Mind Games (21 page)

She sniffles a few times. “So, it’s like
I’m
hiding in the dark?”

“Yes. You’re the secret when it’s dark. Dark is safe.”

“Dark is safe,” she whispers, snuggling into me and throwing one of her bony arms over my stomach. “But only with you here, too.”

“Safe together.” I smile and brush her hair away from where it’s tickling my nose. Sometimes
I
am the one who takes care of Fia. It makes me happy. “I’ll take care of you,” I say, but she is already asleep. I breathe in the sweet shampoo scent of her and fall asleep, too.

Acknowledgments

FIRST THANKS,
AS ALWAYS, TO MY NOAH, FOR HELPING me calm and organize the chaos that is my brain. You are everything good in my life. Thank you as well to my darling Elena and Jonah, for your patience when Mommy went crazy with a story. Again. You are absolutely delightful little people.

Thank you to my mom, Cindy, and my sister Lauren, for babysitting that one night so Noah and I could go on a date and see a movie that has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with this but somehow sparked the idea that I needed. Please feel free to take credit for this book. Unless people hate it, in which case I guess you’ve just lost plausible deniability. Sorry.

Special thanks to my siblings, Erin, Lindsey, Lauren, and Matt. I am so glad to have grown up with you. All the memories and stolen clothes (Matt, you are exempted…I think) and
shared history make me who I am, and I’m glad that you are all part of it. Again, feel free to take credit for me, unless people hate me; in which case, beat them up.

Biggest familial thanks go to my dad, for making me his Kick Butt Action Movie Buddy all growing up. KBP forever.

Thank you to Natalie Whipple, for always spurring me on and for saying, “I thought the sister would be the other POV?” I owe Annie to you. Among many other things (that are not imaginary people). Thank you to Shannon Messenger for doing a lightning-fast crit that I believe included threatening to throw olives (or was it carrots? I’d be much more frightened of carrots) at me. Thank you to Stephanie Perkins for always helping me find my way and for showing me where to deepen my stories and strengthen my writing. You’re like my personal trainer, only instead of getting slender and toned I get better at writing. Maybe we should also try the slender and toned thing next time. Just a thought.

Thank you to Michelle Wolfson, Agent Extraordinaire, for letting me write a book I wasn’t supposed to and for sending it out in spite of its being “crazy.” You keep taking chances on me, and then you keep making those chances pay off. I am so glad you are in my life.

Thank you to Erica Sussman. I can’t imagine making a book without you. I would make some funny threat about what I’d do if you ever quit being an editor, but after reading this book,
you’d probably believe I was serious and get scared. I promise my love of working with and adoration of you is all things good and nonviolent. Thank you also to Berkeley, the cutest Harvard-bound dog in existence.

Thank you to the team at HarperTeen, including but not limited to Editorial Assistant of Awesome Tyler Infinger; Marketing Wonders Christina Colangelo and Stephanie Stein; Publicity Guru Casey McIntyre; Foreign Sales Phenoms Jean McGinley and Alpha Wong; Copyediting Ninja Jessica Berg; and Cover Design Demigods Alison Donalty and Michelle Taormina. I feel ridiculously fortunate that my professional life includes all of you.

Thank you to A. S. King, Nova Ren Suma, Marie Lu, and Franny Billingsley, who wrote books that made me think and in small ways informed this novel. Thank you to Snow Patrol, Muse, and the Civil Wars for writing songs that capture in a few minutes emotions I try to capture in a few (hundred) pages. Thank you to all the femmes fatales of literature, television, and film for being strong—and for the rare occasions those femmes fatales were also allowed to be human and deal with the consequences of impossible decisions.

Finally, thank you again, always, to my readers. You are all ridiculously good-looking and have impeccable taste in literature. Thanks for continuing to trust me by lending me your brains and imaginations for a few hours. You make my life awesome.

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About the Author

KIERSTEN WHITE
is the
New York Times
bestselling author of the Paranormalcy trilogy. Although originally meant to be a story of a femme fatale, MIND GAMES quickly turned into a story about two sisters and impossible choices. This may be because Kiersten has three sisters, none of whom she has killed for, but all of whom she has considered killing at one point or another.

Kiersten lives with her family near San Diego, California. Visit her online and read her blog at www.kierstenwhite.com.

Visit
www.AuthorTracker.com
for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.

Other Books by Kiersten White

PARANORMALCY

SUPERNATURALLY

ENDLESSLY

Credits

NUDE by Kimberley Akrigg

(Girl with hand held up) by Mohamad Itani / Trevillion Images

RAINY NIGHT IN BIG CITY by Peeter Viisimaa / istockphoto

MY ENDLESS DREAM by Marion Lamprecht

EYES ON FIRE by Bailey Higgins

(Flames) by CanStock

Cover design by Michelle Taormina

HarperTeen is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

MIND GAMES

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

White, Kiersten.

Mind games / Kiersten White.—1st ed.

p. cm.

Summary: “Seventeen-year-old Fia and her sister, Annie, are trapped in a school that uses young female psychics and mind readers as tools for corporate espionage—and if Fia doesn’t play by the rules of their deadly game, Annie will be killed”—Provided by pub.

ISBN 978-0-06-213531-5 (trade bdg.)

[1. Psychic ability—Fiction. 2. Sisters—Fiction.] I. Title.

PZ7.W583764Mi 2013

2012004292

[Fic]—dc23

CIP

13 14 15 16 17 CG/RRDH 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1