Page 30

CHAPTER THIRTY

The hallway is empty. In the stairwell I spot a brief flash of brown hair and sheet music. Claudia doing both of us a favor, running away before I could get back. A door slams on the opposite end of the hall, a familiar girl stepping out of the abandoned room across from mine and Claudia’s. Beneath her purple puffer jacket, she’s wearing ripped black jeans and silver combat boots. Definitely not up to uniform code. The corner of the cardboard box in her arms is scuffed, the sleeve of a yellow knit sweater dangling out of the open top.

We lock eyes. The girl—Izzy—scoffs at the sight of me, her gold septum ring catching the light when her nostrils flare. The look she gives me is so chilling it feels like all the air has been sucked out of the room. With a roll of her eyes, she whips around on her heels and rushes toward the staircase on the opposite end of the hall.

“Hey!” I call out, but she’s already made it out to the stairwell. “Hey!” I shout again once I burst through the door she went through, my voice echoing in the freezing-cold stairwell.

I peek over the edge of the railing, spotting her two flights down. She moves fast, even with a box in her arms. No point in losing my voice when she’s clearly not going to stop. Instead, I focus on racing down the stairs, skipping as many steps as I can without breaking my neck.

By the time I make it to the first-floor landing, she’s already gone, the door to the stairway propped open with a cinder block.

The world past the door is blinding. Wind lashes at my cheeks and fingers as I step onto the barely shoveled path. In my rush to get down here, I forgot about my jacket, still sitting on the edge of my bed. The sweat pooling on my forehead from racing down the stairs stings with each gust of wind, locking my face in a permanent sneer.

Thankfully, Izzy didn’t make it far.

“I said, hey!” I shout for what feels like the hundredth time, my voice lost under the force of the wind.

If she did hear me, she doesn’t act like it. Izzy stomps across the untouched blanket of snow to a car on the opposite end of the building. The thought of sinking into the ankle-deep slush in just my uniform leggings makes me numb, but I’m not gonna let her walk away from me.

Treading through the snow takes more effort than deep-cleaning the diner’s fryer. My thighs ache from the pressure of pulling my legs out of the pockets of snow, my shoes and socks soaked within seconds. The cold is a vague, throbbing pain. Dull enough that I can push past it, but not so numb that I need to be worried. Yet, at least.

“So, you’re just gonna pretend you can’t hear me?” I yell at Izzy once I’m within earshot again. Solina never showed her sharp edges, but Izzy’s just put me through some serious hell. Clearly she’s not too fond of me—whoever I am—anyway.

She grunts as she shoves the box into the trunk of the car. The back seat of the dinged-up copper sedan has been pushed down to make room for trash bags leaking shoes and hoodies, a full-length mirror, and cardboard boxes stacked high with books, bags, and the same homey keepsakes Solina kept on her windowsill.

“I don’t have anything to say to you,” she snaps before brushing past me like I don’t exist, heading back the way we came.

What the hell did Solina do to her?

I keep a careful distance behind her. Close enough to not have to shout for her to hear me, but not enough for her to lash out at me for following. “Whatever problem you have with me, it’s not what you think.”

Izzy snorts, shaking her head and picking up her pace. “Sure. Whatever you need to tell yourself.”

Before she can make it back inside, an idea comes to mind. I probably won’t get another shot like this again—a chance to talk to someone who knows about what happened between Solina and Hunter. Details that might help me figure out if he’s the reason she was afraid to come back or if Gabe’s note wasn’t just an empty threat. Details I need now if I want to solve this before the clock runs out.

I think of the article Tiffany found, of the photo of Izzy at that fencing competition, and before I can overthink, I rush forward until I’m blocking her path, ignoring the cold nipping my numb fingers.

“I’m not her,” I say, each word punctuated by a thin white cloud. Whipped away by the wind as quickly as they appear.

Izzy stumbles back, startled by either the wild look of me or what I just said. She holds her arm up, as if to shield herself in case I lunge. “What?”

“I’m her sister.” I pause when she doesn’t immediately cut me off with another question. “Her twin sister.”

The anger in her loosens, her brows furrowing in confusion instead of annoyance. She crosses her arms, and my hands twitch at the sight of her wool mittens. “Then where’s Solina?”

“Dead.” I don’t bother sugarcoating it. No one ever did for me.

She recoils like I slapped her. “What?”

“Over winter break. Someone found her on a riverbank a few miles from our house. Cops think she slipped. Either by accident or …” I stop myself, unable to continue. She gets the idea. “But I don’t think it was either of those.”

Izzy shakes her head and looks over at the abandoned campus, exhaling slowly and letting the cloud of her breath wash over her like cigarette smoke. She taps the toe of her boot against the ground, shaking off flecks of snow with each tap. When she turns back to face me, her eyes are narrowed to slits. “You’re not messing with me?”

Now it’s my turn to scoff. “You think I’d come all the way up here to make shit up about my sister?”

It’s the most me I’ve been since I got here, all sweetness and grace stripped away. My slouch returns almost immediately, my lips tugging into my signature scowl. My nerves are on edge but it’s the most relaxed I’ve felt in weeks. An exhale I’ve been holding since I got here.

The shift startles her enough to make her shrug nervously and pull her jacket tighter around herself. She pauses, opening her mouth and closing it twice before finally replying, “Then what’re you hunting me down for? I haven’t been here since last semester.”

“Because I wanted to talk to you.”

Her eyes narrow again. “You don’t think I did something to her, do you?”

I shake my head and shove my hands as far into my blazer pockets as I can. Why didn’t I think to grab my coat before I came out here? “If you did, you wouldn’t be talking to me, would you?”

We hold each other’s gaze long enough for my eyes to water. It takes all my strength to stay standing, to keep my teeth from chattering. Every second I’m frozen in place makes it harder to breathe, each one ticking by in agonizing slow motion. My body begs me to give up, to break the hold I have over her and run back to the bathroom and crank the shower up as hot as it’ll go.

But before I can give in, she walks away. Her braids dance behind her as a harsh gust of wind lifts them into the air, the beads woven onto the ends of each braid clinking like wind chimes. “You coming?” she calls out over her shoulder. “Or do you want to freeze your ass off out here?”

I don’t think twice before running after her.