Fire Read Online Free PDF Page B

disgusting, disgusting, everything is so totally disgusting.
    She peers at the others. Julia is holding forth, now and then tugging at the T-shirt to cover her bikini. Felicia pretends to listen, but she is completely focused on Robin who doesn’t notice a thing. Must be the only one who hasn’t figured out that Felicia is crazy about him.
    ‘I wonder who of the mental cases are going to off themselves this year,’ Robin says suddenly. The others cackle at this, Felicia louder than anyone else.
    Ida avoids having to laugh along with them by swallowing another mouthful of the dregs in the water bottle. She certainly doesn’t want to think about the so-called suicides by Elias and Rebecka. Why does everything and everyone have to remind her about the Chosen Ones and all the shit that happened last year?
    ‘There can’t be that many left by now,’ Felicia says to Robin.
    But his attention is directed elsewhere. He thumps Erik’s chest.
    Erik snorts and sits up.
    ‘What now?’
    Then he sees what Robin sees and goes quiet.
    Ida doesn’t even have to look to know that it’s Vanessa Dahl. If only Ida had been more alert she would have registered from hundreds of metres away the hyped-up mini-tornado that is Vanessa’s energy. Ida knows it only too well from their training sessions in magic.
    She turns around. Vanessa has brought her entire following of pathetic no-hopers.
    ‘I bet she slept with every one of them,’ Felicia says. ‘That fatso, too.’
    Ida and Julia giggle. But the guys stay silent. Fixed on Vanessa, who bends over, in her minuscule bikini bottoms, to spread the beach towel. Her tan is perfect in the way Ida’s pigmentation will never allow.
    ‘Check out those roots,’ Ida comments.
    Vanessa’s pale blonde mass of hair ends in several centimetres of dark brown hair close to her head. Ida touches a naturally pale blonde strand of hair that has worked free from her own ponytail. It reassures her. Vanessa turns and for one brief moment, Ida feels sure that she will say something, like ‘Hi’.
    But instead Vanessa silently lies down on the towel. That’s a relief. Of course, there is no longer any reason for the five Chosen Ones to try to hide that they know each other. The demons already know who they are. But should it get around in Engelsfors that Ida and Vanessa had something in common … well, regrettably, Ida would have to kill herself.
    Vanessa’s boyfriend, the drug-pusher one, lies down next to Vanessa. It takes about, say, half a second before they start snogging.
    Ida glances at Erik. She would dearly like to scream at himto stop ogling Vanessa, but doesn’t want to seem to care one way or the other.
    Instead she puts her head to the side and stares at his thick dark hair until he senses her eyes on him.
    ‘What is it?’ he asks crossly.
    Clearly, he isn’t the slightest bit ashamed of being fixated on Vanessa. Ida keeps her voice as calm as she can.
    ‘How weird that I haven’t noticed it before,’ she says.
    ‘What?’
    ‘Oh, nothing,’ Ida mumbles and looks away.
    ‘Come out with it, for fuck’s sake.’
    Ida looks at him full on. Smiles.
    ‘You know, it’s just that when you’re sitting here in the sun, it’s obvious that you’ll go bald ever so early.’
    Robin howls with laughter. Julia and Felicia giggle hysterically.
    ‘No way,’ Erik says and his eyes darken.
    ‘Oh, don’t fret. It will be years before it really shows. It’s just that in this light …’
    Robin gives Erik’s scalp a hard rub.
    ‘Let’s see if it comes off,’ he says. Erik slaps his hand away and eyeballs Ida furiously.
    She raises her eyebrows.
    ‘What’s wrong with you? You asked, after all. I’m just telling you the facts.’
    In her beach bag, the mobile pings and, at that instant, a signal rings out from somewhere else on the beach. She notes that Vanessa is checking her phone.
    A sinking feeling somewhere inside Ida. This isn’t a coincidence.
    She pulls her mobile out. The