Page 9 of Kingmakers, Year One

“What do you mean?” A slight toss of my head.

“With the mistletoe?—“

“That was nothing,” I interrupt, looking only at the blank snow, not meeting his eyes.

“Oh.” Leo hesitates, less certain. “I thought maybe?—“

“No.” I’m firm, while inside I’m screaming. “I was just embarrassed. Everybody looking. Sometimes Aida?—“

“I know. She’s an asshole.”

“It doesn’t matter.”Lie lie lie lie lie!“Seriously, don’t worry about it. I’m sick of all of them; I can’t wait to get out of here.”

“Me, too.” Leo sighs with relief.

He’s glad I’m letting it drop. Glad we can just pretend the whole thing never happened.

But inside me, something is ripping…

In fact, it’s already gone.

Whatever rogue part of my heart was rebelling, beating, begging for more, I’ve torn it away and encased it in ice.

What it wants can never happen.

It would destroy everything I love.

So, it has to freeze and die.

When I’m calm and composed once more, I look at Leo. “Are you really coming with me? Even if Dean?—”

“I’m coming.” His eyes are locked on mine with that stubborn certainty I know so well. It means Leo’s going to do what he wants to do, even if our entire family is set against him. But then he blinks and says, “If you want me to…”

I know what Ishouldsay to Leo—what his parents would want me to say.

Leo could have a real career in basketball. He got offers at plenty of schools besides Duke.

The blood feud with the Yenins is no joke. They killed Leo’s great-grandfather. They shot Nero. For Leo’s safety alone, I should keep him far away from Kingmakers…

But to do that, I’d have to tell another lie.

Leo waits for my answer, his head cocked to the side, his hands thrust in his pockets, his white T-shirt as crisp and glowing as the falling snow against the burned brown of his bare arms.

I fling my arms around him.

Nose pressed in the soft waves of hair around his ear, I whisper, “Whether it’s wrong or right…I’m always going to want you with me.”

1

LEO

We’re twenty-three minutes into the State Championship game.

We’re playing Simeon, an athletic powerhouse stocked with muscle-bound behemoths who look like they started shaving in the second grade, and who might have been born with a basketball in their hands.

Every one of their players is better than every kid on my team.

Except for me.

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