No sign yet of JD. Was he with Drea? She tried to dismiss the idea quickly. She was getting paranoid.
She watched Skylar handing out cups of the just-tapped hard cider. Skylar’s dress was cute, and a silvery scarf was wrapped around her neck. She was taller than usual, thanks to a pair of heeled knee boots. Her hair was curled. It’s a mini-Gabby, Em thought as Skylar approached Pierce and tried to get his attention, practically sticking her boobs in his face. If Skylar was going to be Gabby’s project, Gabs needed to teach her the art of subtlety.
She was about to turn her head and do another sweep of the crowd for JD, when something caught her eye. A flash of red, there on Skylar’s blue sweaterdress. She squinted and looked closer. Her breath caught in her throat, and she had a sudden, swinging sense of vertigo. There was a red orchid pinned to Skylar’s dress. The party seemed to disappear; all she could see was the flower.
“Move. Excuse me. Sorry.” Em shouldered her way over to where Skylar and Pierce were standing. She burst in between them.
“Where did you get that?” she demanded, looking down at Skylar’s chest. She heard Pierce, behind her, mumble something about getting more beer.
Skylar seemed nervous. “At the mall. . . . It was pretty expensive, but I got a great deal. . . . Coupon—my aunt gave me a—”
Em cut her off and jabbed at the flower. “Where did you get this?” she said. “Where did you get this flower?” Her voice was high with panic; she could hear it.
“You don’t like it?” Skylar whimpered, wobbling ever so slightly; Em wondered how much she’d had to drink while getting ready for the party. “I wasn’t sure if it matched, but I decided to wear it anyway. But if you think it’s too much . . .” Skylar unpinned the orchid.
Instinctively, acting on the hatred that the orchid sparked in her chest, Em grabbed it from Skylar’s hand and threw it into the fire.
Skylar watched it fall, exclaiming, “Hey! That was a gift!”
“I’m going to ask you again: Where. Did. You. Get. It?” Em spoke with quiet determination.
“A friend gave it to me, actually,” Skylar said, lifting her chin a bit. Em saw vulnerability in her face—desperation. This girl really just wanted to be liked. To be noticed. But still, that flower. It meant only one thing.
“Is your . . . friend—is she here?” Em’s heart thumped. Images of Chase returned to her: His intense longing to be accepted. His feelings of being an outsider. How the Furies had preyed on that weakness. . . .
Skylar shook her head, distracted by a whooping cheer that came from the direction of the kegs. “She had some family thing,” she said vaguely. “She might stop by later.”
Em’s mind clouded with visions of New Year’s Eve: of meeting Ali on the train to Boston, of getting caught in the subway doors, of watching her orchid get chewed up on the subway tracks and then having Ali hand it to her, intact, just minutes later. What had Skylar done to deserve an orchid? Were the Furies now arbitrarily targeting Ascensionites?
Clearly, Skylar was in trouble. But she had no idea, and Em might be the only person who could help her.
Em coughed, feeling the scorching smoke scrape through her throat and nose.
“We should move,” Skylar said, gulping down more of her drink. “The smoke’s blowing right at us.”
But Em barely registered her comment. She grabbed Skylar’s wrist and squeezed it. “Listen to me,” she said with the same quiet fervor. “You have to be careful. What do you know about this friend of yours? Does she . . . does she have two cousins? Two girls?”
This made Skylar light up. “You know them,” she hiccupped. She moved in closer to Em, sloshing some cider out of the side of her cup. “Aren’t they so pretty? Like you!” Skylar was talking nonsense, but it made Em’s stomach flip.
“No, listen, Skylar,” Em said, grabbing the girl’s shoulders to steady her and stare into her eyes. Maybe it was worthless to have this conversation right now—Skylar was obviously already tipsy, and even without the booze, she was distracted by her hostess duties. But Em had to try. “I do know them. They . . . they hurt people, Skylar. You have to be careful. They think it’s justice, but it’s not. It’s evil. It’s revenge. Have you ever heard the expression ‘An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind’?” She didn’t wait for Skylar to respond. “Well, that’s what they do. They make the world blind.”