She’d won.
Chase backed off the throttle, realizing how hollow her vision had become. How swilled and tilted her mind felt. She sucked oxygen, hung her head, and swore in a long, slow string.
“I gather you’re mad at me,” Pippin said.
Chase turned them back toward the Star. “Mad? Try disillusioned,” she said. “That’s one of those fancy words you like.”
“You’re a piece of work, you know that?”
“I do.” She hit the throttle without warning, making him grunt.
22
RED FLAG
Mock Air War
The flight home was ugly-silent. Kale met them in the hangar to download the footage from their onboard cameras, and Chase came down from her cockpit last. Maybe she should have been walking tall, but the victory didn’t feel right.
She was still too riled to make eye contact or to even try to talk to Pippin, but then, he wasn’t hanging around. He took off toward the locker rooms in a hurry. Without Pippin to be angry with, embarrassment knifed its way in. Making her feel pinned down.
“Nyx won,” Tristan said to Kale.
“Like hell,” Romeo chimed in. “She messed up!” But Tristan put a hand on his shoulder. They left arguing.
“What was that about?” Kale asked Chase.
She shrugged and walked off after Sylph.
“Bravo Zulu,” Sylph said to her, more command than compliment.
Chase watched team Phoenix disappear around the side of a helo. “What was Romeo complaining about? I didn’t mess up.”
“Arrow let you win.” Riot’s voice was sharp. “We know he can stand to go faster than Mach 4. The simulators proved that.”
Chase got so angry so fast that it was a wonder she didn’t punch everyone. “Why in the world would he let me win?”
“Don’t make me spell it out, Nyx.” Sylph scoffed. “Arrow let you win because he wants to…” She made wet kissing sounds. Chase sprinted at her, and Sylph laughed her way out of the hangar, outrunning everyone on her stork legs.
? ? ?
Chase couldn’t cool off. She headed to the rec room to play pool, but the only person who wasn’t watching the main event was Sylph. Ugh. The girl couldn’t keep from scratching if her wings depended on it.
Sylph whacked at the cue ball, sending it spinning against the sides pointlessly before it sunk in the side pocket. “This isn’t my game.”
“No shit.” Chase’s anger was barely in check. Her heartbeat had never really come down after her spin out in the sky, and she closed her hand on her stick over and over like she was trying to pump her pulse into a casual rhythm.
All matters were made worse by the distraction of Romeo and Tristan facing off at the flight simulator game in the back, a sizable crowd surrounding them. Chase watched Tristan’s bird dip and double cross Romeo’s, flipping him out of the sky to an assault of cheers. Fistfuls of money were slapped around. Pippin had a scratchpad—organizing bets, no doubt.
“Arrow didn’t let me win.” Chase leaned over the table and took a swift shot, knocking the red ball into the side pocket and sending the cue spinning off in the opposite direction. “He didn’t.”
“All evidence to the contrary,” Sylph snorted.
“If he let me win, then I hate him. And if I hate him, then I have to take him out.”
Sylph smiled thinly. “I’ve never heard you go mobster before. It suits you.”
One of the simulated jets crashed, and the crowd booed.
Chase took a shot and missed everything she was aiming for. Pool wasn’t her game either. It was Pippin’s. “Well, I’m not going to seduce him on purpose, so you can let that one go.”
Sylph jumped up on the edge of the green felt table and crossed her long legs. She glanced at the crowd, as distracted by them as Chase was. “Just ask him if he let you win,” she said. “Here’s your chance.”
The simulator game ended with a roar of cheers and groans. Romeo jogged over, a grin splayed across his caveman cuteness. He had Pippin in a headlock, and Chase’s RIO was practically twisted upside down. “I won,” Romeo said. “Let Arrow have the credit for the jet, but I can beat anyone at a computer game.”
“Your RIO beat you?” Chase asked Tristan, but he ignored her. He was talking with an ebony-skinned sophomore, the girl who, according to Riot, had legs that “didn’t quit.” Chase felt her anger rise up as he turned his back.
The rec room was hotter than it had ever been. People were everywhere, calling out to Arrow and Romeo, and endlessly laughing. Chase chucked her cue stick across the green felt table, whacking Sylph in the butt.
“Arrow,” she yelled. Tristan held up a finger at her, telling her to wait until he was done talking.
A finger.
She grabbed his hand and twisted it, tucking his arm behind his back. Then she leaned into his sweaty hair and asked, “Did you let me win?”
“Yes.”
Chase was numbed by his answer. When he swung around and broke her hold, she collided with the edge of the pool table. He stepped way back, revealing a new quiet that proved the whole room had tuned in to their conversation.
“Why?” Chase wanted her question to sound hard, but it wavered. It felt fragile and damning, and an anger spasm filled her chest. She glanced at Pippin and found him looking distinctly mortified. Good.
Sylph stepped in between them, catching Tristan by the shoulder of his uniform. “Hey,” she commanded. “Take it to the mat.”
“I don’t want to spar with her,” Tristan said.
“At the Star, we don’t let fights turn into feuds. You and Nyx have to work this out. Now.”
A few minutes later, a serious crowd—what felt like the whole academy—surrounded the boxing ring. Sylph ducked under the rope, tightening Chase’s gloves. “I don’t know what’s going on between you two,” the blonde said, “but I love it.”
Chase squeezed her fists, feeling the worn-through spots on the padding. “Advice?”
“Yeah,” she said. “He’s going to cream you. Don’t let him.”