“Good for Whit,” Dash said, like a proud papa.
“Moving on already, huh, Reed?” Josh asked.
My cheeks burned and everyone fell silent for a long moment. Josh's face flushed too, as if he had just realized how hurtful his words were, and he averted his eyes.
“First of all, Hollis, Reed's personal life is none of your business,” Noelle snapped. “Second, your little buddy bailed without so much as a warning. She has every right to move on.”
“Sorry,” Josh said. He crumpled up his napkin and threw it down. “I gotta go.”
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He shoved himself up from the table, shot me an apologetic look, and walked off. For some reason, I couldn't swallow for a solid minute. Everyone watched me and waited.
“Uh, hate to burst your bubble, everyone,” I said finally, tremulously. “But Whittaker and I are just friends.” I quickly stashed the earrings in the bottom of my bag.
“Shyah, right,” Gage said, sucking on his soup spoon. “ 'Cause I buy all my friends five-?thousand-?dollar earrings for no reason.”
My mind spun. Five thousand dollars. Five thousand dollars.
“Come on, new girl. Give the poor guy a shot,” Dash wheedled, popping a few grapes into his mouth. “He deserves to get a little.”
Noelle whacked his arm with the back of her hand and all the guys snickered.
“Ha ha,” I said, pretending to focus again on my book. “Sorry to disappoint, but we really are just friends. It was his idea to be just friends.”
“Uh-?huh,” Natasha said under her breath. Her voice gave me chills. “You just keep telling yourself that.”
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TRUE COLORS
“Reed.”
I kept walking, ducking my head into the wind. I couldn't hear her. The wind was too loud. Let her believe that I couldn't hear her.
“Reed! Reed, I know you can hear me.”
I stopped walking and turned around to face Natasha. Her curls danced around her head in the wind, giving her a very Medusa look.
“I know you've been avoiding me,” she said, hugging a couple of notebooks to her chest. “And I've let you because I was giving you time to do your job. So tell me. What have you found?”
“Nothing,” I replied.
Her eyebrows shot up. “Nothing?”
I sighed and looked at my feet. “I've kind of had other things on my mind, Natasha,” I said, trying to sound annoyed. Annoyed and unaffected and not scared. “You know . . . school, soccer, missing boyfriend?”
Take pity. Come on. You know you want to take pity.
"Weren't thinking about the missing boyfriend much when
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you were crawling all over Whittaker, were you?“ she said. ”Thomas is on that e-?mail list, too, you know. Do you want him to come back and find out what you really are?"
My face burned with anger. “And what's that?”
Natasha took a step closer to me. Her eyes were amused. “A cheating, drunken slut who's too weak to stand up and take care of herself. Maybe he'd like to know about those little baubles in your bag as well. Accepting gifts from another guy,” she said, clucking her tongue. “Yeah. You sure are the faithful, concerned girlfriend.”