“Oh!” The tips of her ears go bright pink and it hits me low in the gut. She’s embarrassed? Wick? I would never have guessed she had it in her. I nearly laugh—until she scrambles backward. Did I scare her?
Possibly. Probably. I did just climb a tree to talk to her in the middle of the night. I grit my teeth and hoist myself over the window ledge and land in her bedroom, still grinning. “Didn’t think you’d actually agree.”
Wick retreats to desk chair, sits on her hands. The embarrassed girl is gone and the prickly one I know from school is back. She’s gone hooded again. Shuttered. I can’t tell what Wick sees when she looks at me, but I really want to know.
I also want to know who thought Wick would like that bed. It’s white with tall, curlicue posts, completely girly-girl.
“What do you want?” she asks.
I shrug, look around like I don’t know what I’m doing. Which is kind of true and kind of not. Wick goes red and embarrassed like the other girls I know, but she also goes dark and pointed like no one I know. Which is the real girl?
“I always wanted to see where you lived now,” I say.
“Why? Were you expecting a coffin or something?”
“Of course not. You sleep hanging upside down, right?”
She glares at me—no, tries to glare at me. There’s a smile fighting the corners of her mouth and I can’t stop my grin. She’s not immune to me.
Well, not entirely.
Wick chews her lower lip. “Why are you being so . . . so . . .”
Flirty? Pushy? Whatever it is, she won’t say it. There’s something under Wick’s words, like she’s biting down all the things she wants to say. Maybe I am too.
“Because I wanted to the moment I saw you, but mostly because Matthew Bradford threw your lunch into the school fountain last week, so you let the air out of his car tires.”
Her shoulders go rigid. “Tire. I only did one.”
“Yeah, I know. I did the other.”
“How did you . . .”
“Know you were there?” I stand and, for the first time ever, I feel her eyes follow me. Everywhere they touch I go hot, tight. I’m used to girls watching me, but I’m not used to reacting like this. “I was one car over, hiding out instead of going to lunch. You’re the first girl I’ve ever met who’s smart and never plays stupid. You’re small, but you don’t back down.”
It sounds like a line but it’s probably the most honest thing I’ve ever said. I’m glad we’re not facing each other. If she’s rolling her eyes, I’d rather not know. I study Wick’s bookshelves instead, touching the spines of her paperbacks with one finger. Stephen King, Jodi Picoult, Courtney Summers, and . . . is that Eat Pray Love? I pull it off the shelf. “So is that a good enough answer?”
Wick’s mouth moves like it might very well be, but then her computer chirps and her eyes go hard. Flat. She spins the chair around, hands already reaching for the keyboard.
“What is it?” I ask, watching her . . . watching the computer. I take a couple of steps toward her and she doesn’t notice. Her eyes are pinned to the screen. “Something going on?”
“No, nothing.”
Yes, something. Whatever she’s seeing has her breath coming fast, shallow. She’s freaked. Why?
I edge closer and peek over her shoulder. It’s the usual computer home screen: Microsoft Office icons . . . Mozilla icon . . . There’s nothing special until I notice the pop-up message at the corner of her screen. The writing’s too small to see what it says, but I recognize the symbol on the left-hand side of the notification: a bone-white skull with a crooked crown on a red-and-black background. That’s the Pandora Code symbol.
It’s a virus. I’ve seen the icon but, thankfully, never been infected. I’ve heard about it though. There was that credit card scam last year . . . but it doesn’t look like Wick’s infected with the virus.
She’s running it.
My stomach falls three inches. Carson was right. Or, at least, partially right. If Wick’s using the virus, she’s involved in some kind of hacking.
She’s not who I thought she was . . . so where’s my disgust?
“What are you doing?” I ask softly.
Wick jerks to her feet, blocking the computer screen with her body. “You have to go now.”
I cock my head, smile at her like I’m confused. It’s not exactly a stretch. I need a reason to stay. “But I just got here.”
“You have to go.”
I glance at the computer, barely visible beyond her shoulder, and then to Wick. Her mouth has a hard set. She’s not going to budge. This isn’t ending like it was supposed to.
“Okay, fine, but close the window after me.” I grin at her and straddle the windowsill. Definitely not the way this was supposed to go.
Then again, now I have a reason to keep coming around.
My grin widens. “You never know who might climb up that tree again, Wicked.”
8
I nearly break my damn ankles hitting the ground. Wick slams the window above me, but she lingers for a beat. Is she looking down at me? The blinds snap shut and I scowl.