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The pixie-haired fourteen-year-old had taken a sneaky video of me in the staff locker room and another on my snowboard. In the first, I’d shrugged on my skiwear over a sports bra. In the second, I’d wiped out while trying to correct the course of a nervous youngster.
She’d made it sexy and funny.
She’d used my full first name, an unusual one that made searching for it easy when paired with Scotland.
It had gone fucking viral.
Muttering, I stowed away my fear and stomped on. After what had happened to Daisy when she’d escaped her family of criminals, I’d had a surge of worry that I hadn’t felt in years. Scotland was safe. My wannabe-Mafia father hadn’t found me, and with my brothers, we’d even started talking to him again, over a secure line, trying to keep a relationship with other family members. So why did I feel so weirded out over this slip?
At the low wall to Bridgette’s home, the last house on the street, I marked the fact there was no car outside—disappointingly, her mother wasn’t home—then swung onto the path and up to the house. Thumped on the door with my fist.
After a few moments, it opened a crack. The girl herself peered out.
She spied me, beamed, and threw it open wider. “Hey, Ariel.”
I gritted my teeth. “Can I come in?”
“Sorry, I’m not allowed to let anyone inside when Ma isn’t here. Well, apart from my boyfriend.” She pressed her lips together, amusement plain. “Finally saw my post then. Made ye famous.”
“Bridgette, that video is not okay.”
I patted my pocket for my phone, belatedly realising I’d left in the Mini.
The girl squinted, then reached for her jeans and brought out her phone, the case with bunny ears springing from the top. “Seriously? Did ye even read the comments? You’re hot. People actually typed that.”
I had read the comments. Teenage boys were scoring me out of ten. Grown-ass men older than my dad wrote what they wanted to do to me. That wasn’t the biggest crime, though. It was the fact that Bridgette had several other videos that gave away too much information. The car park of the snowboarding centre, me in the background getting into my car. Her dancing at school in her uniform, the badge visible and the school name clear.
It led directly to the tiny corner of the UK where I’d been squirrelled away.
I didn’t want to leave.
If I acted fast enough and got the video offline, perhaps it’d be okay.
Bridgette scanned her screen, the video playing. “It hit the big views two days ago but it’s still climbing. Ma makes cooking videos, and this beats down on anything she’s posted. I’ll show ye how I made it. Are ye even online? I couldn’t find an account.”
“I need you to take it down.”
She gasped and widened her eyes. “No way.”
Pretty much the response I guessed she’d give. In a flash, I grabbed the phone from her and wheeled around, pacing down the iced-over path while I jabbed at the settings.
The DELETE option appeared.
I hit it.
“What are ye doing?” In her socks in the snow, Bridgette yanked on my arm, pulling me around.
I held out the phone, and she snatched it back, her expression one of pure outrage.
“You can’t post videos of people without their permission,” I scolded, trying to keep a handle on my emotions. I wasn’t in the habit of mugging teenage girls, but this was cause for an exception. “And for the love of all that’s holy, you shouldn’t put your face and the name of your school on there either. Don’t they teach you anything about internet safety?”
She shot her gaze from the app to me, her cheeks reddening. “Ohmigod. Ye deleted it! I can’t believe you’d do that.”
“When you started in my class, I told you no videos of me. That’s for a reason.”
Tears lined her eyes. “You’re such a bitch. I’ll just post it again.”
“Do that and I’ll have the police come talk to your mom. Then say goodbye to your phone as she’ll know you can’t be trusted with it.”
