protege king
CHAPTER ONE
“The only bad thing about burning your bridges behind you is that the world is round.”
― Anonymous
A sunny day in New York City has the same impact as sunshine splaying across the waterfront.
It blinds you.
I step off the crowded sidewalk and into the street only to be halted by a firm hand on my arm. “Stop! Stop now!”
A truck flies past me rather than over the top of me.
I gasp and my fist balls over my racing heart, before I pant out several heavy breaths and realize that I’m still teetering precariously on the edge of the curb. I almost stepped in front of a truck. It was so close. Too close. The light had turned, I argue in my head. There was no one coming and yet they were and whoever has my arm just saved my life.
This is when you might think the meet-cute comes, when I look left, and some tall, dark, and handsome guy in a six-thousand-dollar suit pulls me to the sidewalk and a little too close to him.
But nope. That’s not my life.
My gaze swings left where I find an elderly lady holding onto me with a steely grip that defies her wrinkled skin and gray hair. “Honey, that could have been bad for you. And me. I think I’d have croaked right here if you croaked. You must be new to the city. These streets are not to be reckoned with. Get your feet back on the sidewalk.”
It’s as if my mother has jumped inside this woman’s body to lecture me. I don’t even defend my long-standing familiarity with New York City. I step backward and fortunately do not get rolled over by a crowd of people. It’s five o’clock. New Yorkers just want to go home, or to their second job they need to pay for an apartment the size of a closet.
“Thank you,” I say offering the woman a nod. I’d shake her hand but she’s still holding my arm with a vise grip.
She studies me a moment, as if to confirm my understanding, only to press her lips together in disapproval. Her hand falls away. “You didn’t hear a word I said.”
I could explain that I’m from the city, that no one was coming—the truck ran a red light—but there really is no point. She saved my life. I have nothing but gratitude. I touch her arm. “I hear you and thank you.”
The impact is as I’d hoped. Her expression softens. “Take care of yourself, honey. It’s a dangerous city.”
“I will,” I promise, turning away from her just as a city bus with my face pulls up beside us. Okay, not just my face. It’s me sitting on a throne, that is really just a fancy chair. My legs are crossed and I’m wearing this luxurious Gucci dress and heels, my long brunette hair draped over my shoulders. How very Sex and the City of me, only it has nothing to do with Sex and the City. As the words above the photo read, “Selling in the City, a new TV show featuring Alana Blue, debuted last week!”
The new TV show is all about real estate. And money. And people with money buying real estate from my family. A TV show I never wanted to do, but just finished filming despite my resistance to the spotlight. It’s about diversity for my family, and not having all of our eggs in one basket. And of course, name recognition.
The old lady is beside me now, pointing at the bus. “Is that you?”
I glance at the photo of the hot woman in the chair, who looks and feels as fake as the TV show it’s advertising, and say, “She’s much prettier,” and I mean it. I’m just me, a simple girl who came straight here to the big city from not-so-little ol’ New Jersey, and did so traveling on the tailcoats of her parents. How they make me look like—a sexy, worldly woman—I do not know.
The woman glances between the woman on the bus and me and then settles her attention on my face. “No, you’re prettier.” She winks and turns away, disappearing into the crowd leaving me reeling with her statement.
I blink at the surprise compliment and eye the bus. I don’t know that I’m prettier than her, but I like this me, the real me, better than the woman in that chair, the one I had to become for reasons I can share with no one.
The light turns.
I hesitate, not so quick on the run this time. I look both ways as my mama taught me and start walking. My destination is the towering thirty-floor steel building just across the street, currently glistening in the sunshine. If only I were blind to what is going on inside. I shove aside the thought, I can do nothing about it, at least nothing more than what I’m already doing, and double step. My father would tell me I’m a worrywart, a type A who can’t just let things fall into place, and happen as nature would have them happen.
But nature is a beast and not a gentle one.
Just as time is a monster, who doesn’t care if you need a moment to breathe.
***
Once I’m behind my desk, Jenna, my assistant, pops her head in the door, her red bouncy curls springing about. “There’s a man up front who insists I give you this right now.” It’s a plain, white letter-sized envelope.
“Any idea what it’s about?”
She steps into the doorway and sashays toward me. She’s short and slender but curvy in all the rights places, the kind of bombshell that should be the face of Selling in the City, except she hates selling anything. I tried to make her once and she broke out in hives. She sets the envelope in front of me and says, “The phones are going nuts. Everyone wants to work with and be on TV.”
I sigh. “Of course, they do. Have them fill out the online form. Where are my mom and dad?”
“They left early for some meeting with a guy who looked important.” She crinkles her nose. “Everyone who comes in here looks important. Money does that to people.”
We cater to high-end buyers who mostly look at us as their servants. I don’t like it. It’s not what I wanted us to be, but my plans went right out the door.
“Expensive clothes make people feel and look important,” I say. “It doesn’t make them important.”
“Your parents were fawning over him,” she adds.
“That only means he has lots of money.”
“Open the card,” she orders, “because I can’t go back out there and face that man until you do. He’s big and cranky.”
I do as commanded, for the sake of Jenna, removing a piece of paper with an official studio letterhead.
Ms. Blue,
One of our largest investors requests a meeting this evening. We’ve provided a driver for your convenience who will transport you to and from your destination.
Allen A. Phelps
CEO/President
NYDD Studios
I sigh and drop the letter to my desk. “Of course.”
“What is it?” Jenna asks.
“The studio requests my presence.”
Her brow dips with my obvious exasperation, “But that’s good, right?” she asks. “You’re hot right now. Everyone is talking about you and your ratings.”
“Yes,” I say. “It is.” And it is, I think to myself. It is. This is a path out of a hole. I was forced into the show, and that’s the only reason it’s negative to me. Had this gone differently I might be embracing this and I need to work on remembering that important point.
Too many times my family has backed me into the same corner. I’ve begun seeing my life as dictated by them to such an extreme that every moment I live is about them. Everything that happens to me is about them. Everything is simply a different shade of negative. I’m fairly certain that makes me more the girl on the bus than the one I see in the mirror.
I love my family. They love me. My father never meant to bury us all in a hole. He’s not a bad man. He’s just a flawed human and aren’t we all? Right now, I don’t like the girl on the bus or the girl in the mirror, I decide.
I grab my purse. “I’m off to see the studio.”
Jenna offers me a keen stare. “You want to talk? I can come over tonight and bring wine. Or vodka.”
“I film tomorrow, remember? No vodka for me.” I soften my voice. “But thank you. Love you, Jenna.” And I do. We aren’t supposed to be friends, per my father. She works for me, and all that stuff. But she’s amazing and she needs no supervision. The friendship happened naturally and I don’t regret it.
Once I’m in the lobby, the tall, broody guy in a suit, Jenna told me about, scowls at me and motions me to the door. “Who am I visiting?” I ask.
“I just take orders,” he replies, an irritated twang in his remark.
I don’t try again. One thing you learn quickly about Hollywood is that you’re not in charge. They are. At least until you reach a certain level of fame I don’t seek. I’ve always wondered why the bosses in charge don’t consider how the tables turn at later dates. Maybe it wouldn’t cost them so much to convince stars to do things if they did.
The limo waiting on me surprises me a bit. I’m not limo material by studio standards and my heart kicks up a beat. The meeting must be in the backseat of the car. Whoever wants to talk to me can’t be bothered with me in their office. The cranky man who greeted me and lead me downstairs opens the rear door. I climb inside to find I’m alone. Maybe ratings really are good? I mean they’re good, I know, but maybe they’re good on a whole other level?
My spirit lifts with this idea. The truth is I tend to downplay opportunities until they prove worthy of celebration. It’s a jinx thing. Every time I’m sure of something, it’s not sure at all. Suddenly this job might feel more important to me, and that’s when I really see things go south. I scold myself. Don’t get excited. This car means nothing.
The window between me and the driver probably means more.
A few minutes later the driver of my fancy limousine has yet to lower the glass between us, the car halts next to a high-rise. I don’t know the building though; I’ve most likely walked past it at some point. I might have grown up in Jersey where my parents tried to shelter me from the city, but my parents always had Manhattan offices. I was always here, then and now.
The car door opens and I exit. The same broody, grumpy guy who’d lead me to the car motions me forward. You know how this goes. He opens the door and I enter the ritzy lobby with glossy floors and fancy lighting dangling from silver poles. He doesn’t talk. I don’t talk. He waves at security and then punches the elevator button. When the door opens, I step inside and he leans in and punches floor thirty. It’s high. Not that I’m afraid of heights, but I could get nervous about the drop going down if I let myself. It’s the whole, everything falls from the bottom, no matter how hard you pull up thing.
It’s a thing my father says. It means—well it means, nothing good.
I glance at my watch to find it’s nearly six-thirty pm. Ooh, I’ve also done my ten thousand steps, thank you, New York City and the walk or die in the subway mentality. I’m not really sure what the late hour means for a studio office as far as busyness goes. I’d think most of the office staff would be gone by now. I’d speculate, translated as worry, about some weird casting couch thing but I already have the job and the program manager is a little old lady. A tough little old lady, but not the casting couch type.
I think. Who knows these days.
The elevator dings and I draw in a breath. I step into the foyer and I glance left and right only to discover there is only one set of double wooden doors. After closer inspection, I realize there is also no bell. I attempt to knock but it’s a solid door. No one is going to hear me. This is weird, I think, and there’s a warning bee buzzing about in my belly. This feels off. Am I at the wrong place?
I open the doors and step inside a lobby that smells of new leather and I sniff—spice. It smells like winter spice. I don’t really know why I know what winter spice smells like, but I do. It must be my mother’s obsession with all things holiday. The room is a lobby with a secretary’s desk and a seating area which is decorated in, of course, leather couches and chairs, hence the leather scent. No one is at the desk.
“Hello?” I call out several times, but it’s crickets in return. My options include one door to the left of the desk or the one behind me I came in through. The bee in my belly is buzzing again but I ignore it and walk toward the door.
It’s open and I step just inside the entryway.
There’s a man standing at the window and my heart begins a pitter patter in my chest. He’s tall, and dark, and familiar.
A rush of awareness floods me, a full body experience that might as well be me being swept into an icy ocean and pulled under. I can’t breathe. This isn’t happening. This isn’t him. I suck in a breath when I finally discover a bit of air, and he turns. God, he turns to face me. Then he’s all out there, we’re all out there, in a room, together, aware of each other. So. Very. Aware. His jaw is a perfect line, so very handsomely straight, his cheekbones a perfect angle, and the dimple in his chin just as adorable and sexy as I remember, but somehow, brutal. Yes, a dimple can be brutal if on this man. And of course, his silk tie is a royal blue that matches his eyes perfectly. The coldest of all eyes because they always feel warm, when the heat in their depths is nothing but a lie.
Lies hurt.
Deception hurts.
He. Hurt. Me.
I blink and he’s around the desk standing on this side of his visitor’s chairs. I don’t even remember him moving. His eyes travel over me, intimate in a way he has no right to look at me. “Alana,” he says softly, and his voice is silk and seduction, but somehow all demand. So much demand.
And just that easily he is the sun, burning me alive with anger and other things I will never admit. Because I didn’t know you could love and hate the same man as much as I do this one. I rotate to walk way, to leave him where he stands. I make it two steps when he says, “Do not walk away from me, Alana.” I halt because we both know I have no choice.
He owns me.
― Anonymous
A sunny day in New York City has the same impact as sunshine splaying across the waterfront.
It blinds you.
I step off the crowded sidewalk and into the street only to be halted by a firm hand on my arm. “Stop! Stop now!”
A truck flies past me rather than over the top of me.
I gasp and my fist balls over my racing heart, before I pant out several heavy breaths and realize that I’m still teetering precariously on the edge of the curb. I almost stepped in front of a truck. It was so close. Too close. The light had turned, I argue in my head. There was no one coming and yet they were and whoever has my arm just saved my life.
This is when you might think the meet-cute comes, when I look left, and some tall, dark, and handsome guy in a six-thousand-dollar suit pulls me to the sidewalk and a little too close to him.
But nope. That’s not my life.
My gaze swings left where I find an elderly lady holding onto me with a steely grip that defies her wrinkled skin and gray hair. “Honey, that could have been bad for you. And me. I think I’d have croaked right here if you croaked. You must be new to the city. These streets are not to be reckoned with. Get your feet back on the sidewalk.”
It’s as if my mother has jumped inside this woman’s body to lecture me. I don’t even defend my long-standing familiarity with New York City. I step backward and fortunately do not get rolled over by a crowd of people. It’s five o’clock. New Yorkers just want to go home, or to their second job they need to pay for an apartment the size of a closet.
“Thank you,” I say offering the woman a nod. I’d shake her hand but she’s still holding my arm with a vise grip.
She studies me a moment, as if to confirm my understanding, only to press her lips together in disapproval. Her hand falls away. “You didn’t hear a word I said.”
I could explain that I’m from the city, that no one was coming—the truck ran a red light—but there really is no point. She saved my life. I have nothing but gratitude. I touch her arm. “I hear you and thank you.”
The impact is as I’d hoped. Her expression softens. “Take care of yourself, honey. It’s a dangerous city.”
“I will,” I promise, turning away from her just as a city bus with my face pulls up beside us. Okay, not just my face. It’s me sitting on a throne, that is really just a fancy chair. My legs are crossed and I’m wearing this luxurious Gucci dress and heels, my long brunette hair draped over my shoulders. How very Sex and the City of me, only it has nothing to do with Sex and the City. As the words above the photo read, “Selling in the City, a new TV show featuring Alana Blue, debuted last week!”
The new TV show is all about real estate. And money. And people with money buying real estate from my family. A TV show I never wanted to do, but just finished filming despite my resistance to the spotlight. It’s about diversity for my family, and not having all of our eggs in one basket. And of course, name recognition.
The old lady is beside me now, pointing at the bus. “Is that you?”
I glance at the photo of the hot woman in the chair, who looks and feels as fake as the TV show it’s advertising, and say, “She’s much prettier,” and I mean it. I’m just me, a simple girl who came straight here to the big city from not-so-little ol’ New Jersey, and did so traveling on the tailcoats of her parents. How they make me look like—a sexy, worldly woman—I do not know.
The woman glances between the woman on the bus and me and then settles her attention on my face. “No, you’re prettier.” She winks and turns away, disappearing into the crowd leaving me reeling with her statement.
I blink at the surprise compliment and eye the bus. I don’t know that I’m prettier than her, but I like this me, the real me, better than the woman in that chair, the one I had to become for reasons I can share with no one.
The light turns.
I hesitate, not so quick on the run this time. I look both ways as my mama taught me and start walking. My destination is the towering thirty-floor steel building just across the street, currently glistening in the sunshine. If only I were blind to what is going on inside. I shove aside the thought, I can do nothing about it, at least nothing more than what I’m already doing, and double step. My father would tell me I’m a worrywart, a type A who can’t just let things fall into place, and happen as nature would have them happen.
But nature is a beast and not a gentle one.
Just as time is a monster, who doesn’t care if you need a moment to breathe.
***
Once I’m behind my desk, Jenna, my assistant, pops her head in the door, her red bouncy curls springing about. “There’s a man up front who insists I give you this right now.” It’s a plain, white letter-sized envelope.
“Any idea what it’s about?”
She steps into the doorway and sashays toward me. She’s short and slender but curvy in all the rights places, the kind of bombshell that should be the face of Selling in the City, except she hates selling anything. I tried to make her once and she broke out in hives. She sets the envelope in front of me and says, “The phones are going nuts. Everyone wants to work with and be on TV.”
I sigh. “Of course, they do. Have them fill out the online form. Where are my mom and dad?”
“They left early for some meeting with a guy who looked important.” She crinkles her nose. “Everyone who comes in here looks important. Money does that to people.”
We cater to high-end buyers who mostly look at us as their servants. I don’t like it. It’s not what I wanted us to be, but my plans went right out the door.
“Expensive clothes make people feel and look important,” I say. “It doesn’t make them important.”
“Your parents were fawning over him,” she adds.
“That only means he has lots of money.”
“Open the card,” she orders, “because I can’t go back out there and face that man until you do. He’s big and cranky.”
I do as commanded, for the sake of Jenna, removing a piece of paper with an official studio letterhead.
Ms. Blue,
One of our largest investors requests a meeting this evening. We’ve provided a driver for your convenience who will transport you to and from your destination.
Allen A. Phelps
CEO/President
NYDD Studios
I sigh and drop the letter to my desk. “Of course.”
“What is it?” Jenna asks.
“The studio requests my presence.”
Her brow dips with my obvious exasperation, “But that’s good, right?” she asks. “You’re hot right now. Everyone is talking about you and your ratings.”
“Yes,” I say. “It is.” And it is, I think to myself. It is. This is a path out of a hole. I was forced into the show, and that’s the only reason it’s negative to me. Had this gone differently I might be embracing this and I need to work on remembering that important point.
Too many times my family has backed me into the same corner. I’ve begun seeing my life as dictated by them to such an extreme that every moment I live is about them. Everything that happens to me is about them. Everything is simply a different shade of negative. I’m fairly certain that makes me more the girl on the bus than the one I see in the mirror.
I love my family. They love me. My father never meant to bury us all in a hole. He’s not a bad man. He’s just a flawed human and aren’t we all? Right now, I don’t like the girl on the bus or the girl in the mirror, I decide.
I grab my purse. “I’m off to see the studio.”
Jenna offers me a keen stare. “You want to talk? I can come over tonight and bring wine. Or vodka.”
“I film tomorrow, remember? No vodka for me.” I soften my voice. “But thank you. Love you, Jenna.” And I do. We aren’t supposed to be friends, per my father. She works for me, and all that stuff. But she’s amazing and she needs no supervision. The friendship happened naturally and I don’t regret it.
Once I’m in the lobby, the tall, broody guy in a suit, Jenna told me about, scowls at me and motions me to the door. “Who am I visiting?” I ask.
“I just take orders,” he replies, an irritated twang in his remark.
I don’t try again. One thing you learn quickly about Hollywood is that you’re not in charge. They are. At least until you reach a certain level of fame I don’t seek. I’ve always wondered why the bosses in charge don’t consider how the tables turn at later dates. Maybe it wouldn’t cost them so much to convince stars to do things if they did.
The limo waiting on me surprises me a bit. I’m not limo material by studio standards and my heart kicks up a beat. The meeting must be in the backseat of the car. Whoever wants to talk to me can’t be bothered with me in their office. The cranky man who greeted me and lead me downstairs opens the rear door. I climb inside to find I’m alone. Maybe ratings really are good? I mean they’re good, I know, but maybe they’re good on a whole other level?
My spirit lifts with this idea. The truth is I tend to downplay opportunities until they prove worthy of celebration. It’s a jinx thing. Every time I’m sure of something, it’s not sure at all. Suddenly this job might feel more important to me, and that’s when I really see things go south. I scold myself. Don’t get excited. This car means nothing.
The window between me and the driver probably means more.
A few minutes later the driver of my fancy limousine has yet to lower the glass between us, the car halts next to a high-rise. I don’t know the building though; I’ve most likely walked past it at some point. I might have grown up in Jersey where my parents tried to shelter me from the city, but my parents always had Manhattan offices. I was always here, then and now.
The car door opens and I exit. The same broody, grumpy guy who’d lead me to the car motions me forward. You know how this goes. He opens the door and I enter the ritzy lobby with glossy floors and fancy lighting dangling from silver poles. He doesn’t talk. I don’t talk. He waves at security and then punches the elevator button. When the door opens, I step inside and he leans in and punches floor thirty. It’s high. Not that I’m afraid of heights, but I could get nervous about the drop going down if I let myself. It’s the whole, everything falls from the bottom, no matter how hard you pull up thing.
It’s a thing my father says. It means—well it means, nothing good.
I glance at my watch to find it’s nearly six-thirty pm. Ooh, I’ve also done my ten thousand steps, thank you, New York City and the walk or die in the subway mentality. I’m not really sure what the late hour means for a studio office as far as busyness goes. I’d think most of the office staff would be gone by now. I’d speculate, translated as worry, about some weird casting couch thing but I already have the job and the program manager is a little old lady. A tough little old lady, but not the casting couch type.
I think. Who knows these days.
The elevator dings and I draw in a breath. I step into the foyer and I glance left and right only to discover there is only one set of double wooden doors. After closer inspection, I realize there is also no bell. I attempt to knock but it’s a solid door. No one is going to hear me. This is weird, I think, and there’s a warning bee buzzing about in my belly. This feels off. Am I at the wrong place?
I open the doors and step inside a lobby that smells of new leather and I sniff—spice. It smells like winter spice. I don’t really know why I know what winter spice smells like, but I do. It must be my mother’s obsession with all things holiday. The room is a lobby with a secretary’s desk and a seating area which is decorated in, of course, leather couches and chairs, hence the leather scent. No one is at the desk.
“Hello?” I call out several times, but it’s crickets in return. My options include one door to the left of the desk or the one behind me I came in through. The bee in my belly is buzzing again but I ignore it and walk toward the door.
It’s open and I step just inside the entryway.
There’s a man standing at the window and my heart begins a pitter patter in my chest. He’s tall, and dark, and familiar.
A rush of awareness floods me, a full body experience that might as well be me being swept into an icy ocean and pulled under. I can’t breathe. This isn’t happening. This isn’t him. I suck in a breath when I finally discover a bit of air, and he turns. God, he turns to face me. Then he’s all out there, we’re all out there, in a room, together, aware of each other. So. Very. Aware. His jaw is a perfect line, so very handsomely straight, his cheekbones a perfect angle, and the dimple in his chin just as adorable and sexy as I remember, but somehow, brutal. Yes, a dimple can be brutal if on this man. And of course, his silk tie is a royal blue that matches his eyes perfectly. The coldest of all eyes because they always feel warm, when the heat in their depths is nothing but a lie.
Lies hurt.
Deception hurts.
He. Hurt. Me.
I blink and he’s around the desk standing on this side of his visitor’s chairs. I don’t even remember him moving. His eyes travel over me, intimate in a way he has no right to look at me. “Alana,” he says softly, and his voice is silk and seduction, but somehow all demand. So much demand.
And just that easily he is the sun, burning me alive with anger and other things I will never admit. Because I didn’t know you could love and hate the same man as much as I do this one. I rotate to walk way, to leave him where he stands. I make it two steps when he says, “Do not walk away from me, Alana.” I halt because we both know I have no choice.
He owns me.
CHAPTER TwO
Ellen Blue
Twenty-Four Years Ago—Age Seven
“One hundred thousand? Are you insane? My client is not coming off that property a hundred thousand dollars. It’s prime real estate.”
“Oh, come on, Ellen. We both know the market is shit.”
“Prime real estate in New York City.”
“You’re good. I give you that, but I’m better. Call me when you’re ready to deal.”
I clench my fist and grimace. Eric Swenson is the real estate mogul straight from hell. I bet he’s the devil’s son. I start to punch in Richard’s number to tell him we might have to take a second mortgage if my luck keeps going this beautifully when I realize Alana and that new little boy next door are slippery and missing. They were just here. I twist around in the living room, making sure the kids are not behind me, but oh, no. No, they are not.
“Alana! Damion!” I call out and hurry toward the many rooms in the lower level of the apartment, repeating their names over and over. The problem with a monstrous home in a highly sought after zip code, I think as my heels click and clatter on the ridiculously expensive natural stone floor, aside from having to pay for it is finding what you have lost is impossible. But this was all Richard. We have to live the lifestyle to sell it, and become the real estate agents of the rich and famous. I roll my eyes as I start up the stairs. “Alana! Damion!”
By the time I’m at the top of the stairs, what felt like kids being kids is starting to feel ominous and freak me out. “Where are those kids?” I murmur, cutting right toward Alana’s bedroom and calling for them again. “Alana!” Damion!” Scanning the kitchen to no avail. “Kids! Where are you?”
I pass the kid’s library we had installed six months ago to create a love for books and learning in Alana, and double-step toward her bedroom. Once I’m inside the doorway, I halt, scanning the room, and the flutter in my chest is nothing in comparison to the sickening sensation in my belly. With a trembling hand, I reach for my phone, about to call Damion’s parents, praying they just slipped next door to his house, when I hear giggles from the inside of the closet.
It’s hard to explain to someone who isn’t a parent what it feels like to be angry and relieved in the same moment. I suspect it’s a bit like surviving a tidal wave. The water drags you under, suffocates you, and then you fight to survive, kicking and pumping your arms until the sweet thrill of air permeates your lungs. Shortly after, you swim as hard as you can to ensure your safety. The anger that follows a parent’s panic is much like that swim toward the shore. It feels necessary to ensure the survival of yourself and your child.
My feet pound a path to the closet and I whip open the door. The two kiddos sit there, eyeing me only to have my scowl transform their laughter into terror. It’s pretty easy to scare kids, and most of the time, us parents don’t want to do any such thing except when they scare us and we see their lives and our own flash before our eyes.
“Out,” I command, offering them the space it requires for them to pop to their feet and exit the closet.
Alana chews her bottom lip, an un-ladylike habit I’ve tried to wean her off of, but it’s almost as ingrained in her as her love of bargain box mac n cheese. I waggle my finger between them. “Why didn’t you answer me? I was worried. I thought someone grabbed you. You scared me to death. What were both of you thinking?”
“We were copying you and Mr. Blue,” Damion blurts.
My brows shoot up. “What does that mean?”
“Alana said I’m supposed to stick my tongue down her throat. That is what boys do to girls, but her gum got in my mouth and it was gross.”
Alana elbows him. “My gum is not gross, Damion.”
“It’s gross. Jeez, Alana. How do you not know that’s gross?”
Oh my God, is all I can think. They’re seven and already sticking their tongues in each other’s mouths. I point at Damion. “Go home.”
He tucks his chin, eyes Alana, and then darts from the room.
My hands plant on my hips. “What was that?”
“Damion and I are going to grow up and be like you and Daddy. We’re getting married.”
***
Alana
Nine Years Later—Age Sixteen
“I’m not going to prom.” I sip my chocolate shake. We’re at Shake Shack, which used to be our favorite place to spend Friday nights, back before he was always on a date, and I was always studying.
“Why not?” Damion asks.
“I don’t like the pressure.”
He laughs. “Pressure. What pressure? It’s a stupid school dance.”
“Who’s with who and all that stuff.”
“You’re with me. Problem solved. No pressure at all.”
My heart does this fluttery little thing. “You’re going with Stephanie.”
“No,” he says. “We should go together.”
“I’m not keeping you from being with the prom queen.”
“I need to be prom king like a need a hole in the head. I thought Jeffery asked you to go? He’s captain of the football team.”
I fiddle with my straw. “He keeps pressuring me.”
His brow arches. “Like he wants between your legs?”
“Jeez. You’re such a guy. Yes. He wants to have sex. Doesn’t every guy?”
“Yes,” he says. “I’m taking you to prom.”
“You have a date.”
“With you.”
“We don’t date. We agreed. That would ruin our friendship and be weird since we live next to each other.”
He draws a d breath and lets it out. “Whose idea was that?”
It was mine, and he knows it. We both know it. It had come about one night a year before, when we’d almost kissed. I’d been certain we’d date, breakup, and hate each other, and I’d told him so. He’d agreed. Maybe a little too easily. I’ve lived to regret turning down that kiss he’s never offered again.
“I just don’t want us to ever hate each other.”
“Do you really think that’s possible?”
“There’s more of a chance if we cross that line. Take Stephanie to the prom.”
“And you’ll do what?”
“I’ll go with my football player boyfriend.”
“And you’ll say no to fucking him.”
I blanch at the use of the F-word. “Probably, but I can’t stay a virgin forever.”
His expression tightens. “I can’t have this conversation with you. Let’s go.” He stands up and starts walking toward the door.
I don’t get up and he leaves without me.
***
I don’t see Damion again until prom but I dress in a sexy black dress, with a deep cut back, with him on my mind. Jeffery, the boyfriend and football player, is all about the dress and me. I should be pleased. He’s good-looking and enviable as a date, but I walk into prom looking for Damion. Me and him and our dates come face-to-face. He’s in a tuxedo looking hotter than he’s ever looked and his eyes burn into mine, anger in their depths I don’t understand.
“Alana,” he greets, his arm around Stephanie, who is blonde and all cleavage even at our young age. He’s sleeping with her, of course.
“Hi, Damion,” I say and turn to Jeffery and away from him. “I’d love some punch.”
That’s how the rest of the night goes. Each encounter with Damion is hot and cold, until I’m outside making out with Jeffery just to survive the idea that Damion is making out with Stephanie. I don’t sleep with Jeffery, though. I just don’t. I’m sure Damion does plenty with Stephanie.
The next morning, I roll out of bed tired and hurt over the boy next door who is my best friend, just my best friend, but I feel so many things for him, I barely understand. It’s so confusing. I pad my way into the kitchen and do what I’ve done since I was a little girl. I start baking my way into happiness. I make chocolate chip pancakes. I’ve just finished the first batch when I find the note from my parents: We went to a business breakfast in the city. Can’t wait to hear about last night. —Mom
There’s a knock on the door and I don’t even bother to look in the mirror. It’s probably a package. I open the door to find Damion standing there, his hair rumpled, his T-shirt snug over his really nice chest.
“What are you doing here?”
“I thought we’d exchange prom notes.”
“No, I didn’t sleep with him. Now go home.”
“Good. And no.” He sniffs the air. “I smell food. I’m hungry.”
His “good” has pleased me for no real reason so I admit, “I made chocolate chip pancakes. I have extra.” I open the door and let him inside.
***
Two Years Later—Age Eighteen
“What’s wrong, honey?”
I draw in a breath and shake myself back to the present. I’m at the kitchen counter, staring at the stack of pancakes with chocolate chips in them in front of me. Damion loves chocolate chip pancakes. I make them every Saturday and he comes over no matter who his new girlfriend is at the time. But his newest—Cara, who isn’t that new anymore, doesn’t love it or me. Which is silly. Damion and I are just friends.
“Alana.”
I blink my mother into view. “Nothing.”
Her expression softens. “You’re upset that he isn’t here. He leaves for Yale today. You know his parents want every moment with him.”
Because his father hates him, I think, but probably wants to lecture him about living up to the West name. His mother is another story. I’m not sure how someone so nice is with someone as cruel as Damion’s father. “You’ll be right there with him at Yale in six months, honey. His birthday just fell at the right time to put him ahead of you.”
“I know,” I say, but in my mind, six months feels like forever and truly, he’ll probably forget me by then.
“Why don’t you take him the pancakes?” she suggests.
“I thought you didn’t like Damion?”
“He’s a player and at such a young age. It’s hard to see you so hung up on him when I know he’ll hurt you.”
“He’s not going to hurt me. We’re friends.”
“Who you’re going to marry?”
I roll my eyes. “I was seven when I said that. Can you please let it go?”
The doorbell rings, and my heart goes nuts, fluttering as wildly as branches in a storm. My mother pats the counter. “It’s him. Go, say goodbye.” She pauses. “For now. You’ll see him in six months.”
Or not, I think. Out of sight, out of mind.
The doorbell rings again.
“Go,” my mother urges.
She’s being ridiculously supportive after how negative she’s been about Damion. I nod and slide off the stool, heading for the front door. I peer out of the window and sure enough, Damion’s on my doorstep. Butterflies swim wildly in my belly, and I open the door. He stands there, ridiculously good-looking, with his tousled dark brown hair, his perfect body and handsome face, and grins at me. His grin is perfect too. I’ve heard the good-looking high school boys never become the hot guys of adulthood. I find that hard to believe with Damion.
“You’re leaving?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says. “My parents want to leave now to have time to check things out. They have a chopper waiting.”
Of course. Because we might be next door neighbors, but a few years back, his family hit the money train. Not that we’re hurting. This is a high-end area, and my parents do well. Just not money train well. Sometimes I’m not even sure we belong here.
“It feels weird leaving,” he says.
“Yeah,” I say, afraid if I expand beyond confirmation I’ll cry.
He holds out his arms. “Come here.”
I sway in his direction, and he’s already in front of me, enclosing me in his strong arms and molding me close, the delicious scent I can only call “The Damion.” It’s earthy and rich and wonderful, and then to my utter shock, his hand cups my face. “I have to do this,” he says, and his mouth closes down on mine, a long lick of his tongue curling my toes. Oh my God. I’ve waited for this for so long. I sink into the kiss and hold onto him, drowning in a lifetime of wanting him, and finally having him.
I’m still swimming in the moment when his lips part from mine. “That’s what boys are supposed to do to girls, right?” he teases, referencing our closet kiss when we were seven.
I laugh. “At least I didn’t have gum in my mouth.”
“No, you taste like chocolate pancakes.”
I laugh again, feeling every bit a schoolgirl with a hot crush realized. “What happened to Cara?”
“We’re never going to work long distance.”
“How’d she take the break-up?”
“Oh, I didn’t break up with her. That’ll just happen.”
Reality hits me hard and fast, and I shove away from him. “You kissed me and you’re still with her?”
“Oh, come on Alana. You and I are not like me and her.”
“Oh my God. How did I not know what an ass you are?”
“Are you serious? I’m your best friend, Alana.”
“No, you’re not. You would not have kissed me while committed to someone else if that were the case. Go to college, Damion. I hope you grow up there, I really do.” With that, I turn for the door.
He catches my arm. “Don’t do this. I don’t want us to be like this.”
“It’s too late. Now I know the real you.” I jerk my arm from his and shove the cracked door open, slamming it behind me. That’s all it takes for me to burst into tears, hit the wall with my back, and slide downward until I’m on the floor.
Almost immediately, my mother is in front of me, squatting at eye level. “What just happened?”
“You were right about him,” I sob. “He’s not who I thought he was.” I fling my arms around her.
She hugs me and whispers, “He’s young honey. You’re both young.”
But she’s wrong. I would never do what he just did to someone and we’re the same age.
I can’t believe I’ve secretly believed I’d one day marry him all my life.
Twenty-Four Years Ago—Age Seven
“One hundred thousand? Are you insane? My client is not coming off that property a hundred thousand dollars. It’s prime real estate.”
“Oh, come on, Ellen. We both know the market is shit.”
“Prime real estate in New York City.”
“You’re good. I give you that, but I’m better. Call me when you’re ready to deal.”
I clench my fist and grimace. Eric Swenson is the real estate mogul straight from hell. I bet he’s the devil’s son. I start to punch in Richard’s number to tell him we might have to take a second mortgage if my luck keeps going this beautifully when I realize Alana and that new little boy next door are slippery and missing. They were just here. I twist around in the living room, making sure the kids are not behind me, but oh, no. No, they are not.
“Alana! Damion!” I call out and hurry toward the many rooms in the lower level of the apartment, repeating their names over and over. The problem with a monstrous home in a highly sought after zip code, I think as my heels click and clatter on the ridiculously expensive natural stone floor, aside from having to pay for it is finding what you have lost is impossible. But this was all Richard. We have to live the lifestyle to sell it, and become the real estate agents of the rich and famous. I roll my eyes as I start up the stairs. “Alana! Damion!”
By the time I’m at the top of the stairs, what felt like kids being kids is starting to feel ominous and freak me out. “Where are those kids?” I murmur, cutting right toward Alana’s bedroom and calling for them again. “Alana!” Damion!” Scanning the kitchen to no avail. “Kids! Where are you?”
I pass the kid’s library we had installed six months ago to create a love for books and learning in Alana, and double-step toward her bedroom. Once I’m inside the doorway, I halt, scanning the room, and the flutter in my chest is nothing in comparison to the sickening sensation in my belly. With a trembling hand, I reach for my phone, about to call Damion’s parents, praying they just slipped next door to his house, when I hear giggles from the inside of the closet.
It’s hard to explain to someone who isn’t a parent what it feels like to be angry and relieved in the same moment. I suspect it’s a bit like surviving a tidal wave. The water drags you under, suffocates you, and then you fight to survive, kicking and pumping your arms until the sweet thrill of air permeates your lungs. Shortly after, you swim as hard as you can to ensure your safety. The anger that follows a parent’s panic is much like that swim toward the shore. It feels necessary to ensure the survival of yourself and your child.
My feet pound a path to the closet and I whip open the door. The two kiddos sit there, eyeing me only to have my scowl transform their laughter into terror. It’s pretty easy to scare kids, and most of the time, us parents don’t want to do any such thing except when they scare us and we see their lives and our own flash before our eyes.
“Out,” I command, offering them the space it requires for them to pop to their feet and exit the closet.
Alana chews her bottom lip, an un-ladylike habit I’ve tried to wean her off of, but it’s almost as ingrained in her as her love of bargain box mac n cheese. I waggle my finger between them. “Why didn’t you answer me? I was worried. I thought someone grabbed you. You scared me to death. What were both of you thinking?”
“We were copying you and Mr. Blue,” Damion blurts.
My brows shoot up. “What does that mean?”
“Alana said I’m supposed to stick my tongue down her throat. That is what boys do to girls, but her gum got in my mouth and it was gross.”
Alana elbows him. “My gum is not gross, Damion.”
“It’s gross. Jeez, Alana. How do you not know that’s gross?”
Oh my God, is all I can think. They’re seven and already sticking their tongues in each other’s mouths. I point at Damion. “Go home.”
He tucks his chin, eyes Alana, and then darts from the room.
My hands plant on my hips. “What was that?”
“Damion and I are going to grow up and be like you and Daddy. We’re getting married.”
***
Alana
Nine Years Later—Age Sixteen
“I’m not going to prom.” I sip my chocolate shake. We’re at Shake Shack, which used to be our favorite place to spend Friday nights, back before he was always on a date, and I was always studying.
“Why not?” Damion asks.
“I don’t like the pressure.”
He laughs. “Pressure. What pressure? It’s a stupid school dance.”
“Who’s with who and all that stuff.”
“You’re with me. Problem solved. No pressure at all.”
My heart does this fluttery little thing. “You’re going with Stephanie.”
“No,” he says. “We should go together.”
“I’m not keeping you from being with the prom queen.”
“I need to be prom king like a need a hole in the head. I thought Jeffery asked you to go? He’s captain of the football team.”
I fiddle with my straw. “He keeps pressuring me.”
His brow arches. “Like he wants between your legs?”
“Jeez. You’re such a guy. Yes. He wants to have sex. Doesn’t every guy?”
“Yes,” he says. “I’m taking you to prom.”
“You have a date.”
“With you.”
“We don’t date. We agreed. That would ruin our friendship and be weird since we live next to each other.”
He draws a d breath and lets it out. “Whose idea was that?”
It was mine, and he knows it. We both know it. It had come about one night a year before, when we’d almost kissed. I’d been certain we’d date, breakup, and hate each other, and I’d told him so. He’d agreed. Maybe a little too easily. I’ve lived to regret turning down that kiss he’s never offered again.
“I just don’t want us to ever hate each other.”
“Do you really think that’s possible?”
“There’s more of a chance if we cross that line. Take Stephanie to the prom.”
“And you’ll do what?”
“I’ll go with my football player boyfriend.”
“And you’ll say no to fucking him.”
I blanch at the use of the F-word. “Probably, but I can’t stay a virgin forever.”
His expression tightens. “I can’t have this conversation with you. Let’s go.” He stands up and starts walking toward the door.
I don’t get up and he leaves without me.
***
I don’t see Damion again until prom but I dress in a sexy black dress, with a deep cut back, with him on my mind. Jeffery, the boyfriend and football player, is all about the dress and me. I should be pleased. He’s good-looking and enviable as a date, but I walk into prom looking for Damion. Me and him and our dates come face-to-face. He’s in a tuxedo looking hotter than he’s ever looked and his eyes burn into mine, anger in their depths I don’t understand.
“Alana,” he greets, his arm around Stephanie, who is blonde and all cleavage even at our young age. He’s sleeping with her, of course.
“Hi, Damion,” I say and turn to Jeffery and away from him. “I’d love some punch.”
That’s how the rest of the night goes. Each encounter with Damion is hot and cold, until I’m outside making out with Jeffery just to survive the idea that Damion is making out with Stephanie. I don’t sleep with Jeffery, though. I just don’t. I’m sure Damion does plenty with Stephanie.
The next morning, I roll out of bed tired and hurt over the boy next door who is my best friend, just my best friend, but I feel so many things for him, I barely understand. It’s so confusing. I pad my way into the kitchen and do what I’ve done since I was a little girl. I start baking my way into happiness. I make chocolate chip pancakes. I’ve just finished the first batch when I find the note from my parents: We went to a business breakfast in the city. Can’t wait to hear about last night. —Mom
There’s a knock on the door and I don’t even bother to look in the mirror. It’s probably a package. I open the door to find Damion standing there, his hair rumpled, his T-shirt snug over his really nice chest.
“What are you doing here?”
“I thought we’d exchange prom notes.”
“No, I didn’t sleep with him. Now go home.”
“Good. And no.” He sniffs the air. “I smell food. I’m hungry.”
His “good” has pleased me for no real reason so I admit, “I made chocolate chip pancakes. I have extra.” I open the door and let him inside.
***
Two Years Later—Age Eighteen
“What’s wrong, honey?”
I draw in a breath and shake myself back to the present. I’m at the kitchen counter, staring at the stack of pancakes with chocolate chips in them in front of me. Damion loves chocolate chip pancakes. I make them every Saturday and he comes over no matter who his new girlfriend is at the time. But his newest—Cara, who isn’t that new anymore, doesn’t love it or me. Which is silly. Damion and I are just friends.
“Alana.”
I blink my mother into view. “Nothing.”
Her expression softens. “You’re upset that he isn’t here. He leaves for Yale today. You know his parents want every moment with him.”
Because his father hates him, I think, but probably wants to lecture him about living up to the West name. His mother is another story. I’m not sure how someone so nice is with someone as cruel as Damion’s father. “You’ll be right there with him at Yale in six months, honey. His birthday just fell at the right time to put him ahead of you.”
“I know,” I say, but in my mind, six months feels like forever and truly, he’ll probably forget me by then.
“Why don’t you take him the pancakes?” she suggests.
“I thought you didn’t like Damion?”
“He’s a player and at such a young age. It’s hard to see you so hung up on him when I know he’ll hurt you.”
“He’s not going to hurt me. We’re friends.”
“Who you’re going to marry?”
I roll my eyes. “I was seven when I said that. Can you please let it go?”
The doorbell rings, and my heart goes nuts, fluttering as wildly as branches in a storm. My mother pats the counter. “It’s him. Go, say goodbye.” She pauses. “For now. You’ll see him in six months.”
Or not, I think. Out of sight, out of mind.
The doorbell rings again.
“Go,” my mother urges.
She’s being ridiculously supportive after how negative she’s been about Damion. I nod and slide off the stool, heading for the front door. I peer out of the window and sure enough, Damion’s on my doorstep. Butterflies swim wildly in my belly, and I open the door. He stands there, ridiculously good-looking, with his tousled dark brown hair, his perfect body and handsome face, and grins at me. His grin is perfect too. I’ve heard the good-looking high school boys never become the hot guys of adulthood. I find that hard to believe with Damion.
“You’re leaving?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says. “My parents want to leave now to have time to check things out. They have a chopper waiting.”
Of course. Because we might be next door neighbors, but a few years back, his family hit the money train. Not that we’re hurting. This is a high-end area, and my parents do well. Just not money train well. Sometimes I’m not even sure we belong here.
“It feels weird leaving,” he says.
“Yeah,” I say, afraid if I expand beyond confirmation I’ll cry.
He holds out his arms. “Come here.”
I sway in his direction, and he’s already in front of me, enclosing me in his strong arms and molding me close, the delicious scent I can only call “The Damion.” It’s earthy and rich and wonderful, and then to my utter shock, his hand cups my face. “I have to do this,” he says, and his mouth closes down on mine, a long lick of his tongue curling my toes. Oh my God. I’ve waited for this for so long. I sink into the kiss and hold onto him, drowning in a lifetime of wanting him, and finally having him.
I’m still swimming in the moment when his lips part from mine. “That’s what boys are supposed to do to girls, right?” he teases, referencing our closet kiss when we were seven.
I laugh. “At least I didn’t have gum in my mouth.”
“No, you taste like chocolate pancakes.”
I laugh again, feeling every bit a schoolgirl with a hot crush realized. “What happened to Cara?”
“We’re never going to work long distance.”
“How’d she take the break-up?”
“Oh, I didn’t break up with her. That’ll just happen.”
Reality hits me hard and fast, and I shove away from him. “You kissed me and you’re still with her?”
“Oh, come on Alana. You and I are not like me and her.”
“Oh my God. How did I not know what an ass you are?”
“Are you serious? I’m your best friend, Alana.”
“No, you’re not. You would not have kissed me while committed to someone else if that were the case. Go to college, Damion. I hope you grow up there, I really do.” With that, I turn for the door.
He catches my arm. “Don’t do this. I don’t want us to be like this.”
“It’s too late. Now I know the real you.” I jerk my arm from his and shove the cracked door open, slamming it behind me. That’s all it takes for me to burst into tears, hit the wall with my back, and slide downward until I’m on the floor.
Almost immediately, my mother is in front of me, squatting at eye level. “What just happened?”
“You were right about him,” I sob. “He’s not who I thought he was.” I fling my arms around her.
She hugs me and whispers, “He’s young honey. You’re both young.”
But she’s wrong. I would never do what he just did to someone and we’re the same age.
I can’t believe I’ve secretly believed I’d one day marry him all my life.
CHAPTER Three
Alana
Three Years Later—Age Twenty-One
While it might seem an impossibility for Damion and me to attend the same university and never run into each other, that is, in fact, the way my first three years at Yale have played out. I spent the first year on campus telling myself I wasn’t looking for him, but secretly watching for him at all times. I was convinced he’d transferred schools, and impatiently dove into his father’s financial empire, but I never let myself look at the student body directory.
Damion West is the past.
I’m looking toward the future, nose down, books open—quite literally—as I study for an exam the entire class fears we will fail.
“You do know it’s my birthday, right?”
This from my best friend and roommate, Sally, who is now sitting in the chair next to my desk. “We did cake and pretty things in a bag,” I say as I laugh. “Yes. I know it’s your birthday.”
“Then put down the books and let’s go out.”
“This test—”
“You’ll nail it like you nail them all.”
“I’m trying to get into law school,” I remind her, which is a big deal for me.
My family sells high-end real estate, and despite us doing quite well, to people in this world, we’re the service industry. Too often I have to point out how whatever another student’s family does is in fact, service. Which is exactly why I’m going to law school. If we had a legal side to our business, which would include real estate law, we will be bigger and stronger.
“Max’s fraternity is having a party. He wants us to come.”
My lips press together. She knows I hate the fraternity scene. I have no interest in snobby guys in heat. They all believe themselves better than everyone else, but they’ll still get you naked. Max has shades of such things in him, too, which didn’t set well at first. He’s a good guy underneath it all though, and once I got to know him, he accepted me and me him. Of course, he did. Sally loves me. I love Sally. And Sally’s family is big tech rich. He looks up to her, not down as he would have me without her by my side. “I really have to study.”
“We only have a year until law school. Then it gets intense.”
She has a year until law school. I’m still not accepted.
“This is our last year to just be college kids, you and me against the world.”
The future attorney in her is one heck of a negotiator. “How do I turn that down?” I ask. “You’re my best friend.” I’ve barely spoken the words when she stands and pulls me to my feet. “Let’s pick out the perfect dresses.”
***
The fraternity headquarters resembles a castle on the outside, but the inside is just a house, and not even a special house. Or so Sally tells me. I’ve never been here before. I don’t even want to be here now. We head up a long concrete stairwell and Sally wraps her arm around me. “Twins,” she declares, meaning our little black dresses, when we are far from twins at all. She’s tall, I’m not. I have long brunette hair and she wears her blonde hair in a bob cut to her shoulders. Okay, it is a little longer than a bob, at least in my mind, but it hangs like one, straight with a perfect edge.
We continue our upward climb, and music vibrates through the walkway, promising a loud, rowdy party. At the top of the stairs, a tall, good-looking guy greets us. Sally waves at him and then me. “She’s with me,” she says. “And broke up with her boyfriend, which means she’s single. You should come say ‘hi’ later.”
I roll my eyes. I don’t need her to find me a new man. So far, I’ve had three, all of which were self-absorbed and demanding in ways that pulled my attention from my future. I don’t need that or them.
Nevertheless, the dark-skinned, handsome guy looks me over, smiles and says, “I will.”
“Perfect,” Sally declares and pulls me inside the doorway of the castle.
Once we’re inside, the music isn’t as loud as I expected, thrumming rather than thumping through the room. People mingle in cliquey groups and random people hang all over each other.
“I’m going to find Max,” Sally announces, jabbing at my arm. “Get us a drink, will you?”
She doesn’t wait for an answer. She rushes forward, and I’m dust in the wind.
I’m not upset that she’s left me here in a den of horny boys because they sure aren’t men, not yet. She’ll be back. Sally is loyal and protective of me and our friendship. She wants to see Max, but he’s not her world. Sometimes I’m not sure Sally has found her world at all.
Someone bumps into me and I use the push that follows as motivation to head toward what I think is the kitchen. I’ve made it halfway across the room when I stop dead in my tracks, my heart thundering in my chest—no, pounding. This sensation is most definitely more pounding than thundering. Heavy, steal my breath, pounding.
Damion is here. He’s standing under the archway leading to another room and he’s watching me.
Three Years Later—Age Twenty-One
While it might seem an impossibility for Damion and me to attend the same university and never run into each other, that is, in fact, the way my first three years at Yale have played out. I spent the first year on campus telling myself I wasn’t looking for him, but secretly watching for him at all times. I was convinced he’d transferred schools, and impatiently dove into his father’s financial empire, but I never let myself look at the student body directory.
Damion West is the past.
I’m looking toward the future, nose down, books open—quite literally—as I study for an exam the entire class fears we will fail.
“You do know it’s my birthday, right?”
This from my best friend and roommate, Sally, who is now sitting in the chair next to my desk. “We did cake and pretty things in a bag,” I say as I laugh. “Yes. I know it’s your birthday.”
“Then put down the books and let’s go out.”
“This test—”
“You’ll nail it like you nail them all.”
“I’m trying to get into law school,” I remind her, which is a big deal for me.
My family sells high-end real estate, and despite us doing quite well, to people in this world, we’re the service industry. Too often I have to point out how whatever another student’s family does is in fact, service. Which is exactly why I’m going to law school. If we had a legal side to our business, which would include real estate law, we will be bigger and stronger.
“Max’s fraternity is having a party. He wants us to come.”
My lips press together. She knows I hate the fraternity scene. I have no interest in snobby guys in heat. They all believe themselves better than everyone else, but they’ll still get you naked. Max has shades of such things in him, too, which didn’t set well at first. He’s a good guy underneath it all though, and once I got to know him, he accepted me and me him. Of course, he did. Sally loves me. I love Sally. And Sally’s family is big tech rich. He looks up to her, not down as he would have me without her by my side. “I really have to study.”
“We only have a year until law school. Then it gets intense.”
She has a year until law school. I’m still not accepted.
“This is our last year to just be college kids, you and me against the world.”
The future attorney in her is one heck of a negotiator. “How do I turn that down?” I ask. “You’re my best friend.” I’ve barely spoken the words when she stands and pulls me to my feet. “Let’s pick out the perfect dresses.”
***
The fraternity headquarters resembles a castle on the outside, but the inside is just a house, and not even a special house. Or so Sally tells me. I’ve never been here before. I don’t even want to be here now. We head up a long concrete stairwell and Sally wraps her arm around me. “Twins,” she declares, meaning our little black dresses, when we are far from twins at all. She’s tall, I’m not. I have long brunette hair and she wears her blonde hair in a bob cut to her shoulders. Okay, it is a little longer than a bob, at least in my mind, but it hangs like one, straight with a perfect edge.
We continue our upward climb, and music vibrates through the walkway, promising a loud, rowdy party. At the top of the stairs, a tall, good-looking guy greets us. Sally waves at him and then me. “She’s with me,” she says. “And broke up with her boyfriend, which means she’s single. You should come say ‘hi’ later.”
I roll my eyes. I don’t need her to find me a new man. So far, I’ve had three, all of which were self-absorbed and demanding in ways that pulled my attention from my future. I don’t need that or them.
Nevertheless, the dark-skinned, handsome guy looks me over, smiles and says, “I will.”
“Perfect,” Sally declares and pulls me inside the doorway of the castle.
Once we’re inside, the music isn’t as loud as I expected, thrumming rather than thumping through the room. People mingle in cliquey groups and random people hang all over each other.
“I’m going to find Max,” Sally announces, jabbing at my arm. “Get us a drink, will you?”
She doesn’t wait for an answer. She rushes forward, and I’m dust in the wind.
I’m not upset that she’s left me here in a den of horny boys because they sure aren’t men, not yet. She’ll be back. Sally is loyal and protective of me and our friendship. She wants to see Max, but he’s not her world. Sometimes I’m not sure Sally has found her world at all.
Someone bumps into me and I use the push that follows as motivation to head toward what I think is the kitchen. I’ve made it halfway across the room when I stop dead in my tracks, my heart thundering in my chest—no, pounding. This sensation is most definitely more pounding than thundering. Heavy, steal my breath, pounding.
Damion is here. He’s standing under the archway leading to another room and he’s watching me.
