Roses. Bloodred roses. Just like the ones currently forming a canopy over Kaitlynn Nottingham’s grave.
A few feet away, Lexa’s back was to Conrad. Maria and Landon noticed him approaching, and Maria’s entire face lit up. She touched Lexa’s arm to turn her around, and Ariana briefly closed her eyes. She couldn’t take this. She simply could not watch.
“Hey, Lex. These are for you.”
“Oh my God,” Lexa said.
Ariana watched the back of her eyelids and awaited the breakdown.
“Ana? Are you okay?” Palmer said, gripping her elbow.
“Oh my God, Conrad!” Lexa squealed. “They’re beautiful! Thank you!”
Ariana’s eyes fluttered open. It took her a moment to focus, but when she did, Lexa and Conrad were hugging, and Maria was leaning back to keep from getting hit in the nose with the flowers.
“I know I said this before, but I’m really sorry about the other night,” Conrad said. “Do over?”
Lexa beamed up at him. She took the roses in both hands and lowered her face to the blooms, taking a deep breath to inhale their scent.
“You’ve got it,” she told him.
Ariana let out a breath, and suddenly her heart was so giddy she could hardly contain it. Clearly Lexa had turned a corner. Clearly she was getting better. Because if the sight of roses didn’t make her think of Kaitlynn, if they didn’t make her freak out the same way red wine and the blood and the broken glass had, that was definitely an improvement. Everything was going to be all right. Everything was going to be fine. In a few short hours, she’d have everything she’d ever wanted.
“Oh, man. Are you mad that I didn’t get you flowers, too?” Palmer said, reaching for her hand. “I didn’t think this was a flowers occasion.”
“No, it’s okay,” Ariana said, squeezing his hand and thinking of Jasper. “It’s all good.”
“Good,” Palmer replied. “Next time I promise to outdo Conrad.”
He released her, looped his arms around her waist, and leaned in for a kiss. As she kissed him back she decided it wasn’t a betrayal because, as Soomie would put it, (A) he was still her boyfriend, (B) she’d just gotten very good news, and (C) Jasper wasn’t here to see it anyway.
Plus, there was always (D) every relationship deserved a good-bye kiss. And Palmer didn’t know it yet, but that’s exactly what this was.
“What an incredible venue for a party,” Ariana mused, looking up at the stars trough the glass roof of the massive greenhouse at Maria’s parents’ Alexandria mansion.
“Apparently the previous owner had a serious green thumb,” Trent Greenway informed her, spinning the brandy in his glass. Mr. Greenway was a world-famous movie producer who’d had at least one multimillion-dollar hit a year for the past ten years, or so Lexa had informed Ariana right before she’d introduced them. Ariana had never been a huge modern film buff, but the list of hits had impressed even her. “Rudolpho and Cordelia have no such interest, so they cleared it out, put in the marble floor, and have used it for parties ever since.”
“It’s got nothing on the ballroom at your place, though, Mr. Greenway,” Lexa said, tossing her hair over her shoulder. “You have to see it one day, Ana. Mr. Greenway has this amazing, sprawling place in the hills overlooking Hollywood, and the ballroom is right on the cliff.”
“Wow. Sounds amazing,” Ariana said.
“It is. The wife begged me not to build it. Something about an earthquake hazard,” he said. “But she wasn’t complaining after our last Oscar party got her picture in all the rags.”
“Besides, one more hit like Flicker and you can build yourself another,” Lexa said with a laugh.
Ariana blinked, appalled for a moment. She thought it was gauche to mention success and money to an adult. But Trent Greenway simply laughed. Apparently he liked to have his success and wealth bandied about publicly. And apparently Lexa knew this. Suddenly Ariana was reminded of how good it was to know someone like Lexa—someone who knew all the right people and knew how to handle them and herself.
“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Miss Greene. If you’re ever interested in a career in the movie business, give me a call,” Mr. Greenway said with a genuine smile. “I could use someone like you around the office.” Then he looked at Ariana. “You too, Miss Covington. You’ve got that creative yet ruthless air about you. Both qualities would work well for you in Hollywood.”
Ariana was stunned into speechlessness.
“Ladies,” he said with a bow, removing himself from their space. He backed away and struck up a conversation with Landon and Maria. Lexa smiled at Ariana, impressed.
“I know!” Ariana said, moving toward the bar. The skirt of her dress scraped delicately along the floor, and the cool air circulating around her tickled her skin. “But where’d he get ruthless from?”
“I told him how you stole Palmer from me,” Lexa said matter-of-factly, resting her empty glass on the bar and signaling for another. “Maybe he was referring to that.”
Ariana’s jaw dropped. “Lexa, I—”
“I’m just kidding!” Lexa said, placing her hand on Ariana’s arm in a placating way. “You should see your face. That joke is just never going to get old.”
Ariana rolled her eyes and leaned back against the bar, biting back a retort about how the joke had gotten old the first time it was made. But what was the point in arguing about this now? She had a feeling the jibe would be completely passé the moment she broke up with Palmer, and then she’d never have to hear it, or explain it, or feel guilty about it again.
Not that she had ever felt all that guilty about stealing Palmer from Lexa in the first place. She’d simply done what needed to be done.
As Lexa sipped her new drink, Ariana was suddenly hit with a brilliant idea. Perhaps Lexa and Palmer would get back together. The moment she imagined it, she was shot through with automatic jealousy, but in the next moment she realized how silly that was. She didn’t want Palmer anymore. And he was a good guy. He and Lexa had been in love once. They could be again. Ariana realized it might be difficult for Palmer to get over her, but once he did, he could be exactly what Lexa needed. Solid, mature, kind, understanding.
Captain Boring, she thought, stifling a laugh.
“What?” Lexa asked, swirling the ice in her glass. “What’s so funny?”
“Nothing,” Ariana said. “Just thinking about how everything’s falling into place.”
And not just for Lexa and Palmer and her and Jasper. Already tonight Ariana had met several influential Stone and Grave alumni who worked in a number of different and fascinating fields. All of them had attended Ivy League schools, and three people had already offered to write her recommendations for Princeton. The whole world was opening up at Ariana’s feet. In two year’s time she would be a freshman at Princeton University, just as she’d always dreamed. She might have fallen a couple of years behind schedule, thanks to Reed Brennan, but she would get there. All she had to be was patient. And patience was something Ariana had in spades. How else could she have survived those eighteen months inside the Brenda T.?
Suddenly the crowd before her parted, and there was Jasper. It was the first time she’d seen him all night, and he put all the other boys to shame in his black tux and long dark gray tie. He looked elegant, sleek, sophisticated. And he had an incredibly sexy look on his face as he approached. A look that said he knew something no one else in the room knew.
That he knew her.
“Hi, ladies,” he said, hands in his pockets as he paused in front of them.
Ariana’s heart was on fire.
“Hi, Jasper,” Lexa said in a friendly way. “You look quite dashing.”
“You’re looking lovely, too, Madame President,” he said with a smile. Lexa blushed, and Ariana felt momentarily envious. But then he turned his eyes to her. “But, if you don’t mind my saying so, nothing compares to my fellow pledge.”
Ariana smiled and cast her eyes at the ground.
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“I don’t mind at all,” Lexa said, accustomed to the flirtatious ways of the boys at APH. “I happen to agree.”
“Do you now?” Jasper asked, his face lighting up. “That’s very interesting.” He turned around, kicking his heel against the floor, and leaned back next to Ariana. “You know, you two will never believe what I heard about you the other day.”
Ariana glanced at Lexa and watched as all the blood instantly drained from her face. She wanted to reach for her friend’s wrist, to reassure her that there was nothing Jasper could possibly know, but before she could, he continued.
“I heard that the two of you have been very . . . bad . . . girls,” he said, leaning toward them, his eyes gleaming with mischief.
Ariana’s mouth went dry. He couldn’t. He didn’t. “What . . . what do you mean?” she asked, the smile frozen on her face.
“Don’t you two know by now?” he teased. “It’s impossible to keep secrets around here.”
Ariana’s eyes darted to Lexa, who looked like she was about to faint. She felt as if her own heart was being twisted into a coil, tightening, tightening, tightening with each passing second. There was no way he could possibly know. There was just no way.
“I—”
She had to say something. Anything that made sense. But she could think of nothing. What was she supposed to say to that? What was he thinking? How could he know?
Without another word, Jasper turned and sauntered off, disappearing into the crowd. That was when Lexa started choking.
“Lexa!” Ariana hissed, whirling to her friend. Lexa pounded on her own chest with a flat hand and turned toward the bar, dropping her glass on the wood surface, where it promptly spilled. “Lexa, are you choking?”
Lexa managed to shake her head no, but she gripped the bar with both hands, coughing like mad and making awful, strangled sounds.
“Stop! Lexa! Stop and breathe!” Ariana said, wrapping her arm around her friend and looking around at the Stone and Grave alums apologetically. Any second someone was going to shout for help, and they’d have a dozen of the nation’s finest physicians all over them. Ariana didn’t need that kind of attention on Lexa. Not right now. Not when she was clearly spiraling all over again.
“Breathe, Lex. Just breathe,” Ariana said in her ear.
Finally, finally, Lexa stopped coughing. Holding her arms around Lexa’s slim shoulders, Ariana glanced around wildly, desperate to find Jasper in the crowd— desperate to hunt him down and make him explain.
“Oh my God, he knows,” Lexa hissed, her voice raspy. “He knows, Ana. How does he know?”
The bartender gave Lexa a disturbed, curious look, and Ariana’s blood turned to ice.
“Lexa, shut up,” she said through her teeth.
But inside, her own voice was in complete panic. He does. He does know. But how? How and why? Why him? Why is this happening to me? Why him?
Lexa promptly began to cry. Ariana grabbed her by the shoulders and forced her to face her, channeling all her frustration, all her anger, all her fear, into controlling her friend.
“Lexa, stop,” she said, looking into her friend’s eyes. Her skin was an awful grayish color, as if all the blood had left her body. “We don’t know what he was talking about.”
Except that she did know what he was talking about. Because what else could it be? What else could he know?
But how? How? How the hell did he know?
“I’m going to go find him and talk to him, okay?” Ariana said. Her voice cracked, and she gritted her teeth. Weakness was not an option. Not now.
Ariana glanced at the nearby cliques and klatches, looking for Soomie, Maria, Tahira, Conrad . . . anyone who could come hang out with Lexa. Anyone who could keep her focused and in the now. But she saw only strangers. Her eyes darted toward the doorway that led to the hall and the bathroom beyond. Grasping Lexa’s arm, she steered her across the room and out the door. The bathroom had been built for parties, with a lounge area just outside the toilet. Ariana shot a stiff smile at the elderly woman in front of the mirror, before flinging Lexa inside the private room and closing the door behind them. Lexa sat right down on the closed toilet and put her head in her hands. “You stay here and calm down. Lock the door behind me and don’t move. Do you understand me?”
Slowly, silently, Lexa nodded.
“Everything is going to be fine,” Ariana promised Lexa, crouching down and whispering the words in her ear. “I’m going to fix this. Just . . . don’t do anything stupid.”
When she stood up again, Lexa looked up, directly into her eyes. Ariana took a breath. Lexa was not gone. She was still with her. This could be fixed. It had to be fixed.
“I will be right back,” Ariana assured her. “Promise me you won’t move. Promise.”
“I promise,” Lexa said.
That was all Ariana needed to hear, and she was off. Off to keep the love of her life from repeating what he knew. By any means necessary.
Jasper was here somewhere. In this room, among these people. These people she needed to impress. These people who could make her future. These people who, moments ago, had seemed like the answer to everything. They’d seemed like family, like openly helpful new friends. But now they were all potential enemies. Because Jasper could tell any of them the secret that could end her life.
Ariana whirled around the room, in search of that familiar head of blond hair. Everywhere, everywhere, everywhere there was nothing but black, white, and gray. Tuxedo after tuxedo, gown after gown, curious face after curious face. Somewhere nearby someone let forth a loud, belly laugh. Laughter. So out of place. So wrong. They were mocking her. Every one of them. Staring at her, staring through her, knowing her, mocking her.
Where was he? He was hiding from her on purpose. She could feel it. Hiding from her and torturing her. Making her search. Making her desperate. Making her weak. But why?
Why was he doing this to her? He’d said he loved her. That he would always love her, no matter what. How could he have found out? How could he possibly know?
And then, suddenly, Ariana stopped. Right in the center of the marble floor, she simply froze. Her lack of movement was so sudden that a waiter almost tripped over her. He apologized and kept moving, straightening the empty glasses on his tray, but Ariana barely noticed. Because suddenly, she knew. Suddenly she understood.
The soccer game. The soccer game had been very illuminating. Now she knew what that meant. It meant that he had somehow found out the truth about her there. That she, her identity, her worst secret, had been illuminated. But how?
A photo suddenly flashed through her mind. A picture of young Reed Brennan chasing a soccer ball across a verdant field. Reed . . . soccer . . . Reed . . . soccer. It all made sense.
A chill coursed through her body, and Ariana hugged herself.
Jasper’s game had been at Georgetown Prep. Reed Brennan must have been there. Maybe she was scouting for her team or something? Who knew? Who cared? She had been there. And she had spoken to Jasper. And Jasper had told her all about the new girl with the ice-blue eyes, and Reed had started to talk. Talk all about the girl she had once known with ice-blue eyes. The two of them had talked and talked and figured it all out, and now Jasper knew. It was just as it had been with Thomas Pearson. The moment she found herself in love—real, true love—Reed came along to obliterate it.
Reed Brennan had ruined her. Again.
But how had he found out about Lexa? About Kaitlynn’s death? That part made zero sense.
“Champagne, miss?”
Ariana jolted out of her paranoid reverie. She took a glass from the offered tray, downed it in one gulp, then grabbed two more. The waiter was obviously startled, but said nothing. Quickly Ariana moved toward the glass wall closest to her, tripping over someone’s strappy heel as she went. She muttered an apology and kept moving. The entire room was spinning, which made it difficult to focus, but she made it to the wall. She pressed her back against the cold glass and downed the
second flute of champagne.
Taking a deep breath, she placed the empty glass on a table and held the third. She watched the happy faces of her peers as they hobnobbed with the elite of Stone and Grave, and slowly, slowly, she started to come back to herself. She could not let Reed Brennan do this to her. Not again. Reed had nothing to do with her. Nothing to do with Briana Leigh Covington.
She would not allow Reed to ruin this life too.
Ariana looked down at the full glass of champagne. She scoffed, disgusted with herself, and set it aside. Now was not the time to start drinking. Now was not the time to lose control. She was going to need all of her faculties if she was going to survive what was going to happen next. What had to happen.
Clenching her jaw, Ariana pushed herself away from the wall. She sidled through the room slowly now, methodically, checking each group of revelers one by one by one.
And then, finally, she found him. She felt a pang of sadness, a pang of nostalgia, a pang of real loss, as she watched him laugh with a pair of older men. And then she shoved it all aside and made her move. She walked up behind him and whispered in his ear.
“Come with me,” she said huskily, determinedly.
Jasper, ever so languidly, smiled. He looked at the older men, who both gazed upon her with leering, sparkling eyes. “Duty calls, gents.”
They both nodded in understanding, which made Ariana’s blood curdle. But she ignored it. She had to. She had far more important things to deal with. She turned and lifted her chin and, smiling blithely at the illustrious guests as she passed them by—smiling as if she had no idea who Jasper was or that he was eagerly following her—she slowly led him away.
Ariana shut the heavy wooden door of what must have once been the potting shed. Long shelves lined two of the walls, all of which were empty. There was a low metal counter along the third wall, a large sink dead center, its tall faucet turned to the side. Above this hung a series of metal pegs, and from those pegs dangled dozens of gardening tools. Spades and shovels in various sizes, rakes and hoes and forks, and several pairs of clippers and shears. The tile floor had been swept clean of dirt and potting soil, and the air inside was frigidly cold, as if the heat hadn’t been turned on in years.