“Oh, yeah, sorry, I just spaced out for a second,” I assured Anna, who’d wrapped her arm around me with concern.
“Don’t worry about anything, just enjoy the night. My brother won’t let anything happen to you.” How does she know what I’m thinking? How often have my feelings shown on my face?
I was about to apologize for my dark thoughts interrupting her night, but she just shook her head. “Come on, our guests await.” My knees almost gave out as I turned to leave the room with them. The first thing I saw when I stepped out into the hallway was Gabriel standing just where I’d left him. The look of shocked surprise on his face when he saw what I was now wearing, so drastically different from what I’d just taken off, helped ease my nerves.
“You look amazing.” I didn’t miss the look of confusion on his face when he leaned in to kiss my cheek; I figured he’d been played as well in this game the girls and Lance had orchestrated. He’s going to be even more surprised when he recognizes the song we were going to dance to and the way I’d chosen to tell the story he’d told me about one of the women he admired most in the world through dance.
VICTORIA
Who has this kind of security for a sweet sixteen? I couldn’t even get close to the gate. What am I even doing here anyway? Like a lost puppy searching for its owner. I don’t know what came over me, what made me get into mom’s car and sneak away, but I needed to know if everyone else had been invited but me.
Just thinking about it made me too sick to my stomach to sit still. I couldn’t stand the thought of all of them laughing at me, talking about me behind my back, reminiscing about all the things I’d said and done in the past, and laughing at me. It always comes back to them laughing at me; that’s the one thing I can’t stand.
But it’s like there’s an information blackout, and I’m the only one left looking in from the outside. My so-called friends aren’t returning my calls, and there’s no one else for me to ask. At least I haven’t seen any of them show up, and I’ve been here since well before the party started.
I thought it would’ve been easy with all these people going in and out to just slip in beneath the radar and stay hidden well enough that no one would notice, but without an invitation, not even name-dropping helped me get past the ogre at the gate.
I’d balked when the security guy asked if I wanted him to call up to the house and have someone vouch for me, and now I’m sure he knows I was lying. It was pure luck that I found this spot on the other side of the house away from prying eyes where I could peer into the well-lit room from outside.
It wasn’t the best view, but the binoculars I’d had the sense to grab on my way out the door were of great help. I recognized Gia right away because she was clamped onto Gabriel’s side like a leech. I zoomed in and became filled with rage when I saw what she was wearing. She was dressed better than most of the people in attendance.
Once I got past the intricate design of her hair and the way she was smiling like she didn’t have a care in the world, my eyes got caught on the necklace she wore. I know I’ve seen that necklace somewhere before, but where? It took me a minute, but when it finally hit me where I’d seen it, the bottom fell out. “This can’t be.”
Felix has been acting strange, especially now with mom gone, but how far gone is he that he’d given Gia those jewels? He knows how mom feels about them, how she’s always wanted them. Even I remember the uproar over them, and I was a child back then. Felix would never go against mom like this, never do something that he knew would upset her. This could only mean one thing; mom had lost his favor for real this time.
A kernel of doubt started to grow in my gut, followed close by fear. The fear that I’ve been fighting back day after day and barely winning the battle. As long as mom still had the power over Felix, I knew there was still a chance that we could turn this thing around. But lately, he’s been doing all the things we fought so hard to stop.
I should’ve clued in when he spent the last few days staring at that stupid portrait of his dead wife and walking around the house like even more of a shell of a man than usual. But I figured the woman was dead; she can’t harm me, so what do I care? I was sure once mom came home, she would work her magic just like before, and it’ll be gone by the time that bitch came back home with her tail between her legs.
That’s been my silent wish, the only thing that’s keeping me from curling myself into a ball and crying my eyes out. Pointless nonsense that won’t get me anywhere. At my lowest, only the thought of Gia being kicked out of the Russo home gave me an inkling of hope. I was sure that with her being as stupid as she is, it wouldn’t be long before Gabriel and his family saw the real her and be rid of her sooner or later.
There’s no way the hottest, most elusive guy in school, the one set to inherit millions in a few years if the whispers are true, would want to be with someone like her. How long before he grows tired of her whining and toss her away? I mean, it’s bound to happen.
She doesn’t know anything, has spent her life locked away in her room, not even free to walk around campus as she might’ve liked because I wouldn’t allow it. Even her father had become mine; I was winning, dammit.
But now, for some reason, seeing Gia in that jewelry more than anything drives home the fact that life as I know it might be over. I stand to lose everything if I don’t do something. I’ve tried to think of every way to get to Gia, but she’s never alone; Gabriel or his annoying sisters are always nearby. I can’t step foot on school grounds thanks to their meddling grandmother, so there’s nothing I can do but wait.
I sat there in the dark confines of the car, watching the party from a distance hating Gia more as time went by but refusing to accept defeat. Mom should be home soon. She’d know what to do. I can’t accept that it’s all over, that we’ve lost in the end. Maybe if I play up to Felix, if I remind him that I’m the daughter he loves, I can turn things around.
He’s alone now and seems to be having some kind of mental break. Now would be the perfect time to solidify my place in his life. I’m his adopted child; after all, it’s not like he can get rid of me that easily, even if he and mom don’t work out. Besides, I’ve always been able to get him on my side. In all these years, he’s never sided with Gia over me.
That’s it. I’ll play the innocent fatherless child who had nothing and was once again being left out in the cold by harsh, uncaring people. Mom had used that one once when the other women weren’t too fond of me hanging around their daughters when we first moved in.
They’d barely tolerated me back then, but it was never enough. I’d still felt like an outsider until years later when we were about twelve and I, who had learned from the best, used my own mind and skills to finally win them over to my side. All it had taken was me making up stories about Gia and how horrible she was, accusing her, in fact, of all the things that I had been doing to her at the time.
Those snooty bitches had bought it hook line and sinker, especially when I told them all the lies she’d told about them. All I’d had to do that time was use the things my beloved sister had shared in innocent confidence and twist them to my advantage, and mom had taken care of the rest then too. Those women didn’t want their preteen daughter’s reputations tarnished after all.