The Complete Private Collection: Private; Invitation Only; Untouchable; Confessions; Inner Circle; Legacy; Ambition; Revelation; Last Christmas; Paradise ... The Book of Spells; Ominous; Vengeance (128 page)

“Haven’t you ever heard that it’s inadvisable to have major relationship status conversations after chugging several fuzzy navels?” she asked slyly.

She was taking pleasure in this, and she wasn’t even trying to hide it.

“How do you know what I was drinking?” I demanded.

“Oh, I make a habit of keeping an eye on party crashers, just in
case they decide to cause trouble,” Ivy said, tilting her head. “Luckily, you only caused trouble for yourself.”

She placed a hand on the doorknob behind her. Josh was in there. She was about to join Josh. My heart skipped a nervous, covetous beat.

“What the hell are you doing here?” I demanded.

“Working on my senior project.” She glanced over her shoulder again, smoothing her shiny hair with her long, pale fingers. “I’ll be spending a lot of time in the studio this year,” she added pointedly.

Implication?
With Josh. I’ll be spending a lot of time in the studio this year with Josh.

She was just like Cheyenne with her “seniors stick together” routine. All to spend time with Josh. And just like that, I remembered. Ivy’s room last night. That bizarre collage. The pictures of her and Cheyenne being BFFs on beaches and boats and tennis courts. Ivy and Cheyenne, who were supposed to hate each other. Why had they hidden their friendship from the world? And what else was Ivy hiding?

“Well, I should go. Let you get back to your little fund-raising project,” Ivy said. “It’s good to have a distraction at a trying time like this, Reed. Doctor Phil would be proud.”

She gave my shoulder a quick squeeze with faux sympathy, then turned and walked into the room where Josh sat. Her red lips stretched into a mocking grin right before she slammed the heavy door in my face.

The tears burst forth all over again. I ran down the hall toward the exit, but before I could get through the door, it was opening. I slammed
into someone so hard he was knocked off his feet and his stuff scattered everywhere. Who knew the J.A.M. Building was so heavily trafficked on Monday evenings?

“Dammit,” I said, automatically crouching to the ground. Tears streaked down my nose, mingling with snot. I wiped my hand across my face, not even sure whether it made a difference. “I’m so sorry.”

“No. It’s my fault,” my victim replied, gathering his bag and notebook. “I never look where I’m going. Hey, are you okay?” I looked in his face for the first time. Light brown skin, dark, floppy hair, concerned brown eyes. Light brown eyes. Odd. Nice.

“M’fine,” I mumbled. “Just have to get out of here.”

“Okay.” He stood up, repositioning his stuff as it slid in his hands “I’m Marcellus Alberro. Marc for short. And you’re Reed Brennan.”

I looked at him quizzically. Why he felt the need to tell me my name was beyond me.

“Yeah.”

“I thought it was so cool how you didn’t back down from Cromwell,” Marc said with a smile.

I immediately thought of my encounter with West. Damn. Was this guy going to use my so-called bravery as a segue to ask me out too?

“I’m gonna do a story about it for the
Chronicle,
” he told me. “I was actually just on my way up to the offices to do some research and see if they’ve ever tried to shut down a whole dorm like this before. I’m on the paper,” he added needlessly. “In case that wasn’t clear.”

I heard myself laugh, which was a surprise.

“Well, good luck with your story, Marc-For-Short,” I said, shoving
the door open and letting the cold air pour in. All I wanted to do was go back to my dorm and do that curling-up-in-a-ball thing.

“Thanks. I’d like to interview you for it, if I could,” he blurted.

“Now?” I asked.

“Now’s good. If you can.”

Couldn’t he see what a mess I was? I was in no shape to be interviewed. But still, maybe it was a good idea. Get the press behind us. Some free publicity. Another distraction.

“Actually, I—”

But Ivy’s laughter cut me short. It wafted down the hallway from the studio, through the air vents, along the walls. It was everywhere. And it made the hair on my arms stand on end. Josh had made her laugh. Angry, bitter, brokenhearted Josh was down there right now, making Ivy Slade laugh.

“I’m sorry. I have to go,” I said.

Letting the door bang behind me, I tore across the rapidly darkening campus, leaving an understandably confused Marc-For-Short Alberro behind.

I had to call Dash. He was, after all, the reason I was such a total mess. I had risked everything for him, and now that I knew that I had risked and lost, I had to know why. Why had he lured me up to the roof at the Legacy? Why had he begged me to be with him? Why, when he was still in love with Noelle? Why, when all along he was planning on getting back together with her?

Or had he already? Had he gotten back together with her before we had hooked up? The idea sent my pulse into panic-attack mode as I rushed through the dark to Billings. I had to know. After everything that had happened, I deserved some kind of explanation. I knew now that I’d been used, but I was not at all blameless. I needed to know how awful my infraction was when it came to Noelle. Had I simply hooked up with a friend’s ex right before they had gotten back together, or had I helped the guy cheat on said friend?

There was a big difference.

“Reed! Wait up! Hold the door!” someone shouted as I slid my electronic key through the slot next to the inner door to Billings. The outer door was slowly closing as Kiki Rosen managed to slip through.

“Hey. Thanks,” she said, breathless. “I lost my key.”

“You did?” I asked.

“Yeah, over the weekend. Probably somewhere between here and Boston. I gotta go to Hell Hall tomorrow and get a new one. Such a pain in the ass,” she said, tugging the earbuds from her ears. I could hear tinny guitar music and drums blaring through them. She hustled inside and headed straight for the parlor off the Billings lobby, where a few people were hanging out.

“You coming?” she asked over her shoulder as she struggled out of her puffer coat. “Astrid said we were going to talk fund-raiser.”

“In a minute. I have to do something first,” I replied.

I sprinted up the stairs before anyone could protest, taking the steps two at a time. My room on the top floor was, mercifully, empty. Sitting on the edge of my bed, I struggled to get my breathing under control as I speed-dialed Dash on my iPhone. I held my breath, unsure of what I was going to say, but certain it was going to be shouted. I had a lot of angry, confused adrenaline to spew. Why not spew it at Dash “You’re All I Think About, Reed” McCafferty?

The phone rang once, then clicked over to voice mail.

“This is Dash McCafferty. Please leave a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.”

So formal, that Dash. I hung up before the beep. I was not in the frame of mind to leave a coherent message. I yanked my laptop off my
desk and hit a few keys to bring it to life. My fingers trembled as they hovered over the keyboard, waiting for my e-mail to boot up. When it did, I typed a simple message.

Dash,

We need to talk. Call me.

—Reed

Message sent, I tossed the computer on the foot of my bed and collapsed backward, my legs hooked over the side of my mattress, feet on the floor. Dried tears tightened my cheeks. Josh hated me. Hated me. And Dash had abandoned me. And Noelle was going to kill me when she found out. How had I gotten here? How had everything gotten so screwed up? My head pounded as if my brain were pulsating against my skull and my skull against my skin. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and brought my fingers to my temples.

Breathe, Reed. Just breathe.

But Josh’s disgusted expression kept flitting through my brain and my head pounded harder. My throat was desiccated, and the muscles in my back and neck coiled painfully. I couldn’t take it anymore. This wasn’t just the drama talking. This was the hangover. The lack of sleep. I had been awake since yesterday morning. Awake and partying and drinking and puking and barely eating a thing.

God, I loathed myself.

It was still early. Not even six o’clock. Dinner had yet to be served at the dining hall, but I didn’t care. This day had to end. Now. I would
take something for the headache and go to bed, and tomorrow I would start fresh. Start my life without Josh. Somehow, I would start over.

I forced myself up to a seated position, my eye sockets exploding with pain, and reached for my top desk drawer, where I kept a small bottle of Tylenol. As I yanked the drawer open there was a racket not unlike the sound of a dozen bowling balls racing down their lanes. Then a slam.

The unexpected noise scared me half to death, but when I peered into the drawer, my heart all but stopped.

Black marbles, dozens of them, had rolled forward from the back of the drawer and slammed into the front. A few latecomers still trickled forth, bouncing around my pens and pencils to join their friends.

Black marbles. Used in the inner circle for voting people out. For expelling people from Billings.

Who had put these in my drawer? Why? Was it just some kind of stupid prank, or was someone sending a message? That they wanted me out? Wanted me gone?

I was just starting to hyperventilate when the door to my room opened. I grabbed the Tylenol bottle, then slammed the drawer so hard the framed picture of me and my brother, Scott, fell over on my desktop. Sabine came traipsing in, all excitement, too hyper to realize anything was wrong.

“Omigosh! Everyone on campus is talking about how incredible you were,” she trilled, dropping her backpack on her bed. She turned to me, her green eyes glowing. Lately Sabine had updated
her Caribbean wardrobe to better suit the New England autumn weather, and today she was wearing a kelly green turtleneck, tartan skirt, and tall brown boots. The preppy look suited her, but she still wore her shell earrings, which dangled almost to her shoulders. “Your fund-raiser is
the
hot topic of the day. Do you have any ideas yet?”

“No. Not yet,” I said shakily.

I popped the top off the Tylenol bottle with my thumb and let it fall to the floor. The two white pills lodged for a second in my dry throat, but I managed to choke them down.

“Do you want some water or something?” Sabine asked.

“M’fine,” I mumbled. I kicked off my sneakers and tipped to the side so I could free my covers from under my butt without actually standing up.

“You’re going to bed?” Sabine asked, her face falling. “But everyone’s waiting for you downstairs to talk about the fund-raiser.”

“Tomorrow,” I told her, clicking off my desk light.

I lay down fully clothed and pulled the covers up over my head, turning my back on her crestfallen face—on my desk and everything it contained. All I wanted was to go to sleep and put the past two days behind me.

Suddenly, I felt her weight at the foot of my bed. I looked up to find Sabine sitting near my feet, looking at me with concern in the dim light coming through the window.

“Is it Josh? Do you want to talk about it?” she asked.

“Not now,” I replied.

“Because I know it’s hard, having your heart broken,” she said sympathetically.

“Who broke your heart?” I muttered. There was the tiniest light of curiosity deep inside of me. Sabine had never mentioned any exes before.

“Me? Oh, no one. I’ve never had a real boyfriend,” she told me, looking down at her hands. “But I helped my sister through a horrible breakup. She said she would never have survived it if it wasn’t for me. So maybe I can help you, too.”

I managed a tight smile for her benefit. “Maybe. Just not tonight, okay? Right now all I want to do is sleep.”

“Okay,” Sabine said finally. “I’ll go tell them.”

“Thanks.”

Sabine slipped out and closed the door with a quiet click. Part of me felt guilty for bailing on my friends, but it was just one night. I could think about all of this tomorrow—about the fund-raiser and the black marbles and Dash and Noelle and Josh and Ivy and everything else. Right now, I craved only the sweet release of sleep.

The black marbles were still there in the morning. I had hoped to find when I woke up that they were just one of the many sick, swirling dreams I had all night long, but when I opened the drawer, there they were. Not a figment of my subconscious, but real. Unwilling to dwell on the circumstances of how they had gotten there, I gathered them all up, shoved them into a lone sock that had lost its partner, and deposited the whole thing in the back of my bottom dresser drawer. After all, I might need them at the end of the year when we voted on new members for the house. If, of course, the house lasted that long.

It didn’t matter how the black marbles had wound up in my possession—who might have put them in my desk. It didn’t. Today was a new day. A new start. I had to focus. There was no time to dwell. No time to freak myself out.

I showered, downed some more Tylenol to take the edge off my stubbornly clinging headache, and dressed up for my first day as
Single Reed. In-Charge Reed. A Reed with a Purpose. Black skirt, black boots, light blue V-neck sweater. I was going to show the world that my breakup wasn’t getting to me—even though every time I thought about it, I felt like collapsing into a heap on the floor.

At breakfast, I strolled over to my usual table with Constance, Sabine, and Kiki in tow and waited for them to settle in among the rest of the Billings Girls. Then I placed my tray at the end of the table and forced a bright smile.

“Everyone, I have an idea.”

Silence fell. Kiki took the earbuds out of her ears. I noticed for the first time that her bangs were no longer pink. Instead, her blond hair was streaked with royal blue.

“Do tell,” Noelle said, looking up at me as she tore off a chunk of her bagel.

“We should hold the fund-raiser in New York,” I announced.

The Billings Girls murmured in excitement and tired eyes brightened all around our two tables. My heart fluttered with pride.

“Most of the Easton alumni live there or close by, so why not bring the party to the money?” I suggested.