I was going to ask what stuff exactly, but David was already picking up his bag and heading for the door. I walked him down, stopping so that he could say good night to my parents, and then followed him out to where his car was parked in the driveway. He opened the door and threw his satchel inside before turning back to me, that familiar wrinkle between his brows. “Sometimes I wonder what would happen if I just drove out of town, you know?”

His tone was casual, but something about those words made goose bumps break out all over my body. “You can’t,” I told him, my voice stiff. “I mean, right now, you literally can’t since Alexander had Ryan put up all these wards, but—”

Shoving his hands in his pockets, David leaned forward a little. “What? Why?”

“I don’t know,” I confessed. “Apparently the one time Ryan decided to take the initiative, it potentially screwed us over.”

With a groan, David tipped his head back. “It would be awesome,” he said, “if people would stop doing things that affect me without, you know, asking how I might feel about those things.”

I swallowed hard.

David tilted his head back down and gave me a steady look, his hands still in his pockets. For a moment, I thought my guilt must show clearly on my face.

But he didn’t ask me anything about his visions. Instead, he studied me and asked, “If you could do it all over again, don’t pretend that you never would have gone into the bathroom that night.”

I blinked, thinking about Bee. About Saylor and the Cotillion and all the lying I’d done to my family.

Smiling as best as I could, I raised up on tiptoes and kissed him. “Of course I would have.”

Chapter 13

Chapter 13

“SO THIS IS a thing that’s happening?” David asked as he sat against the fence in my backyard.

Pulling my hair up into a high ponytail, I sighed around the rubber band in my mouth. “Yes,” I mumbled. “And if you mock it, I’ll never ask you to come back.”

“No mocking,” David replied, laying his arms on his upraised knees. His wrists looked bony underneath the cuffs of his (both ugly and seasonally inappropriate) plaid button-down. “You’re going to train for whatever trials the Ephors may have coming your way by... spinning a baton? Because I was honestly kidding about that earlier.”

Hair secured, I propped my hands on my hips. “It’s not like I can practice dagger swinging or karate kicks in the backyard. But baton twirling is totally socially acceptable, and it lets me both work on my agility and wield what could be a weapon.” I gave the baton a few experimental twirls, and David laughed.

“Your ability to multitask is truly extraordinary, Pres.”