LIVIN’ LA VIDA BENNET
Book 4 in the Bennet Sisters series
Lydia Bennet is back in town.
After a year at reform school, Lydia returns home, unapologetic and ready to reclaim her title as leader of the pack. But where’s the party? And why isn’t she invited?
Home isn’t much different from reform school – or jail. Her dad acts like a warden, and even her mom won’t give Lydia time off for (almost) good behavior. Her twin sister thinks Lydia’s the enemy, the other girls in her old posse treat her like roadkill, and most of the guys want her for one thing. The only guy who wants something different doesn’t seem to want Lydia.
She changed in reform school, but no one else sees it or believes it. Is it too late to fix her bad-girl rep? Or should she just give up and be the wild girl everyone thinks she is?
She’s come home, but it’s time to decide whether she has what it takes to stay.
Livin’ La Vida Bennet is available in print and ebook on Amazon Kindle, Apple iBooks, Nook, Kobo, and more.
An Excerpt from LIVIN’ LA VIDA BENNET
“I’m back! Let the parties begin!”
Dead silence. My gaze flickered over the frozen faces at my old lunch table, then around the cafeteria. Kids at other tables were staring at me, too, and I heard a buzz of recognition, but the kids at my own table didn’t say a word. My crowd didn’t say a word. Was I speaking Swahili? I mean, it wasn’t like they didn’t remember me. Everyone at Woodbury High School knew me. Half of them worshipped me.
A year away at reform school didn’t change that, did it?
Frowning, I glanced across the cafeteria, zeroing in on my sister Cat, who was sitting with Jeremy Fisk, who’d never been part of our crowd. No wonder Cat wasn’t at our old table: she was either shut out or too embarrassed. I knew she’d been dating Jeremy for six months now, but it was still weird. I’d been home for ten days, and she hadn’t bothered to warn me how things stood with our crowd. With my crowd.
“Lydia. You’re back. It’s been ages.”
“Hey, Tess. Yeah, they finally sprang me.”
My mom and dad told me not to put it that way, not even to friends, but Dad was the one who shipped me to reform school a year ago, and Mom didn’t exactly stop him, and I didn’t give a rat’s ass what either of them thought.
Grinning, I glanced at Tess O’Halloran and set my tray down in the empty spot next to her. Finally. Someone I could talk to, really talk to, despite all the snotty things Cat said about Tess in all her emails last spring. We’d always been close. I could count on Tess.
She turned back to Amber Tomlinson, though, on the other side of her, which put me right back where I’d started: with no one talking to me. Or acting like I belonged here.
What the hell? I owned this school, and every one of these kids knew it.
I ran a hand through my hair, still thick but short now, thanks to a year in Shangri-La. It almost killed me to cut it, but I would’ve done anything to reduce the odds of that repulsive witch, Shannon, yanking it out by the roots. Shannon didn’t last past February, but not because they sprang her for good behavior. She torched the headmaster’s office.
But Shannon wasn’t my problem anymore. When I flew home from Montana, I thought I didn’t have any problems except Mom and Dad, who should really get a new phone number, 1-800-LECTURE, since that’s all they did these days. And, okay, Cat avoided me, which qualified as a slight problem, but it had to be because she had this loser boyfriend. After three classes and now lunch on my first day back, though, I realized Cat wasn’t my problem. Mom and Dad weren’t my problem.
It was the whole entire school.