Chapter 18: Front Row

Auditorium B held two hundred seats, and Giada had filled most of them.

I walked down the center aisle in my plain grey coat, past a banner with her face on it.

Phones came up as I passed. Somebody whispered my name.

I took the seat in the front row with the card that said Reserved for Family.

My mother was already in the next chair.

She wore her good blouse and her cross, and she did not turn her head.

"Sit up straight," Rosa said, low. "Smile. There are people here from the department."

"Did you tell Giada to smile too?"

"Do not start."

"I'm not starting. I'm watching."

Tobias sat three rows back in the aisle seat, in a jacket I had never seen him wear.

He had said he would be a stranger tonight.

He had also said that if I turned around, he would be there.

The lights went down.

A student in a lanyard announced the first presenter, and then the second, and then a third who spoke for ten minutes about a podcast.

I waited.

At last the screen flashed pink, and music started, and Giada came across the stage in a white dress with a clip-on microphone.

The crowd cheered. She knew how to take a cheer.

"Hi, everybody!" she said. "I'm Giada, and this is my capstone: Den Sites and the Managed Forest. A New Look at How Predators Choose Home."

Keep reading free with an account. Start My Fated Mate Chose My Sister, So I Left from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.