1269_UgliesFreeBook

UGLIES 301
“You did this!” Her whole body writhed like a snake in
its death throes. “Stealing my boyfriend wasn’t enough? You
had to betray the whole Smoke!”
Tally closed her eyes and shook her head. It couldn’t be
true. She had destroyed the pendant. The fire had consumed
it.
“Shay!” Croy said. “Calm down. Look at her. She fought
them.”
“Are you blind, Croy? Look around you! She did this!”
Tally took a deep breath and forced herself to look at
Shay. Her friend’s eyes burned with hatred.
“Shay, I swear to you, I didn’t. I never . . .” Her voice
faltered.
“Who else could have led them here?”
“I don’t know.”
“We can’t blame each other, Shay,” Croy said. “It could’ve
been anything. A satellite image. A scouting mission.”
“A spy.”
“Will you look at her, Shay?” Croy cried. “She’s tied up,
like us. She resisted!”
Shay slammed her eyes shut and shook her head.
The two Specials with the eye-reader had reached the
resistors’ corner of the pen. One stood back while the other
stepped forward warily. “We don’t want to hurt you,” she
announced. “But we will if we have to.”
The cruel pretty grabbed Croy’s chin and flashed the
reader in his eye. She looked at its readout.