by Kelly Oram
“That back there was the end of this publicity stunt,” I said after Kaylee followed me into the bathroom, waiting for an explanation.
I briefly met Kaylee’s eyes in the mirror, then picked up my razor and went to work making my face kissable. “I’m done, Kaylee.” My mind had been made up the second I recognized Ella, and once I knew I was finished with this game, I was filled with serenity. “We can end it however you want. You can tell people it was you, or you can say I dumped you and play up the heartbroken angle—I don’t care. Whatever you want, but it’s over. I’m not doing it anymore.”
“Excuse me?”
I rinsed my razor in the sink, and as I brought it back to my face I wondered if having sharp objects nearby while having this conversation was the best idea. “That wasn’t just any woman back there; that was Ella.”
Kaylee didn’t say anything for a moment, but her eyes narrowed and her lips pursed together tightly. She was remembering the meet-and-greet and seeing my interaction with Ella through a new light.
“That was Ella? You can’t be serious.” She laughed a hard, humorless laugh. “That sarcastic little bitch is what you’ve been fussing about all this time?”
I put down my razor and whirled on Kaylee, backing her against the wall behind us. “Don’t talk about her like that. I’m done with you, Kaylee, and I’m going after her. You can either make this easy or complicated, but if you try to pull any shit, I’ll come clean about the relationship being a sham from the beginning. I’ll tell everyone how the spoiled little princess threw a Lindsay Lohan-style tantrum and blackmailed me into a fake engagement. I’ll tell everyone how you threatened to ruin my career, get my dad fired, and sabotage the film all because you’re crazy and obsessed with me.”
“Obsessed with you?” Kaylee scoffed. “You’re not worth the drama. There are hundreds of guys out there better-looking and richer than you who would be grateful for the chance to be with me.”
“Good. Go torture some of them.”
Ignoring Kaylee’s glare, I finished shaving my face, spritzed myself with a dash of cologne I hoped Ella would find irresistible, and went to find something fresh to wear.
“No one will believe you, you know,” Kaylee argued, following me into the bedroom. “Not with your reputation for being such a player.”
What a joke. “Trust me, Kay, everyone in town already knows you’re a coldhearted bitch. Mentally unstable diva wouldn’t be too far of a leap.”
I rummaged through my things and found a dark gray V-neck sweater that women always seemed to like. Hopefully Ella would, too.
“What about the Zachary Goldberg film? The contracts are still in negotiations. Nothing’s signed yet. I can still make my father back out.”
“You’re overestimating your importance, baby,” I said as I slipped the sweater over my head. “You may have persuaded your father to hear the proposal, but I was at that meeting, too. He loved the script and has the most prestigious director and the hottest up-and-coming actor already attached. The project is gold.”
I patted myself down and checked the mirror one last time. Satisfied with what I saw, I slipped my wallet and phone in my pocket. It was already six, so I called the restaurant to tell them I’d be a little late and not to let Ella go anywhere.
“I can still ruin your career,” Kaylee said darkly. “I can drag your reputation through the mud. I can have the paparazzi so far up your ass you’ll need surgery to have them removed.”
Her anger rose as she became more desperate, but she no longer had any effect on me. I was beyond caring. “Do your worst. Whatever damage you do won’t be permanent.”
“You’ll lose your Oscar.”
A few months ago that might have bothered me, but what was a damn statue worth if it meant I’d lose Ella? I shrugged. “Maybe. But even if you ruin my chances this year, I’ve got time to prove to people I’m for real. I’ve got four more Cinder Chronicles movies and a project with Zachary Goldberg coming up that may as well be called Brian Oliver is the Man. I only needed you to make me look good in the first place because I was an immature asshole, but I’m not that guy anymore. I have Ella now, and she won’t just make me look like I’m serious. With her, it’s real.”
Kaylee stood there, staring completely dumbfounded, as she finally realized she’d lost this argument. In one last desperate attempt to get what she wanted, she crossed the room and placed her hands delicately on my chest. “Brian…” She gazed up at me with lust-filled eyes as she slid her arms up over my shoulders and pressed her body against me. “Baby, please don’t go.”
As Kaylee brushed her lips over my freshly-shaven jaw, I wondered how I’d ever found her tempting. I grabbed her arms off my shoulders and untwined myself from her grip. “Sorry, Kay. There’s only one woman for me now, and you aren’t her. You don’t even come close.”
For the first time since I met her, Kaylee’s true emotions cracked the surface and she was unable to hide the hurt my rejection caused. I felt bad for exactly two seconds. Then, a knock on the door made my stomach explode with butterflies. “That would be Scotty.”
“Brian, you can’t do this!”
Ignoring Kaylee, I opened the door, suddenly in the biggest hurry of my life. Scott stood there with an excited grin on his face, holding up the book I’d asked him to get and a large green cloak. “I have the things you asked for.”
“My hero!”
“Good luck, man.”
“Brian!” Kaylee shouted again.
“Sorry, Kay, I gotta go.” I wrapped the cloak around my shoulders and pulled the hood over my head. The cloak was more Lord of the Rings than The Cinder Chronicles, and hopefully the disguise would be enough to get me through the convention center to the restaurant, unnoticed. “Scotty’s going to pack up my stuff for me and check me out of the room. Play nice and leave his man parts intact.”
Kaylee glared for all she was worth and I blew her a kiss in return, giddy from my new freedom. “See you on the set of the sequel, Princess.”
. . . . .
The Dragon’s Roost was a restaurant inside the convention center. I stood back across the aisle from the entrance, scoping out the scene. I wished I’d picked a more private place to meet, but I panicked when Ella started to walk away from me and the only place that came to mind was the café where I’d eaten lunch that afternoon.
Considering the event was packed, dining options were limited, and it was prime dinnertime, the restaurant was crowded. There was a line at the hostess stand twenty people long. At least I’d reserved a booth in the back ahead of time, and so far, my Elven cloak of invisibility had done its job. I blended right into the crowd of fantasy lovers. No one in the world besides Ella and Scott had any idea I was coming, so as long as Ella and I didn’t cause a scene, we should be fine.
I was fifteen minutes late, but I wasn’t the only one. Just as I was about to head inside, five people in amazing costumes I instantly recognized walked up next to the hostess stand and stopped.
“I don’t think I can do this,” Ella said as she peered nervously into the restaurant.
My stomach flipped. She was standing just three feet from me. Too tempted to get a read on her feelings, I leaned against the front wall of the restaurant and pulled my hood just a little lower over my face. I kept my head down and pretended to be very interested in texting someone while stealing as many glances at her as I could.
“Of course you can,” the redheaded girl in the Queen Nesona outfit said.
The blonde with the long hair just frowned at her. “Why not?”
It was a very good question.
A crazed laugh bubbled up from Ella’s throat. “Why not? Because he’s Brian Oliver. He’s America’s favorite bad boy. He’s dating Kaylee Summers, for heaven’s sake!”
The redhead snorted. “Yeah, because that was a healthy relationship.”
I choked back a laugh. Apparently Kaylee and I weren’t as good at acting as we thought.
“Guys l
ike him do not hang out with girls like me, Vivian.”
Ella’s fierce declaration was startling. How could she think that?
“But he’s Cinder. He’s your best friend,” the blonde argued.
I wanted to hug her for pointing that out, but Ella’s response was frantic. “Because he doesn’t really know me! It’s different online. If I meet him now, everything changes. What if he’s disappointed and I end up losing my best friend?”
Impossible. I found it ironic that now she was the one worried about losing me when it had been the other way around the day I refused to meet her.
“There’s no way he’ll be disappointed,” the redhead, Vivian, promised, “but if he is, then I’ll be your new best friend and we can feed him to the flesh-eating worms.”
I smiled at that. It was easy to see why Ella liked Vivian.
The Ratana with the long hair put her arm around Ella. She had to be one of Ella’s stepsisters—Ella had mentioned they were twins—and she was obviously the good one. The evil one was standing back from the others, wearing a very Kaylee-esque scowl.
“The guy’s clearly nuts about you,” the good sister said. “He was flirting like crazy with you even before he figured out who you were. In front of his fiancée!”
Well. At least someone appreciated my charm. Obviously not Ella, though, because she groaned and said, “He flirted with everyone. It’s his job to be friendly with his fans.”
Her annoyance was amusing, but my attention was drawn by a loud scoff from Mr. Fantastic. Thankfully, he wasn’t glued to Ella’s side anymore, but he was still standing close enough to make me crazy with jealousy.
“That was way beyond friendly, Ella. The guy was seconds away from jumping over the table and punching me in the face just for standing next to you.”
Soccer Boy was really perceptive. I had been close to doing exactly that, but not because he was just standing next to her. The evil sister agreed with me. “You mean hanging on her,” she muttered. “You may as well have peed on her.”
It was funny—and completely true—but Ella blanched and her other stepsister was pissed. “Ana, don’t be so mean!”
“It’s Ella’s fault,” Ana argued. “She’s been stringing Rob along for weeks because of her precious Cinder, and now she doesn’t even want to meet him. What a tease!”
Before I had time to try and decipher what that meant, Ella snapped. “Of course I want to meet him!”
“Then what’s your problem? Obviously he wants to meet you too, or he wouldn’t have asked you to come.”
“I hate to agree with Ana,” Vivian said, “but he did ask you to meet him, and he didn’t have to do that. If you don’t talk to him, you know you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.”
“But he doesn’t know about me,” Ella blurted suddenly. “I’ve never gone into detail about my accident. He doesn’t know I’m… I’m…”
I glanced up so sharply that I would have been discovered had not all of Ella’s friends been too shocked by her confession to notice me. The looks on their faces ranged from pity, to sad, to sympathetic, and, of course, a very satisfied smirk from Kaylee Jr.
“You’ve never told him?” Vivian asked quietly. “Even after all this time?”
Ella looked as if she wanted to cry as she shook her head. I was going to go crazy if I didn’t figure out what she was talking about. Ella needed to go inside already so I could talk to her myself.
“Cinder was the one person I never had to talk about my condition with, so I didn’t. I didn’t think it would matter. I didn’t think I was ever going to meet him.”
The nice sister shook her head. “It won’t matter. He’s going to love you anyway.”
Well. And that was the truth.
Ana laughed and it came out as a cackle. “Sure, he is!” she cried. “He’s going to give up Kaylee Summers for you. It’ll be the real-life version of Beauty and the Beast, only backwards!”
I nearly dropped my phone because I was clenching it so hard. Ella wasn’t joking when she said her stepsister had a lot in common with my girlfriend. I was damn near ready to break cover and give her a piece of my mind, but Rob beat me to it. “Shut up, Ana! I’m so sick of your attitude!”
Ana looked so shocked to be yelled at that I wondered if any guy had ever dared do it before. Probably not. Only, Rob didn’t stop there. “You want to know why I didn’t ask you to the dance? It’s because it doesn’t matter how hot you are; every time I look at you, all I see is a cruel, selfish bitch.”
The entire group was stunned stupid by Rob’s outburst. Even me. Damn the man for earning some of my respect.
Ana’s eyes filled with tears and she stalked off without another word. I almost felt bad for her, but quickly forgot all about her because the second she left, Rob took Ella’s face in his hands and plastered a passionate kiss on her. If he hadn’t said what he said next, I would have decked him. “You are beautiful, Ellamara,” he promised. “And I am jealous as hell right now because you are going to go in there and make Brian Oliver fall madly in love with you. I have no doubt.”
Too late, I thought, smiling to myself. I decided I couldn’t begrudge Rob the kiss since the guy really seemed to care for Ella, and it was the only one he was ever going to get.
“Go get him,” Rob told her, and then gave her a gentle nudge toward the front door.
I tugged my hood down again and slipped away when the group took a step closer to me. I waited a few minutes because Ella looked like she might need a moment to compose herself after all the drama, but then I went inside, determined to finally claim my druid priestess.
I felt slightly sick to my stomach as I entered the restaurant. I knew what my friends all believed, but the idea of someone like Brian Oliver wanting someone like me was too insane to accept, even if I could make myself understand that he was the guy I’d known for years.
I was so lost in thought that I didn’t see anyone approach me until a man said, “Miss Ella?”
I drew back a step, startled. “Yes. That’s me.”
“Welcome. Your table is ready for you.” The guy flashed me a brilliant smile. “Right this way, please.”
I was a little baffled by the special treatment. Then again, it made sense when the man said, “Mr. Oliver is running a few minutes late as well. He asked me to convey his sincerest apologies, but he should be here in just a few minutes.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
The restaurant was all one big, open dining floor with tables in the middle and booths lining the outside edges. It wasn’t the best place for privacy, but I could tell the manager had tried his best because he led me to a booth in the far back corner. We wouldn’t be tucked away entirely, but we wouldn’t be in the middle of everything, either. I was grateful for the effort.
The manager fussed over me for a minute, lighting a small candle in the middle of the table. Before he left, I had to ask. “Excuse me, but how did you know who I was?”
The man smiled again. “When Mr. Oliver called ahead for a table, he described what you would be wearing. He also said I’d know for certain it was you by your ‘stunning eyes.’” The man didn’t move his hands, but the air quotes were definitely there in his tone.
“And was I not right?” a quiet voice asked. A voice that made me shiver.
Cinder slid gracefully into the booth across from me and smiled from beneath the hood of a heavy cloak—a cloak a lot like my gorgeous white one, except for its dark color. His face was shadowed, but the flicker of the candle on the table caused his eyes to gleam in the soft light. Those eyes never left my face as he thanked the manager for reserving us a table and ordered dinner. They burned into me like lasers.
The manager hurried off to give our orders to the kitchen, leaving me alone—well, as alone as two people can get in a crowded restaurant—with my best friend, who just happened to be a famous movie star. For a moment, all we could do was stare at one another.
“Ella.”
He said m
y name with reverence and deep satisfaction. My response sounded nervous and unsure. “Cinder?”
“Call me Brian, Ella. Please.”
He paused, waiting for me to respond.
“Okay… Brian.”
He grinned, and the effect was devastating. “I’ve always wished I could tell you my name. Every time you called me Cinder, it felt like a lie. I hated that you didn’t know me.”
Finally, the shock cleared from my head. His words caused reality to crash down on me with vengeance. “Then why didn’t you ever tell me?” I was unable to keep my spiraling emotions in check. “How could you not tell me this?”
His smile faded a little. “If I’d told you, you wouldn’t have believed me.”
“Maybe not three years ago, but two weeks ago when you said we could never meet? You could have just told me you were famous and way too busy with your big movie and your psycho fiancée to spend time with me.”
Cinder flinched as if I’d slapped him. He seemed stunned by my anger, but what had he expected? His face crumpled with regret. “Ella, that wasn’t it. You don’t understand.”
“No, I finally do.” My head spun as everything fell into place with perfect clarity. “It all makes so much sense now. Everything. That’s the last piece of the puzzle I’ve been missing this whole time. Your relationship with Kaylee is a scam. It’s a publicity thing, isn’t it?”
Brian grimaced. “I didn’t want to have any part of it, but I was in a vulnerable position and everyone insisted it would solve my problem. Plus, there were a lot of people that had a lot to gain if Kaylee and I were together. At the time, I didn’t have an excuse to say no. I didn’t have you back yet.”
His confession startled me. I wasn’t sure what he meant, but it was very hard not to read into it and see things I wanted to see. Impossible things.
He reached both hands across the table, in a gesture asking for mine. When I didn’t give him my hands, he pulled his back and started fiddling with his glass of ice water.
