Last Christmas (Private 0.60)

Then she saw the final name in the column. Ariana Osgood. The entry next to it read, Senior year Christmas

break.

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All of the oxygen was sucked right out of Ariana's lungs. Her chest tightened. This was a list of girls that

Daniel had slept with, and she was next in line. He wasn't a virgin. He had been sleeping with every girl on

campus and then some since he arrived at Easton. Even worse, everyone must have known it. Everyone knew

what a naive idiot she was. The guy who said he loved her, said he wanted her to be his first, had humiliated

her in front of the entire school. Lied to her for the entire year they'd been together. She checked the dates

again. He'd slept with two other girls while they were dating.

I'm such a loser. Such a stupid, stupid, loser. He used me. I let him use

me."Ariana? Are you okay?"

They're all laughing at me. All of them. Laughing at me behind my back.

Ariana started to tremble again. The computer shook in her hands. She was nothing but a number on a

spreadsheet. A nothing. A blip. She was worthless. She grabbed her arm, her nails cutting deep grooves in her

sweater. I may as well just kill myself now. No one would miss me. No one would care.

"He's a jackass," Thomas said quietly. "He doesn't deserve you."

Ariana looked up at Thomas and everything seemed to snap into place. Someone would care. Thomas wo

uld

care. He'd just said it himself. She was too good for Daniel. Thomas thought she was worth something.

Ariana dropped the computer. It slammed on the floor and died

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with a sickening zip and a flash of the screen, but she didn't even care. She grabbed Thomas's coat and pulled

him toward her, pressing her lips, her body against his. Nothing that had stood between them before mattered

now. She felt a weight lifting from her shoulders as he kissed her back.

Daniel didn't deserve her.... He didn't deserve her.... She was done belonging to him.

Ariana grabbed Thomas by the collar and stripped his coat down his arms. He flung it to the floor as her

hands moved to his shirt. They were no longer trembling. As her fingers unbuttoned his shirt, she was moving

with a steady purpose.

Screw Daniel Ryan. Screw him and his perfect family and his perfect life. "You sure?" Thomas murmured as

she pushed his shirt off his bare shoulders. His body was perfect. Taut and lean and tan.