Rachel Vincent - My Soul to Lose

TORONTO NEW YORK LONDON AMSTERDAM PARIS SYDNEY HAMBURG STOCKHOLM ATHENS TOKYO MILAN MADRID PRAGUE WARSAW BUDAPEST AUCKLAND

Thanks first of all to Lisa Heuer for the technical advice and consultation. Without your contributions, this story would have been impossible for me to write.

Thanks also to my early readers, Rinda, Chandra, Heather, and Jen. Your opinions and advice were invaluable, and the story is so much better for them both.

Thanks to Mary-Theresa Hussey and Natashya Wilson for so much enthusiasm and encouragement, which keep me smiling.

And thanks finally to everyone out there reading about Kaylee for the first time. Ive poured my heart into her continuing story, along with some delicate pieces of my own soul, and Im so very honored and excited that youve decided to give her a chance. I hope you like her as much as I do.
Thanks for the ride, Traci! Emma slammed the back door, then opened it again to free the end of her filmy red skirt as her sister leaned out the open drivers side window.

Be ready to go at eight, or Im leaving you here.

Em gave a mock salute, then turned toward the mall entrance without waiting for the car to pull away from the curb. We would be nowhere near the parking lot at eight oclock. Finding a ride home would be no problemEmma could cock one hip and smile, and guys all over Texas would throw their car keys at her feet, if thats what she wanted.

But sometimes a ride was more fun, because she could flirt with the driver. See how much he could take before his concentration wavered and he had to force his attention back onto the road. Shed never actually caused a wreck, but Em went a little further every time, ever eager to push the limits of Well, of anything.

I went along for the ride because it was a delicious rush of power and freedomliving vicariously through Emma was usually more exciting than living my own life for real.

Okay, Kaylee, heres the plan. Em stepped up to the glass doors, and they whooshed open. The artificial cool inside was a mercy on my damp skin and overheated cheeks; Tracis car wasnt air-conditioned, and September in the Dallas metroplex was still hot enough to make the devil sweat.

So long as it leads to Tobys public humiliation,

Im in.
It will. She stopped in front of a mirror built into
the wall of the main walkway and her reflection
grinned at me, brown eyes sparkling. And thats the
least he deserves. You really should have let me key
his car.
And Id been totally tempted to. But I was less than
a year from getting my license and couldnt shake the
certainty that if we keyed someones fresh paint job
even if that someone was my rat of an ex-boyfriend
new-driver karma would come back to bite me on the
bumper.
So, what are you going to do? Push him into the
snack table? Trip him on the way into the gym?
Unbutton his pants while youre dancing, then scream
for help? I wasnt too worried about homecomingdance karma. But Toby should have been
Emma turned from the mirror, her pale brows high
in surprise. I was just gonna stand him up, then make
out with his best friend on the dance floor, but that last
one has real potential. Maybe well do both. She grinned again, then tugged me around the first corner to the huge main corridor of the mall, where the center of the floor opened to reveal the first level below. But first were gonna make sure you look so good that he spends every minute of this stupid dance wishing he
was there with you.
Normally Im not much of a shopper. Thin and
small chested looks just as good in jeans and skinny
tees as it does in anything more complicated, and I
must have been dressing to my advantage
subconsciously, because finding a new date had only
taken two days.
But that didnt make Toby any less of a human
cockroachless than an hour after hed dumped me,
hed asked Emma to homecoming. Shed accepted
with a plan for revenge already half-plotted.
So Id come to the mall the weekend before the
dance armed with my aunts credit card and Emmas
good taste, prepared to dump a metaphorical shaker of
salt over my slime-filled leech of an ex-boyfriend. We should start with Emma stopped and
gripped the brass rail, looking down at the food court
on the lower level. Yum. Wanna split a soft pretzel
first?
I knew from her tone that food wasnt what had
caught her eye.
A level below us, two guys in green Eastlake High
baseball caps were shoving two tables next to a third,
where four girls from our school sat in front of an
untouched pile of junk food. The guy on the left was a junior named Nash Hudson, whose pick of the week Amber something-or-otherwas already seated. Showing up at homecoming with Nash would have been all the revenge I could ask for against Toby. But that wasnt gonna happen. I wasnt even a blip on
Nash Hudsons social radar.
Next to Amber sat my cousin, Sophie; I would have
recognized the back of her head anywhere. After all,
that was the part of her I saw most.
How did Sophie get here? Emma asked.
One of the other dancing monkeys picked her up
this morning. Shed been ignoring me consistently
mercifullysince dance-team tryouts a month earlier,
when shed become the only freshman member of the
varsity dance team. Aunt Vals picking her up in
about an hour.
I think thats Doug Fuller across from her. Come
on! Emmas eyes glittered beneath the huge skylight
overhead. I wanna drive his new car.
Em But I could only run after her, dodging
shoppers hauling bags and small children. I caught up
with Emma on the escalator and rode down one step
above her. Hey look. I nodded toward the group at
the food court, where one of the dancers had just
switched sides of the table to whisper something into
Dougs ear. Merediths gonna be pissed when she
sees you.
Emma shrugged and stepped off the escalator.
Shell get over it. Or not.
But the moment my foot hit the ground, a cold,
dark sense of dread gripped me, and I knew I couldnt
go any closer to the food court.
Not unless I wanted to cause a scene.
I was seconds from losing control over the scream
building deep inside me, and once it broke free, I
wouldnt be able to make it stop unless I could get
away.
Better to leave before that happened.
Em I croaked. One hand went to my throat; it
felt like I was being strangled from the inside. Emma didnt hear me; she was already strutting
toward the cluster of tables.
Em I said again, forcing that single syllable out
firmly, ahead of the pressure building in my throat,
and that time she heard me.
Emma turned and took one look at my face, and her
forehead wrinkled in familiar concern. She glanced
longingly toward the food court, then rushed to my
side. Panic attack? she whispered.
I could only nod, fighting the urge to close my
eyes. Sometimes it was worse then, when I saw only
darkness. It felt like the world was closing in on me.
Like things I couldnt see were creeping toward me. Or maybe I watch too many scary movies Okay, lets go. Em linked her arm through mine,
half holding me up, half dragging me away from the
food court, the escalator and whatever had triggered
this particularepisode.
A bad one? she asked, once wed put a good two
hundred feet behind us.
Its getting better. I sat on the edge of the huge
fountain in the center of the mall. The jets of water
shot all the way up to the second floor at certain points
during its routine, and little droplets pelted us, but
there was nowhere else to sit. The benches were all
full.
Maybe you should talk to somebody about these
panic attacks. Emma plopped down beside me with
one leg tucked beneath her, trailing her fingers through
the rippling water. Its weird how they seem to be