Scarred

I cracked my neck, resigned. No point crying over what's done. I can't change who I used to be. The important thing was what I did now.

I could resist. Go cold turkey, sweat it out, face the heat. Or, I could die. Simple as that.

Simple, my friends, is not the same thing as easy.

I shoved hands in gritty pockets. "Well, I'm for the shower—"

"Thank Christ for that," whispered Eb. "You stink like a frontier whorehouse. Who the fuck are you: Calamity Jane?"

I flipped Eb and his slippery grin the finger. "And then let's talk, Ad. We have a situation. Glimmer, you want to fill him in?"

Glimmer shrugged. "Sure. Breakfast in my room, boss?"

I snickered. He always called Adonis boss. Partly to annoy him. Partly because he meant it. The two of them had reached a workable truce in the months since I'd dragged Glimmer into our family problems. Glimmer thought Adonis was a talented but corruptible asshole; Ad thought Glimmer a useful if frustratingly honorable idealist. Ad respected Glimmer's opinion; Glimmer respected Ad's authority. Working relationship: go.

Adonis drained his latte. "Thought you'd never ask. When are you going to stop calling me 'boss'?"

"How about the day you aren't giving the orders?" Glimmer arched dark brows. "But don't think it's because I fall for your bullshit charm. I know you only want me for my data."

"Likewise," said Ad. "Those smoky bedroom eyes cut no ice with me, boyfriend. If you drop crumbs in the bed? We are so over."

I grinned—they were so cute together—and stomped upstairs to grab shampoo and a towel.

The bathroom, an ugly stainless-steel jail of a place. We'd put up some stalls for privacy, but to me it still stank of ice baths and suffocation and bad memories. I showered with my eyes squeezed shut.

But it did feel great. Hot soapy water sloshed the stains from my body, rinsed my gritty hair, washed away the smells of despair and disgust and shameful deeds in the dark.

If only it were that easy.

Afterwards, I wiped the fogged mirror and dragged a comb through my knots. The roughened scar tissue curling over my cheekbone was reddened, angry. The other eye wore a dark raccoon ring. I looked like I could use a good feed and about a hundred hours of sleep. Situation normal.

Back in my room, I re-dressed in my costume coat—somehow it had escaped the worst of last night's excesses—and fresh jeans, plus my lace-up boots. My only clean t-shirt sported a photo of a gigantic green cactus that wore a scribbled sign reading FREE HUGS. I felt better already. My headache was in retreat to a distant battlefield, if not entirely vanquished. Another of Glimmer's caffeine colas and I'd be set. I pocketed my mask and grabbed a banana from my stash (stinky, black and withered, but hey: potassium is potassium) on the way out.

And crashed into cousin Harriet.

Just when I was starting to feel good.

~ 6 ~ (#u63e7c8ce-943b-5dfe-abee-c0561b1a1f92)

"Watch where you're going, can't you?" Harriet bounced moussed locks over one shoulder. She wore an ass-hugging skirt, a stretchy top and bra that made her boobs defy gravity, and enough make-up to blind a badger.

The opposite of me when I was her age. I'd been the angry tough girl in jeans and Doc Martens, and I'd spent most of my time sporting black eyes, getting kicked out of class for swearing, and beating up on a succession of Adonis's snotty queen-bee girlfriends. Yeah, them was the days.

I glanced at Glimmer's cell. Door closed. I sidled closer to Harriet, surreptitious. Heh. I should mysteriously flick my coat open and whisper behind my hand: Psst! Wanna buy a 'W'? "Listen, can we have a word?"

Harriet looked at me like I'd suggested we get married. "Right. Because we have so much to talk about."

I endured my usual itch to punch Harriet in the face. Skinny, bad-tempered, always ready to fling me an unnecessary put-down, she reminded me of my dead sister, Equity, whom I'd also wanted to deck on a regular basis. Aside from the tragic fashion sense, that is. My sister and I both inherited our late mother's coloring, and Equity had too closely resembled me to ever be beautiful, but at least she'd known how not to look like a cut-rate hooker.

To be fair, Harriet wasn't awash in role models. She'd had no mother since she was a toddler, and like most fathers—fathers who weren't mine, that is—Uncle Mike was a total pushover when it came to his baby girl.

I sighed. "It's about Glimmer."

Harriet scowled, harpy-like. "That's none of your business."

"Is too. He's my friend, and he's not interested in you." I winced. Wow, that came out all gentle and caring. "Look, I don't mean that you're—"

"You know nothing about me, Verity. Where do you get off telling me what to do?" Harriet stared me down, furious, but she kept her voice low. She knew what happened if she got a bit too loud. Warping metal, shattering glass, people screeching and bleeding from the earholes. Not a pretty picture.

"It's not about you, okay?" I whispered fiercely. I couldn't voice-whip glass; I just didn't want Glimmer to hear. "There's a time and a place, that's all. He's trying to work and the way you flirt with him all the time makes him uncomfortable. One, he's too old for you—"

"I'm seventeen, Mom." She widened sardonic eyes at me. "I can do what I want."

My mom was dead, too. I sympathized. That didn't mean Harriet could give me lip. "And two," I persisted, "he's got stuff in his past that means he's not interested in hooking up." With a horny, smart-mouthed infant like you, I added silently. Zingg! Take that.

"Yeah? Like what?" A defiant chin-tilt.

I could've invented something. His last girlfriend was a serial killer, or dude, he's gay, can't you tell? or even just sorry, buthe asked me not to tell anyone. But my indignation on his behalf was as gratifying as it was maddening, and my temper flashed like a flintlock. "That's none of yours. Just let him be."

"Right. Just because you're too pig ugly for him."

My powermuscle flexed with rage, and I had to bite my tongue. What the fuck did you say, you vicious little brat? But the scar on my face stung. I knew how I looked. Everyone knew. Didn't mean we had to trade insults about it.

I gritted my teeth, a salty tang of blood. "Come again?"

"I knew it. You're jealous. And you're, like, old. It's so pathetic." Harriet laughed, and it sliced a shrill edge on my nerves like a paper cut.

Oh, honey. Was that a threat? "That's bullshit," I said tightly.

"Everyone knows you want him for yourself. Too bad he likes me better. So sad. I win." She pouted, and raised her chin, triumphant. She didn't even know she was doing it. Just one of those teenage-girl things.

But it flared my belligerence afresh, a hot breeze over coals. Keep it down, Verity, don't do something you'll regret…

I clenched a fist behind my back and stepped closer, trapping her in my shadow. I was taller, and I made sure she knew it. I hulked. I menaced. I loomed. "Grow the fuck up, Harriet."

She edged backwards. "You're not my mother, Verity. I don't have to do what you—"

"Shut your trap for once, and listen. Real life isn't a TV bitch drama, okay? Guys aren't prizes you can play for. And real people? They don't have these little contests where they lie and cheat and screw each other over for kicks." Not strictly true in the augmented world, I guess, but my point stood. "So back the fuck off from him, or I'll make you."

"Whatever." She fixed a sneer on her face, but her chin trembled.

She was afraid of me. I liked that.

And I grinned, so she'd know. "Think before you mess with me, girlfriend," I murmured, silk over thorns. "I went bonkers for a while, remember? Madder than a cut snake. Utterly off my rocker. Maybe I still am. If I hear you've been bothering him again… well, who knows what I might do?"

Harriet's jaw tightened, mutinous. "Bitch," she muttered—back to boring insults, were we? I had more respect for “goatfucker”—and flounced away.

I popped my neck, satisfied. Hmm. Perhaps I'd handled that poorly?