Page 54 of All Fall Down

Chapter Eighteen

No one is lateto the party. When the doors ceremonially open at 8:30, every student at Belle Mere Prep is waiting. Security does a decent job weeding undercover reporters from the crowd, but my heartbeat speeds up as I survey the group of strangers before me. Behind their masks, I can’t recognize any of them, and I realize without their masks, I wouldn’t know most of them anyway. The uppermost floor of West Casino has been transformed into a golden playground. Ropes of sparking lights drip from the ceiling, casting a warm glow that feels out of place in the modern setting. Dozens of white roses dipped in gold-leaf are staged strategically throughout the space.

“It’s gorgeous,” Josie says as she comes up beside.

“It’s gaudy,” I correct her. “Actually, it’s nouveau riche.”

The whole scene screams wealth and debauchery. Monroe has made her point. In the future, if I’m going to fit in I might try to do so with a bit less theatricality.

“What?” Josie asks.

“Inside joke,” I say dryly. I haven’t had the heart to tell Josie how much money Hans put in my trust fund before he went upriver. Between my relationship with Jameson and everything going on in her private life, I don’t want the gulf between us to widen any further.

“When did that happen?” she shrieks. I follow her finger to find Hugo and Leighton entering, hand in hand.

Leave it to him to be the only person late to the party of the century. Behind my mask I study the way Hugo hovers near Leighton. I can’t imagine what it took to convince him to let her come back here. Not after she’d nearly died. Glancing over I realize I can’t even tell which window we went through. It’s been repaired—erased as if it never happened.

“I didn’t tell you? They were together when I went to the hospital. He’s been there since she woke up.”

“I did not call that,” Josie admits, waving her hand under her mask. “Screw this.”

She pulls off her mask and smiles tightly.

“Too hot?” I ask.

“Yeah. Besides no one here knows who I am anyway. My face is as good as a mask,” she says with a laugh.

I don’t miss the pain that lingers in her eyes. Josie has never felt like she belongs here. I can’t imagine how she feels at the moment.

“Let’s find you some water,” I suggest, but before I can abscond with her to the kitchen, a man steps into our path. “Excuse me.”

He catches me around the waist when I try to push past him. Tipping his masked face lower, he whispers, “You don’t recognize me, Duchess?”

“Of course, I do.” My fingers trace the broad shoulders accentuated by the dark cashmere of his tuxedo jacket. “You’re supposed to be watching my back.”

Literally and figuratively.

“A West is always fashionably late,” he advises me, pushing his mask up. He points to the corridor that leads to the private family rooms. “Case in point.”

Monroe is the last to arrive, despite the obsessive care she took planning it. She sweeps into the room in a long black gown that dips low, exposing the valley between her breasts. Unlike the mask she chose for me, hers is a simple lace strip tied around her eyes. Monroe West is on display for all of us to see, but how many people see past the image she projects?

Josie clears her throat to remind us that she’s still here. “I’ll give you two some space.”

Before I can tear myself away from Jameson to join her, Monroe marches up to us.

“How did they get past security?” she hisses, pointing to Sabine, her former best friend, and Levi, Jameson’s former roommate. She’s not the only one late to the party.

“Were they on the list?” Jameson asks indifferently. He’s much more calm than the last time he was in the same room as Levi. He’s had time to cope with his fair-weather friend’s betrayal.

“How can you just stand there?” Monroe demands, and I can’t help but agree with her.

“That movie will never get made. Levi will continue to be a B-list star whose destiny depends on his looks. Karma has done its part as far as I’m concerned.”

“You’re a bigger person than I am.” Monroe sweeps across the room after them.

I tug Jameson’s arm, forcing him to follow.

“My sister can fight her own battles,” he reassures me, but I ignore him.