Bitter Bite (Elemental Assassin #14)(35)

They were bumping into furniture, breaking dishes, and making a mess of

everything.

One guy staggered out into the hallway right in front of me. He grinned, his

eyes bright and glassy, then bent over and puked all over the floor. I jumped

back so I wouldn’t get any of it on my sneakers, but I couldn’t escape the

hot, sour stench, and my nose wrinkled in disgust.

Once he was finished, puke boy lurched over, grabbed a random can off one of

the tables lining the hallway, and chugged back all the beer inside. Several

cheers sounded, and people gathered around and clapped him on the back, as if

puking your guts out and then immediately guzzling down more beer was totally

awesome. Whatever.

Enough was enough. I wasn’t going to get kicked out of Fletcher’s house

because Finn had decided that he just had to throw a stupid party for all his

stupid friends.

I shoved through the kids crowding the hallway, searching for Finn. It took me

forever to move from one part of the house to the next, and more than a few

guys were drunk enough to throw their arms around my shoulders and hit on me,

even though I was as flat-chested as a girl could be. But I supposed all that

beer had already soaked into their puny brains, making me look prettier than I

actually was.

I sidestepped another guy with grabby hands and pushed my way into the den.

Finn was standing in front of the fireplace, a red plastic cup in his hand,

talking to a gorgeous blond girl who looked a year or two older than him. Finn

had his elbow propped up on the mantel and the collar of his black polo shirt

popped up, like he was supercool. I rolled my eyes. Super-idiot was more like

it.

I went over and tugged on Finn’s arm. The music was so loud in here that I

could barely hear myself think.

Finn glanced over his shoulder. When he realized it was me, he narrowed his

eyes and jerked his head, a clear leave-me-alone-right-now signal. But I

tugged on his arm again.

“People are throwing up everywhere!” I yelled over the music. “And they’re

breaking things and going through Fletcher’s stuff. You need to tell them to

leave. Now. We’ll have a hard enough time as it is cleaning up this mess

before he gets home.”

Finn looked out over the den as if he were just now noticing how many kids

were packed inside and what a colossal mess they were making. The drinking,

smoking, and puking were bad enough, but one particular drunk idiot was

standing on top of the coffee table, scuffing his boots all over the wood as

he tried to do some sort of lame-ass cowboy line dance.

Finn winced. For a second, I thought he was going to tell people to start

clearing out. But the girl he’d been talking to peered around his shoulder at

me.

The girl’s nose wrinkled in disgust, the same way mine had a few minutes ago.

“Who is this? And why is she at your party? I didn’t think you had invited

any losers, Lane.”

I looked at Finn, expecting him to tell the girl that I was his cousin, since

that was the cover story Fletcher had concocted to explain my living here.

But he gave me a sneer that was even crueler than the girl’s. “I didn’t

invite any losers, Ella. She must have snuck in.” He flapped his hand at me,

like I was a bug he was trying to shoo away. “Am-scray, kid. Go away and

leave us alone.”

I stared at him, my mouth hanging open and hot tears stinging my eyes. For a

moment, guilt flickered in Finn’s eyes, but then his face hardened into a

cold, uncaring mask, and he made that shooing motion again.

“Go on,” he growled. “Get out of here. Can’t you see I’m busy?”

Then he deliberately turned his back to me and started talking and laughing

with Ella again, as if I had never been here to start with.

I bit my lip, trying to focus on that small, sharp pain, instead of the much

larger ache in my heart, but it didn’t work. Two tears streaked down my face

before I could blink them back. Ella noticed and laughed again. Finn turned to

see what she thought was so funny, but I scrubbed my hands over my face,

whirled around, and shoved my way out of the den before he realized just how

much he’d hurt me.

It was bad enough that he’d humiliated me in front of that girl. I didn’t

want him to know that he’d made me cry too. Especially since I had promised

myself that I would never cry again. Not after my family had been murdered and

I hadn’t been able to save them.

Besides, Finn insulting me wasn’t so bad. It wasn’t anything compared with

living on the streets. I could put up with a little humiliation, as long as

Fletcher let me stay here, as long as I had a warm, safe place to sleep and

enough food to eat. At least, that’s what I told myself as I pushed through

the dancing, laughing kids in the hallway, twisted the front doorknob, and

staggered outside.

I stumbled all the way across the porch over to the wooden railing, clutching