Shane (Damage Control 4)

“Lots is wrong with me.” I realize I’m holding my arm, ghostly pain flickering down my nerves, and I don’t know why. “I need to find Seth. And Cassie. Can you help me find—”

“Take a deep breath.” She takes my hand in hers. “What’s the matter with your arm?”

I look down at the small red scar, cock my head to the side, try

ing to recall—and it’s there. The memory’s right there. The prison, the showers, water and blood everywhere, my bare feet slipping on the tiles, my hair in my face, blinding me.

Burning pain in my arm. I kick at the man, and he falls with a cry. I grab the blade from his hand and swing at his face. He twists and turns, punches me—my blade cuts his face, bisects his cheek, barely missing his eye.

An alarm blaring. Guards running inside with bats, blows raining down on me, a boot slamming into my hand, breaking bones.

Oh shit.

Not real. I’m okay. Cassie said so.

It doesn’t matter. She’s not here. And I need to escape.

So I do. Staggering blindly through the memory, pushing away anyone and anything that stands in my way, I go looking for a door and a way out.

Chapter Sixteen

Cassie

“Stop hiding,” Manon is saying, dragging me out of my corner and across the house. “It’s a party.”

“I’m not hiding.”

“Right.”

We walk past open doors leading into gigantic study rooms and sunrooms and whatever else you need huge, furnished, empty rooms for.

“What is this house?” I totter beside her on my high heels. “It’s like a palace.”

Pretending to care. Pretending I’m not thinking about Shane, that I don’t want to curl up back in my corner and cry my eyes out.

When Jesse said those things, I wanted the earth to open up and swallow me whole. I thought he’d forgiven me. But that isn’t what hurts most.

Shane. He looked so pissed off before he left, even when I begged him to wait. I bet he remembered what he sometimes seems to forget: that I kissed one of his friends, no, forced a kiss on him.

Now that I know what demons hide in Shane’s past, I know I couldn’t have done anything worse. In his eyes, I am the monster.

I thought he couldn’t care less when he saw me kiss Jesse last summer. But he has to hate me for it. I know why now.

And it’s breaking me apart—that my mistake has not only hurt Jesse and Amber, but also the boy I love and pushed him away from me.

So stupid, Cass. You are so stupid. Mom always said so.

But also horrible and selfish.

Guilty.

“Dakota has a lot of family,” Manon is saying, “lots of aunts, and many of them are single and rich.” She tugs me right into the crowd gathered around the dais in the ginormous living room. “Or widowed and rich, no idea. This little house belongs to her Aunt Georgia, dog lover and president of the local knitting club.”

“Knitting club. Ah-huh.”

Crap, I wonder what’s going through Shane’s mind right now. Is he okay? Where is he? Worry is eating at my stomach lining like acid.

“You okay, Cassie?”