"Ugh! That's it! I'm outta here!" Briana Leigh turned to Ariana. "You can find your own ride!"
She shoved through the crowd, disappearing almost instantly, and Ariana felt panic start to rise up through her chest. She couldn't let Briana Leigh out of her sight. If she didn't run after her and act the good friend, the girl might sour and freeze her out. She might not even let her back into her house if Ariana had to get her own cab."Hudson, I'm sorry. I really have to go," she said.
When she turned to look at him, Hudson had her new cell phone out and was toying with the keyboard. His own cell was in his other hand and he was typing something into that as well.
"What're you doing?" Ariana demanded, on high alert. What if he noticed there were no contacts in her phone?
"There," he said, popping the phone back into her bag and handing
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it over. "Now you have my number and I have yours. This way if you don't call me, I can call you and demand an explanation."
Ariana was touched, but then she remembered this was a one-night thing. She couldn't have him hanging around. Ariana was in Dallas to make one connection and one connection only. After she got what she wanted out of Briana Leigh, she planned on disappearing. For good.
She had let her guard down, and this was the result.
"Talk to you soon," Hudson said, leaning in for a sweet, lingering kiss.
Ariana's heart was still beating in excitement as she sprinted after Briana Leigh.
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VULNERABLE SIDE
"Ibiza! He's going to Ibiza! After giving me all that crap about going to stinking Atherton-Hill Prep because it's so far, he's going half a world away. And he doesn't even know when he's coming back!"Ariana bit her tongue to keep from correcting Briana Leigh on the name of the exclusive boarding school. The girl was trashed and in full-on babble mode, so there was no point. Ariana did her best to remain upright as she supported most of the girl's weight on their way across Briana Leigh's bedroom. One of Briana Leigh's arms was slung around Ariana's neck and the other slapped limply at her side as she teetered in her gorgeous new Louboutins. Ariana had suggested she take them off in the car, which would have made this ridiculous trek so much easier, but the girl had i
nsisted they would only be removed from her cold, dead feet.
Which Ariana was starting to consider.
"Here. Bed," Ariana said as they arrived at the foot of Briana Leigh's
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massive four-poster. She turned Briana Leigh around and dropped her on the end of the bed. Briana Leigh's chunky gold bracelet got caught in Ariana's hair as she started to fall back.
"Ow!" Ariana blurted, hurtling forward to keep from having a chunk of her hair ripped out.
"Sorry," Briana Leigh said with a pout as Ariana extricated her hair from the offending accessory. She finally stood up straight and smoothed the front of her dress.
"No problem," Ariana said. "It's fine."
"No. It's not. It's not fine," Briana Leigh said, gazing up at the ceiling with her bleary eyes. "Everyone leaves me. No one loves me enough to stick around. Am I that awful?"
She lifted her head half an inch off the bed to look at Ariana, who was now risking Briana Leigh's wrath by unbuckling the skinny straps on her shoes. Ariana paused, her heart constricting at the suddenly vulnerable expression on Briana Leigh's face. Ariana knew exactly how Briana Leigh felt. Exactly. The one person she had loved more than anyone in the world had left her too. Had not loved her back. And the pain had been unbearable.
Perhaps she had more in common with Briana Leigh than she had ever bothered to consider.
"Of course not," Ariana lied in a soothing tone. "You're great."
She placed Briana Leigh's shoes on the floor next to her dresser and fished a silky nightshirt out of the girl's pajama drawer. Back at the bed she pulled Briana Leigh up by the wrists and slipped the nightshirt over the slumping girl's head. Then, as Briana Leigh tipped even
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further forward, her head pressed into Ariana's waist, Ariana reached up under the nightshirt and unzipped her dress. As she went through the motions, Ariana felt a pang of nostalgia for Easton and the many nights she, Noelle, and Taylor had done this little dressing-undressing ritual for Kiran. She wondered if her old friend had ever gotten help for her alcoholic tendencies.
But you don't care, Ariana thought. Because she doesn't care about you.Once the dress was unzipped, Ariana stepped back. Normally Noelle and Ariana would have lifted Kiran up so that Taylor could reach in and yank the dress to the floor, but this time Ariana had no help. She decided to just leave it. If Briana Leigh got uncomfortable enough, she would wriggle out of the thing herself.