Ariana froze as she toweled off her hair. There was a casual tone in his voice. He was joking. Now that she’d had a chance to cool off, she felt the humiliation of her overreaction back in his room, and decided to follow his lead. Pretend it was no big deal.
“Why didn’t you answer when I said your name?” she asked.
There was a pause. “What do you mean? I just got here.”
“But I just heard you a few minutes ago,” she protested. “You were in the bathroom.” She secured the towel around her and opened the door. Thomas looked genuinely confused. Ariana’s heart thumped with fear. “You really just got here?”
“Swear.”
But someone had been there. She was sure of it. Was Thomas lying?
Or was Daniel on campus messing with her? Or had it been someone else entirely? Ariana’s empty stomach turned dangerously.
“How did you get in?” she demanded.
“Noelle’s key,” he replied simply, perusing the bath products next to the shower. He picked up a giant jar of conditioner, inspecting the label. “What the hell is jojoba oil?”
“How do you know about Noelle’s key?” She stepped onto the woven bath mat and hugged herself against the cool air.
“Common knowledge, naughty girl.”
Common knowledge. Noelle had probably told Dash about it. Which meant that Paige probably knew about it, too. And Daniel.
Thomas put the jar down and took an uncertain step toward her.
“Give me a second.” She held the door to her room open. “I’ll be right out.”
“I’ll be right here,” Thomas said with a suggestive smile before closing the door behind him.
Alone again, Ariana leaned against the wall and tried to slow her breathing. What if Daniel
was
here? What if he was inside Billings right now, listening in on her and Thomas?
But no. No. It couldn’t be. He wouldn’t skip out on his parents, his sister, their Christmas vacation, just to mess with her. He wouldn’t. She had to believe that. She had to believe it or she was going to go insane.
“Just deal with the current problem,” she whispered, wiping the fog off the mirror and staring at her reflection.
Thomas.
What was she going to do? She had thought this was over. Thought that slap, for better or for worse, had put a stop to this insanity. But now, here Thomas was, in her room. They were alone and her skin was humming again. She took a deep breath and slipped into her white silk robe.
She had to tell him they couldn’t do this anymore. Maybe it was intriguing and fun, but it couldn’t be real. What she had with Daniel was real. Yes. That was what she was going to tell him, and he would just have to understand. She looked into the mirror, into her own blue eyes, and steeled herself for the conversation. But when she reached for the door handle a minute later, she realized she was still shaking. And it wasn’t from the cold.
“Thomas, I—”
Ariana’s words died on her tongue as Thomas held out a pair of Noelle’s sexiest underwear—a red thong with a tiny wedge of fabric at the front.
“Are these yours or Noelle’s? ’Cuz I gotta say, my imagination is going to some pretty sweet places right now. . . .”
“They’re not mine,” she said, snatching them away from him and tossing them onto Noelle’s bed with all the other clothes that hadn’t made the cut for her trip home. “Thomas, listen—”
“Look, I just came over here to make peace because it looks like we’re going to be stuck here for a couple of days,” Thomas said, pushing his hands into the front pockets of his jeans. “And I still haven’t heard that apology for teeing off on me.”
Ariana clutched her arm again. “What do you mean, stuck here?”
Thomas gestured at Ariana’s computer, which was showing
streaming video of a weather forecast. Clearly he’d helped himself to her Internet connection. She reached over and turned up the volume.
“. . . highway has been closed and all mass transit is suspended for the duration of the storm,” the weatherman was saying as he was assaulted by wind and snow. “The governor has declared a state of emergency and all nonessential personnel have been told to stay home. The fewer people on the roads, the better. . . .”
Ariana’s heart felt sick as she turned the volume down again.
“It’s a nightmare out there,” Thomas said.
Ariana turned and stared out the window. All she could see was white. It was like an opaque veil had been wrapped tightly around Billings House, trapping her inside.
“We’re stuck,” she said slowly, her mouth dry. “Together.”
“Yeah, but don’t worry. I won’t do anything to make you smack me again,” Thomas said, his blue eyes dancing.
“You won’t?” Ariana asked dumbly. She felt like she was just waking up. Just realizing that Vermont was not going to happen. It was taking her brain a minute to adjust.
“I’m not an idiot. I get the point. You’re not going to cheat on Daniel,” Thomas said. “So if you want, we can be stuck here as friends.”
He looked her directly in eye. No fidgeting, no innuendo, no cocky grin.
“Just friends,” she said cautiously.
She wasn’t sure if she could be friends with Thomas Pearson. Or
that she wanted to be. But she did know that she didn’t want to be stuck in this room alone. She couldn’t do that. Not without losing her mind.
“Just friends,” Thomas said.
“Fine.”
Ariana nodded and started rooting through her dresser for warm clothes. Just friends was good. She could do this. If she just concentrated on Daniel, she could ignore Thomas’s eyes. His smile. The memory of his bare chest pressed against her back all night. She could. Really.
“Cool. So, as my friend, I have this story that I
have
to tell you.” Thomas plopped down on her bed. The bedsprings creaked loudly. “I just walked in on this smoking hot girl in the shower, and she was totally nak—”
Ariana clamped her hand over his mouth. Thomas looked up at her like she was nuts, but she kept her gaze trained on her door. She’d heard something. In the hallway. And this time, she definitely hadn’t imagined it.
Thomas grabbed her wrist and pulled her hand away from his mouth. “What?” he said, following her gaze.
“Someone’s here,” she whispered.
Thomas scoffed. “There’s nobody here but—” He stopped at the clear sound of footsteps nearing the door. “Shit!”
He jumped up and she practically shoved him into Noelle’s walk-in closet. They ducked inside and closed the door quietly behind them. Ariana stepped directly onto a stiletto heel with her
bare foot and had to bite her lip to keep from crying out. She cursed herself for choosing Noelle’s closet. It might have been bigger than hers, but it was crammed with so many clothes, shoes, and bags that she and Thomas barely fit inside. Their bodies were pressed against each other, and she could feel Thomas’s warm breath on her shoulder. Suddenly, she was aware of the fact that there was nothing but her thin robe between the two of them. Her skin pulsed with fear and excitement.
Then the door to her room slowly creaked open and Ariana forgot everything but her fear. She held her breath, leaning against Thomas for support, her skin slick with sweat. Someone crept into her room and across the creaky wood floor. A desk drawer slammed and Ariana gripped Thomas tighter. Whoever was out there was rifling through her things. Rage bubbled up inside of her, but she swallowed the urge to open the closet door.
Let it go.
Just let it go. . . .
She
had
to let it go. She couldn’t risk getting caught on campus. Headmaster Cox had been very clear about his rules.
A deep rumbling rose from Ariana’s stomach, and she cringed and wrapped her arms tightly around her waist in a weak attempt to muffle the noise. She felt Thomas’s body shaking with silent laughter. Until now, she hadn’t even thought about the fact that she hadn’t eaten since the day before.
The footsteps got closer to the closet and stopped in front of it. She screwed her eyes shut.
Please. Please just leave. Go. Go. Go.
Ariana gripped her arm in desperation. She pictured her mother, getting the news that her only daughter had been expelled from Easton. Pictured her alone, in that big, empty house. Flipping through photo albums filled with the pictures Ariana had sent almost every month since she’d arrived at Easton. Pictures of her and Daniel. Of dances and picnics and Daniel’s lacrosse games. Of her and Noelle hanging out in their room. Of the dark, regal buildings that cast foreboding shadows over campus.
If Ariana was expelled, if Easton was gone and Billings was no longer a part of Ariana’s life, her mother would have nothing to be proud of anymore. Without those places, those things, those people, Ariana was nothing. Nobody. And her mother would have nothing to live for. Ariana trembled with terror at the thought.
Finally, the footsteps moved away from the closet, and a few seconds later, the door to Ariana’s room slammed shut. Instantly, Ariana burst out of the closet. She was dying to go for the door and catch the intruder in the hallway, but she knew she couldn’t.
“Ariana, you’re shaking,” Thomas said, reaching for her.
“I know I’m shaking! There was someone in my room!” she hissed in response. She dove at her desk and started checking her desk drawers. She was torn between relief and rage. No one was supposed to be in Billings. Just how many people knew about Noelle’s key? Besides, what would anybody want in her room? “Who the hell
was
that?”
“A teacher, maybe? Checking all the rooms to make sure everybody’s out?” Thomas sounded uncertain.
She shook her head. “A teacher wouldn’t go through my stuff. And they’re all supposed to be in Drake, anyway.”
She paused in front of her desk, letting her gaze wander from her laptop to her copy of
Madame Bovary
, and over the candle Daniel had brought her a few days before. Something didn’t seem right. Something was missing.
Thomas shrugged. “Who knows? As long as we don’t get caught, we’re okay.”
“How can you be so casual about this?” she snapped, running her hands over the surface of her desk. The thought that someone had been here, had been going through her things, made her skin crawl. “Someone was—” A splinter slipped underneath the surface of her skin. “Shit.” She winced, peering down at the drop of blood that appeared on her fingertip. “Someone was going through my personal things, and you’re acting like it was no big deal.”
“It’s just . . . there’s nothing you can do about it, so there’s no reason to get all stressed out.” Thomas walked over to window, his shoulder lightly brushing her. She felt him pull away quickly, as if he had just burned himself. “It’s not like you can go to the headmaster. We’re not even supposed to be here.”
Ariana ignored him, focusing for a moment on the splinter wedged in the tip of her throbbing finger. Why couldn’t she figure out what was wrong, what was different with her desk? Something had changed. Just like something had changed in the bathroom between the time she’d gotten in the shower and the moment Thomas had appeared.
“Can we forget about this?” Thomas sighed. “Put on some clothes
and let’s get you something to eat before your stomach rats us out to the entire campus.”
“Fine. I just need to figure out what’s missing from my—”
Ariana’s throat closed as her blood ran cold. She had just realized what was different. Whoever had been in her room had passed up her laptop, her diamond earrings, her delicate antique watch, and had taken only one thing.
The black-and-white picture of Ariana—the one Daniel had taken of her in the Hamptons—was gone.
Daniel. It had to be. Who else would have broken into her room and taken only a picture of her? A picture
Daniel
had taken. Who else?
Ariana felt suddenly exhausted as she quickly threw on a pair of fresh jeans and a blue cashmere sweater. Thomas was waiting for her in the hallway, but she had to take a moment to just think.
If it was Daniel, why was he torturing her like this? Why not just come out and confront her? He was hotheaded, quick to anger. The way he’d jumped Dash’s friend . . . But maybe he’d been so hurt by what she’d done, he’d decided to torture her,
then
confront her. The possibilities, the not knowing, were making her head hurt.
“How long does it take to put on a sweater?” Thomas asked, barging into the room. He blinked as she looked up, her shoulders slumped forward. “Oh. You’re dressed.”
“Didn’t you tell me to get dressed?” she asked flatly.
“Yeah, but I thought if I surprised you I might catch the second act of
Nothing but Skin
,” he joked.
Ariana leveled him with a no-nonsense stare. “I thought we were going to be just friends.”
“We are.” Thomas rolled his eyes. “Now let’s go. I’m starving.”
Ariana hesitated. “Thomas . . . you don’t think it was Daniel who was in here before, do you?”
Thomas stopped on his way to the door. He tipped his head back and sighed at the ceiling. When he turned to her again, his expression was almost condescending, like he was about to explain some simple math concept to a first-grader.
“Ariana. Your boy’s not here. He’s in Vermont. The hat we saw was one of a million just like it around here. A coincidence. And yeah, somebody came in here. But it was probably just the housekeeper.” Something in his eyes told Ariana he wasn’t as confident about the intruder explanation as he was about the others. “Either way, we’ve gotta eat, right?”
“Right,” she sighed. The heat had been turned off in the dorm and she was still cold, so she pulled her coat on over her clothes.
“So come on. I’ve got a surprise for you.”
He turned and started rummaging through her desk drawers.
“What are you doing?” Ariana demanded, annoyed. Why did people keep touching her stuff?
He held up a silver paper clip. “Just call me Pearson,” he said smoothly. “Thomas Pearson.”
“What—”
Thomas held a finger to his perfect lips. Then he swiped Noelle’s favorite Donna Karan tank top from her bed and sauntered toward Ariana, swinging the practically nonexistent piece of fabric in his hand. In a single move, he wrapped it tightly around her head, like a makeshift blindfold.