Page 69 of Reckless
The girls parted around me, the tension disappearing under the bigger, stranger shape of the room.I crossed to the mirror while Roxanne stood behind me and held the necklace up against my throat.
Roxanne’s hands settled on my shoulders.She smiled at me in the mirror.
“Beautiful,” she said simply.I hated when kindness did that.
Hope made a happy little sound.Avril nodded.Isabel said, “The color works.”Miley looked like she wanted to be grumpy and was losing.Even Britney’s mouth softened.
Roxanne unclasped the necklace before I could say anything stupid and kissed my cheek.“You do not need jewels,” she said.“But I like seeing what suits people.”
Something about that sentence got to me more than it should have.It was I like seeing what suits you.
I breathed and said lightly, “This room is trying to convert me.”
Roxanne laughed.“Too late, habibti.You’re already halfway ours.”
My body stiffened for one tiny beat before I recovered.
We came back out of the vault twenty minutes later.
Hope was already ahead of me, radiating.
“I need emeralds,” she said.“I have literally never needed anything more.”
“You don’t need emeralds,” Miley said.“You need perspective.”
“Perspective doesn’t go with everything.”
“Neither do emeralds.”
“Name one outfit.”
Miley paused.“That’s not the point.”
“It is exactly the point.”
Avril fell into step beside me.“You went quiet in there.”
“I was processing.”
“Processing the jewelry Maman is planning for you or processing the family?”
“Both.”
She smiled.“The warmth gets to you, doesn’t it.”
“It shouldn’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because belonging to a family like this isn’t mine to want.”
Avril looked at me.“Wanting isn’t the same as claiming, Kelly.”
That landed harder than it should have.
When we stepped back into the main hallway, Xerses was in the salon doorway and his gaze found me.
I walked straight toward him because if this weekend was happening, it was happening with him.
