“Clearly, this is the dance floor, but we have the upstairs lounge as well if you want to escape the mayhem for a few minutes.” Maria pointed toward two sets of stairs at the back of the room, winding up in opposite directions toward a gallery area above. “Then, outside, we have the entire outdoor deck, which overlooks the water.” She moved swiftly to the outskirts of the dance floor, trailing Soomie, Tahira, and Jasper toward a glass wall with several clear doors closed to keep out the cold. “As you can see, there’s a hot tub out there. We’re already taking bets on who’ll get drunk enough to be
the first skinny-dipper.”
“Bet on me!” Tahira shouted, raising her arm. “I don’t even need to be drunk.”
Ariana cracked up laughing. “Thanks for the warning.”
“This party gets better and better,” Jasper joked.
“And just wait until you see your birthday cake!” Soomie exclaimed, raising all ten fingers. “It’s incredible.”
“I can’t wait,” Ariana replied.
“So? What do you want to do first?” Jasper asked, slipping his arm around her waist.
Ariana scanned the room, taking it all in—the happy faces, the gyrating bodies, the winking lights, the sparkling crystals. She felt so giddy she could have burst open like a bottle of Taittinger.
“Suddenly all I want to do is dance,” she said with a grin.
“Woo-hoo!” Tahira cheered, throwing her arms over her head.
Jasper took Ariana’s hand as the others laughed. “Your wish is my command.”
After diving into the crowd, Ariana found that getting to the center of the dance floor was easy as pie. Everyone moved out of the way of the guest of honor and her entourage, and before long, she was moving to the beat with her best friends and boyfriend around her. Soon, Adam, Landon, and Rob had joined them, and Ariana smiled wider each time her entourage grew. She could feel the eyes of the crowd on her, and never before had she felt so entitled to the attention. Everything was as it should be. This was her night. She was the hottest girl at one of the most prestigious schools in the world. Everyone knew her name. Everyone wanted to be near her.
Life was perfect.
Then, she opened her eyes. And the entire world stopped spinning. There, right there, standing at the top of the dance floor scanning the crowd, was Dr. Victor Meloni in the flesh. Ariana froze and took one of Tahira’s wayward elbows to the side.
“Ow!” Ariana blurted, louder than strictly necessary. She grabbed Tahira’s wrist and yanked her away from the others, fighting the crowd to get to the gift table—which was rather impressively stocked. She ducked behind a huge Kate Spade box and pressed her back against the wall.
“I’m sorry! God! What’s the matter?” Tahira hissed.
“What is he doing here?” Ariana asked, standing on her toes to see over the pile of presents. Meloni was moving slowly around the periphery of the room now, studying all the faces of the people on the dance floor.
Tahira whirled around, saw Meloni, and screwed her face up in confused disgust. “I have no idea,” she said. “Kind of pathetic though, no? Him crashing? There aren’t even any other adults here.”
“Tahira, focus!” Ariana said through her teeth. “How could he have even known about this?”
Tahira lifted her shoulders and let them drop dramatically. “I don’t know! I might have said something in our therapy session about planning your party for you—you know, dealing with my grief by throwing myself into a project. He seemed impressed, actually. I—”
Ariana groaned and gripped her forearm tightly. She curled her fingers and squeezed, trying as hard as she could to keep it together.
“What’s the big deal? Do you want me to ask him to leave?” Tahira said, turning to the side. “Because what the birthday girl wants, the birthday girl gets!”
For a split second Ariana almost agreed to the plan. Let Tahira be the bouncer. But then she realized it was pointless. Dr. Meloni was here because he knew he would be guaranteed to finally get a glimpse of the elusive Briana Leigh Covington, and he wasn’t going to leave until he got one—and probably cornered her afterward.
“No. It’s okay,” Ariana said. Across the dance floor, someone had stopped Meloni to talk, and he now had his back to her. “I’m just going to run to the bathroom to freshen up and maybe say hello to a few people. I’ll be back.”
“Okay,” Tahira said. She shrugged once more, than shoved her way back into the throng of dancers.
Ariana took a moment to herself to breathe.
Shit, she thought. Shit, shit, shit.
This was not the way this was supposed to play out. She was supposed to have more time. She had a whole plan, which she’d yet to execute. Ariana narrowed her eyes as Meloni broke away from his conversation and resumed his deliberate search of the party.
“Screw it,” she said under her breath. “I can do this.”