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“I swear the older you get, the more your brain cells defect on you,” she says fondly. “It’s your birthday tomorrow, dork face, or have you forgotten?”
Oh God, she’s right. Today’s the seventeenth.
“It was meant to be a surprise, but I’m terrible at keeping secrets. Anyway, I pre-guessed sushi, so I booked a table atUmai. It’s completely unpretentious. You’ll love it. I’ll text you the details and see you at eight.”
21
ELLA
Someone’s beenin my apartment.
It hits me the second I open the door. Everything is exactly where I left it—my black Chucks are still lying in a messy heap under the table and my sunflowers are still sad and dull and in need of replacing—but the air is different. It’s thicker. More masculine, and with the faintest trace of a scent I can’t place. When I glance at the floor, I half-expect to find incriminating footprints on the carpet.
“Everything okay,señorita?” Antonio’s hovering behind me, puzzled as to why I haven’t moved from the threshold.
I don’t usually allow him inside. My father owns the whole floor, so every exit is heavily protected, but on this occasion, I shimmy to the left to let him go first. He frowns for a split-second before comprehension kicks in, and then he’s pulling out his gun and waving my other two bodyguards over.
“Stay here while we check it out.”
“Okay, Rambo,” I joke, attempting to make light of it.
I hover in the hallway, picking old varnish off my nails and going over every rational explanation in my head. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe my anxiety is off the scale again. Since the whole tape incident, it’s been a roller coaster for me in that department.
“Señorita?” Antonio appears in the doorway of my bedroom and motions for me to join him.
I don’t know what I expected to find, but it wasn’t the designer black silk dress, Gucci purse, and black Louboutin heels that someone’s laid out for me across my white comforter. Hundreds of rose petals have been scattered around the outfit, but they’re not red, they’re gold.
Black and gold.
I’m beginning to loathe that color combination.
“Was this you?” he demands, looking antsy.
I shake my head, tempted to tell him that this mystery doesn’t exactly require a Sherlock Holmes-style deduction to figure out the culprit.
How dare he enter my apartment without my permission. Is he on a total mission to screw with me this week?
“It’s okay, Antonio,” I say wearily. “You can tell the others to stand down. I know who did this. Please tell yourjefethat if he thinks an expensive dress is a suitable apology for what he’s done, he’s very much mistaken.”
He blinks in surprise. “You want me to call Señor Santiago and—”
“I meant yourotherjefe, but can you do so in the hallway outside? I’d like to get changed for dinner if that’s okay?”When he doesn’t budge, I give him a gentle shove toward the door. “Go!” I cry, trying not to laugh at his mulish expression. “Tell Grayson he’s not wanted, and neither is his dress. I’m fine. Thanks for checking my apartment over. I’ll be ready in a half hour, and then can you take me toUmai? It’s a sushi restaurant on 46th Street.”
Or not, as the case may be…
Ten minutes later, I’m close to meltdown. Everything I own is either dirty, looks crap, or is at the dry cleaners gathering dust. All the while, Edier’s dress is sitting pretty on my white comforter, mocking me with her easy elegance.I’d love to box it back up with some passive aggressive rejection note, but desperation is overriding my principles right now. Besides, he doesn’thaveto know I’ve worn it. I could always bribe Antonio to tell him I threw it in the trash.
Finishing off my black eyeliner, which, for once, hasn’t made me look like a cat on steroids, I step out of the bathroom and run my fingers over the material of the dress. It’s so similar to the one I wore on my eighteenth birthday. I remember how invincible it made me feel that night. I wasn’t a patient, or a daughter trapped in a gilded cage, just a normal teenager who was free to make her own mistakes, including the biggest one of all.
Before I know it, I’m removing my bathrobe and shimmying into the dress. It fits perfectly, like I knew it would. Edier’s a Grade A shitty human being but he’s always had impeccable taste. Slipping my feet into the heels, I grit my teeth at the familiar bite of pain in my ankles. I’ve increased my meds tonight in the hope of feeling semi-normal, and I’m still waiting for them to kick in.
Collecting my new purse and my phone, I’m heading for the front door when it suddenly bursts open so violently it bounces off the opposite wall.
“Take it off, Ella! Take the fucking thing off right now!”
Before I can register who’s storming into my apartment like a raging tempest, the man starts ripping at the delicate straps of my dress. I scream and try to push him away as he kicks the door shut again, his familiar cologne wrapping my senses in a chokehold.
“Edier, no! What the hell are you doing?”
