Blue was someone who prided herself on being independent. She didn't need some guy on his noble steed to come swooping in to save her. She could save herself.

Then why the hell was she feeling so flattered by this?

When she'd gotten to school that morning, the boys who'd been flirting like crazy the night before outside of Nino's had been oddly silent, glancing over at her and looking away just as quickly. But they hadn't looked away in time to hide the black eyes and split lips.

She knew it was highly unlikely that the injuries were a direct result of them flirting with her—more likely they'd flirted with another girl, one whose boyfriend took offense and whacked them.

The fact that she knew they'd driven off after she'd turned down the street simply showed that the boyfriend had beat them up somewhere other than Nino's.

The fact that she had seen a BMW follow them meant nothing. Same with the fact that she knew Monmouth was in the opposite direction of the way they were headed.

Simple coincidence.

Gansey had bestowed upon her the firm disbelief in coincidences.

She really needed to talk to Ronan about this attitude of oh look there's a boy and he's flirting with Blue he must die and he must die now. It really wasn't funny.

Noah probably egged him on.

She managed to get through the day without calling attention to her plotting to murder the idiots (and who cared if Noah was a ghost, she'd do it somehow) and slowly biked over to Monmouth.

When she parked and went upstairs, Gansey and Adam were in one corner doing homework, while Ronan and Noah had their heads together, plotting something. She walked over to the latter pair, glaring. Noah was the first to look up, and he grinned and nudged Ronan until the shaved head came up to raise an eyebrow at her.

"Something the matter, munchkin?" he asked. "How was school?"

She opened her mouth, paused, and closed it again before saying, "I know it was you guys."

Adam and Gansey glanced over, and she saw their closed off expressions. The ones that said we know something and we're not going to admit it. And then she remembered.

There had been four shadows in the BMW.

Blue was someone who prided herself on being sensible.

So why was she so damn flattered?