Sweet Little Lies (11 page)

Jane stopped in front of him and tilted her head up to look at him. At five-foot-five, she was at least seven inches shorter than him. “Can I talk to you for a minute?” she asked him.

Jesse’s jaw clenched. “What about?”

“I just wanted to…I wanted to say I’m sorry. I know you’ll probably never forgive me, and I don’t expect you to. But I wanted you to know how bad I feel about what happened.”

Jesse glared at her, not saying anything. The volume in the room began to rise—people were shouting, noisemakers were going off, the DJ was making an announcement—but Jane wasn’t paying attention.

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Getting through to Jesse was all she could think about.

“It really hurt me when you were all over that girl at your birthday party,” Jane went on. “Because I thought that you and I were…well, I thought that you really cared about me and…Anyway, after that night, I wasn’t sure what was gonna happen to us. I was so mad at you. I know that’s no excuse for what I did. I…Ihave no excuse, and…and…”

Jane’s throat burned as her eyes brimmed with tears. She covered her face with her hands, shaking, trying to stop from breaking down in public, and with the camera guy standing just a few feet away from her, filming everything. It was all catching up to her now: these last few crazy months, meeting Jesse at his and Braden’s house party, falling for Jesse, falling apart when she thought he wasn’t the guy for her, after all…and then Braden coming over to comfort her, offering her a friendly hug that somehow turned into a kiss that somehow turned into more….

Jane felt Jesse’s hand on her shoulder. “Hey,” he said in a voice that was gruff and tender at the same time. “You okay?”

Jane sniffed and nodded. She took a moment to try to compose herself. She needed to get this out.

“I know I don’t have any right to ask this,” Jane said, gazing up at him. “But do you think that we could be friends someday?”

Jesse looked away. “I don’t know. Maybe. I’ll think about it.”

Jane nodded. At least there was hope. That was all she could ask for. She had no idea if she was meant to be with Jesse asmore than friends. But she couldn’t imagine not having him in her life. Friendship was better than nothing at all.

Wiping away a tear, Jane realized that everyone in the room was yelling, “Ten! Nine! Eight!” And then Jesse’s date appeared out of nowhere and wrapped her skinny, spray-tanned arms around his neck. The count-down continued: “Three! Two! One!Happy New Year! ” Confetti rained down to a symphony of noisemakers and popping champagne corks and that New Year’s song they always played (what did

“Auld Lang Syne” even mean?), and Ms. Bubble Dress stood on her tippy-toes and pressed her artificially plumped lips against his lips. Jane’s heart sank even farther. She should go. But Jesse kind of drew back a little, even as Ms. Bubble Dress kept trying to kiss him, and then Jane realized that he was looking over the girl’s shoulder ather . Their eyes met, and she mouthed the words,I’m sorry , again, as if she couldn’t say them enough, which she couldn’t, and he kind of smiled at her, as if he were trying to let her know that maybe, just maybe, things were going to be okay between them after all.

Which made this the best New Year’s Eve ever. Even though her life was still a crazy, tangled-up mess.

15

LIE UPON LIE

Scarlett groaned and rubbed her eyes as sunlight flooded her field of vision. What time was it? She glanced over at the alarm clock, which flashed 11:25 a.m. Eleven twenty-five a.m.? How could it be so late in the morning already? Her head felt cloudy, like she had gotten only a couple hours of sleep.

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Wait! WTF?

Scarlett did a double take. Where was her beaten-up, retro, turquoise blue alarm clock? This alarm clock was sleek and white and had an iPod dock on top. And now that she thought about it, she didn’t own sheets the color of Cocoa Puffs, either.

She turned slowly, nervously, to check out the other side of the bed.

Liam was lying there, fast asleep.

Scarlett sucked in a deep breath, trying not to panic. What was he doing there? Wait, no—what wasshe doing here?

She had to get out right now, before he woke up. She searched the room quickly, trying to locate her clothes.Oh. She was still wearing them. And upon closer inspection, she realized that Liam was still wearing his, too.

And then it all came back to her.

After the amazing kiss they had shared at the stroke of midnight, a bunch of people spilled out onto the terrace with bottles of champagne. She and Liam had escaped to his room and proceeded to stay up for hours, watching old movies on cable…and making out…and talking…and making out…and eating Ben

& Jerry’s out of the carton…and making out…and playing Wii tennis…and making out. She hadn’t intended to spend the night with him; in fact, she remembered thinking at 1 a.m. (and at 2 a.m. and 3

a.m.) that really, it was soooo late and she should go, and that maybe Jane would be home from the lame h.wood party.

But obviously Scarlett had fallen asleep on Liam’s Cocoa Puff–colored sheets instead.With Liam. After a long (and, admittedly, really fun) night of activities that were more “datey” than “casual hookup.” They had talked a lot and she hadn’t had a single drink. The problem was, Scarlett wasn’t into “datey.” She didn’t even remember the last time she’d given a guy her real phone number, much less her real name.

Now all she had to do was make her escape before it was too late.

Scarlett glanced at Liam again. Still asleep. He looked really cute sleeping, and she was kind of tempted to lean over and kiss him.

Scarlett shook her head. She had to focus. The question was, should she just slip away? Or should she leave a note? Something casual and noncommittal along the lines of,Had to run. See you around!

She was carefully trying to slip out of bed when Liam’s eyes blinked open. He smiled lazily at her.

“Good morning.”

“Oh! Hey! Hi! I was just”—Scarlett jumped out of the bed and started looking around the room—“leaving. I was trying to find my, uh, shoes. Oh, there they are! Shoes! Well, listen, thanks for everything, and, uh, I’ll see you later!”

Liam sat up. “Wait, Scarlett? Do you want coffee, or—”

“No, I’m good. Thanks, but I’ve gotta go. I’m really, really late for this thing I forgot I had to do today.

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They’re expecting me. Bye!”

Scarlett didn’t even wait for his reply as she scooped up her sandals from the floor and bolted out of the room.

It was almost noon when Scarlett walked through the front door of the apartment. She found Jane curled up on the couch, watching TV in her sweats and drinking a glass of OJ.

“Hey,” Jane called out. “Where’ve you been?”

Scarlett threw her keys on the front hall table and sat down next to Jane. “What? I went to this party at a friend’s house and I fell asleep on the couch.” No reason to tell Janewhich friend, or that by “couch” she meant “bed.”

Jane gave her a strange look. “You know we were shooting at h.wood last night, right? Dana tried to call you, like, a hundred times. I tried to call you, too. Why weren’t you answering your phone?”

“Battery died,” Scarlett said, feeling increasingly uncomfortable piling lie upon lie with her best friend.

“Ohmigod, I totally forgot about the shoot. I’d better call Dana and apologize. How was the party?”

“Soooo weird,” Jane replied. She picked up the remote and began clicking through channels. “Jesse showed up.”

“The man-whore?Again? He was at that party at STK, too. What, is he stalking you?”

“Hardly. But we talked. I apologized to him for, you know, for everything.”

Scarlett, who didn’t think Jane had anything to apologize for, since Jesse had screwed up first, arched her eyebrows. “And?”

“He started out really mad. But then he kinda…I don’t know. I think that he came around.”

An image of a couple kissing flashed across the TV screen. Scarlett winced. Déjà vu. It was a scene from one of the movies she and Liam had watched last night on cable:Casablanca . Jane was watching the television with a wistful half smile.

Scarlett was starting to get a bad feeling. “Janie? Be honest. You’re not seriously thinking about getting back together with Jesse, are you? I don’t care how hot or charming or rich he is; you and I both know that deep down, he’s a mess, and—”

“Scar!” Jane snapped. “Stop it! And stop saying mean things about him! He’s my…hewas my boyfriend, and I care about him, and it’s really, really obnoxious of you to keep saying this stuff.” She added, “Seriously, I’m so sick of your negativity lately. It’s extreme, even for you. You need to lighten up.”

Scarlett folded her arms across her chest, trying to resist the impulse to shake some sense into Jane.

They’d argued about Jesse throughout much of his and Jane’s (brief) relationship. No matter how hard Scarlett had tried to convince Jane of the very obvious fact that Jesse was a C-list celebuspawn who loved girls, drinking, drugs, and his own press more than he could possibly love Jane, her BFF had

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steadfastly defended him. She was still defending him now. “Okay, whatever. Sorry.”

Jane sipped her OJ in silence and clicked to some random game show on TV. Scarlett could tell that she was still pissed. “So…how was the rest of your evening?” she said, trying to change the subject.

“Good,” Jane replied, staring at the screen.

“What’d you do?”

Jane shrugged. “Madison and Gaby and I stayed at the party till, like, two thirty, and then we all went back to Madison’s. And then a bunch of us went to Toast for breakfast. It was Madison’s idea, even though she barely ate anything. Like two blueberries or something. She says she’s on a diet, which is insane, since she’s, like, a size negative two.”

Madison, Madison, Madison. Scarlett wasn’t sure whose name she hated hearing more—Jesse’s or Madison’s. Probably Madison’s. Actually,definitely Madison’s. Jesse might be a man-whore, but Madison was a sabotaging bitch who was out to ruin Jane’s life.

Jane began clicking through channels again. “So tell me about your party. Who was throwing it?”

“Um, this girl from my English class last semester and a couple of her roommates,” Scarlett said quickly.

Ugh. More lies.

“Did you have a good time?”

“You know, I did.” At least that part was the truth. “Just a bunch of us literature geeks debating about British novelists between vodka shots.”

“Hmm, sounds pretty wild,” Jane joked. At least she was smiling now.

“Yeah, things got a little out of control,” Scarlett joked back.

“Any cute guys?”

Scarlett thought about Liam. Her breath caught in her throat. “Nah.”

“Too bad.”

“Yeah, well.”

For a brief second, Scarlett was tempted to tell Jane everything. But she couldn’t bring herself to do it.

For one thing, there was nothing to tell. Big deal, so Scarlett liked Liam. She accidentally spent the night with him. It wasn’t like they were dating or in a relationship or anything like that. Last night was a onetime thing. She had no intention of repeating it.

The other thing was bigger: Scarlett felt strangely uncomfortable confiding in Jane. It was like she was watching their relationship change and she couldn’t do anything about it. It used to be that they never kept secrets from each other.

And now they did.

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16

FIFTEEN MINUTES

Veronica Bliss leaned back in her chair and gazed pensively through the glass-paned wall of her office, looking out onto her employees’ cubicles. She’d had it mirrored on one side so that she could see them, but no one could see in, which helped to achieve the balance of privacy (for her) and lack of privacy (for her staff) that madeGossip the well-oiled machine that it was.

She glanced at her laptop screen and saw that Madison Parker had sent another email. Veronica opened it with a heavy sigh, guessing that Madison was throwing a tantrum about the latest issue of Gossip.

She was.

TO: VERONICA BLISS

FROM: MADISON PARKER

SUBJECT: WTF???

You promised me that if I got you pictures of Jane, you would publish an article about me. You call the tiny mentions of the grooming habits of “Jane Roberts’s friend and confidante” an article about me????

WE HAD A DEAL.

Veronica rolled her eyes, annoyed that she had to waste even thirty seconds of her valuable time dealing with this. Quickly, she typed:

TO: MADISON PARKER

FROM: VERONICA BLISS

SUBJECT: RE: WTF???

That was your article. If you want another one, you need to get me more info ASAP. What is Jane up to? Is she dating anyone new?

What was Madison complaining about, anyway? The latest issue ofGossip featured a cover story about Jane’s postscandal escape to Cabo:L.A. CANDYSTAR HIDES IN MEXICO AFTER

TWO-TIMING BF . The photographer had gotten pictures of Jane on the beach: downing a margarita, covering her face with her hands (probably to shield her eyes from the sun, although the readers didn’t need to know that—better they believed she was sobbing in shame). And talking to Madison (whom the photo caption described as the “tan, skinny shoulder Jane cried on”).

And now Madison was throwing a fit because…why? Because she wasn’t the cover story? She was lucky to have gotten into the magazine at all.

A movement on the other side of the one-way window caught Veronica’s eye. It was her assistant,
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Diego, hovering.Ugh. What was his problem? He was really getting on her nerves lately.

The reply email from Madison came almost immediately. The girl must be sitting at her computer or staring at her BlackBerry, waiting. Obviously, she didn’t have a life.