Devious (15 page)

The smile on her face disappeared as she saw the flowers Brandon was holding. “Oh…” she trailed off. In her plaid Emilio Pucci jumper and her mustard yellow flats, she didn’t exactly look like the kind of girl who’d have a frantic, hair-pulling, clothes-tearing makeout session on an ex-boyfriend’s bed in front of his current girlfriend.

“They’re for you,” Brandon said, suddenly nervous. Was yesterday some sort of hallucination? Had Callie not been nibbling on his neck and digging her nails into his back? No, he’d seen the scratch marks in the mirror that morning. At least he wasn’t crazy. But why wouldn’t she want flowers? Didn’t girls always want flowers? “I just wanted to, you know. Give you something nice.”

Callie stared at the bouquet of lavender and white flowers and took a deep breath. They were gorgeous, and it was sweet. But… she already knew the sweet Brandon. He wasn’t the one who wanted to make her tear his clothes off. That was the aloof Brandon who had a girlfriend, and who didn’t really care about Callie. Their frantic makeout session yesterday had been completely hot, and she was already wondering when they’d get the chance to do it again.

But Brandon didn’t think that they were a couple now, did he? They’d already tried that once, and it didn’t work. And now, after one hookup, he was bringing her flowers?

Before she could ask, Brett strolled through the door, wearing a yellow slouchy C&C California sweater and a pair of skinny gray jeans tucked into fleece-lined suede boots. Her bright red hair was twisted up and held in place by half a dozen tiny butter fly clips. “Am I late?”

“Not at all.” Callie rushed over to Brett, grateful for her friend’s interruption. “Thanks so much for doing this.”

Brett smiled and waved a hand in the air, then frowned slightly at the camera. “I didn’t know you were videotaping this.” She touched her hair.

“Don’t worry, you look great. And I’m…” She glanced at Brandon. “Er, we’re just using the video to make the interviewing easier. No one’s going to see it. Come over here. Sit in front of the camera, okay?” Callie shuttled Brett into a leather-backed armchair. Brandon turned the camera on her, and Callie sank back into the chair next to it, crossing her legs. She could feel Brandon’s eyes on her short jumper, and her annoyance toward him softened. It wasn’t so bad that he wanted to bring her flowers—it was sweet, after all. As long as he didn’t expect too much.

Callie shuffled through her index cards. “I’m just going to ask you a bunch of questions, and try to be as honest as possible.” Brett nodded, leaning back into the chair and staring up at the vaulted ceiling. “Have you ever been in love?”

Brett nodded her head slowly. “Yes.”

“More than once?”

Brett nodded again. “Twice.”

Callie’s lips twisted in surprise.
Twice?
Brett was in love with Sebastian—already? She’d been madly in love with Jeremiah Mortimer, her long-haired football star boyfriend, for what seemed like forever. How had she managed to move on so quickly? Callie leaned forward in her chair. She really wanted to know. “How did you know it was love?”

“I don’t know.” Brett shifted in her seat. She tapped her glittery pink fingernails against the padded leather arm of the chair. “It was different each time.”

“Do you believe in true love?”

“I don’t really think I know what that means. I mean, I fell in love with Jeremiah, and I was sure he was my true love. You know, the one I’d been waiting for and all that.” She shrugged and smiled at Callie. “But there were just so many ups and downs. Like, we were always fighting—always misunderstanding each other. It was like we were… I don’t know. Speaking different languages or something.”

Immediately, Callie thought about her tumultuous relationship with Easy. They’d broken up about eight hundred times. There were plenty of ups, of course… but they always seemed to be followed by an even bigger down. And even though the making-up part of fighting was really, really fun, the fighting part sucked. Just this September, Easy had broken up with her to date Jenny, her
roommate
. Talk about a down. That made Callie want to drive a sharpened pencil into someone’s eye.

“And now, with Sebastian…” Brett bit her lip to keep from smiling. Her cheeks colored a little. “It’s not what I expected, but it’s amazing.” She absentmindedly touched her cheek, and something about the gesture told Callie that she was thinking about Sebastian, about how he kissed her.

“Do you believe in soul mates?”

Brett tilted her head to the side. “Yes and no. I believe we connect with people in different ways—and sometimes it’s not the kind of person you thought it was, but it’s so much better.” She shrugged. “I mean, I think everyone’s always going to have a special place in their heart for their first love—you know, the one who made them realize what love is and all that. But I don’t think that means you can’t find it again—or something better.”

Callie found herself nodding in agreement. She glanced over at Brandon, who was watching Brett through the video camera. In profile, he looked so serious. Then, as if he felt Callie’s eyes on him, he looked up. The moment their eyes met, Callie felt a connection.

Brett had told her everything she needed to know.
People can have more than one love.
And maybe, just maybe, here was the first sign that she wasn’t doomed post-Easy.

Brandon smiled back at her, a curious half-smile that made heat rush to Callie’s cheeks. She didn’t know exactly what this was between them, but she’d never know if she didn’t give it a real chance.

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J
enny Humphrey opened the stainless steel Sub-Zero freezer in the Dresdens’ state-of-the-art kitchen and grabbed a plastic bag full of cubed ice. The sounds of laughter and clinking glasses filtered in from the living room, which was filled with happy Waverly Owls, relaxing and lounging on the dean’s furniture. The party was a huge success. That morning, she and Isaac had typed up invitations and slunk around campus, trying to slide them beneath dorm room doors without anyone seeing them. It was fun, and strangely romantic—Jenny felt kind of like Harriet the Spy, with an extremely sexy accomplice. They’d kept the guest list on the smaller side, hoping it would make the cleanup go faster when the evening came to an end.

She poured a bag of ice into a crystal bowl from the Dresdens’ pantry, then used the knife to slide the chopped kiwi, oranges, and apples from the cutting board into the bowl. The sounds of an old Coldplay song spilled through the surround-sound speakers.

“Wow. You make a mean sangria.” Isaac appeared at her side, wearing a charcoal gray Ralph Lauren T-shirt and a pair of dark wool Theory trousers. Around his neck, she glimpsed the edge of a braided leather rope necklace that looked vaguely African. She’d noticed it the other day—it looked like the kind of necklace a girlfriend would give.

“I like your necklace,” she said, hoping it would prompt him to say more. She didn’t know exactly what was going on between the two of them. Was it weird that they hadn’t kissed yet? Did that mean he wasn’t attracted to her?

Isaac looked surprised. He touched his necklace, as if trying to remember what it was. “Oh, that. Isla brought it back from Senegal.”

“Senegal? When was she there?” Jenny asked, leaning back against the counter. It sounded so exotic for a high school girl to visit Senegal. Jenny wasn’t even sure exactly where it was, or what language they spoke.

“This fall. She, uh, sort of spent the semester there.” Isaac grabbed a grape and popped it into his mouth.

“Really?” Jenny asked, her eyes widening. “That’s cool.”

Isaac shrugged. “Kind of. My parents really encouraged her to go.” He fingered his necklace absentmindedly. “There was this incident.”

“Now it’s getting juicy,” Jenny teased, leaning closer to Isaac. “You’ve got to tell me the whole story.”

He laughed. “It’s not that exciting. Isla’s just always been kind of, as my parents call it, high-spirited. Last spring, she got kind of close to this one teacher. Male. Young. Kind of looked like Brad Pitt.”

“Oh, my,” Jenny said, then immediately blushed. She sounded like a granny.

“I don’t know exactly what happened, but basically the teacher came forward and told my dad that Isla was, uh, trying to cross certain boundaries. Isla said it was exactly the opposite.” Isaac reached up and tapped his fingers against a copper pan hanging over the counter. “So, the teacher was fired. And Isla… well, it kind of worked out for her. The story was everywhere, so my parents let her take a semester abroad, something she’d been begging to do all along.”

“Wow.” Jenny bit her lip. She loved secrets, but mostly she was happy that Isaac was sharing them with
her
. That had to mean something, right? “I won’t tell anyone. Promise.”

“I trust you.” Isaac grinned at her. She noticed for the first time that one of his bottom teeth had a tiny chip in it. It was adorable.

Sage Francis rushed in, wearing a slinky black dress. “We need more sangria in the library. We’re starting a game of Twister.” She ignored Jenny and batted her glitter-covered eyelids at Isaac.

“Coming right up,” Isaac announced, barely glancing at Sage as he expertly popped the cork on a bottle of Bordeaux from the dean’s extensive wine cellar and poured the wine into the crystal bowl. He’d brought Jenny down there earlier, to help pick some mediocre-looking wines that wouldn’t be missed. She was still thinking about how nice it had been, just the two of them, in the dimly lit cellar. It would have been the perfect place for a first kiss—but it hadn’t happened.

Jenny handed the sangria bowl to Sage. “Nice dress,” Sage said, petulantly. Jenny glanced down at her eggplant-colored scoop-neck knit dress from Urban Outfitters, which revealed just the right amount of skin. She touched her hair, smelling of her Frédéric Fekkai Luscious Curls Cream. She could feel it tumbling over her shoulders in long, loose curls, exactly as she’d intended it to.

“Thanks,” she said self-consciously, touching the neckline.

The doorbell chimed, an elegant
ding-dong
. “I’ll get it,” Jenny announced, dashing through the dining room to the foyer, where the expansive black marble floor had been claimed as the dance floor. She and Isaac had lined the stairs with tiny glass tea lights—a fire hazard, to be sure, but the effect was ghostly and romantic. The only other light in the room came from the full moon, beaming through the intricate floral design of the stained glass skylight. She elbowed past a few slow-dancing couples and threw the door open. Callie and Brandon stood on the doorstep, kissing.

“Hello,” Jenny said, surprised, as she ushered them into the house. Brandon helped Callie out of her coat. She looked gorgeous and happy, her hazel eyes lined with thick gray kohl that matched her flowing dress. Were they together? Jenny tried to catch her roommate’s eye. They’d been all flirty at the Atrium the other day, but Callie hadn’t mentioned it again. “Let me take your coats.”

“Thanks,” Callie mumbled. Even in the dim light, Jenny could tell she was blushing. Jenny grabbed their coats and hung them in the already-stuffed coat closet off to the side of the entryway.

“This is incredible,” Brandon noted, staring up at the ceiling of the foyer. His hand rested against Callie’s lower back. “It’s so romantic.” Jenny thought she noticed Callie stepping a little closer to him.

“Hey, do you guys know Isaac?” Jenny spotted him coming out of the dining room. She quickly grabbed him by the sleeve and tugged him over to her friends. “Isaac, this is my roommate Callie, and… Brandon.” Isaac shook their hands politely. Both her friends sized him up and gave Jenny slight nods of approval.

Jenny’s face warmed. “I’m going to change the CD. Put on something better to dance to.” Isaac touched her waist as she passed, letting his hand linger a moment.

“You remember how to do it?” he asked. The house was equipped with a surround-sound stereo system, and he’d spent ten minutes showing Jenny how to operate the fancy, four-hundred-CD changer.

“Hopefully I can manage to avoid your mom’s John Denver albums.” Jenny grinned shyly. The door opened again, and all the flames on the candles flickered, making the shadows on the walls dance. “But as this party’s host, you’ve got to get out on the dance floor.”

Isaac groaned. “You haven’t seen me dance yet.”

“And I’m not leaving until I do,” Jenny challenged, sticking her chin out flirtatiously. She hadn’t even noticed that Callie and Brandon had disappeared into another room. When Isaac was around, it was so hard to concentrate on anything else.

“I could deal with that.” Isaac laughed, watching Jenny’s expression. She could tell already that he liked to make her blush. He was cute, and it had been strangely romantic setting up his house for the party. The candles, the chopping fruit for sangria, the wine-choosing, the stereo instruction. They’d spent hours alone together already.