Page 111 of Kingmakers, Year Three

I walk with Kade, even though we’re not talking, because I know how it feels to be alone with your failure.

20

CAT

Lola is driving me bonkers.

We share almost all our classes, and she won’t get off my fucking ass.

I swear she’s following me around campus just to give me shit.

She seems to pop up everywhere, especially if Dean isn’t around. She accosts me in the hallways, the dining hall, and even the library now that her ban has elapsed—though she’s careful to make sure Miss Robin isn’t around before she starts harassing me.

As I pass through the common room on my way out of the Undercroft, she jumps up out of an overstuffed armchair, blocking my path.

“Where do you think you’re going?” she demands, shifting in front of me as I try to sidestep her.

“None of your business,” I say shortly.

“Are you going up to the Bell Tower to meet Dean again?”

I narrow my eyes at her. I think of the Bell Tower as belonging to me and Dean alone. I’m annoyed that she knows about it.

“What exactly is your fixation with me, Lola? Harassing me isn’t going to get you back in theQuartum Bellum.”

“I don’t give a fuck about that stupid competition,” Lola snarls, tossing her shining hair contemptuously.

“Then what the fuck is it?”

“It’syou,” she sneers, towering over me even in her flat shoes. “Mousy, sneaky, stupid little you. Everything about you irritates me.”

“Then why can’t we just avoid each other in peace?”

I try to step around her again but she blocks me, her arms folded across her sweater-clad breasts. Lola always looks like she stepped off the pages of a Ralph Lauren catalog—nails manicured, skirt freshly pressed, not a hair out of place.

“I wish I could avoid you,” Lola says softly, “but you’re always strutting around with Anna Wilk and Chay Wagner and Leo Gallo, like you’re one of them, like you belong. They’re not your friends. They just pity you. You’re barely a mascot to them.”

I can feel my face getting hot.

Lola is poking at my deepest insecurity, and she knows it.

But she’s not invulnerable herself. In attacking me, she’s letting her own weakness show.

“You’re jealous,” I say, in wonder.

“Jealous ofyou?” Lola sneers. “Why would I ever be jealous ofyou?”

“I don’t know,” I say, moving to pass her again. “Maybe you just can’t stand to see someone else happy?—”

This time Lola shoves me hard in the chest so I stumble back a step.

“And why are you sohappy,exactly?” she demands. “ ‘Cause of your new boyfriend? You don’t actually think he likes you?”

Now she’s really starting to piss me off. My hands ball into fists, my nails cutting into my palms.

“Just because he likesfuckingyou doesn’t mean he gives a shit about you . . .” Lola hisses. “I saw you chasing after him like a lost puppy, carrying his books to class . . . He’s using you because you’ll do whatever he says. When he’s tired of you, he’ll throw you away. And you’ll be back to the lonely little loser you always were all along.”

“You don’t know anything about Dean and me,” I spit back at her.

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