Free Exposed by Susan Vaught Page B

sophomore under the basketball goal and Devin, Carny, me, and the two freshman twirlers (kind of hiding behind us) standing at the baseline.
    Everybody’s got fists clenched.
    Nobody has batons.
    Probably a good thing.
    I wonder what it would cost to pay a hacker to splice Ellis’s grades, wreck her college applications, and transfer her folks to some corporation in Bora-Bora.
    As calmly as I can, I match Ellis’s equally cold stare. “I’m still varsity.”
    Devin snorts with relief. Carny grins. The freshmen cower, but they’re still on our side.
    Ellis smiles, way nasty. “She’s a skank
and
a liar. I saw the scales.”
    Devin leans forward, but I grab her slapping hand and keep my eyes locked on Ellis. “For God’s sake, I
don’t
want Adam-P back. You have to know that by now.”
    This catches Ellis off guard. I can tell from the twitching in her witch-monster mask and the way those cold blue eyes get a little wide. Her minions stir beside her, but nobody says anything.
    Maybe it’s that little success, the fact I’m right about why she’s such a total jerk to me. Maybe it’s the rush of gaining the advantage, no matter how slim. Or maybe I’m as big an ass as Ellis, because what I say next just flows out of my mouth, perfect and smooth.
    “But if I change my mind, I can take him.”
    Ellis throws herself at me, flailing both arms and shouting at the same time.
    Heart banging, I jump to my left. Slam into Carny. Pain flares up my shoulder as Ellis’s grabbing hands miss my throat by inches.
    Carny hits the floor. My brain sees it in slow motion. Ellis stumbles and thumps to the floor beside her, landing on her palms and knees.
    I’m breathing hard, like I’m running.
    Freshmen scatter and scream.
    Devin groans. Wades in. I turn toward her as she snatches two big handfuls of senior hair and the girls start hollering. The other seniors stand very still, arms hanging, mouths open. Shocked by Ellis? By me?
    Thump, thump, thump.
My chest might explode. I want to yell, make a noise, a whoop, some kind of battle cry, but when my mouth opens, nothing happens.
    Ellis staggers to her feet and rounds on me. Her perfume smells like rotten lilacs.
    I’ve got both fists ready, and I swing at her and miss, and the Bear’s there like she popped out of thin air.
    Blood roars against my eardrums, but I hear theBear’s bellow over all that racket. Russian. No idea what she’s saying, but my heart keeps thumping and my breath catches and I don’t move at all.
    Neither does Ellis. She’s about a foot from me when she stops. Her blue eyes go wide as the Bear yells again, still in Russian.
    Devin lets go of senior hair, Carny cowers on the floor, and God only knows where the freshmen are.
    The Bear’s furious glare might kill a healthy plant at twenty paces. It’s directed first at me, then at Ellis. My heart slows down a little bit, and the noise in my ears eases a fraction. Devin looks like she wants to hurl.
    Then the Bear claps her hands, and Carny jumps up, and freshmen reappear, and seniors stop restraightening their hair, and everybody scurries into line, Ellis and Devin and me included.
    We stand, shoulders back, chests out, hands behind our backs.
    Now my heart’s drumming for a whole new reason. Everybody’s breathing hard. I want to smash my head through the bleachers.
    Was I out of my mind, baiting Ellis?
    Do I need medication?
    Fighting? In the
gym
?
    The Bear will kill us all. She’ll move the whole JV squad up
today
.
    For now, she storms up and down the line, lecturing us—I know that’s what she’s doing, even if I don’tunderstand a word of it, except one that sounds like
dura
, which I think means
idiot
.
    You’re an idiot, Chan.
    I’m really, really a total idiot.
    What if Devin gets busted down because of me
?
    The Bear stops in front of me. Her dark eyes are bloodshot and narrow and for one long, awful second, I’m afraid she’s actually going to bite me.
    She gets close to my