Page 34 of The Promposal

I blinked several times, not really getting what she was saying. “Somebody got on your phone and broke up with Trent? Don’t you have a password?”

“Yes. And no, I don’t have a password. Why would I?”

This was part of the problem when you had all the trust and innocence of a newborn fawn. People took advantage of it. “When was it sent?”

“The day I lost my phone. No wonder he was kissing Bronte. He thought I’d broken up with him.”

The kiss I’d seen didn’t appear to have been a first date kind of kiss. More like they’d been going out for a while and felt comfortable kissing over appetizers. But I wasn’t about to rain on Ella’s parade.

“Did Trent reply to your text?”

“No.”

“Then he doesn’t get a pass. He should have talked to you first. I mean, breaking up with someone is pretty serious. You’d think he would have run it by you to make sure your phone didn’t do some weird auto-correct thing. And to find out why you would just break up with him out of the blue after you’d stood by him for so long.”

She stayed quiet for a minute. “Maybe. I don’t know. I think I should explain it to him.”

“You can if you want to. I don’t think it’ll change anything.”

“I know. I’m not trying to change anything. But I feel like we should have a final conversation. For closure or whatever.”

Maybe I should go with her. And start throwing some left hooks if dumb boys got out of line. “Up to you.” I checked my phone for the time. “Jake’s been in there a while, and we have no idea if he’s coming out soon. We’ll pick this up another day.” I started the car, and as I was backing out of the parking lot, I turned to my sister to ask the one question neither one of us had voiced yet.

“Who would send Trent a breakup message from your phone?”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

I tried to think through all the possibilities of who would have broken up with Trent on Ella’s behalf. Her phone had been found out in the football field, so it was possible the jocks had discovered it and thought it would be funny. Especially since Trent had so often been the targeting of their special brand of bullying.

It could have been Deacon. The tall, blond football player friend of Jake’s. Jake had mentioned a while ago that Deacon had a crush on Ella. The same guy I’d seen Jake talking to yesterday. What if he’d done it to clear the field for himself?

Or the cheerleading squad, who were constantly telling Ella to dump Trent and date someone better. Somebody like Deacon. Maybe they decided to take matter into their own freshly manicured hands.

Maybe it was some freshman or sophomore who was deeply envious of Ella and had decided to try and mess up her life.

But I had the sinking feeling that the person who did this was Old Scratch herself, Mercedes Bentley.

Problem was I didn’t know anybody in the police department so I couldn’t beg for a favor and get them to dust Ella’s phone for fingerprints. (Not to mention that Mercedes’s fingerprints probably wouldn’t even show up. Like how vampires don’t have reflections.) There was no way to prove my suspicions. And I could have been wrong. It could have been someone I hadn’t even considered yet. But my gut told me that it was Mercedes.

Jake called at our regular time. “Hey there, Mike Tyson. I was just calling to tell you good night.” His rich, masculine tone made me melt. His voice was almost as hot as his perfect face and body.

Did that make me shallow?

If it did, did I care?

He asked about my day, and I so badly wanted to demand he tell me why he’d gone to the hospital, but I couldn’t. I didn’t want him to know that I’d been following him because I intended to keep doing it until I had my answers. Until I figured out what he’d been up to and why he was being so secretive and distant. I knew I could have just asked him, but I was afraid he’d lie, or he’d push me away, or worse, he’d admit to everything, and then we’d have to break up.

I didn’t really want that to happen just before prom. Even if that did make me superficial.

The next morning Ella and I saw a big commotion right outside the school’s front doors. When we got close enough to see a man talking, it took me a minute to place him. He was Harrison Phillips, host of that reality show about bachelors pretending to fall in love after going on two dates. There were four women lined up and in formal gowns. I wondered if they were from the show.

Right next to the host stood Alan Feldstein in a suit and tie. He cleaned up nicer than I would have expected. He held a metallic pin shaped like a heart in his hands.

His girlfriend Tori stood in front of them, hands over her mouth as she jumped up and down.

“It’s her favorite TV show,” somebody in the crowd said.

Another voice offered, “I think Alan’s dad is Harrison Phillips’s agent. Or manager. Something like that.”

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