Free Hallie Hath No Fury . . . by Katie Finn Page A

Gemma waved with a slightly panicked look on her face. I pretended not to see it as Josh and I walked to my car, making sure not to look back as we loaded up his duffel bag and I sped out of the parking lot.
    â€œDoesn’t Sophie seem great?” Josh asked, turning to face me as I turned down the road that would take us home. We paused at a stop sign, and I glanced at my brother.
    What I saw made my heart sink. He had the dreamy, unfocused expression he got whenever he was about to fall hard for the wrong girl. And if anyone was the wrong girl, it was Gemma. Not only was she the girl who had hurt me when I was younger (something I knew Josh wouldn’t be able to forgive), but she was lying to him, pretending to be someone she wasn’t. To say nothing of the fact that she’d just gotten out of a two-year relationship that had taken over her life. She was the definition of on the rebound , and I could not think of a worse person for my still-heartbroken brother at the moment.
    â€œYeah,” I replied, hesitation in my voice. “Sure. But maybe … I mean, like you said in your e-mail. Maybe it would be best to just take a break from girls for a while?”
    Josh nodded a few too many times. “Right,” he finally said. “Yeah. Totally.” But his expression, as he looked down at his phone, was still one of slightly unfocused happiness, and I felt my hands tighten around the steering wheel.
    Whatever I would do with this—I hadn’t gotten so far as what, yet—I had to make sure my brother wouldn’t get hurt. If I wasn’t going to tell him I knew who she was, I had to protect him. The last thing I wanted was for Josh’s heart to get broken once again.
    But despite that worry, I couldn’t help but feel a little giddy. I never would have been able to have planned this, but I had a feeling it was going to work to my advantage beautifully. Did Gemma have any idea of the gift she’d just handed me? She’d made it possible for me to craft the ultimate revenge this summer. She’d practically handed me the instructions for her own undoing.
    As I thought about this, all these possibilities unfurling, I felt myself smile as I drove through the falling darkness toward home.

CHAPTER 9
    The Fourth of July
    I pushed the door open and stepped inside the house.
    Just outside, down the beach, I could still hear the sounds of the party going strong, but it seemed that the couple of people who’d been hanging out in the kitchen before the party got started had left, and I was glad of it. I needed just a minute alone to try and get my bearings. I hadn’t let myself look back out to the water. If Gemma was still standing there, I didn’t want to know about it. It’s okay , I tried to tell myself firmly. It’s over .
    â€œHi, Hallie,” my mom said as she walked into the kitchen. She’d taken off the blue-and-white striped dress she’d been wearing earlier, and had changed into her writing outfit—sweatpants and a T-shirt. Her glasses were pushed up on top of her head, and even though it was the Fourth of July, I had a feeling she’d be working for a few more hours tonight.
    â€œHey,” I said as I crossed to the fridge and pulled out a bottle of sparkling water. If anything of what I’d just gone through with Gemma was still visible in my expression, I didn’t want her to see it. “Did you have fun tonight?”
    â€œI did,” my mother said, glancing out toward the beach. “It was nice to get to meet all the neighbors. You?”
    â€œYeah,” I said as I looked down at my bottle and eased open the top. If you weren’t careful with these, or shook them even the slightest bit, they were likely to blow up in your face. “I liked the fireworks.”
    â€œI think they’re still going on for another ten minutes or so,” my mother said as she crossed toward her study. She paused in