Page 84 of By the Orchid and the Owl
Shit. I turned to Sylvie and was just about to handherthe orchids so I could go after Emelle when a silky voice said, “Torturing the symbol of our house, are we now, Drey?”
I jumped. Kimber was gliding toward us, bedecked in… I blinked. Ladybugs?
Yes, I realized as she came to a halt in front of Sasha, Sylvie, and me. A thousand or more of the black-spotted yellow beetles clung to her figure, twitching and stretching their shelled wings whenever she moved. The parakeet on her shoulder was eyeing them hungrily, but never made a move to peck at one. Yet.
Jenia and Dazmine stopped on either side of her, but I couldn’t stop staring at Kimber herself. She’d always talked around me, but nevertome.
I frowned at the orchids in my arms. They were, indeed, screeching faintly. Probably because their link to the lifeline of their existence had been snipped.
“They’re not mine,” I began lamely. What else was I supposed to say?
Kimber, however, was already turning her attention to Sasha and Sylvie, and when her teeth flashed through a forced smile, I had the feeling she hadn’t stopped here for me at all.
“How lovely you look this year, girls. Much better than last year.”
“Perhaps that’s becauselastyear you tore our dresses to shreds,” Sasha replied.
What the hell? My heart dropped. Something was definitely taut between Kimber and the twins, but surely Kimber hadn’t actuallytouchedthem in any way…
“Did I?” Kimber slapped a hand to her heart—crushing some of those ladybugs in the process. I heard their dying whimpers even over the din of the party. “I don’t remember. Things get crazy when you’re having fun, am I right?”
She smirked at Jenia, who smirked back. Dazmine remained stone-faced.
I thought that was going to be the end of it. That Kimber would turn on her high-heel and leave us alone then. But she pulled a contemplative face and asked Sylvie, “So, are you sharing my ex with this little girl?” She didn’t even gesture at me, as if I were no more than the dirt between her parakeet’s talons. “I would have thought he’d be satisfied with two girls, but maybe he got bored and asked for a third?”
Clearly, I was missing something, although the pieces were starting to stitch themselves together in my mind. Coen had never mentioned hooking up with either of the twins, but perhaps he had after his breakup with Kimber…
“Oh, did they not tell you?” Kimber barely glanced at me. “I bet you’ve just been swept head over heels, huh, Drey? Not realizing that Sasha and Sylvie will always be Coen Steeler’s number one and number two. Interchangeably, of course. You will never be more than the third most important thing in his life.”
I didn’t hear her mutter a command to the ladybugs on her dress, didn’t see anything more than the flash of her teeth as she whisked together another smile. But suddenly, her parakeet was laughing, and a frenzy of wings exploded around us, forming a dotted cloud of yellow, and the multiple conversations died down just enough for everyone to gape.
By the time Sasha, Sylvie, and I had swatted away the swarm, Kimber was already leading Jenia and Dazmine away, the dress beneath where the ladybugs had been semi-transparent. Leaving her entire naked body on display through the sheer nylon.
“What—?” I started, turning toward the twins.
“My question exactly,” came a voice.
I whirled to find Coen, Terrin, and Garvis emerging from the crowd, the latter two sneaking glances behind them to gape at Kimber’s retreating bare form. Coen, however, kept his eyes on me, Sasha, and Sylvie, a frown slipping over his face as he no doubt swept through the thoughts of all three of us.
I’m so sorry, he said suddenly in my mind.Terrin was showing Garvis and me his new fireproof pants and we were testing it out, but—it doesn’t matter. I should have been by your side the moment you stepped through the door.
I didn’t answer him with my thoughts. The fact that he hadn’t been waiting for me at the Element Wielder front door didn’t bother me; he’d asked if he could escort me to the formal a few days ago, and I’d told him I was going to show up with Emelle and Wren.
But I still folded my arms around the orchids and said, “Would anyone care to explain what Kimber was talking about? And why she set a bunch of ladybugs on us?”
“Yeah.” Sylvie’s magic flicked a stray ladybug off her chest. “Kimber’s a possessive psychopath who wanted Coen to break off his extremelynon-romantic friendship with Sasha and me.”
I did a double take, my arms falling to my side again.
“Really?”
“Trust me,” Sasha said, rolling her eyes, “we grew up with Coen. He’s like a brother to us. I’d rather kiss that giant octopus in the Element Wielder lake.”
Coen’s jaw twitched—with both annoyance and a hint of laughter. “You’d rather kiss an octopus?Really, Sash?”
She shrugged, a wicked smile creasing over her face.
“So,” I said before she could respond, desperate to make sense of this, “Kimber didn’t like that you were all friends and wanted you to break ties even though none of you have ever had anything romantic going on?”
