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Why wouldn’t he be lonely? He spent more time running around catering to his famous clients than tending to his relationship with Mom. They seemed to get along well enough when he was in town, but I couldn’t tell how much they even had in common anymore. They had more like a series of quick flings than an actual marriage. He’d been a cool but erratic older friend to me more than an actualfather.
Was that whatIwanted for the rest of my life, with any girls who came into it? Was that what I’d take, just to avoid the thought of commitment, when I’d been offered something so muchgreater?
My chest clenched. “Dad,” I said, “I’m sorry, and I’m looking forward to seeing you next week, but I really can’t leave. Not rightnow.”
We went back and forth a few more times, and in the end Dad said we could talk more when he got home. After I’d hung up, I sank down on my back on the couch. Somehow exhausted and excited and terrified out of my mind all atonce.
This opportunity was what I’d been waiting for, wasn’t it? Even if I hadn’t let myself admit it. To find my way back to the dynamic that had sparked between the six of us when we were younger, that had changed everything about how I saw theworld.
But what Rose had offered had only been hopes. What were the chances we could make themreal?
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Rose
Philomena sprang at me the second I came in the manor door. “So how did it go?” she asked, her skirts rustling as she hustled with me up the staircase. “What did they think of your stunningproposition?”
“They’re thinking about it,” I told her. “Which they should.” As much as part of me longed to claim the guys completely as mine this instant, I knew I didn’t really want that. “It’s a risk for them too. Probably even more than it is for me. It won’t really count unless they’ve thought the risks through and decided they’re all inanyway.”
“I’ve seen the way they look at you,” Phil said. “All of them. I don’t think there’s anything in this world that could tear them away fromyou.”
There had been, once already. And her name was Celestine. I touched my pocket, feeling the faint outline of the folded papers there: the contract, and the hasty photocopy I’d made while I was intown.
Dad should be home mid-day tomorrow. I had less than twenty-four hours left before all this could be over. Spark take me, I wished I could bury myself in my duvet and not come out of my room until he washere.
The first thing I did when I reached my room was open the wobbly bit at the base of my bookcase to stash the photocopy. If Celestine noticed the contract was gone before Dad got back, she could track it down easily enough, but there was no magic in that ordinary piece of paper for her to trace. It wouldn’t be as solid proof as having the original, but it’d be enough to convince at least Dad, I thought. A little extra precaution never hurtanyone.
My hand slid into the narrow space to nudge aside the phone—and touched only the cool wood of the floor. I frowned, pushing my fingers deeper. Had I shoved it in farther than I usually did the last time I’d usedit?
My groping hand encountered nothing but dust mice. Pulling my arm back, I squinted into the dark space. I couldn’t see anything in thereeither.
My pulse started to thump. I stood up and glanced around my room. Had I forgotten to put the phone away after I’d confirmed today’s meeting with the guys last night? I’d been so careful with it up until now. And surely if I’d left it out last night, I’d have noticed it in the morning before Ileft?
“What’s wrong?” Phil asked, her foreheadfurrowing.
“The prepaid phone I used to talk to the guys,” I said. “It’s gone.” And I couldn’t see it by my bed or on my desk or anywhere else I might have set it down if its disappearance had just been an accident,either.
Phil’s eyes widened. “What does thatmean?”
“I don’t know.” I grabbed my purse and dumped its contents onto the bed. My heart sank lower as I pawed through them. Only my regular phone, the one Dad had gotten me as part of our Family Plan, was there. If the prepaid one wasn’t anywhere in the room or anywhere onme…
I dropped onto the bed, pressing the heels of my hands to my temples. “Rose?” Phil saidtentatively.
“Someone found it,” I said, the words coming roughly even in my head. “Either I left it out and someone saw it, or someone searched my room for anything I might behiding.”
“Yourstepmother.”
“If it wasn’t her, it’d be someone who’d have taken what they found toher.”
The loss of the phone wasn’t a total catastrophe. I’d deleted all the message threads as they’d come in. Kyler had given it to me with the numbers programmed in, but I’d deleted those contacts as soon as I’d memorized them. Celestine couldn’t know what I’d been using the phonefor.
But she knew that I’d had a secret phone for some purpose. That I must have been communicating with people I didn’t think she or my father would approve of. And she’d taken it away fromme.
I still had my regular phone. I couldstill—
I groped for it and brought up my account information. Was there any way I could keep a message or two totally private, even with the linked plans? She’d be monitoring anything I did with this phone even morenow.
A window popped up on the screen informing me that my account had been temporarily disabled. I stared at it for a second, my fingers tightening around thephone.
