Free Ruthless by Sara Shepard Page B

happy fellow, right? Always painting sunflowers or beautiful starry nights?”
    “That’s not true,” Kirsten Cullen piped up. “He was severely depressed and in lots of pain. And he took painkillers, which might have altered his visual perception, which could be why his paintings are so vibrant and hypnotic.”
    “Very good,” Mrs. Kittinger said.
    Aria shot Kirsten a smile. She was the only person besides Aria who actually tried in this class.
    Mrs. Kittinger shut off the projector, turned the lights back on, and walked to the blackboard, her oxfords clacking loudly on the wood floor. “Our next project is going to be about psychology. I’m going to assign you an artist, and you’re going to investigate his mental state and link it to his work. The paper is due not this coming Monday, but next.”
    Mason groaned. “But I have an indoor soccer tournament all next week.”
    Mrs. Kittinger gave him an exasperated look. “Luckily for you, we’re working in pairs.”
    Aria instantly turned to Kirsten, wanting to work with her. Other kids silently paired up, too. “Not so fast.” Mrs. Kittinger lifted a piece of chalk in the air. “ I’m doing the pairing, not you.”
    She pointed to Mason Byers and matched him with Delia Hopkins, who hadn’t said a word all semester. She paired Naomi Zeigler and Imogen Smith, a tall girl with large boobs who’d never shaken her reputation as the class slut.
    Then Mrs. Kittinger pointed to Aria. “And Aria, you’ll report on Caravaggio. And you’ll work with . . .” She pointed at someone in the back. “What did you say your name was again, dear?”
    “Is Klaudia Huusko,” chirruped a voice.
    Aria’s blood went cold. No. Please, please, no.
    “Perfect.” Mrs. Kittinger wrote Aria’s and Klaudia’s names on the board. “You two are a team.”
    Mason turned around and stared at Aria. Naomi let out a mrow . Even Chassey Bledsoe giggled. Clearly everyone knew that Noel had dumped Aria and was with Klaudia now.
    Aria swiveled around and looked at Klaudia. Her uniform skirt barely skimmed her thighs, showing off every curve of her impossibly perfect Finnish legs. Her ankle was propped up against the back of Delia’s chair, but Delia was too much of a wuss to tell her to move it. A beat-up leather bomber jacket hung over her shoulders. Aria squinted at it, recognizing the eagle military patch on the arm. It was Noel’s jacket, a beloved hand-me-down from his great-grandfather, who’d fought in World War II. Once, Aria had asked to try it on, but Noel had refused—he didn’t let anyone wear it, he said. It was too special.
    Guess the rules didn’t apply to his new Finnish girlfriend.
    Klaudia met Aria’s gaze and smiled triumphantly. Then she turned to Naomi. “Guess what I plan for this weekend? I go with Noel to romantic dinner! We going to have wine, feed each other bites of meal, is going to be sexy time!”
    “That sounds amazing.” Naomi smirked at Aria.
    Aria faced front again, her cheeks on fire. She hated Klaudia. How could Noel fall for her ridiculous act? Everything about her was fake, even her choppy, I-don’t-know-English accent—when Klaudia had threatened Aria on the chair lift, all traces of it had vanished. It seemed the bimbos of the world always got the guys. Where did that leave Aria?
    She looked around the classroom. Both art history and English classes met here, so there was a motley mix of Cézanne and Picasso prints and black-and-white photos of Walt Whitman, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Virginia Woolf. Tacked up in the corner was a poster labeled GREAT SHAKESPEAREAN SAYINGS . That poster had hung in Aria’s English classroom last year, too, the class that had briefly been taught by Ezra Fitz, with whom Aria had had a fling until A got him fired.
    Ezra. Now there was someone who would have enjoyed going to an art gallery and commiserating about all the Typical Rosewoods. The first time Aria and Ezra had met, they’d had a real connection.