“You’re the one who connected me with the Langdons in the first place. They’re legit. Plus Paul’s an invalid. If he could arrange for his own care, he probably wouldn’t need care.” I say this as patiently as possible. It’s a clear indication of just how small my mom’s world is, despite her good intentions. She doesn’t know anyone who’s actually gone to war, much less been injured.
Not that I do, for that matter. Park Avenue isn’t exactly swarming with members of the U.S. armed forces.
“Well,” Mom says, taking a deep breath and pushing my long hair over my shoulder affectionately, “it’s lucky he has a pretty girl like you to take care of him.”
I smile wanly. I’ve been hearing this refrain all evening, and it makes me slightly ill. Not only because it’s condescending to the poor guy I’ll be caring for, but because it makes me into some sort of sweet, saintly figure.
Only two other people in this house know the truth about me. My mother isn’t one of them.
“Hurry back down,” Mom says. “The Austens said they hadn’t had a chance to talk to you yet.”
Probably because I’ve been dodging them. Annamarie Austen is the catty kind of gossip I’ve avoided like the plague in recent months, and Jeff Austen stares too long at my chest.
“I’ll be fast,” I say before fleeing up the winding staircase to fetch my imaginary Band-Aid. My feet are far too used to being pinched in high heels to be plagued by blisters. I just want—need—five minutes to myself. A chance to be away from everyone’s misplaced fawning and the crushing pressure in my chest every time I look at Ethan.
But my bedroom isn’t quite the solitary sanctuary I imagined. Far from it.
I jump in surprise, but a part of me isn’t surprised at all to see him in here. Him being the iceberg that destroyed my life. It’s only appropriate that he also be around to watch me sink.
Now there are three people in the house who know the truth about me.
“Michael,” I say, keeping my voice calm. Polite. I’m always polite.
“Liv.”
Michael St. Claire is one of those amiable, good-looking guys who attract friends—and girls—like a magnet. He gets his dark brown hair perfectly styled at a salon that costs just about as much as my own, and his lightly golden skin is the gift of great Italian genes on his mother’s side. He’s been one of my best friends for as long as I can remember.
The Middletons, St. Claires, and Prices have been a tight-knit clique at the top of New York society for over twenty years. My mother and Michael’s mom were best friends in college, and they met Ethan’s mother when they all showed up, little kids in tow, for orientation at the rich-kids preschool.
The occasional dinner party with their respective spouses followed, and by the time I was eight, we were spending more holidays with the St. Claires and Prices than we were with my grandparents.
Our parents’ friendship ensured that Ethan, Michael, and I went to the same prep school, but by the time college came around, the three of us were so tightly entwined with each other’s lives that our joint NYU enrollment had been our own choice. It ensured we could stay close to home and close to each other.
But now?
Now the three of us in the same house feels almost unbearable.
“What are you doing here?”
Michael sets aside the picture of the three of us on Ethan’s parents’ boat the summer after our freshman year of college. “What do you think? I came to ask what the fuck is going on.”
I move toward my vanity to reapply lip gloss so I don’t have to look at him. “I’m sure you saw it on the invitation. I’m going to spend a few months volunteering.”
He moves closer, his golden eyes both skeptical and concerned, as if he has the right to be worried about me.
“You’re running away,” he says in a low voice.
I spin to face him, crossing my arms over my chest and leaning back against the vanity. “Of course I’m running away. Don’t you want to?”
“No,” he says, his voice going hard and angry. “I don’t want to tuck my tail between my legs and scamper off so I don’t have to deal with anything.”
“So what’s your plan then, Michael? You want to keep trying to pretend everything’s like it was? Even my dad knows something’s up, and he’s not exactly Mr. Observant.”