“I should probably get back,” Harper said, and she reached into her pocket for her money.

“No, no.” Daniel waved his hand. “I got this. Don’t worry about it.”

“But I thought this was my IOU meal for the ice cream.”

“I was just kidding. I’ll pay.”

“Are you sure?” Harper asked.

“Yeah,” he said, laughing at her guilt-stricken expression. “If it bothers you so much, I’ll let you pay for it some other time.”

“What if we don’t ever eat together again?” Harper asked, eyeing him skeptically.

“Then we don’t.” He shrugged. “But I think we will.”

“Okay,” she said, because she couldn’t think of anything else to say. “Thank you for the Coke.”

“No problem,” Daniel said, watching her as she got up.

“And I’ll see you around, I guess.”

He nodded and gave her a small wave. As she was walking out the door, she heard Pearl ask him if he wanted any pie. Harper went back across the street to the library, and it was very hard for her not to glance back over her shoulder at him.

THIRTEEN

Rebellion

Part of her penance was helping Harper clean. It actually wasn’t specifically dictated as part of her punishment, but it helped ease Gemma’s guilt over frightening both Harper and her father so badly.

Based on how much Harper complained about it, Gemma thought that cleaning the bathroom was her least favorite chore. So that was the one Gemma had offered to take over. Although, after spending five minutes scrubbing the inside of the toilet, she was really starting to regret it.

When she got to cleaning the tub, she realized that the toilet wasn’t even the worst part. The drain in the bathtub was disgusting. Harper always claimed it was mostly Gemma’s hair clogging things up, but Gemma hadn’t really believed her until now.

Fortunately, she wore thick yellow cleaning gloves, or else there would have been no way she could’ve handled it. As she pulled out a long wet rope of hair that looked all too much like a drowned rat, Gemma noticed something glinting in the light.

Carefully, she picked it out of the tangles, and when she saw what it was, she dropped the wet mass of hair. It was another one of those weird iridescent scales she’d found in her bath sponge. She’d nearly forgotten about the last one. Or at least she’d tried to.

Gemma sat in the tub, leaning her back against the rim, and stared down at the big scale in the palm of her gloved hand.

Something strange was definitely going on with her. Ever since she’d drunk from the flask, something had felt … off.

Not that it was all bad stuff. In fact, Gemma couldn’t actually think of anything bad about the changes at all.

Sure, she’d bitten Alex yesterday, but he hadn’t really been hurt. And while the making out had been different, it hadn’t been bad. Kissing him like that had been fun.

Her body healed crazy fast. All her bruises and cuts had disappeared in just over twenty-four hours.

At swim practice today, she’d had her best times. Coach Levi was totally blown away by her speed. The weirdest part was that she actually had to hold back. She was afraid if she went as fast as she could, he’d think she was on something.

When she was in the pool, that same thing happened to her skin again. That odd sensation that felt like butterflies running from her thighs down to her toes. But it was actually a pleasurable feeling, so she didn’t mind it.

So if it was all good, what was she worried about?

Except … it wasn’t all good. As much as she wanted to brush off biting Alex’s lip, she couldn’t. She hadn’t spoken to him since then, but he’d probably passed it off as a heat-of-the-moment, kinky kind of thing. But it wasn’t.

When she’d been kissing him, she’d been so hungry. It was unlike any hunger she’d ever felt. It was part lust, like she’d wanted to kiss him and be physical with him. But the other part was actual starvation, and that’s why she’d bitten him.

That’s what terrified her. The hunger inside of her.

Gemma got out of the tub and flushed the scale down the toilet. Something was seriously wrong with her, and she had to stop it.

“Harper?” Gemma said and poked her head in her sister’s room.

“Yeah?” Harper was lounging on her bed with her e-reader.

“Can I talk to you?”

“Yeah, of course you can.” Harper set aside her e-reader and sat up straighter. “Wow. Did you do something in the bathroom?”

“Uh … why?” Gemma froze in the doorway. “What do you mean?”

“You look … good,” Harper said, for lack of a better word.

Gemma glanced down, looking herself over, but she knew what Harper meant. She’d already noticed it today. While she’d never been prone to acne, her skin was smoother, and it almost appeared to be glowing. She’d gone beyond her usual scope of pretty into something almost supernatural.

“I’ve just been using a different moisturizer.” Gemma shrugged, trying to play it off.

“Really?” Harper asked.

“No, actually”—Gemma sighed and rubbed her forehead—“that’s what I came in here to talk to you about.”

“You came to talk to me about moisturizer?” Harper raised an eyebrow.

“No, it’s not moisturizer.”

Gemma went over and sat down on the bed next to her sister. She didn’t know why she found it so hard to tell Harper about what was happening to her, except she knew she’d sound like a crazy person.