wavy blonde hair perfectly styled, tall, muscular body super hot in his black tuxedo. He smiled at me, the smile I adored since we moved to Wilding Springs.

  “Wow, Syd,” Brad said.

  I knew I blushed under my makeup, but was pretty sure he couldn’t see it.

  “This is for you.” He produced a clear plastic dish with flourish. Inside was a single red rose. Not my favorite flower, but it’s not like I could wear a daisy to prom.

  We had an awkward few minutes as he slid it over my wrist, Mom and Dad and Erica snapping so many pictures I could barely see from the spots in my vision. Naturally, we had to have our photos with everyone in the household, both as a group and individually.

  Dad wasn’t so bad, and Mom was great. Even Erica stopped giggling long enough I figured the picture with her turned out okay.

  After I caught her peeking, my little sister Meira locked herself in her room and refused to come out. She’d been acting like that, distant, angry, ever since my demon left. Like she blamed me for losing my power or something. It hurt, it hurt a lot, considering how close she and I always were. It was as if I didn’t matter to her anymore, wasn’t worth her time. I hadn’t bothered to confront her about it just yet, so tied up in my own crap, but was tempted tonight. I let it go at last, not sure what annoyed me more—the fact she’d been avoiding me or that she didn’t want to see me in my dress. I was just vain enough to know it was more the latter than the former.

  Minus a Meira photo op, I had to settle for a picture with my demon cat, Sassafras. Not by his choice. When he poked his head into the kitchen to see what was going on, I risked cat hair on my dress for the chance to scoop his chubby silver Persian body into my arms and hug him.

  He hissed at me, suitably irritated. Perfect. My job was done.

  My last shot was with Gram. She seemed grumpy these days, and nothing drew her out, not even her favorites of chocolate and tequila. As much as the crazy lady had never really been stable since her battle with the Purity coven, she at least had her happy moments. But those seemed to be over, especially when she was around me.

  I think the thing troubling me most was the fact she stopped asking me the question she’d been bugging me with since I was a little girl. Why she thought I had something of hers I had no idea. Now that my demon was gone, it seemed like the thing Gram lost went with her.

  When Mom suggested we call the family, as in the coven, for more photos, I finally force-marched Brad out the door to the waiting limousine.

  The car was filled with giggling cheerleaders in dresses as frothy as mine and football jocks squeezed into their own penguin suits. I slid in on the end next to Brad, wondering what I had gotten myself into. My only saving grace was Alison. I spotted her further along the line, close to the front of the limo. She waved and blew me a kiss, looking gorgeous, as usual.

  I felt like a fraud.

  Oddly, Brad made no attempt to put his arm around me or even really talk to me. I passed it off as prom night jitters and tried to enjoy myself.

  My heart wasn’t in it, though. Every time I looked at Brad I thought of Quaid and what we almost had. How close we were. I know I would have been happy, even with my continued aversion to magic, if only I could have been with Quaid.

  That dream was as dead as the flower on my wrist would be by morning. I fingered the petals as the rest of the people around me laughed and talked.

  This was normal. This was the life I wanted. No worrying about being hurt by magic, attacked by those who felt threatened by my power or the power of the family. Just a girl and a life, school and a job. Two point five kids, a white picket fence.

  Yup. This was it.

  And I swore if I got my demon back, I’d never complain again.

  ***

  Chapter Four

  Okay, so prom ended up a total waste of time.

  Dinner was a joke, for one. All the girls ignored me, and it seemed like they purposely separated Alison and I so I’d have absolutely no one to talk to. I was stuck at the end of our table with one of the jocks across from me and he spent the entire dinner either stuffing his face or tearing of blobs of his roll and throwing them at exposed cleavage.

  His aim was pretty good by the end of it.

  I didn’t eat much. My dress was too tight anyway, despite the rumbling in my stomach. Didn’t stop Brad from cleaning his plate and mine. At least the food didn’t go to waste. Though as I watched him stog what amounted to about half a potato into his mouth at once before laughing and spitting most of it out on the table, I quickly lost my appetite.

  So classy. Why had I not noticed this about him before? The way he slurped his drink, how he grated his knife across the plate when he bothered to cut anything at all? Not to mention the way he ignored me, instead leaning over to put his arm around one of the other girls. His eyes stayed glued to the front of her dress and he cheered when a blob of roll soared toward her and found its target

  I couldn’t stand to watch when he offered to retrieve it. From the giggling I heard as I sipped my ice water in an attempt to cool my temper, she wasn’t protesting nearly enough.

  I’d spent the last two years thinking Quaid was the jerk. Now I was beginning to wonder.

  Dinner didn’t last long. I smiled sympathetically at the waitress as we abandoned our table. I slid her an extra fifty as a tip, knowing how much work she had ahead of her. It was just money, my family had lots of that. And empathy, thank goodness.

  Oh right. The silver purse. Nothing embarrassing, as it turned out. Just lipstick and gloss, some spare bobby pins and a roll of money. I flipped through the bills when I settled in the limo for the second time, keeping my count private. I’m not sure what Erica was expecting, but I could fly to South America and back on that bankroll.

  The drive to the school was short, blissfully short. I think if I heard one more horrible rendition of the latest pop song the girls made the driver play over and over I would explode. Brad was the first out, already waving to another group piling out of their own limo. Aside from the odd one in the summer, I’d never seen so many of the stretched- out black cars. Wilding Springs didn’t exactly warrant daily
trips in the lap of luxury.

  I tripped over the hem of my dress as I climbed out, naturally. And where was Brad? Yeah, Brad. Had his back to me, didn’t he? Wolf whistling at some girl in a skanky outfit it took me a moment to realize was Page. Gone was the fallen angel I’d first met. And from what I could tell, also gone was the sweet but needy cheerleader who just wanted to fit in. Ever since Suzanne left town, moving after the whole possession fiasco left her stripped of her confidence and cruelty, things had been actually nice at school.

  I guess Page saw the opportunity. The last week or so she’d been raising some dust, gathering a posse. Bullying. I frowned on it, but I wasn’t exactly in a position to really care all that much. I was too busy feeling sorry for myself.

  She waved, teetering on her own heels, skin-tight red dress plunging so low I was sure her belly button would pop out at any second. And that wasn’t the only thing threatening to pop out. Page caught my eye and smiled. There was nothing nice about it.

  Whatever. There was less than a week of school left anyway. What could she do?

  Feeling possessive and more than a little miffed, I grabbed Brad’s arm. He looked down at me as if he’d forgotten I was there.

  “Cool, right?” He grinned, exposing the sliver of lettuce stuck in his perfect front teeth. Does it make me a bad person I didn’t say anything about it?

  A giant and very tacky archway, covered in gold, green and white balloons, stood outside the side entrance to the local hall. This town was just so full of class I could barely stand it. Or the chattering, swaying line of overdressed grads and dates waiting to have their pictures taken under the fluttering, bloated entry. Every once in a while one of the balloons popped and, without fail, all the girls screamed and giggled. I felt like a block of ice. I’d been through far too much to jump over anything so stupid.

  Jaded, that’s me. And totally out of place.

  The worst was the incessant, “Smile!” from the kids on the yearbook committee pressed into service to take the pictures. Finally it was our turn. My feet ached so much I wanted to hurl them across the parking lot, my mood rapidly deteriorating as the wait continued. I’m sure I was a scowling mess by the time we positioned ourselves under the arch.

  I flinched when I saw Beth behind the camera. I waved at her a little and she waved back with much more enthusiasm.

  “You look gorgeous!” She sighed, her eyes huge and admiring as she tipped her head to the side with a dreamy expression.

  I stuck my tongue out at her. Just as the too-perky voice of the photographer said, “Smile!”

  Um, yeah. Oops. Whatever.

  Done with our pose for posterity, Brad swept us inside, found us a table, seated me at it and left me there to get us drinks.

  And pretty much never came back.

  At least Alison’s date did the same. Come to mention it, all the girls we were with turned up dateless within a few minutes of arriving. I made sure to save a seat for my best friend which she fell into with a huge smile on her face.

  “You look, oh my god, so stunning.” She giggled and ran one hand over the fabric of my skirt. “I’m jealous.”

  I shrugged and tried not to breathe too deeply while my feet groaned in pleasure at having my weight off of them.

  “You too,” I said and meant it. Her dress was the palest pink, a sheath that fit her so well it looked like a painting. Her hair was down, corkscrew curls just soft enough she didn’t look too young.

  “Thanks,” she said. “I just borrowed this from Mom. Not like it’s our prom or anything.”

  True. I looked around me and sighed. If this was all there was to it, I wasn’t impressed.

  What was my problem? Why had I wanted so badly to be normal? Normal was boring. Normal was watching your date from across the darkened and badly decorated hall built sometime before my grandmother was a baby, making a fool of himself with his buddies. Normal was this horrible, dull feeling, of being muffled and wrapped in cotton, where everything was so quiet and empty all I could hear was the echo of my own regret.

  Normal sucked.

  No wonder latents like Brad felt such a connection to witches. Even a taste of what life could really be like must have been a real addiction. But I didn’t even have that. According to Mom, my witch power was still there and she called me a latent, but whatever was trying to protect me had me so tied up and smothered I might as well have been just plain old human.

  I spotted Brad slipping something from his pocket and handing it to his buddy. Great. Alcohol. At least now if I wanted to drink I could. Any kind of booze does weird things to those with power. I’d never tasted the stuff for that reason. But it didn’t matter anymore.

  Didn’t change my mind about wanting to drink, though. I’d seen Brad drunk. It turned him into a jerk. Okay, more of a jerk. And in the mood I was it, it was likely I wouldn’t be much better under the influence.

  The guys finally returned to our table, loaded down with punch. One sniff of mine and I understood the purpose of the bottle. I shoved it aside. Alison took it with a wink while Brad and his crew wandered off again.

  Why was I here again?

  “Having fun yet?” Alison leaned in, having to yell to be heard over the pounding music coming from the DJ booth. I glanced over the dance floor and the handful of lackluster participants gyrating their way to the beat while a sparkling disco ball showered them with points of light.

  So. Tacky.

  “I guess.” I leaned away from her strong breath.

  “Yeah, me too.” She giggled. “I was here last year, too. Same old.” She downed the last of her drink then started on mine. “I only said yes this year because you were coming too.” She hugged my arm with one of hers.

  “Thanks.” I watched Brad and the boys hovering around a group of dancers. I knew them at least on nodding terms. Simon would fit in with them if he’d chosen to. I could hear deep laughter even over the sound of the music as several of the football boys made their presence known. Not that Brad participated in the bullying, but I knew now he was drinking and didn’t have the best empathy when he was diluting his blood with who knew what.

  There was a time when he wouldn’t have left my side. I guessed those days were over.

  We endured the dance for about an hour. Brad and the other guys finally did their duty, coming to collect the girls when a slow song started playing. I hated to stand up again, my poor swollen feet inventing curse words at me when I did, but cuddling close to him while we danced was at least fun. He smelled fantastic and I loved the way his arms curved around me.

  But not how his feet tended to catch the tips of my shoes.

  Dance over, at least for the cool crowd it seemed, the group piled out of the hall and back into the parking lot. Our limo was gone, but I spotted Brad’s truck in a space nearby.

  But Brad had been drinking. I stopped him as the others staggered toward their waiting cars, Alison waving at me as she slid into the back seat of a convertible.

  “Should you be driving?” Cars tooted at us as they pulled away, tires squealing. The couple coming with us waited impatiently beside the truck.

  “I’m fine,” he said. “Are you coming or not?”

  I hesitated. This was stupid. I knew he was drinking. What was he thinking?

  Before I had a chance to do anything, say anything, he pulled me into his arms and kissed me.

  He tasted like alcohol and garlic and he pressed so hard it hurt. When he tried to jam his tongue into my mouth, I jerked away from him. He made a frustrated sound and stepped back. When Brad met my eyes, his were distant.

  “Syd,” he said. “Look, I didn’t want to do this tonight. I wanted to wait. You know. Until after.” He ran his hand through his hair, shuffled his feet. “It’s just… I don’t think we should see each other anymore.”

  Oh. My. God. He was dumping me. At prom.

  “It’s not you,” he lied in haste. “It’s totally me. I thought about what you said last year. About focusing
on college. Football. And I think you’re right.” He tried a smile while his friends called for him to hurry up. “I really just want to enjoy my last summer. You know?”

  I refused to cry. Not that I really wanted to spend the rest of my life with Brad. I knew now I didn’t. That fact was crystal clear. But there was something desperately pathetic about being dumped at prom that just put the last sprinkles on the crappiness that was my life.

  “Sure,” I said. “I get it.”

  He exhaled in a rush and laughed a little. “You’re the best, Syd.” He turned toward the truck, keys jingling in his hand. He paused as he hit the unlock button, the loud beep lost in the chatter of his friends as they climbed in. “Are you coming?”

  I couldn’t bear to go to the party now. Not like I wanted to anyway.

  “It’s okay,” I said, hugging myself. “I’ll call my Mom. Have fun.”

  It was the last time he looked back. His big truck rumbled off leaving me alone in the dark.

  Nice.

  No, damn it. Not nice. Not nice at all.

  Instead of calling Mom, I started to walk. Which was stupid, considering my shoes. Those ended up dangling by their thin straps from my fingers after about half a block of cursing and hobbling like an idiot. My other hand hitched up my skirt so I wouldn’t walk on it while balancing the silver bag.

  The stupid flower corsage ended up in the ditch a block later, tossed there with a fury that surprised me. Followed rapidly by tears I couldn’t contain.

  Lucky for me, Erica included some tissues in the purse and the coating of hairspray hopefully kept me from making too big of a mess of myself.

  The tears ran out about two blocks later. All that remained was the numbness.

  I hated it.

  Home was all the way on the other side of town. It really wasn’t that far, if I had been in sneakers and shorts. But dragging my body weight in satin and chiffon, not to mention my badly abused ego, all that way was almost too much for me to consider. I’d made it about half way when I stopped and sat on a bench near a park and tried to decide if the shoes should go in the small pond or if they would somehow poison the ducks.