"What did you just say?" someone asked.

Me.

Our little huddle of people stilled on the lawn. The ducks were long gone, the breeze suddenly cool on my skin.

I lifted my chin, my eyes narrowed at Joanna. Red. All I saw was that murderous, bruising shade of red.

I cocked my head. "Say it again."

Noah put a hand on my arm, his expression tense. "It's fine, Madison. Joanna's just joking."

It wasn't. And she wasn't.

"Say it again," I challenged. "Louder."

Joanna just blinked. I thought she might have swallowed. Thought her smile might have faltered. But she didn't do as I said. Didn't acknowledge that I'd spoken up at all.

Her condescending brown gaze zeroed in on me, scanning my outfit from head to toe—like she could sense the plated glamor of my jewelry.

"Come on, Madeline." She tilted her head, the gesture utterly serpentine. "Please tell us we're not alone here. What did you write about for your personal essay?"

As if they were her clones, Joanna's friends took a sip of champagne at the same time their master did, shooting me twin glares that glistened with condescension. It was almost enough. Almost unnerving.

But I, Madison Jane Watson, wasn't about to be unnerved by a trio of pretentious, overdressed rich kids who didn't even bother to learn my name.

"My dad," I started, raising my chin a fraction. "I said that he left my mother, sister, and I for another woman two years ago. No warning, no notice. Just up and left one morning."

"Ah." One of Joanna's minions chuckled, sharing a knowing glance with the other two girls. "The classic parent-cheating-on-parent story. I almost went with that one."

I nodded slowly, biting my lip before deciding to continue. "I said that we should've seen it coming. That he'd been unusually moody and reclusive for weeks. That he'd put all of his assets on trust. I said that my mother hired a private investigator, because she couldn't accept the idea of dad leaving her for another woman. They were just so happy, so in love." I ran a finger along the rim of my drink, peering at the reflection of my vapid expression in the golden liquid.

"I said that she was right." My throat tried to close up, but I pressed on. "That the P.I. discovered that my dad was diagnosed with stage four pancreatic cancer one month before he left. And it was only three weeks later that he died." I paused, sipping my drink, the cool liquid soothing my dry throat. "I guess he thought that driving us to hate him was kinder than letting us mourn him."

A long-repressed aching resurfaced in my heart. I forced it back with another mouthful of champagne.

Silence.

But Joanna raised a perfectly threaded eyebrow, her eyes sparkling for the first time with something other than arrogance. With respect. "That's good. Good enough to have gotten you into Oxford, surely." She pursed her lips. "How did you make something like that up?"

When I glanced up at her again, it was my gaze that was piercing. My glare that penetrated deep into her soul.

"I didn't."

Instantly, her mask crumbled.

It was like my words had sucked the air right out of her heartless body. Even better, perhaps they reminded her that she did, actually, have a heart after all.

Suddenly, the six of us became encased in our own private bubble. A bubble bursting with discomfort and tension and awkward glances. An incredibly quiet one, too, since not one of my bubble-mates seemed to know what to say in the aftermath of my loaded revelation.

"Jo?"

Fresh anxiety rose to my chest as a deep, reluctant voice cut through the quiet. The person behind it cleared his throat, and the six of us turned in unison to find that we weren't alone.

James was standing amongst us. It looked like he had been for some time, though he was conveniently shielded from my line of sight.

I sucked in a breath, hoping it would subdue the daggers that were piercing my stomach.

It didn't.

He leaned forward to grab the arm of his childhood friend. Or his girlfriend. Or whatever the hell she was to him that I didn't at all care about. "My parents need you in the kitchen. Something about crabfish—"

"Lobster," a now-beaming Joanna corrected. "Of course, dear." She turned back to us with that same phony smile she'd been wearing earlier, but her eyes possessed slightly less confidence than they had before. "Lovely meeting you."

She didn't even wait for a reply before she broke my gaze, spinning on her outrageously high heels to gallop across the lawn. Naturally, her minions trailed after her.

But the silence of our bubble lingered on. I could sense it without even looking up. I knew exactly what emotion danced on the faces of my friends, exactly what it was pouring out from their eyes.

Pity.

I hated, hated, hated being pitied.

I avoided looking at them. James' face, in particular, was the last that I wanted to see. I could practically picture the frown that was threading his features, imagine the sympathy he felt in the wake of learning I was more screwed up than he already thought I was.

I averted my eyes to a passer-by, motioning to the lava cake on his napkin that oozed with thick molten chocolate. "What does a bridesmaid have to do to get some dessert around here?"

The wedding marquee was a veritable garden, overflowing with roses and orchids and lilies, pink as the cocktails being served with little cuts of orange poised on the rim. The wedding might have been a footfall beyond extravagance, but stepping into the reception felt like tumbling through an old-fashioned storybook; the guests looked like faeries in their pastel skirts and suits as they twirled beneath floral chandeliers and drooping vines. The bride had changed into a beautiful white chiffon gown. She embodied the Ever After theme completely, right down to the baby's breath that had been weaved through her coronet braid.

I sat at a round table next to Holly as the speeches gave way to another round of light string music. The air was sweet with the smell of cakes and pastries, and fairy lights had been strung over the transparent roof, glittering like hundreds of fireflies caught mid-flight. James and the others had snuck off at some point; I suspected that the all-you-can-eat buffet was to blame, though Noah had muttered something about Tyler not answering his messages before skulking off to check out some meadow on the Bennet's property, claiming the view and reception were better there. Holly and I finished off our slices of wedding cake. Spoke about anything and everything.

Except Dex.

That wasn't good.

And then there was this. A single word—followed by a definitive full-stop. A text, sent at precisely twelve forty-five that afternoon, minutes after I'd hung up on my mother on the way up to the Bennet's estate.

Disappointed.

My mother hadn't been kidding about driving to campus, and hadn't been pleased when I'd informed her that I couldn't greet her because I was out of town. For whatever reason, I couldn't stop pulling out my phone and re-reading the message. It was like I expected it to change. Was willing it to.

But she just didn't get it. She didn't get me anymore. And I couldn't stand that feeling—that I was so much of a stranger that my own mother didn't know who I was anymore.

I shoved my phone into my purse and straightened out my tulle skirt. The whole situation with my mother left me confused. She'd never liked Elijah. She only really came around to him the year after dad passed away. I didn't know what Eli said to get in her head the way he did, but I also didn't care to find out. I wanted nothing to do with either of them, with anything or anyone from my old life. I couldn't stomach it. And the wedding cake was too delicious to see again on its way up.

"Are you alright?" Holly asked, licking the last of the icing from her spoon before pushing her plate away.

I painted on a smile. "Great. You?"

I didn't know whether she believed my overenthusiastic reply. She pulled a compact out of her purse to inspect her lipstick. "Same. I'm so glad that you guys invited me here. The food is incredible."

The food was incredible? I resisted the urge to sigh into my drink. What about Dex?

There wasn't just my mother's texts to worry about; Ivy had been bombarding me. She wasn't very happy about my spontaneous getaway, and was far from pleased that I'd essentially run away with our test subjects. Which I gathered mostly from her one-word responses and definitive full stops.

Deep down, I knew I deserved the storm brewing on Ivy's side of the line. I was still filling her in on Dex's progress with Holly, of course. But, as time went on, I found myself less willing to share the nitty-gritty details. I wasn't as forthcoming in sharing what Dex told me in confidence, and I was telling Ivy my plans, rather than asking for her feedback or input.

I knew it was wrong. We were partners in crime, after all. But the closer I got to our two test subjects, the less well divulging the progress of their courtship to Ivy sat with me. I didn't know whether Dex was my friend, or whether he was only using me for his own personal gain. But I still felt some inkling of guilt nagging at the pit of my stomach every time Ivy demanded an update on their relationship, as though they truly were lab rats, and not human beings.

Still, I knew opportunity when I saw it.

I glanced toward the tables lining up on the far side of the marquee, groaning under the weight of tarts and little cakes. When I was confident that the others were distracted—although I had no idea where James was—I put a hand on Holly's chair, bringing my head closer to hers.

I smiled coyly. "Hi."

She cocked her head at my expression. "Hi..."

I stared at her for a second longer, attempting to ignite some sort of female telepathy with a wiggle of my eyebrows. "So. How's it going?"

We were like two twelve-year-old girls gossiping about an older boy we'd met over the summer break. Even though I could tell by the pink hue traveling across her cheeks that she'd caught my inference, she looked away, trying to play it cool.

She put her compact away. "Good..."

"Just good?"

I was totally interrogating her, totally trying to get some sort of reassurance that she and Dex were on track.

But I didn't get the kind of reassurance I was looking for.

Instead, I watched while a veil crept over Holly's face, the playful smirk disappearing from her lips. She was fidgeting with a charm bracelet around her wrist, and when she peered back up at me, her whole face had fallen into a frown.

"Can I ask you something?"

I tilted my head, curiosity roused. "Of course."

"Do you think you can, like, grow to like someone?"

My heart sunk.

This was not going to be a reassuring conversation. At all.

My mouth was suddenly so dry that I only just managed to ask, "What do you mean?"

She sighed. We were so close that her fruity perfume was tickling my nose, the intense scent mixing with the nausea starting to build in my stomach. "I mean..." Holly's voice trickled away as the melody gave way to something fast-paced, her eyes growing glassy. Something flickered, and they were back on me with newfound determination. "Okay. When you met James, for example. Were you, like, attracted to him straight away?"

I felt my frown deepen at the question. Why was she asking me about James? She knew we weren't really boyfriend and girlfriend ...

Just before confusion tugged on my tongue, I remembered the lie. James' lie. Holly thought that he and I dated. And now she was asking me for advice based on that totally fabricated experience.

I cursed him in my head. Cursed him for putting me in this position in the first place, one where I had to fumble around for an answer to a question built on deception and trickery.

"I guess," I managed to stammer, recalling the first day I'd met the guys in the hall. I'd never had a problem admitting that James clearly stuck out amongst the other students in the corridor—all tall and broad-shouldered and irritatingly charming. The way he'd watched me curiously, waiting for me to answer Noah's question about whether or not I'd date him. Smirking as he looked away, sensing that my appeasing answer was merely an act of civility. "I mean, yeah, I thought he was attractive—"

"Well, duh," she interjected matter-of-factly, rolling her eyes as though I'd told her the sky was blue. "I mean, were you attracted to him?"

I jolted at the question. I knew what she was asking. I knew the difference between thinking that someone was attractive and being attracted to them. I was just hoping that she didn't, that I'd be able to weasel myself out of the conversation without having to lie.

I shrugged. "I guess."

Strangely, I didn't feel even a prick of guilt after lying. I didn't feel like I'd lied at all. Perhaps my new, strictly-Madison-not-Madi persona was more heartless than even I'd given her credit for.

"Right." She nodded. "So, there was like... a spark."

I glanced around the room, needing somewhere to look. Not at all looking for James. "I suppose."

"Dex is great," Holly told me, her tone far too sweet. Artificially so. "You were right about that. He's so nice, and he's funny. I can tell that he's one of the good ones, just like you said. And we have a bunch in common—music, comics, video games. I really want to like him. Like-like him. I'm just not sure that I ... feel it."

"Feel what?"

She widened her eyes at me, circling her hands around one another pointedly. "It."

My stomach was still tangled with knots, but it was more than just nerves twisting them. It was dread.

It. She wasn't feeling it. Him. Them. Chemistry.

Which meant that my ship was sinking. It was rocketing to the bottom of the sea, and half of my grade was aboard.

"So, that's what I mean." Holly took a deep breath, the exhale shaky. "Do you think that you can grow to like someone? Even if it's not there at first, but you really, really want it to be?"

I looked up, something in her tone pricking my deflating resolve. She sounded ... hopeful. Sure, everything she was saying sounded bad. Really, really bad. But why would she be asking me that question if some small part of her didn't want to make things work?

There was hope. A ray of sunshine amongst the storm. And that was good enough for me.

Still, I didn't know what to tell Holly. My only experience came from my relationship with Eli, and a lack of chemistry had never been our problem.

One thing that I did know, however, was biology.

A grin twisted my lips, a drop of determination coursing through my veins. "I think there's only one way to find out."

She tilted her head, blinking back at me silently underneath her bangs.

I raised my eyebrows suggestively, recalling some of that previous telepathy. It took her a second longer, but sure enough, she caught on.

"What? No!" she practically squealed.

"Yes!" I nudged her, hoping my newfound confidence could pour through me and into her. "Make a move, girl."

It was the perfect plan. How hadn't I thought of it before?

"I ... can't!" she exclaimed.

"Why not?"

She fidgeted with that charm bracelet again, a tic I presumed was a manifestation of her nerves. "Because I'm the girl!"

"You're a woman." I reached out to tuck a rogue curl behind her ear. "A strong, independent woman who deserves a concrete answer to a valid question. One that I can't give you." I nodded toward Dex, who was finishing off his third slice of wedding cake. "But he can."

Holly mulled it over. The song ended, and when she glanced at me again, her eyes were bright. Brimming with resolve. "I'm going to ask him to dance."

"Damn right you are!" I clapped as she rose, grabbing her purse and heading for the bathroom.

"Get me a drink?" she pleaded.

"Done." It was the least I could do.

Her answer sent a fresh wave of relief washing over me. I stood and spun on my heel to hide the triumphant glow lighting up my face, aiming for the bar before she could change her mind. Despite my crappy day, despite the crappy showdown with Joanna and the crappy memories of my dad and Elijah that tortured my fractured heart, I felt a sense of victory propelling my every step. One half of me was cautious, of course. Wary, given everything that Holly had divulged.

But the other half of me knew science. It knew the power of a kiss, how it stirred dopamine and oxytocin, unearthing a sense of affection and attachment. As far as bonding went, a good kiss was unrivaled. It could be the key. Not just for Dex and Holly, but for me and my project as well.

With Holly's drink in hand, I slid up to one of the food tables beside Dex. He was in the middle of an argument with the pageboy about who would win in a battle—Superman or Spiderman. I knew nothing about either, except that Henry Cavill was my hall pass. That was a non-negotiable.

When I could disguise the movement of my mouth behind my hair, I whispered to Dex, "She's going to ask you to dance."

I may as well have told him that there would never be another superhero movie made again.

"What?" he shrieked.

The pageboy slipped away, eyes wide.

Dex cleared his throat, repeating, "Come again?"

"Dex." I groaned, looking around the marquee for Noah. Or James. Or anyone who could help me reel him in from his latest panic attack. "I had to graft for this one. You'll be fine—"

"Dance with me."

I shrieked, "What?"

"I'm rusty. I'm nervous. My hands might be sweaty." I grimaced as he grabbed a napkin, dabbing at his palms. "Just ... help me get into the swing of it. I'll teach you how."

I screwed up my face. "I know how to dance!"

He screwed up his face. "You do?"

"Yes. I'm not some poor little match girl, you know!" Actually, my mother had insisted on my sister and I taking dance classes when she joined the local country club. And not cool dancing, like hip hop or jazz ballet. Waltz. The fox trot. And my partner—a seventy-year-old man who'd tried to set me up with his lawyer grandson—had been very impressed with my ability to pick up the moves so quickly.

"Please, Madison?" Dex was using puppy dog eyes. That wasn't fair.

I groaned again, putting down the glass of champagne. "One dance. And you owe me." Remembering the lie he'd told about me and James, I poked him in the ribs. "Big time."

He nodded sincerely, extending a hand.

I took it.

Dex steered me toward the dance floor, the bodies parting to usher us into the revel. The song changed again—a light, happy duet between piano and cello. Dex was wrong. His hands weren't sweaty. And he didn't look nervous. It was like dancing was his superhero suit; Dex was confident. Sauve. Good.

I told him as much.

He blushed.

"It's all about having the right partner," he whispered, chewing away a small grin.

"We make a good team," I agreed.

Dimples.

Okay. Maybe I didn't want to murder him anymore.

We danced and laughed, Dex extending his arm so I could twirl into his embrace. When I accidentally stepped on his foot—I was the rusty one—every inch of his face brightened with the widest, toothiest grin, a laugh like spring rain ripping from his stomach.

Gorgeous. Dex was absolutely gorgeous. If Holly couldn't see that ... It was her loss.

Her name niggled at the corner of my mind. Remembering myself, my project, I broke Dex's gaze to glance around the marquee.

Holly was watching us.

My stomach knotted. Yikes. If what James had said about Holly being jealous of me was true ...

The song ended, and I unlaced my hand from Dex's, courtesying when he bowed.

"He's all yours," I said to Holly, flashing what I hoped was an easy, soft smile.

She didn't look angry when Dex extended a hand to her. Thank god.

In the blink of an eye, I was alone on the dance floor. My heart was thumping happily. Happily. My mouth hurt a bit from smiling so much. I supposed those muscles hadn't been used in a long time. Not genuinely, at least.

I saw him.

My heart lurched again.

James watched me from the other side of the dance floor, revealed when the throng of elegant bodies parted as the music started again. Gone was his blazer, his tie loose around his neck, colored a shade of lightest pink to match my bridesmaid dress. The fairy lights doused his face in a mellow glow, leaving the deepest contours lounging in decadent shadow.

Gorgeous. He was gorgeous, too. Just in a different sort of way.

I swallowed hard as he took a step onto the dance floor. Another one. One more. The sea of dancers around us became a blur, the world a shadowy tunnel with me on one end and James on the other. His eyes were on mine. He looked at me intensely. Almost ... scientifically. Like he was holding me under a microscope, trying to see all the different colors under my skin. My body was locked. I couldn't glance away, even though I knew I should.

James arrived in front of me, and nothing else mattered. I couldn't even hear the music, my pulse hammering in my ears.

"My grandma said that I should ask you to dance." James' lips tipped up in a knowing grin. "I know you probably don't want to, but, honestly ..." He glanced toward the tables behind us, probably toward said granny. "She scares me a bit."

That warmth surging through my chest cooled a bit. "You're asking me to dance because your grandma told you to?"

"It was more of a threat."

"Forget what I said earlier." I arched a brow. "I think this is why we broke up."

James' gaze swung back to me. He leaned in closer, and for the strangest moment, I thought he was going to kiss me. "We're not broken up tonight, remember?"

I swallowed. Again. Why was my mouth suddenly so dry? "Right." I tried to sound casual. Breezy. Sarcastic, at least. "I really can't keep our relationship status straight."

"Considering you haven't even accepted my friend request, neither can I."

"You requested me?"

He arched a brow.

I didn't know what that meant.

"Dance with me?" James extended a hand, and there was something different about the gesture from when Dex had done it. He ducked his head, a rogue blonde lock falling over his brow. "Don't make me beg."

"You? Begging? I can't fathom the sight."

His blue eyes glittered like diamonds, and I didn't have to wonder too long about what oh-so-clever quip was dancing on his tongue.

He didn't voice it, though. Just flexed that sheepish hand.

I accepted it.

A/N: Hi lovely readers!

What do we think about Madi's revelation about her dad? That's quite the burden to carry. Does it shed a little more light on why she is the way she is?

What do you think will happen when Madi and James take to the dance floor? She had quite a bit of champagne ...

For those of you coming from your notifications now that the story has been edited, I wanted to let you know that I'm currently publishing another new adult romance! It's called Faking Love, and it's up on my profile now. Here's a little synopsis:

With love,

Danielle x