Page 107 of Deadly Little Scandals
But Nick just stared at me for a full three seconds, then held out his hand. “I think it’s about time you gave me a second dance.”
I gave him two before Lily pulled me away, outside to the patio overlooking the winterized pool below. At first, I thought she’d brought me out here to discuss what had happened at the cemetery, but then I saw Campbell.
A split second later, Sadie-Grace literally bowled me over with a hug.
“I love college,” she told me, scrambling to her feet and helping me up before resuming her aggressive hug campaign. “I’m majoring in dance and also Russian literature, and combined, Boone and I have only broken two bones!”
“Both Boone’s,” Campbell clarified.
“His bones are my bones,” Sadie-Grace insisted. “And vice versa. Unless that’s creepy? I’ve discovered I have a really hard time telling what’s creepy, but on the bright side, I haven’t been kidnapped or kidnapped anyone else this semester, so that’s good.”
“And you?” I asked Campbell, wondering how she’d spent the months Lily and I had been away.
“Same old, same old,” Campbell said. “Freshman year at an institution where I’m already a legend, planning world domination and plotting my revenge for the disappearing act the two of you pulled.” She turned her gaze pointedly to Lily. “Not very half-sisterly of you, was it? Not very polite, either.”
“Oh, shut up, Campbell.”
I wondered if either one of them realized that they’d acted like squabbling siblings for about as long as I’d known them.
“Just for that,” Campbell told Lily, “I’m not going to tell you what Walker’s doingorgive you the present I had specially made a few months back. In fact, I won’t give any of you your presents.”
“Presents?” Sadie-Grace smiled, then turned to Lily. “Walker is going to college—inScotland.” Sadie-Grace said Scotland like Walker might as well have been attending university on Mars. “Boone keeps asking him to mail home haggis and a kilt, but either that’s illegal or Walker just really doesn’t want to.” Waiting a beat, Sadie-Grace turned back to Campbell.
“Presents?” she said hopefully.
“I’ll give them to you,” Campbell promised coyly, “just as soon as Sawyer thanks me for getting her out of that hole.”
I had a feeling she’d be lording that over me for an eternity—and then some.
“Campbell?” I said calmly.
“Watch your language,” Lily murmured preemptively.
But all I said was: “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” Campbell smiled sweetly. “You’re not forgiven for ditching me—you either, Lily—but you’re welcome. Now close your eyes and hold out your hands.”
In normal circumstances, that would not have struck me as a particularly risky proposition, but between the events of our debutante year and the summer that had followed, I couldn’t rule out the possibility that, once I closed my eyes, Campbell might calmly place a stolen masterpiece or a still-beating human heart in my palm.
Hell, if history was any indication, I couldn’t testify with any level of certainty that I was talking to Campbell and not her evil—or evil-er—twin.
Sadie-Grace closed her eyes and held out her hand. Lily did the same.
“Sawyer,” Campbell prompted.
“Fine.” Eyes closed, hand held out, I waited, and then Campbell placed something in my hand. I opened my eyes and determined the present in question to be a necklace. The chain was simple and delicate, and the tiny charm on the end was…
“A shovel?” Lily said. “Really, Campbell?”
Campbell smirked. “They’re platinum. Custom-ordered. Honestly,” she continued as she affixed her own shovel necklace in place, “the White Gloves are proving a little mild for my taste. I deeply suspect the four of us can do better.”
“A shovel!” Sadie-Grace did the math. “Like the kind people use to dig holes!”
I could have done without the insignia Campbell had chosen, but I put the necklace on anyway.
“We’re ladies,” Campbell said as Lily and Sadie-Grace slipped their necklaces on, too. “And my mama raised me to believe that ladies play to win.”
When I’d taken Lillian’s deal more than a year earlier, it had been because I wanted to find my father, but deep down, what I’d really been looking for wasfamily. I’d been looking for my people, for a place where I belonged. I hadn’t imagined finding it among the Debutante set.
