Cruel Love

by Kate Brian

  “Ow!” Ariana blurted, louder than strictly necessary. She grabbed Tahira’s wrist and yanked her away from the others, fighting the crowd to get to the gift table—which was rather impressively stocked. She ducked behind a huge Kate Spade box and pressed her back against the wall.

  “I’m sorry! God! What’s the matter?” Tahira hissed.

  “What is he doing here?” Ariana asked, standing on her toes to see over the pile of presents. Meloni was moving slowly around the periphery of the room now, studying all the faces of the people on the dance floor.

  Tahira whirled around, saw Meloni, and screwed her face up in confused disgust. “I have no idea,” she said. “Kind of pathetic though, no? Him crashing? There aren’t even any other adults here.”

  “Tahira, focus!” Ariana said through her teeth. “How could he have even known about this?”

  Tahira lifted her shoulders and let them drop dramatically. “I don’t know! I might have said something in our therapy session about planning your party for you—you know, dealing with my grief by throwing myself into a project. He seemed impressed, actually. I—”

  Ariana groaned and gripped her forearm tightly. She curled her fingers and squeezed, trying as hard as she could to keep it together.

  “What’s the big deal? Do you want me to ask him to leave?” Tahira said, turning to the side. “Because what the birthday girl wants, the birthday girl gets!”

  For a split second Ariana almost agreed to the plan. Let Tahira be the bouncer. But then she realized it was pointless. Dr. Meloni was here because he knew he would be guaranteed to finally get a glimpse of the elusive Briana Leigh Covington, and he wasn’t going to leave until he got one—and probably cornered her afterward.

  “No. It’s okay,” Ariana said. Across the dance floor, someone had stopped Meloni to talk, and he now had his back to her. “I’m just going to run to the bathroom to freshen up and maybe say hello to a few people. I’ll be back.”

  “Okay,” Tahira said. She shrugged once more, than shoved her way back into the throng of dancers.

  Ariana took a moment to herself to breathe.

  Shit, she thought. Shit, shit, shit.

  This was not the way this was supposed to play out. She was supposed to have more time. She had a whole plan, which she’d yet to execute. Ariana narrowed her eyes as Meloni broke away from his conversation and resumed his deliberate search of the party.

  “Screw it,” she said under her breath. “I can do this.”

  Then she turned and took the darkest, most camouflaged route to the coat check, where she retrieved her bag and coat. She shoved her way outside and handed her ticket to the valet.

  “Wait. My car’s right there,” she said, spotting the Porsche. “Just give me the keys.”

  The fresh-faced valet hesitated. “But I’m not supposed to—”

  “Just give me the keys!” Ariana demanded.

  He handed her the keys, his hand shaking. Ariana stormed over to her car, angrier about having to leave her party than anything else. As soon as she was safely inside behind the wheel, the engine started, she took out her phone and dialed Dr. Meloni’s cell phone number.

  It took a few rings for him to answer, and when he did, the first thing she heard was the music. Dr. Meloni was at her birthday party right now and she wasn’t. How entirely wrong was that?

  “Hello?”

  Ariana took a breath and closed her eyes. “Dr. Meloni?” she said, pitching her voice up and throwing in a Texan accent. “Is this Dr. Meloni?”

  “Yes it is.” The background noise grew duller now. He was moving away from the dance floor. “To whom am I speaking?”

  “Dr. Meloni, this is Briana Leigh Covington,” Ariana said, infusing her voice with emotion, choking herself up.

  “Miss Covington! I’m at your birthday party right now. Where are you?” he said.

  Ariana clenched her jaw for a moment before answering. “I … I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t face all those people. Not tonight. I need someone to talk to, doctor. Immediately. Tonight.”

  “Of course!” He sounded happy, the jackass. Elated, actually. Because he’d won. He’d turned out to be right. Ariana’s fingernails dug into the skin on her thigh.

  “Can we meet somewhere private? Somewhere away from campus? I can’t be here anymore. There are just too many memories. Too many ghosts,” Ariana said, sounding tearful.

  “Of course, of course. We can meet at my house. I’ll give you directions.”

  There was dead silence behind his voice now. He was probably getting his coat.

  “I have GPS,” she said flatly. “Just give me the address.”

  He did, and Ariana stared at the front door of the club. It wasn’t like she needed to write it down. She’d long since memorized the route. Seconds later, Meloni strode out the front door and handed his ticket to the valet.

  “I’ll be there in half an hour,” she said, glaring at him through the side window of her Porsche.

  “Good. And Miss Covington? I’m glad you called,” he said.

  I’ll bet you are, Ariana thought.

  “Me too,” she said with some effort. Then she ended the call.

  The valet pulled the doctor’s car around. He hoisted himself up behind the wheel and slammed the door, a Cheshire grin on his face. Ariana wished she could have walked over to him right then and there and shot him directly through the front of his skull. But she had no gun, and there were way too many people around anyway.

  Ariana scrunched down in her seat, waiting for Dr. Meloni to drive on by. As his SUV roared past her rear bumper, she envisioned herself slamming her car into reverse and taking him out. She wanted to drive her fist through the windshield, yank his lifeless body out through the shattered glass, throw him to the asphalt, and run over him multiple times with his own car, reveling in the crack of each and every bone, the squishing and splurting of his vital organs, the lakes and rivers of blood. But since she was not a possessor of superhuman strength, and since that dream was unrealistic, she decided to just breathe.

  In, one … two … three …

  Out, one … two … three …

  In, one … two … three …

  Out, one … two … three …

  Instead, she took comfort in knowing that at least the very clueless Dr. Meloni was headed toward his death, and in approximately one hour, she’d be headed back to her party.

  EVIDENCE

  In the yard behind Dr. Meloni’s house Rambo barked his fool head off, every high-pitched yelp like a pinprick to Ariana’s nerves. She stood in front of the fourth window on the side of the house, saying a silent prayer that this one would give unlike the first three, then she pressed her fingers into the glass and shoved upward. The window slid noiselessly open. Ariana smiled. Finally. She was in.

  She hoisted herself through the window and carefully lowered her feet onto the floor of what appeared to be a guest bedroom. Slowly, she crept to the doorway and listened. Meloni’s voice. He was already on the phone. She had given him ten minutes to get settled before getting out of her car and creeping around the house, but of course he couldn’t just wait for her. The man always had to be doing something, anything, to make himself feel important. Ariana peeked her head around the corner and saw that at the very end of a long hallway, a door stood slightly ajar, soft yellow light pouring out from inside.

  Ariana took a deep breath and steeled herself. This was it. The moment of truth.

  She tiptoed to the end of the hall and hovered right outside the doorway, relishing the moment. Maybe this wasn’t the way this was supposed to happen, but it was happening. She might as well let herself enjoy it. Dr. Meloni was so deliciously oblivious. He had no idea she was here. He had no idea what was about to happen.

  “But that’s exactly why you need to take some time to think,” Dr. Meloni said urgently on the other side of the thick, oak door. “There’s no reason good enough to consider taking your own life.”

  Ariana gritt
ed her teeth and rolled her eyes closed. He was on the phone with a patient. And this was just like him, trying to tell people what were good reasons and what were bad reasons—acting like he knew everything about everything and it was all so black and white. What did he really know about the person on the other end of that line? Ariana’s fingers curled inside her black leather gloves.

  In fifteen minutes, you’ll be on your way back to your friends, to Jasper, to your party and your life, Ariana told herself, taking long, soothing breaths. Just get through this and all will be well.

  Dr. Meloni hung up the phone and heaved a sigh. Ariana’s pulse sped up to an alarming pace, but suddenly, she saw everything around her more clearly. Just like that, her adrenaline brought focus. She pressed her lips together and pushed the door wide. She didn’t even try to conceal her face.

  Dr. Meloni looked up from his desk with a start. His jaw fell open and his eyes widened in shock. All the blood drained right out of his face, from his temples to his cheeks to his chin. Even with her new hair, and even though she was supposed to be dead, he clearly recognized her.

  “You,” he croaked.

  Ariana took a step into the room and smiled.

  “Miss me?”

  The doctor reached for his phone. Ariana leaped forward, tore the reading lamp from the corner of his desk, knocking over a cup full of pens and pencils, and swung as hard as he could. The heavy metal base cracked across his jaw, sending a spurt of blood over the wall where it showered his precious framed degrees—arranged just as they’d been in his office at the Brenda T.—with thick red spots. The phone slipped from his hand and he went down, slamming his chin into the edge of the desk. His head whipped back and she heard the telltale crack of his spine breaking. As his heavy body slumped to the floor, his eyes rolled into his skull. At first, one arm crooked over the arm of his leather chair, but then, ever so slowly, it slipped off and landed on the hard-wood with a thud.

  Her chest heaving, Ariana slowly walked around the end of the desk. Dr. Meloni was curled up at an unnatural angle, blood seeping from his mouth onto the floor. She tossed the lamp and caught it by its neck, then crouched over his feet, letting out an amused, derisive snort.

  “That was almost anticlimactic,” she said with a sneer.

  Suddenly the doctor’s eyes popped open. He grabbed a gold letter opener off the floor, let out a wet, guttural growl, and swung. Ariana felt the stabbing pain in her side before she even registered the fact that he’d moved. She shouted out, raised the lamp over her head with both hands, and brought it down with all her body weight on the front of Dr. Meloni’s skull. Instantly, he fell back again. When Ariana shakily lifted the lamp, the entire front of his head was crushed inward. There was blood everywhere, and he was gone. Truly and utterly gone.

  Ariana tried to breathe, but her lungs caught over and over again. She put her gloved hand over her wound and it came back covered in blood. She was supposed to do this without leaving any evidence, but now … now there was no way to be certain that some of the blood on the floor wasn’t hers.

  Her eyes filled with hot, angry tears as she looked around shakily, trying to decide what to do. She caught a glimpse of the gold letter opener, glinting in the overhead lights. It was soaked in her blood. When she reached out to grab it, she felt her wound open further and she winced. A few drops of blood slipped from her dress and hit the floor.

  “Oh, God. Oh God, oh God, oh God,” Ariana wept. She shoved the letter opener into her coat pocket and used her sleeve to try to wipe up the droplets. She only succeeded in smearing them into the grainy wood planks.

  “This isn’t happening,” Ariana whispered hoarsely. “This is not happening.”

  Reaching up to clutch the desktop, Ariana dragged herself up to standing. The pain in her side was excruciating, and she was starting to wonder if Meloni hadn’t hit a major organ. She fought for breath and tried to think. What did this mean? What did she need to do?

  Think, Ariana. Just think.

  When the police arrived, as they would eventually, they wouldn’t find any fingerprints, but they would find blood. When they tested the blood, they would not be able to identify it as Briana Leigh Covington’s, but they would be able to match it with Ariana Osgood’s criminal file. This would, of course, stump them for a time. Ariana was supposed to be dead. But DNA didn’t lie and eventually they would figure out that Ariana had faked her own death. They would figure out that she had assumed a new identity. They would put her picture everywhere. They would come looking for her, and as Meloni was currently employed at Atherton-Pryce Hall, that would certainly be their first stop.

  She had to get out of here. As soon as possible. She had to get the hell out of Washington, out of the United States.

  It was time to haul ass.

  Taking a few tentative steps toward the door, Ariana found she couldn’t move much without pain. She grabbed Meloni’s scarf from a hook by the door and pressed it against the wound, staunching the blood flow. It helped her move a bit more freely, too, and she was able to nudge the door open with her foot. She opened the Internet connection on her cell phone and toggled directly to the page for Intercontinental Air. Ariana had already booked tickets for Emma Walsh and Jasper Montgomery on a three a.m. flight to Portugal, plus a nice but not ostentatious hotel room in Lisbon. All she had to do was hit CONFIRM.

  Standing in the hallway, Ariana’s eyes caught on a stack of mail resting atop a small table. The top envelope bore the Atherton-Pryce Hall crest. Her heart squeezed so tightly she staggered sideways, and had to brace herself on the far wall. Suddenly, the last few months seemed like a dream. Scoring a spot at the prestigious school. Making all these amazing friends. Winning the Welcome Week competition and moving into Privilege House. Being with the most coveted guy on campus. Masterminding her pledge class plot to score points with her secret society. Getting elected president of Stone and Grave. Falling in love with Jasper. Being offered a guaranteed admission to Princeton. It had been everything she ever wanted. And now, she had to let every bit of it go.

  Every bit of it except Jasper, she reminded herself as she started down the hallway, her legs quaking beneath her. You may have to give up the future you always wanted, but at least with Jasper, you’ll have some kind of future.

  She made it through the front door and out into the cold, where Rambo’s bark still split the air. Cursing Dr. Meloni under her breath for the last time, she limped her way across the driveway as fast as she could go.

  A PROMISE

  Ariana slammed on the brakes of her silver Porsche outside the club and one of the valets jumped to open her door. She pushed herself up and out, still holding Meloni’s scarf to her side underneath her coat. As she tried to stand up straight, a lightning bolt of pain shot through her abdomen, and she found herself unequal to the task. She leaned hard on the door, practically doubled over, and tried to look as if she was simply relaxing.

  “Good evening, Miss,” the valet said with a smile, holding the car door for her.

  “I don’t want you to park it,” she said, a bead of sweat slipping from her temple down her cheek. She folded her coat over her dress, the skimpy fabric of which was completely soaked through with blood. The pain was growing unbearable. She had to get Jasper and get him to take care of her, or she was going to end up in a hospital, which would be the worst possible thing. “I need you to do me a favor.”

  “Oookay,” the guy said, clearly confused.

  She pulled her phone out and brought up a picture of Jasper. “See this guy?”

  He nodded.

  “Good. Go inside and get him for me,” Ariana ordered. Then she fell back into the leather bucket seat.

  The valet hesitated. “Um … I’m not really supposed to leave my station.”

  Ariana tugged a crisp hundred-dollar bill out of her wallet and handed it to him. His eyes widened in disbelief. “Go.”

  “Yes, Miss.”

  He ran inside, letting the door slam behind him
. Ariana leaned back in her seat, the exhaust making steam clouds against the night air, and closed her eyes. She imagined all of her friends inside, dancing, eating, drinking, wondering where she’d gone off to, assuming she was in another part of the club. She imagined how confused they’d be when they finally realized she’d ditched her own party, how devastated they’d be when they realized she was gone from APH entirely. She hadn’t decided yet whether or not to leave them a note. Certainly it would be the kind thing to do—to tell them she’d simply decided to drop out and move to Europe. It would keep them from fretting that she was dead, and probably keep Soomie out of the loony bin. But would it help or hurt her cause with the police? Part of her thought it would help because if she simply disappeared, they would be suspicious of her. But part of her thought it would hurt because it would let them know her plan.

  Perhaps she could tell them she was going to Australia or Hawaii or Africa. Throw them off for a little while at least.

  “Ana?”

  Ariana’s eyes popped open at the sound of Jasper’s voice. He hovered next to her door, his cheeks ruddy with the cold. She’d never seen anything so perfect before in her life.

  “Hey,” she said weakly.

  Jasper crouched next to the open door. “Are you all right? You look sick.”

  “I’m—”

  Ariana shifted and the scarf tumbled out from under her dress, caked with blood.

  “Holy—Ana! You’re hurt!” he whispered harshly.

  “It’s not as bad as it looks,” she told him, pushing herself up straight.

  “We have to get you to a hospital.” Jasper fumbled for his phone.

  “No.” She gripped his wrist so tightly he froze. “Jasper, no. Do you remember, last night? What you said to me?”

  Jasper’s brow knit. “What I said …?”

  “About going to the ends of the earth for me?” Ariana prompted.