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But perfection was so hard.
“I saw your gorgeous guy leaving. Is that why your lipstick is a mess?”
“Is it?” I pulled open my purse for the lipstick Sabrina had loaned me.
“Let me. You can’t draw a lip to save your life.”
Sabrina plucked the lip liner and gloss from the inside of my bag and got right up into my personal space. That was kinda Sabrina’s thing. No boundaries.
“Sooooo…” she said.
“Yeah.”
“I heard Dylan was invited.”
Our half brother.
“He won’t come.”
Sabrina projected so much hope. She’d followed him around like a puppy the summer he’d stayed with us. We all had. He still left and never came back. “Hank said—” Sabrina had refused to call our father by any other name.
“He won’t come because of Dad, Sabrina. Trust me. If there’s one thing you can count on with Dylan, it’s that he wants no part of being a King.”
She pouted and I did, too. Which must have been the right thing to do because she beamed at me as she finished the makeup repair.
“You look perfect.”
“You know…” I said, like it was a surprise—which it was “…I feel kinda perfect.”
She wrapped me in her thin arms and I hugged her back. “Garrett Pine is here,” she whispered.
Oh, boy.
In addition to Dallas society, we’d invited the entirety of the town of Dusty Creek, the arid clutch of churches and bars with one school, a medical clinic, and a grocery store that was about five miles away from the ranch.
Bea, Sabrina, and I all went to high school there with varying degrees of success and happiness.
And Garret Pine was a big part of that town.
And Sabrina loved him like a lunatic.
“He brought his fiancée.”
“Oh, honey,” I breathed. “I’m so sorry.”
“I’m not,” she said. “I’m happy for him. Delighted.” She smiled so bright it almost blinded me to the heartache she couldn’t quite hide.
“Don’t do anything crazy,” I told her.
“I won’t.”
“Sabrina,” I sighed. “I mean it. No more stunts.”
She pulled a face. “I won’t do anything except make him sorry he’ll never be mine by being charming and amazing.”
“Well, you do look amazing.”
“So, do you, Ronnie,” she said. “Emma Stone’s publicist is here, too. And some TV executives. I’m going to go show them my star power.”
I hoped that didn’t mean her underwear.
And then she was gone, leaving the smell of her perfume and a sense of glitter in the air behind her.
I trusted Sabrina’s reaction to my reflection more than my own judgment, so I didn’t bother looking back into the mirror. Outside the dressing-room door, I turned left instead of right and headed down the back staircase.
“Veronica!” called a voice behind me and I turned, wishing I’d moved just a little faster.
James Court.
Ugh.
“Hello, James,” I said with a reserved smile. Which didn’t seem to matter. I could be cold and reserved and downright rude, and it never seemed to matter to this guy.
James worked at King Industries and was one of my father’s favorites.
“The boy’s got swagger,” Dad always said.
Which meant he had an ego and sense of entitlement a mile wide.
I hated him and I had no idea why, in the last six months, he’d gotten so interested in me.
“Congratulations,” he said, tipping his glass of scotch toward me—a little too much and some of the scotch slipped out. “The best man won. I should have seen that coming, I suppose.”
He was drunk.
I took a step back, keeping my smile small. “If you’re referring to Clayton, you’re right.”
He took another step forward, so close I could smell his hot breath. His blue eyes narrowed. Mean, I thought. This guy is just mean.
“You’re going to figure out sooner or later your old man made a mistake picking that fucker.”
“Jimmy, you’re drunk,” I said and put my hand up to push him away. I took four quick backward steps before I turned.
“You’re not even the hot sister,” he yelled after me. Like that was a newsflash.
Around the edge of the hallway I stopped to get my breath and calm myself down. So many assholes were trying to ruin my night.
I needed my sister and a drink.
And some cheese.
The kitchen was full of black-vested and white-gloved staff, and I ducked out the back door, grabbing a skewer of grilled halloumi and figs as a server walked by.
Delicious.
Another thing they didn’t tell you about orgasms. They made everything better.
Even cheese, which I honestly didn’t think could be better.
The moon was swollen and low in the endless indigo sky and the air smelled like the grills behind the long screened-in porch—hickory smoke and twilight. The stables in the distance looked like a mansion, with turrets and bright, sparkling windows. All the horses, the stable cats, and Sally the collie lived pretty damn well here on The King’s Land.
I pulled open the wide door and the cats came out to greet me. Sally, in the corner, lifted her head, thumped her tail once, and then sighed, tucking her nose under her leg. I heard the party in the far stall and rolled my eyes.
