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“Hey, Skyler,” he said. “Having fun?”
“Yeah,” I lied.
“You’re friends with Carson, right?”
I nodded. This was interesting. “Uh-huh. How come?”
“He said if I saw you tonight to say hi. He was going to come but he had a family emergency and had to drive to New Hampshire.”
Okay, this dude had been at the party since I’d arrived, and he was only telling me thisnow? But I felt a rush of excitement that Carson was interested enough to send a message.
Wanting to leave on a high note, I set off looking for Chloe, making a big loop around the first floor of the house, but I came up empty. I retraced my steps in case I’d somehow missed her and also checked out the patio, but there was no sign of her. I wondered if she might be searching for me at the same time, so I changed direction and made a counterclockwise sweep, but still no luck.
By this point I was starting to get annoyed. I’d told her “an hour,” and she was on her phone enough that she must know what time it was.
As I stood in the front hall trying to figure out my next move, I noticed a red-haired girl coming down the staircase, and so I decided to check upstairs. I climbed to the second floor and made myway down the wide, dimly lit hall. There was no one in view, and I couldn’t hear any noise coming from behind the closed doors, but just to be sure I took a peek behind each one, getting a glimpse of five massive bedrooms. All of them were empty. Maybe the redhead had just been snooping around.
Turning to go back downstairs, I jerked in surprise. One of the older, alpha male types was standing in my way, having obviously come up the stairs without me hearing him.
“Looking for me?” he asked. He was wearing a pompous grin and reeked of beer.
“No, I wasn’t,” I said curtly.
“Really?
“Yeah,really.” He laid a hand on my arm, but I shoved him aside with an elbow and hurried downstairs.
Now what?, I wondered, feeling a sliver of concern mixing with my annoyance. As I returned to the crowded living room, I spotted Jamie leaning against a wall and sharing a joint with a guy whose hair was dark and shaggy.
“Hey, Jamie, have you seen my sister by any chance?” I asked, approaching them.
She stared at me blankly, her olive-green eyes unfocused.
“What?” she asked after a second.
“The girl I came with, Chloe Severson,” I said, raising my voice above the noise. “Have you seen her?”
“I know who you mean,” the guy announced, sounding more lucid than Jamie. “She split a little while ago.”
“Split?” I repeated, totally flabbergasted. How could she have left without fucking telling me? Besides, I was her ride.
“Yeah, about twenty or thirty minutes ago,” he told me. Now that he’d angled his body toward me, I saw that he was wearing a black T-shirt that said,I HAVE PEOPLE IN BOSTON, in white letters and I remembered him being introduced earlier as a childhood friend of Jamie’s from Dover.
“Are you sure we’re talking about the same person?” I asked.
“The hot blonde in the blue top? I heard her talking to a couple I know who were getting ready to drive back to the city, and she asked them for a ride.”
“Did you actually see her leave?”
“Yeah, I was under the portico out front, and I watched her get in the back seat of their car.”
Shit.My concern had now turned to indignation. I dug out my phone from my purse, expecting to see a text from Chloe apologizing profusely, but there was nothing. I muttered a thank-you to Jamie’s friend and stepped away to call my sister’s cell. All I got was her voice mail.
“Chloe, where the hell are you?” I demanded. “Someone told me youleft. Call me as soon as you get this.”
I wanted nothing more than to take off that minute, but just in case the guy had been confused as to what he saw, I hung around another thirty minutes. As I nursed a Diet Coke, I kept my eyes peeled and repeatedly checked my phone to see if I’d missed the ping of a text because of the music, which was now louder than ever. Finally, after one more fruitless search through the house, I realized Chloe had really left, and I headed to the door. Before I could open it, Jamie came up from behind me and tapped me on the shoulder.
“You’re still here,” she said. Her eyes looked a little clearer.
