Beneath Him

by Kant, Komal

  At least her love life was normal and going well.

  “Okay, tell your millionaire boyfriend I say hi.”

  “Will do! But I doubt we’ll be doing much talking!” Erin responded brightly before hanging up.

  Ugh. A mental image of Erin and Stavros getting it on infiltrated my thoughts, and I tried to push them away as I headed back to the mansion. There were certain things about my friend’s life that I didn’t need to know.

  Silence followed me as I slowly walked up the path that led to the side door of the mansion. When I entered, my phone beeped, alerting me to a text message. It was from Oscar.

  Please come by my office.

  Interesting. I wondered what he wanted to see me in person for. I didn’t see too much of Chloe and Oscar—I figured Oscar was mostly at his office in town and Chloe was, well, doing whatever it was that she did—so it was unusual to have many face-to-face conversations with them.

  In the case of Chloe, that didn’t bother me too much.

  Changing direction, I headed down the corridor that led to Oscar’s office. I hadn’t been by here since the day I’d first arrived. It was a wonder that I had pretty much figured out my way around the mansion now when at first I had wondered how I would ever remember where everything was.

  Once I reached Oscar’s door, I rapped on it firmly with my knuckles and entered when I heard him say, “Come in.”

  Oscar sat behind his imposing desk as the setting sun sent slivers of light dancing into the darkening room.

  “Good evening,” I said, approaching his desk and taking a seat across from him. “Your timing was impeccable. I was just-”

  “Taking a stroll through the garden?” he asked with a pleasant smile.

  My brow creased as I nodded, wondering how he already knew that.

  Oscar gestured to the large windows behind him with a hand. “I have a lovely view of the garden from here. I thought I’d catch you on your way back.”

  “Oh, okay. Is something wrong?” I fidgeted with my hands in my lap as nerves built up in my stomach.

  There were so many things that I could have done wrong. Maybe Chloe had complained about me. Maybe Nick had decided he couldn’t be around me anymore.

  “No, nothing’s wrong,” Oscar said, giving me a reassuring smile. “I just wanted to make you aware that next Saturday we will be hosting a ball for my birthday, like we do every year.”

  “A ball?” I asked, only having heard that term in fairy tales. “Will I turn into a pumpkin at midnight?”

  “I hope not, dear,” Oscar chuckled. “But you will need to get dressed up. The dress code is black tie.”

  I groaned inwardly. I wasn’t great at this whole dressing up thing. Fancy balls weren’t exactly the norm for me. I really was a pumpkin.

  “Yay,” I said, forcing a smile onto my face, but I was a terrible liar and I could tell Oscar saw through me immediately.

  “Don’t worry, I’m sure Emily will be thrilled to go shopping with you for a new dress.”

  “Yeah,” I said uncertainly, glancing around the room as I dreaded the idea of trying to fit in with the high society friends of the Ruggarsons.

  My eyes fell on the portrait hanging on the wall—the one of the young, blonde woman. She truly was beautiful and I was hypnotized by how perfect her features were—rosebud lips, hazel-green eyes, a cleft in her cheek. I wondered if she was as beautiful in person.

  “Who is she?” I asked, still studying the painting.

  “Hmm?” Oscar followed my gaze. “Oh. Celia. She’s someone important to us.”

  When I turned back to Oscar, I saw him studying the portrait with a sad expression on his face, almost like his heart was breaking.

  “I’ve never heard anyone mention her before.” I continued watching him to see if he gave anything away, but he just seemed sad. It looked like I had brought up a touchy subject.

  “She is no more,” he said faintly. “She passed away when she was nineteen.”

  In surprise my eyes shot back to the woman. She looked about nineteen in that picture—her eyes were filled with a smile and promises of a future—and it made me sad that she hadn’t had a long life.

  The more I stared at her portrait, the more she seemed familiar to me, but it was probably because I was studying it so intensely.

  Shaking my head, I smiled politely at Oscar and left a few minutes later, still haunted with the image of the blonde girl.

  ***

  A few days later, Emily managed to drag me out of the house so that we could go dress shopping with Lisa and Jessica. I couldn’t come up with a good enough excuse to get myself out of it, so I went along.

  Don’t get me wrong, I loved the girls and I was sure they knew their thing when it came to fashion, but I knew that we’d be hitting up the expensive stores and I wasn’t looking forward to that.

  I understood why the girls were taking me to these stores—the dresses were stunning—but there was no way I would be able to buy anything from there.

  “Oh, my gosh! This is perfect!” Lisa made a beeline straight towards a sequined, red dress that had a dramatic, plunging neckline. She pulled it off the rack and held it out for us to critique.

  “Um, there’s no back,” Jessica pointed out. “You may as well be naked.”

  “Black tie, remember?” Emily reminded kindly.

  Lisa rolled her eyes and put the dress back. “I am not wearing something boring and stuffy just because there are going to be old, rich snobs there,” she pouted.

  It looked like she had done something to her lips since I’d seen her last because they looked puffier than usual. I guess Matt was right when he’d alluded to Lisa’s love for cosmetic surgery.

  I snorted at her bluntness as I stopped to rifle through a rack of dresses that had a more simple design. Maybe these ones wouldn’t be as expensive.

  “Sooo, Matt told me that he had a cute dinner with you a few nights ago,” Lisa said, nudging me with an elbow as she stopped beside me.

  “You went out with Matthew De Voir?” Emily asked, turning to me with wide eyes. “I had no idea.”

  I nodded slowly, wondering if she was going to freak out the same way that Nick had. Instead, she looked a little sad.

  “That’s okay, right?” I asked, when she didn’t immediately say anything else. “He’s not weird or anything?”

  “No, no.” Emily shook her head. “Matt’s a great guy.”

  There was an awkward silence as Emily chewed on her bottom lip, deep in thought. I took that opportunity to sneak a peek at the price tag of a nice looking black dress. I almost had a heart attack. It was $1200.

  “Then what’s wrong?” I finally prompted when I couldn’t stand the silence any more, moving away from the pricey dresses like they were infected.

  Emily snapped out of her thoughts and gave me an uncertain smile. “Nothing at all. Did you have a good time with him?”

  “Yes,” I said, nodding. There was something very strange about the way she was acting. “Are you sure everything’s okay?”

  “Yes, everything’s great. I’m glad you enjoyed yourself.” The smile she gave me was more confident this time, but I noticed her dart a glance at Jessica out of the corner of her eye. “Does Nick know?”

  It was weird that she was bringing up her brother. Why did everyone tiptoe around this Matt and Nick thing? Everyone was in on this secret, whatever it was. Why weren’t they telling me? Did they not trust me yet?

  “Yeah, I told him.” I shrugged, trying to act like it wasn’t a big deal.

  “Oh, how did he react?” Jessica asked, sounding surprised.

  I maintained a poker face. “Like he usually does. He left.”

  Which wasn’t the truth at all. A lot more than that had happened. Nick shirtless, touching and kissing me like he was desperate to have me. His abs tensing against me, his groin pushing into me. But of course I wasn’t going to reveal any of that.

  “Hmm.” Jessica twisted the end of her blo
nde hair around a finger. She looked like she wanted to tell me something, but was trying her hardest not to blurt it out.

  Staring around at them, I noticed they all looked a little guilty. And they should. This was really starting to annoy me.

  Without bothering to ask for answers, knowing I wouldn’t get any, I turned and walked deeper into the store pretending I didn’t care when I actually did.

  A few minutes later, I heard Emily call out my name. When I turned around, she was walking toward me holding up a dark grey dress and grinning. “This would look great on you! Try it on!”

  As I took it from her with a forced smile, I was too scared to look at the price tag, so I just headed to the change rooms instead, glad to have something to do to break up the awkwardness hanging around in the air.

  Stripping free of my jeans and plain sweater, I slipped on the dress which fit me like a glove. Emily had chosen well. The strapless dress fell well above my knee in a flared skirt, but looked classy despite the length. It hugged my chest and cinched at the waist, making it look tiny. An intricate grey design was embossed into the dress and there were lighter grey flowers that were three-dimensional.

  It was truly stunning. I would normally have never picked this color for me, but it really suited my skin tone.

  Too bad I already knew it was way outside of my budget, but I couldn’t stop staring at my reflection in the mirror. I had never wanted a dress more in my life.

  “You have three seconds to come out or I’m busting in there!” Lisa threatened from the other side of the door.

  With a grin, I opened up the door and stepped out to where Lisa, Jessica, and Emily stood with their own dress selections hanging off their arms.

  Jessica gasped as she caught sight of me. “You look amazing!”

  “Spin, spin!” Lisa said, wiggling her finger at me.

  I did a quick twirl and then curtsied. “I wish I could afford it,” I said wistfully, “but it is definitely out of my price range. Everything here is.”

  “Then you have to let me buy this for you!” Emily said, clapping her hands together. “It looks perfect on you!”

  I shook my head, backing away from her. “No way. You’re not doing that for me. I can settle for something at Macy’s. This is too much.”

  Emily gave me a puppy dog face. “Pleeeease!”

  “Nope, not happening.” I entered the change room before Emily could argue with me, and so I could get out of this dress before I became too attached to it.

  Once I’d changed back into my clothes, I walked back out and handed the dress to the sales assistant hovering by the change rooms. “Not the right size?” she asked.

  “No, it was great,” I said with a smile, glad that she wasn’t snotty. “I just want to shop around some more.”

  “No problem,” she said, returning the smile and walking away with my dream dress.

  I watched her go, and then sucked it up as the girls studied me sadly. I wasn’t going to pine over a dress I’d never be able to afford. Even if it was perfect.

  Nick

  “Nick?”

  My sister’s voice jarred me from my thoughts.

  I was supposed to be working, but my head hadn’t been on the job today. I was completely uneasy and I knew it had a lot to do with Sky and Matt going out to dinner. It had been days and I was still thinking about.

  “Hey,” I said with little enthusiasm, glancing up.

  “Glad you’re excited to see me,” Emily said with a laugh as she approached my desk and sank down in the chair across from me.

  “Sorry, I just have a lot on my mind.”

  “Like Sky?” she asked, tilting her head in question.

  “What?”

  My sister had my full attention now. Her eyes gleamed as she watched me, gauging my reaction.

  “You heard me,” she said, a smile in her voice. She was so much like Dad sometimes, amiable but direct. “You have Sky on your mind, don’t you?”

  Dropping my head, I pinched the center of my forehead with two fingers. When it came to Sky, I wasn’t willing to admit anything. I couldn’t tell Emily that I found comfort with Sky during the night—and not in the way everyone expected. I couldn’t tell her that it tore me up that Sky had gone on a date with Matt. I couldn’t tell her that we had finally kissed and that it had made me feel more than I had ever felt with any girl before.

  “That,” I said shortly, “and other things.”

  “Does it bother you that she went to dinner with Matt?” she asked out of nowhere.

  I tried not to sound surprised that she already knew all this. “I’m assuming Sky told you.”

  She was thoughtful for a second. “Kind of. Matt told Lisa who brought it up when we went dress shopping today for the ball. And by the way, just so you know, Sky tried on this dress today and she looked stunning in it.”

  “That’s nice.” I tried to keep a straight face because I knew my little sister was just trying to get a reaction out of me. “Did she get it?”

  “No, she said it was out of her price range. I really wanted to buy it for her because she looked like perfection in it, but she refused.” Emily trailed off, her eyes catching mine again. “But let’s not get off topic. Are you bothered by Matt taking Sky out?”

  Straightening up in my chair, I gave her a lazy smile as I tried to regain my composure. “Why would it bother me? She can do whatever she wants and I wouldn’t care.”

  Which was a complete lie. I would care. I would absolutely care if another man slept in her bed.

  Despite my denial, I could tell that Emily didn’t believe me. She knew me too well and could see right through the act of indifference I put on.

  “You should tell her the truth before you push her into someone else’s arms. She would understand,” Emily urged, her tone as gentle as her gaze. “Sky’s good for you, Nick, even if you don’t see it yet. She could help you.”

  I wanted so badly to believe that that was true, that Sky wouldn’t judge me, but there was always a chance she would be disgusted by me.

  “She’d never look at me the same again.” My voice shook as I stared down at my desk, thinking about what I’d done. “I’m a bad person.”

  “No, Nick, you’re not.” Emily’s chair scraped back and a second later I felt her arms wrap around me, and I slackened against her. “You’ve made some mistakes, yes, but there’s always a chance to fix things. Sky could help you.”

  “Or she could hate me. I’ve fucked up, Em.” My eyes met hers. “You know I have. There’s no coming back from what I’ve done.”

  Emily let go of me and stared at me long and hard. “You’re right, there isn’t, but all you can do is forgive yourself and make new memories. How can you let someone in if all you do is shut people out?”

  As much as I hated to admit it, Emily was right.

  “When did you become so grown up?” I asked, tucking her hair behind her ear.

  “When you decided to stop,” she said, with no hint of a smile on her face.

  Sky

  It had been six days.

  Six days since Nick had spoken to me.

  Six days since Nick hadn’t slept in my bed.

  And each day, my heart crumbled a little more.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Sky

  The evening of the ball, I was anxious.

  There was a twisting knot in my stomach that I couldn’t get rid of, and the more I thought about the ball, the more it intensified.

  I’d run myself a bath in hopes that it would calm me down, but as I lay submerged in the lukewarm water amongst the jasmine scented bubbles, I was having so much trouble fighting off the anxiety that I finally had to climb out and stop delaying the inevitable ball I was attending.

  I was mainly anxious because I would have to spend an evening with the upper class of Beverly Hills. Knowing what Chloe was like, it concerned me that her friends would be the same—rude, condescending, and obnoxious.

  The other cause of m
y anxiety was Nick, of course. It had been exactly a week since we’d spoken and with every passing day I wondered if all the progress we’d made so far was becoming undone. It sure felt like it.

  I couldn’t back out of the ball now since it was for Oscar’s birthday and he had asked me so kindly that I felt horrible for even thinking about not showing up. Grudgingly, I wrapped myself up in my SpongeBob towel and walked out into my room, heading over to the bed where I had laid out my outfit for the night.

  The dress I’d finally settled on was a floor length, cream colored gown from Macy’s. I’d decided to go with something completely different to the dream dress I’d tried on at Dolce & Gabbana.

  As I neared the bed, I froze mid-step, my eyes growing wide.

  The Dolce & Gabbana dress was lying on my bed.

  I blinked several times to make sure it was really there. Was I dreaming? There was no way that dress was sitting on my bed waiting for me to put it on.

  There was only one person who would have bought it for me—Emily. I couldn’t believe she had gone out and bought it even though I’d told her not to. She was such a generous person. I didn’t know how I was going to thank her.

  Excitement shot through me as I picked it up and felt the soft fabric. I, Sky Hudson, was about to go to a ball wearing a two thousand dollar dress. No freaking way.

  Without hesitation, I started getting ready, my anxiety slowly slipping away. Now that I was wearing this dress, I felt more confident about facing a room full of Chloe’s acquaintances.

  When I finally managed to pin my hair up in a simple sock bun and had applied a layer of makeup to give myself a natural look, I studied myself in the mirror.

  I didn’t look like me. I looked like someone who belonged at a fancy ball.

  The dress was breathtaking and I couldn’t believe that I was actually wearing it. I couldn’t wait to thank Emily for buying it for me.

  Slipping into a pair of shoes, I glanced at the clock on the wall and saw that it was half past six. The ball had started thirty minutes ago, so now was probably a good time to head upstairs.