The Complete Private Collection: Private; Invitation Only; Untouchable; Confessions; Inner Circle; Legacy; Ambition; Revelation; Last Christmas; Paradise ... The Book of Spells; Ominous; Vengeance (224 page)

“That’s Daddy. Always multitasking,” Noelle joked.

“He doesn’t have to do all this,” I said, a bit awed by his concern for and defense of me.

“Sure he does. He likes to be in control,” Noelle said with a shrug.

Like father, like daughter. I heard him pause to talk to some people out in the hallway and recognized Taylor Bell’s voice. I glanced at Noelle quizzically.

“A bunch of people came to make sure you were okay,” she explained. “Dash, Kiran, Taylor, Tiff, Amberly, Gage, West . . .”

All my friends from Easton. Even Gage Coolidge, who usually called me Farm Girl. And Amberly, who was closer to frenemy than friend. Of course Poppy, Paige, Sienna, and Daniel, Paige’s brother, hadn’t shown. Why was I not surprised?

“You guys believe me, right?” I asked, looking around at my friends.

“Of course,” Sawyer replied.

My heart welled with gratitude. I was about to thank him, but then Upton walked over and paused next to his chair. “You mind, mate?” he said.

Sawyer glanced at him, hesitated, then got up, pushing the chair toward the wall with the back of his legs without a word. Upton leaned over and kissed my lips, running his hand over my forehead before dropping right down in Sawyer’s vacated seat.

“Just calm down and get some rest,” he said, clasping my hand in both of his. His deep voice and sexy English accent sent a pleasant thrill down my spine. The first pleasant sensation I’d had since I woke up. “We can deal with all of this later. Right now you just have to take care of yourself.”

“Okay,” I said, my voice full. “I’m so glad you guys are here,” I added, glancing at Noelle.

“We’re not going anywhere,” Noelle replied, pulling up another chair from under the window. “Just try to get some sleep.”

I nodded and leaned back into the pillows, clinging to Upton’s hand. A sense of peace came over me and I felt my eyelids growing heavy. Everything was going to be okay. Upton and Noelle would take care of me. And Sawyer. Sawyer had saved me. I wouldn’t even be here if not for him. Plus, he believed me. He was the only one other than Mr. Lange who had actually said he believed me.

I forced my tired eyes open, intending to thank him again, but when I glanced around the room, he was already gone.

My bags were packed and placed next to the front door of the Langes’ house, along with the footlocker brimming with college sweatshirts that Upton had given me for Christmas. Mr. Lange barked into his cell phone at the police, pacing around the glass-topped coffee table in the great room of the Langes’ vacation home. I stood near the door, my fingers toying with the tiny shell on my rope necklace—a Christmas gift from Sawyer, which I had put on for the first time that morning. I stared at the footlocker, letting my eyes focus and blur, focus and blur.

I’d been so happy on Christmas Eve. So in the moment with Upton. I wished we could have just stayed there forever, hanging out on the floor of his father’s study. Alone together. Where no one could touch us. I had to get out of here. How could I stay after everything that had happened? But I felt the loss of everything this trip could have been. It pressed against my chest like an iron fist.

“Is that everything?” Noelle asked, coming up behind me.

I jumped and let out an involuntary yelp. Apparently almost getting killed three times in a week can make a girl jumpy.

“Sorry. I forgot. No sneak attacks,” Noelle said, touching my shoulder lightly.

Her hair was back in a loose bun and she wore a black T-shirt dress with a neckline so wide the right side fell off her shoulder, exposing her perfectly tanned skin. She looked like a girl without a care in the world. Someone ready to spend her day lazing on the beach sipping piña coladas, just waiting for some hot guy to come along and reapply her suntan lotion. I had never been more envious of her than I was in that moment.

Carefree was not a state with which I was familiar.

“Yeah. That’s everything,” I said.

“Are you sure about this?” Noelle asked. “If you stay I swear I won’t let you out of my sight for the rest of the trip.”

“That’s comforting, but no thanks,” I said, taking a deep breath. “My parents are expecting me today and my mother is kind of freaking out after everything that’s happened. I think she’ll lose it if she doesn’t actually get to see me and make sure I’m in one piece.”

Noelle smirked. “Parents.”

“I know. Besides, whoever’s after me is on this island, so I think the best thing to do is just to get the hell off of it,” I added.

“Get the hell off of what?”

“Omigod,” I breathed, my hand flying to my chest.

Upton had walked up behind us from the great room, once again
scaring the wind right out of me. He was wearing a soft-looking navy blue polo and white linen pants, and his feet were bare. His light brown hair had been tousled by the ocean breeze and he made no move to fix it. He was gorgeous. Of course he was. But my heart didn’t skip in excitement upon seeing him, like it had every other time he’d entered a room. Since being released from the hospital the afternoon before, I had been trying not to think about all those hours in the water alone. Instead, I’d been focusing on what had happened before my ignominious plunge.

Namely, that Upton had left me alone at one of the most humiliating moments of my life and run off to comfort Poppy Simon, the girl he had been hooking up with for the past few months—until he met me. Poppy was the person he’d been worried about after she and Mrs. Ryan had caught the two of us rolling around on the bed in Mrs. Ryan’s stateroom. Her feelings were the ones that mattered to him. Not mine. When I’d seen him at the hospital, my mind hadn’t even gone there. I was so happy just to be with him again, to be alive, that I’d momentarily spaced on how much he’d hurt me.

But now I remembered. And I was not happy.

“Where did you come from?” Noelle asked. She shot him a narrow-eyed look. I had told Noelle the entire stateroom story the night before, and she had been about ready to drive over to Upton’s and wring his neck. Girl always had my back.

“Walked up from the beach,” Upton replied, tilting his head toward the sliding glass doors that fronted the white sand and the pristine turquoise ocean beyond. His sandy flip-flops had been
left by the open door. “I was going to ring you, but it’s such a gorgeous day I decided on a stroll instead. Now who’s getting the hell off what?”

“I am,” I said tonelessly. I picked up my hoodie, which I’d flung over the top of my suitcase, and shoved my arms into it. “I’m getting the hell off this island.”

Upton’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “What? Why?”

He sounded shocked. Like he couldn’t think of a single reason I might want to go. I felt so angry and defensive that my shoulders actually curled.

“You seriously need to ask?” I blurted, zipping the sweatshirt violently. “In case you’ve come down with a case of sudden amnesia, one of your jilted girlfriends is trying to
kill
me. I’m not going to stick around here and give her the opportunity to finish the job.”

Noelle and Upton exchanged a look that made me want to grab the back of their heads and knock their skulls together. In the great room, Mr. Lange lowered his voice and paced over to the doors, staring out at the ocean as he spoke.

“Are you
laughing
at me?” I demanded, my face growing hot.

“It’s just . . . we know these people, Reed. We’ve known them since we were zygotes,” Noelle said. “They’re not capable of murder.”

“Yeah, but two years ago you never would’ve thought Ariana could kill anyone either,” I shot back, staring her down.

Noelle’s jaw clenched, but she never broke eye contact. She’d never been one to back down from a direct challenge, even when she was 100 percent wrong.

“For the record, I would have,” Upton said, raising a hand. “Girl was always a bit dodgy in my opinion.”

“Shut up, Upton,” Noelle said impatiently. “Okay, I never would’ve thought Ariana could kill anyone either, but Ariana was different. Poppy and Paige . . . they don’t have the guts to do something like this.”

“What about Sienna? You haven’t known
her
since you were ‘zygotes,’” I said sarcastically, throwing in some air quotes.

“No, but Sienna is harmless,” Upton said, stepping closer to me.

“Harmless? She left me in a shower stall for hours, freezing my ass off with no clothes,” I replied.

“Right. I’d forgotten about that,” Upton said, looking at his feet. “Okay, so she’s not harmless, but she’s not a violent person. You have to be quite mad to commit murder, Reed, and that’s not Sienna.”

His tone was placating, almost condescending. I glanced at Noelle. Both of them were looking at me as if I was some irrationally scared toddler. Like I’d just woken up from a nightmare and they were trying to convince me that the monsters weren’t real. But they
were
real. Someone had pushed me off that boat. I had felt their hands, smelled their fragrance,
seen
them slink away. Why didn’t anyone want to believe me?

“I don’t understand how you guys can act like nothing’s wrong,” I said, desperation welling inside my chest, constricting my lungs. “Someone is trying to kill me. They spooked my horse, they rigged my Jet Ski, they shoved me off a moving boat. Three times in the last week I’ve almost
died.
Don’t you get it? I can’t stay here.”

Tears welled up in my eyes, which frustrated me even more; I was
playing into their image of me as a frightened, irrational baby. I took a deep breath and forced myself to calm down. My vision was blurry as I glared at them in defiance, but no tears escaped.

“Reed, Misty and the Jet Ski . . . those were simply accidents,” Upton said, taking my hands lightly in his.

I clucked my tongue. “No, they—”

“But if you say someone pushed you off the boat, then someone pushed you off the boat,” Upton added, interrupting me. “And if you stay here, you’ll be available to the police. Maybe you’ll remember something that will help them sort it all out.”

I scoffed, my voice bubbly and wet. “Please. They’re not even going to investigate this. They think I’m some drunk, spoiled liar.”

“Oh, they’re investigating it,” Noelle said, glancing over her shoulder at her father, whose back was to us. “You saw how pissed off Daddy was. Believe me, he’s going to take care of it.”

Mr. Lange’s phone snapped shut and he huffed a sigh, muttering under his breath as he approached us. As always, his clothes were crisp and pressed—a light yellow button-down shirt over gray pants—but he looked tired. Exhausted, actually. He pressed the top of his nose between his thumb and forefinger before addressing me.

“Reed, I’m so sorry, but it looks like we won’t have access to the jet until tomorrow,” he said.

“What? Why?” Noelle asked.

His nostrils flared slightly. “Your mother has seen fit to fly it back to the States to pick up some sort of flowers she simply
must
have for the centerpieces at the gala,” he replied sarcastically.

Noelle sighed. “That’s Mom for you.”

Noelle’s mother was hosting her annual hospital benefit on the island the following week. She had been wrapped up in the plans ever since we’d arrived, and I’d barely laid eyes on her, even though I’d been living in her house for the past week. Which made sense if she was jaunting around the island in search of flowers.

“There is one commercial flight leaving for Philadelphia later today,” Mr. Lange said, checking the screen of his phone. “You’d have to connect through Atlanta, and of course I’d hire a car to drive you the rest of the way to Croton once you arrived. I feel horrible about this.”

“See? Now you
must
stay,” Upton said, squeezing my hand.

I loved how flying commercial wasn’t even an option for him. Before last year I’d never been on any kind of plane, never mind been spoiled into thinking a private jet was the only civilized way to go.

“No. It’s okay. I’ll take the commercial flight,” I replied, pulling my fingers away. Upton, for the first time, seemed to sense the cold vibe I was giving off. His brow creased and he pushed his hands into his pockets, looking dejected.

“Are you sure?” Mr. Lange asked. “I can have the jet gassed and ready for you first thing in the morning.”

“Yes, I’m sure,” I replied. “I’ll go today.”

“I’ll call my travel agent.” Mr. Lange flipped open the phone again, but Noelle held up a hand.

“Wait, Daddy.”

He did. She turned to face me.

“Reed, come on. Just sit tight one more day,” she said. “We can
stay here on our beach, hang out at the house. I promise you won’t have to see Poppy, Paige, or Sienna if you don’t want to. You should get at least one day of relaxation out of this trip.”

I looked into her eyes and realized with a start that she felt guilty. Like all of this was somehow her fault. Why? Because she was the one who had invited me here? That was crazy. She had been trying to do something nice for me. It wasn’t her fault one of her friends had turned out to be a sociopath.

“Besides, you heard what Mr. Lange said,” Upton added. “You can take the private jet in the morning. You’ll be so much more comfortable and it’ll take half the time.”

Apparently my coldness hadn’t completely shut him down. Which was kind of nice. Part of me was glad that he wasn’t simply giving up on me. But if I stayed, I was going to have to talk to him. Figure out what had happened, what it meant, and where we stood. The very thought exhausted me.

“Please?” Noelle asked.

That one word stopped me cold. Noelle almost never said “please.” To her, just saying the word was akin to begging, which was
not
her style. I felt my resolve start to cave. I glanced at Upton, whose blue eyes stared back at me, open, questioning, almost vulnerable.

“Okay, fine,” I said finally, feeling my resolve melt. “But first thing in the morning, I am on that plane.”

I took a deep breath, filling my lungs with warm, tropical air, and held it as I looked up at the blue-and-white brocade pattern of the umbrella overhead. The breeze fluttered the trim and blew the pages of Noelle’s magazine over her hand. Digging my toes into the toasty sand, I let out the breath and felt relaxed for the first time all day.