Free Slayers: Friends and Traitors by C. J. Hill Page A

a comment about Fleur, lonely country roads, or Bess’ definition of action, but she wordlessly kept putting things in her suitcases. She’d hardly said anything since she’d come inside.
    Rosa put down her book and studied Tori. “Are you all right?”
    “Yes,” Tori said. She didn’t bother faking a smile. “It’s just, you know, camp is ending.” Even though Bess and Rosa were Tori’s friends, she couldn’t tell them that Jesse had dumped her. Not when she’d never told them that Jesse and she were a couple to begin with.
    Bess wouldn’t have told her father that Tori and Jesse were breaking the rules—Bess was the biggest practical joker in camp, so her respect for the rules was questionable at best—but Rosa would have felt the weight of keeping that secret. Rosa was the type that looked for things to worry about. And it had never felt right to tell one friend and not the other.
    Rosa watched Tori for another moment. Rosa was also the type that noticed pain lurking in the corners of people’s eyes. She didn’t press Tori, though.
    A few minutes later, everyone got up and left for dinner. Tori didn’t go with them. “I’ll come in a little bit,” she said. She was lying. Her appetite was gone and she wasn’t about to sit at the same table as Jesse and pretend everything was fine.
    Outside, she heard the guys leaving for dinner, too. Kody called out, “Bess, don’t think I’m going to forget about this next year. You’re toast—or at least a few of your belongings will be.”
    “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Bess said airily.
    Shang let out a disbelieving grunt. “You blocked our cabin door with your shield.”
    “Hmm,” Bess said. “Maybe your doorknob is just stuck.”
    “Right,” Kody said, drawing out the word with his Southern accent. “That’s why we all had to haul ourselves out the window.”
    “Aren’t there bars on your window?” Alyssa asked. Both of the cabins had bars to keep intruders from breaking in.
    “Used to be,” Kody said. “I yanked them clean off. I’ll let you explain that one to your dad.”
    “You know,” Bess said, unconcerned, “you’re all going to miss me tomorrow.”
    Murmuring to the contrary went through the group.
    “You will,” Bess insisted as the group walked away. “Especially once you realize I’ve stolen all your car keys.”
    Tori kept packing. A clean break. She didn’t want to hear Jesse’s words repeating in her mind. It was already a loud enough place. Still the phrase was there, its volume irrepressible. Jesse wanted a clean break? It was a stupid thing to say. You couldn’t break a heart into anything but jagged pieces.
    Tori lifted a stack of books off her dresser. A pink wildflower she’d pressed between the pages fluttered down onto her bed. Jesse had given it to her. Once while teaching her to fly low, he’d skimmed along the forest floor, plucked the bloom, and put it in Tori’s hair.
    Tori held the flower by its threadlike stem. She had pressed it between the pages so she could keep it forever, so it wouldn’t wilt or fade. Ironic. It hadn’t, but Jesse’s feelings had. She stared at the flower, wanting to crumple it up and wanting to keep it, and then felt furious at herself when she couldn’t do either. She could only stare at it and blink away tears.
    She wasn’t going to cry about this. She had never cried over a guy before and she refused to start now. She would go fly somewhere, find a place to be alone, and not come back until she could pull herself together. She dropped the flower on her bed and walked out the door.
    Dirk was leaning against the stair railing that led to her cabin’s patio. It surprised her to see him. She’d been so caught up in her emotions, she hadn’t sensed him there at all.
    He looked like he was waiting for someone or something.
    “What are you doing?” she asked.
    He gazed at her casually. “Deciding whether to come in and talk to you.”
    Tori stopped,