Page 9 of Pretty Secrets

I peek at him, finding my best friend thin-lipped, his brown hair falling over his forehead in a cute curl. Growing up, I often thought of Oliver as my opposite. He did everything he was supposed to, despite what everyone thought of him, just for the sliver of a chance to fit in with his family. But they never actually accepted him, no matter how hard he tried. They just gave him scraps of their attention, and he ate it up despite the big game he talked. It’s a different story now. He may look like the perfect royal, but he’s the perfect royal stain. At least, they dubbed him that in a tabloid headline once.

I give him a small smile and pretend to search through one of the hideous racks. “I’m going to need your help.”

“Obviously,” he deadpans as he moves to another rack and starts throwing clothes over his arm.

When he keeps going, amounting a fair number of outfits over his shoulder, I gasp. “Hey, how do you even know that’s my size?” I stride toward him and peek at the tags. Oddly, he’s pretty much nailed it. I shrug, and he gives me a smug smile in response.

After he has way more garments than I’ve ever wanted to try on in a lifetime, we search for the dressing rooms and find a small seating area in front of two rooms with velvet curtains pushed back, revealing an oversized mirror and a low bench pushed to one side. He walks right in and sets up the clothes on the hooks provided before ducking out again. Instead of sitting and waiting, he takes my arm, walks me in, and then pulls the ivory velvet curtain closed behind him as he exits. Almost as if he thought I might try to escape.

Huh. Maybe he does know me.

I start to undress, my angry movements a staccato of frustration. “I don’t know why I have to try these on. I—” When I spot the tired eyes staring back at me in the mirror, I stop complaining. The red veins are practically permanent now. For a girl who wants to find out what happened to her sister, I seem to be bitching an awful lot.

“Eden? You were saying?” Oliver prompts.

“Nothing,” I tell him, trying to keep the sadness out of my voice. I’m being ungrateful and prissy. I’ll wear a meat suit if that’s what it takes to find out what happened to Dee.

After pulling on the first outfit that Oliver’s helpfully laid out for me, I stare at myself in the mirror. The soft ivory sweater would’ve complimented my California tan. Now, though, it just washes me out. The skinny belt paired with fancy leggings are nice, though. I freeze when I stare at the big picture. The blonde hair coupled with these clothes means I look like Delilah. I pull the collar of the sweater up and breathe in deeply, expecting to find her signature scent, but instead, I just get a huge lungful of…nothing.

Before I can think too much, I push aside the curtain and step out. Oliver is sitting on the couch, one leg over his opposite knee. He breaks into a grin, his hair a burnt honey color under the fluorescents. “Little Edie Astor, you’re so grown up.”

I flip him off, which only makes him laugh. “What do you think? Is it a yes or a no?”

“I think you finally fit in,” he muses.

Despite myself, my heart squeezes a little. It hasn’t been easy to be the one who thinks outside the box. The one my parents were always worried about, and the one who always got all the complaints. Once I told them I was going to Carnegie, a small part of me thought they would be enamored with the fact that I would be taking Dee’s spot, but instead—again—all I got were worried stares. Deep down, I understood that they were for completely different reasons, but I still couldn’t shake the feeling that I was letting them down once again.

I try on outfit after outfit, getting Oliver’s thumbs up or down. He even pulled a couple of dresses from an area in the back that I modeled for him like the good little high-society girl. I have a closet full of dresses like this back home for when I’m made to play the part of dutiful Astor daughter—and I’m sure Dee has a whole slew of them in one of the boxes the roommates packed up—but we end up deciding to get three, anyway. Because in the elite world, you never know when you’re going to need a nice dress.

The whole process is freaking exhausting.

I’m sitting on the bench inside the dressing room, deciding which one of my new outfits to wear out, when Oliver pulls the curtain back a little. “Can I come in?”

I scoot over, allowing him space to sit. He leans his head against the wall, narrowly avoiding a garment hook. When he doesn’t talk, I take that as a cue that he came in here so I could. “Dee liked clothes,” I start, which sounds so dumb if you pick the sentence apart. Who doesn’t like clothes? They’re necessary. Everyone has them. But Dee took pride in what she wore. She understood there was a statement that could be made with the right outfit. She understood that about a lot of things. She spoke up when she needed to. She didn’t fight at the wrong times, she waited for her moment. Her favorite advice was to tell me I was being so obnoxious fighting about everything all the time when I should pick my fightandthe time, then really dig down.

The Knights were her digging down. It wasn’t just about the prestige that came with being a Knight or making Dad happy, she wanted to make a difference. She wanted to push the envelope of our male-driven society to allow space for women like us.

Her voice rings in my head, and I smile.It’s the twenty-first century, after all. It’s about damn time.

Oliver reaches over, enveloping my hand with his. “You did good, Edie. I know it’s hard to lose yourself.”

“Just temporary, right?” I ask, trying to shrug it off.

“Exactly. They’re just clothes. It doesn’t mean you’ll lose what’s on the inside. The Eden Astor I know would never do that.”

“Bullheaded?”

“Terribly. Astronomically,” he adds. “Never met anyone like you.”

His humor fades while he finishes the sentence, his voice dropping a few octaves as he takes me in. He’s been doing that the last few times I’ve seen him.

I immediately get to my feet and gather the thumbs down outfits. Sometimes I hate that we crossed a line we probably shouldn’t have. Sometimes, I’m certain he thinks we’re more than we are. Before I’d orgasmed this morning, he’d held my gaze. Helooked. Like we were lovers.

It’s fucking scary. I’ve already lost Delilah, I can’t lose Oliver, too. And if I break his heart, I will.

“I’ll get these,” he says, voice lost in thought as he gathers up the approved clothes.

After he leaves, I take a minute to breathe. I can’t deal with anything new right now. I don’t want to break down and talk to Oliver about whatever these looks mean. My hands are full with everything else.

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