Uglies 2 - Pretties Read Free Page A

anywhere, even inside Valentino Mansion's dumb walls. The other cliques always made fun of the Swarm, who were afraid to go anywhere except in giant groups. They were all dressed as houseflies with big bug eyes, which at least was sense-making.
    No other Crims appeared among the tumult of costumes, and Tally began to wonder if they'd all ditched the party rather than vote for her. Paranoid thoughts began to plague her, and she kept catching glimpses of someone lurking in the shadows, half-hidden by the crowds, but always there. Every time she turned around, though, the gray silk costume slipped out of sight.
    Tally couldn't tell whether it was a boy or a girl. The figure wore a mask, scary but also beautiful, its cruel wolf eyes glinting in the low, flickering party lights. The plastic face jarred something in Tally, a painful memory that took a moment to gel.
    Then she realized what the costume was supposed to be: an agent of Special Circumstances.
    Tally leaned back against one of the cool stone walls, remembering the gray silk coveralls that Specials wore and the cruel pretty faces they were given. The sight made her head spin, which was the way Tally always felt when she thought back to her days in the wild.
    Seeing the costume here in New Pretty Town didn't make any sense. Besides herself and Shay, hardly anyone had ever seen a Special. To most people they were just rumors and urban legends, blamed whenever anything weird happened. Specials kept themselves well hidden. Their job was to protect the city from outside threats, like soldiers and spies back in the days of the Rusties, but only total criminals like Tally Youngblood ever met them in person.
    Still, someone had done a pretty good job on the costume. He or she must have seen a real Special at some point. But why was the figure following her? Every time Tally turned, it was there, moving with the terrible and predatory grace she remembered from being hunted through the ruins of the Smoke on that awful day when they had come to take her back to the city.
    She shook her head. Thinking of those days always brought up bogus memories that didn't fit together. The Specials hadn't hunted Tally, of course. Why would they? They'd rescued her, bringing her home after she'd left the city to track down Shay. The thought of Specials always left her spinning, but that was just because their cruel faces were designed to freak you out, the same way that looking at regular pretties made you feel good.
    Maybe the figure wasn't following her at all; maybe it was more than one person, some clique all dressed the same and spread out across the party, which made it feel like one of them was lurking her.
    That idea was a lot less crazy-making.
    She caught up with the others, and joked with them as they searched for the rest of the Crims.
    But as Tally kept one eye out for figures in the shadows, she slowly became sure that it wasn't a clique.
    There was always exactly one, not talking to anybody, totally lurking. And the way the figure moved, so gracefully…
    Tally told herself to calm down. Special Circumstances had no reason to follow her. And it made no sense for a Special to come to a costume party dressed as a Special.
    She forced a laugh from herself. It was probably one of the other Crims playing a joke on her, one who'd heard Shay's and Tally's stories a hundred times and knew all about Special Circumstances. If so, it would be totally bogus to go all brain-missing in front of everyone. Better to ignore the fake Special altogether.
    Tally looked down at her own costume, and wondered if the Smokey clothes were helping to freak her out. Shay had been right: The smell of the old, handmade sweater brought back their time outside the city, days of back-breaking work and nights staying warm by the camp fire, mingled with memories of the aging ugly faces that still brought her awake screaming sometimes.
    Living in the Smoke had totally done a job on Tally's head.
    No one else mentioned