Authors: Jennifer Lynn Barnes
The Naturals (25 page)
“You can start by getting rid of that Rose Red lipstick I gave you,” Lia said. Leave it to her to know that I still had it, that I’d carried the tube she’d given me everywhere I went since discovering an ancient tube of Rose Red, worn to a nub, in my aunt’s hand the night she died. Apparently, it had been my mother’s color of choice even as a girl. Lacey had kept it all these years.
That was what she’d carried in her pocket.
That was what she’d held as I’d spun my story about my mother’s death.
The FBI had found a dozen other lipsticks in a cabinet at her house. Keepsakes that she took from each victim. A little sister, dying to be like big sis, stealing her lipstick until the end.
She was the one who’d given the makeup to Lia. She’d bought a fresh tube of Rose Red just for me, and Lia had played right into her hands. Now that it was over, I should have thrown the lipstick away, but I couldn’t seem to bring myself to do it. It was a reminder: of the things my aunt had done, of what I’d survived, of my mother and the fact that Lacey and I had both joined the FBI in hopes of finding her killer.
A killer who was still out there. A killer who not even a psychotic, obsessive FBI agent had been able to find. Since joining the program, I’d gained and lost a mentor and seen my mother’s only other living relative shot dead. I’d helped take down a killer who’d been recreating my mother’s death for years—but I was still no closer to finding the monster who’d actually killed her. I might never get answers.
They might never find her body.
“Well?” Lia had done a good impression of a patient person, but clearly, her capacity for waiting for me to reply had
been stretched to its limit and then some. “Are you in or are you out?”
“I’m not going anywhere,” I said. “I’m in this, but I’m keeping the lipstick.”
“Rawrrrrr.” Lia made a scratching motion. “Somebody’s finally growing claws.”
“Yeah,” I said dryly. “I love you, too.”
I turned around to walk into the house, but Lia’s voice stopped me halfway there.
“I’m not saying I like you. I’m not saying I’m going to stop eating your ice cream or stealing your clothes, and I’m certainly not saying that I won’t make your life a living nightmare if you jerk Dean around, but I wouldn’t want you to leave.” Lia strode past me, then turned around and flashed me a smile. “You make things interesting. And besides, I’m kind of into the idea of Michael’s war wounds, and having my way with him will be that much sweeter knowing you’re right down the hall.”
Lia flounced back into the house. I thought of the scars Michael would have once he’d healed, thought of the kiss, the fact that he’d almost died for me—and then I thought of Dean.
Dean, who hadn’t forgiven himself for not being able to pull the trigger.
Dean, whose father was as much of a monster as my aunt.
Weeks ago, Lia had told me that every person in this house was fundamentally screwed up to the depths of our dark and shadowy souls. We all had our crosses to bear. We saw things that other people didn’t—things that people our age should never have to see.
Dean would never just be a boy. He’d always be the serial killer’s son. Michael would always be the person who’d put a round of bullets in my aunt. And part of me would never leave my mother’s blood-soaked dressing room, just like another part would always be at the safe house, with Lacey and her knife.
We would never be like other people.
“I don’t know what the back door did to you,” an amused voice told me, “but I’m sure it’s really, truly sorry.”
Michael was supposed to be using a wheelchair, but he was already trying to maneuver on crutches—an impossible feat, considering a bullet had also been lodged in his shoulder.
“I’m not glaring at the back door,” I said.
Michael raised one eyebrow, higher and higher until I caved.
“Fine,” I said. “I might have been glaring at the back door. I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Like you didn’t want to talk about that kiss?” Michael’s voice was light, but this was the first time either of us had brought up that moment in my bedroom.
“Michael—”
“Don’t.” He stopped me. “If I hadn’t been so jealous of Dean, I wouldn’t have bought your little story for a second. Even as it was, I didn’t buy it for much longer than that.”
“You came after me,” I said.
“I’ll always come after you,” he said, wiggling his eyebrows in a way that made the words seem like more of a joke than a promise.
Something told me it was both.
“But you and Redding have something. I don’t know what it is. I don’t blame you for it.” On crutches, he couldn’t lean toward me. He couldn’t reach out and brush the hair out of my face. But something about the curve of his lips was more intimate than any touch. “A lot has happened. You have a lot to figure out. I can be a patient man, Colorado. A devastatingly handsome, roguishly scarred, heartbreakingly courageous, patient man.”
I rolled my eyes, but couldn’t bite back a smile.
“So take whatever time you need. Figure out how you feel. Figure out if Dean makes you feel the way I do, if he’ll ever let you in, and if you want him to, because the next time my lips touch yours, the next time your hands are buried in my hair—the only person you’re going to be thinking about is me.”
I stood there, looking at Michael and wondering how it was possible that I could instinctively understand other people—
their
personalities,
their
beliefs,
their
desires—but
that when it came to what
I
wanted, I was just like anyone else, muddled and confused and stumbling through.
I didn’t know what it meant that my aunt had been a killer, or how I felt about the fact that she was dead.
I didn’t know who had killed my mother, or what losing her and never getting any closure had done to me. I didn’t know if I was capable of really letting someone else in. I didn’t know if I could fall in love.
I didn’t know what I wanted or who I wanted to be with.
But standing there, looking at Michael, the one thing I did know, the way I always knew things about other people, was that sooner or later, as a part of this program—a part of this
team
—I was going to find out.
Jennifer Lynn Barnes is the author of a dozen novels for young adults. She has advanced degrees in psychology, psychiatry, and cognitive science and recently completed her Ph.D. at Yale University.
She is now a professor of psychology.
You can find her online at
www.jenniferlynnbarnes.com
and
www.jenniferlynnbarnes.tumblr.com
What’s next for Cassie?
Find out in the second thrilling instalment of
Quercus
T
he Naturals
might be the most challenging and rewarding book I’ve ever written. I’m grateful to have had the opportunity to combine my love of psychology and knowledge of cognitive science with my passion for YA, and I owe a major debt of gratitude to the many people who help me along the way.
Major thanks go to my editor, Catherine Onder, whose passion for this project and keen eye helped me make this a book I couldn’t have written on my own. My agent, Elizabeth Harding, has been with me every step of the way for a dozen books now, and I feel continually lucky to have her on my side. My UK agent, Ginger Clark, as well as everyone at Quercus Books, have been such supporters of this project from its conception—I’m so grateful to have such tremendous teams behind the book on both sides of the pond. And, of course, I owe huge thank you’s to everyone
at Disney-Hyperion, including Dina Sherman (for—among other things—two-stepping!). Thanks, too, to my film agent, Holly Frederick, and to Lorenzo De Maio for asking questions that made me go further into this world.
Writing this book involved a lot of research. I owe particular debts to the memoirs of FBI profiler John Douglas, and to the empirical research of Paul Ekman, Maureen O’Sullivan, Simon Baron-Cohen, and many others.
As a writer—and a person—I’ve been blessed with an incredible support system, and I’ve never relied on it as much for my own sanity as I did in the writing and editing of this book. A big thank you to Ally Carter, BFF extraordinaire, for talking me down off many a cliff and for reading an earlier draft of this book. Thanks also to Sarah Cross, Sarah Rees Brennan, Melissa Marr, Rachel Vincent, BOB, and so many others for their friendship and support through the ups and downs of publishing and the creative process.
The writing and revising of this book spanned the last year of my PhD and my first year as a college professor. Thank you to my cohort and advisors at Yale, and to everyone in the psychology department at the University of Oklahoma for being so welcoming my first year as a professor there—and so supportive of my books! I’d also like to thank my incredible students, especially those in my Cognitive Science of Fiction and Writing Young Adult Fiction classes last spring.
Teaching you has been such an incredible experience, and I’m a better writer for it!
Finally, thanks—as always—go to my incredible family. Mom, Dad, Justin, Allison, and Connor, I love you more than words can say.
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