The interior of Jude’s car was all black leather, dark wood, and reeked of that new car smell. If Taliana had the choice, she would’ve stayed in the air-conditioned cabin for the rest of her life, especially if it meant she didn’t have to face what was waiting for her at home.

“This isn’t going to end well.”

Currently, said car was idling in front of Taliana’s home in the heart of Georgetown, and she was silently debating whether or not she wanted to enter the place. Her father was probably throwing a fit inside, prepared to ground her the instant she set foot in the foyer. Had she still been living with her mother, Taliana could have slipped in unnoticed since Andrea was rarely home anyway. But this was Charles Avilla, the man who’d blown a gasket the day Taliana had been expelled from Georgetown Trinity Day School and sent her packing to live with mommy dearest as punishment. Taliana wasn’t sure what she would do if this situation had the same outcome.

“I’m sure it’ll be fine,” Jude said soothingly, patting Taliana’s arm.

In the fifteen-minute drive from the hotel to her house, she and Jude had gotten to know each other. Jude now knew Taliana was seventeen, had moved back to DC after spending six years in LA, and absolutely despised geese. In return, he’d told her that his birthday was on Christmas Eve, he’d moved there from Miami a couple years ago, and that he’d once been hit on by an honest to god pirate.

Though they’d hardly spent any time together, Taliana felt like she’d known the guy for ages. Maybe it was the fact that their personalities just clicked, but she was glad it looked like she was making a friend—her first back in DC.

“I don’t know,” she murmured hesitantly, glancing once more at the brick structure. “He’s called me like a hundred times, but I’m too afraid to listen to any of his messages. I bet you he’s going to flip the second I walk in there.”

“Maybe, maybe not. Charles seems like a pretty chill guy.”

Taliana shot him a look that said otherwise. “You should have seen him the day I got expelled from Georgetown Trinity back in sixth grade. I thought he was going to turn into the Incredible Hulk.”

Jude snorted. “That was a totally different situation. All you did this time was miss curfew, not try to kill a kid.”

Taliana wasn’t surprised that Jude knew what had gotten her kicked out. She was sure her baseball bat wielding had landed her on a list of Trinity’s infamous troublemakers. “I didn’t try to kill him,” she corrected, folding her arms across her chest. “It was just self-defense. That kid punched me; what else was I supposed to do?”

“Self-defense?” Jude tossed his head back and laughed. “You broke his arm in three places and reduced the boy to a sobbing mess. Now, I’m not exactly taking my cousin’s side, but do you really think he deserved all that?”

Taliana opened her mouth to respond, but her jaw snapped shut when his words fully registered. “Wait, did you say cousin?”

“You didn’t know?” he questioned, obviously surprised. “Sebastian’s my cousin. I thought my last name would’ve given it away.”

“You never got around to telling me your last name, Jude.”

“Well, it’s Phillips. Now you know.”

Taliana shook her head, shocked by the revelation. “I can’t believe you two are related. You’re so sweet and he’s so...”

“Egotistical?” Jude offered as Taliana trailed off. “Stubborn? Bossy? Vain? Melodramatic?”

“I was going to say annoying, but those work, too.”

“You really are too cute,” he laughed. “We need to hang out again soon.”

Taliana nodded in agreement and tugged on the hem of her still damp dress. “We do. I’ll call you tomorrow after I talk to my dad.” But knowing him, Taliana would probably be six feet under in the next ten minutes. “If I’m still alive.”

After thanking Jude for the ride, Taliana slid out of the car and made her way to the front door. She sent a quick prayer to every deity she could think of before slipping inside the house and bracing for the ambush. After a few tense moments of nothing happening, her tired eyes swept the foyer, and she let out a sigh of relief when she realized her father was nowhere to be found.

But her luck ran out a few seconds later.

“Taliana Colton-Avilla, where in the world have you been?”

Cringing at the sheer volume of her father’s voice, Taliana cracked open an eye and took in the sight in front of her. Charles was standing, hands on hips, a few feet away, and his mouth was set in a hard line. In an attempt to pacify the situation, Taliana tried her best to pull an innocent smile onto her lips.

“Hi, Daddy.”

If the twins could get out of trouble by batting their eyelashes and sucking up to daddy dearest, maybe she could do the same.

“Don’t you ‘hi, Daddy’ me, Taliana,” he snapped. “Where have you been? Katherine and I have been worried sick about you!”

Shit. It didn’t look like playing darling daughter was going to get her out of this one. “I’ve, uh— I was— I went…” she trailed off, unable to come up with a valid excuse. With the way he was glaring and clenching his jaw, Taliana was seconds from blurting the truth, but she was saved when someone else answered for her.

“She was at Jude’s house,” Vanessa said as she popped into the room, shooting Taliana a look that clearly said follow my lead and no one gets hurt. “He just dropped her off.”

“Yeah,” Taliana mumbled, rubbing the back of her neck. “I, uh, spent the night at his place.”

Taliana thought her answer had been a relatively good one, but judging from the way her father’s face was turning redder by the second made her reconsider.

“You spent the night at a boy’s house?”

“Dad, relax,” Vanessa cut in, coming to Taliana’s rescue once again. “He’s gay.”

The anger on their father’s face turned to confusion, then to realization, then to something she couldn’t read.

“Oh.” His brow finally relaxed and his hands dropped from his hips, both good signs that Taliana wasn’t going to face a life sentence of grounding. “I guess that’s all right. But you should have called us anyway. I had to talk Katherine out of calling the police five times last night since she was so worried something had happened to you.”

“I’m perfectly fine,” Taliana lied, wincing slightly as a sharp pain shot through her head. “Really.”

Charles looked like he didn't believe a word of it. “Go to your room, Taliana. We’ll discuss this later.”

With one last pointed look at her and Vanessa, he turned and left the foyer, leaving the two girls by themselves. Inside, Taliana was doing a victory dance that she’d escaped punishment for the time being, but she was too tired to even give herself a pat on the back.

“I’m going to bed,” she mumbled to Vanessa as she kicked off her heels and shuffled toward the staircase. “I owe you one.”

“Oh no you don’t!” Vanessa grabbed Taliana’s hand and hopped up on the first stair, putting her at the same height as Taliana. “You’ve got some major explaining to do.”

“Can’t it wait?” she whined as she tried to slip around Vanessa. “I’m not in the mood to talk about anything right now.”

Maybe it was the way Taliana said the words, or maybe it was because she looked like she was seconds away from hurling all over the floor, but Vanessa blew out a heavy sigh and stepped out of her way.

“Fine, but you better tell me everything later.”

“I will, I will,” Taliana promised, waving a hand over her shoulder as she started up the stairs.

She finally stumbled into her bedroom a few seconds later and shut the door before wriggling out of her wet dress. The relief she felt as it fell to the ground was almost enough to make her cry tears of joy, but nothing could compare to the bliss of throwing on a pair of pajamas and collapsing face-first onto her bed. She got in one last yawn before her brain decided it was time for lights out.

Her phone, however, had a different idea.

Its incessant buzzing chased away every ounce of sleep in Taliana’s body, bringing on an onslaught of rather colorful curse words instead. To get the damn thing to shut up, she slapped blindly at her bedside table, trying to locate it without having to open her eyes. Once her fingers curled around it, she toyed with the decision to either fling it across the room or simply silence it, but when she saw it was her mother calling, she had no choice but to pick up.

“Hi, Mom,” Taliana mumbled groggily as she struggled to sit up again. “How are you?”

“I’d be better if my daughter could remember to call me,” she sniffed, though Taliana knew she was just kidding. “Didn’t I tell you to give me a ring when you got there?”

Taliana groaned and ran a hand through her tangled hair, wincing when she hit a few snags. “Ah, sorry about that. I forgot.”

Her soft chuckle made Taliana smile. “You haven’t changed one bit.”

“I’ve only been gone three days.”

“It feels like it’s been three months.” She sighed. “I miss you like crazy. Hopefully you’re holding up better than I am.”

“I really haven’t had much time to think about how much I miss LA,” she said honestly, drawing her knees up to her chest. “I’ve basically been on the go since I got here.”

“Your father told me he’s barely seen you since the day you arrived. He said the twins were keeping you pretty busy.”

Taliana raised an eyebrow in amusement. “Since when do you talk to Dad? Even when you lived around here, you barely spoke two words to him whenever you dropped me off at his house on the weekends.”

“We only talk when necessary,” she clarified. “And when a certain daughter of mine forgot to call and tell me she’d gotten there safely, I had call to Charles instead. Not only did he assure me you were fine, he told me you’d gone to a party.” Taliana could feel her smirk across the line. “Didn’t you tell me your partying days were over, missy?”

Taliana groaned and dropped her forehead to her knees. “I thought they were.”

“Did you at least have a good time, though?”

“It was okay,” she said after a beat. She certainly wasn’t about to share any details about the second half of the night, but she figured her mom could know about who she’d run into. “I saw Zak there last night.”

There was a long pause on the other line, but the sound of her mother’s steady breathing alerted Taliana that she was still there. “I guess I should have told you he was going to live with his aunt in DC,” she admitted meekly.

Taliana’s heart thudded dangerously against her ribs as her head snapped up. “You knew Zak was here? Why didn’t you tell me this sooner?”

“I forgot?”

“Mom!”

“Sorry!”

“I can’t believe this,” Taliana seethed, clutching her comforter. “When did you find out?”

“Well...”

“Tell me.”

Andrea groaned, obviously not keen on answering Taliana’s questions. “The day before you left,” she finally conceded. “But you’d already made up your mind that you were leaving! I tried to get you to stay, but you were having none of it!”

“Well maybe if you told me that cheating scumbag was moving here as well, I would have changed my mind! God, Mom, why didn’t you say anything?”

“Because I didn’t see the point! DC.is a big place, and I never thought you’d run into him.”

“Next time you need to take all possibilities into consideration,” Taliana snapped, furious and slightly hurt that her mom would keep such a thing from her.

“Don’t use that tone with me, young lady.”

Taliana didn’t apologize, but she attempted to reel in her anger. “What’s he even doing in DC?” she asked instead, pushing the conversation in a different direction. “Last I heard, his parents were shipping him off to some military school in the middle of nowhere.”

“Apparently, they changed their minds and decided they’d rather send him to live with his aunt,” Andrea explained. “I think she’s a senator or something and is rumored to be a real hard-ass.”

Oh yeah, like any old hard-ass could handle Zak Huntington. He’d probably end up causing that woman so much trouble that she’d send him right back in less than a week. Taliana knew from first-hand experience that no one could control that boy or change him. Both had been tough lessons to learn.

“She’s got her work cut out for her,” Taliana muttered. “But out of all the places he could have gone, why here? Do I just have super bad karma or something? I mean, isn’t it bad enough that he cheated on me with Sara? I thought I could escape all that.”

"Well, look on the bright side," her mother tried to reason. "At least you don't have to deal with her, too."

Taliana sent a death glare to the boy band poster on her wall, pretending it was her mother instead. “That doesn’t make this any better.”

“Just face it, honey,” she sighed. “Your best friend was a terrible person and your boyfriend was even worse. You’re not the first girl this has happened to, and you’re definitely not the last. So I suggest you suck it up and try to ignore him if you see him again. You came to DC for a fresh start and you’re going to get it, no matter what. Do you understand me?”

“Loud and clear.” Taliana flopped back against her pillows and blew out a breath. “Let’s not talk about him anymore. He makes me sick.” Then again, that could have been from her slowly subsiding hangover, but she wasn’t going to say anything about that.

“Good idea,” her mother agreed. “How about we talk about my love life instead?”

Taliana had to try hard not to laugh. “What love life, Mom?”

“Aren’t you a funny one.”

“I try.”

She chuckled again. “I’ll have you know that I scored a date with a male model.”

Taliana’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “A model? I’m impressed.”

“I did pretty well, didn’t I?” She laughed, sounding excited about her upcoming date. “He’s taking me to dinner tonight at some new restaurant. I have this gorgeous red dress that I’ve been meaning to wear, so I’ll probably go with that. All have to consider is jewelry and shoes.”

“I bet you’re really regretting that you gave me the ring now,” Taliana joked. “That thing goes with everything.”

“As long as you’re treating it well, I’m okay with it. You haven’t lost it yet, right?”

Taliana laughed at the outrageous idea. They both knew she would guard that thing with her life. “Of course I haven’t,” she scoffed, glancing down at her right hand.

Her bare right hand.

“Oh no.”

A tense silence spread as Taliana stared at her middle finger, which was bereft of any jewelry. The ring that should have been there was most definitely not.

“Don’t tell me you lost it, Taliana.”

“Then I won’t say anything.” The panic rose as she hopped down from the bed and began shaking out the covers in search of the diamond. “Look, Mom, I’m gonna have to call you back.”

“Taliana Colton-Avilla, if you hang up on me, I’ll—”

Taliana ended the call before her mother could finish the sentence, knowing the threat at the end of it wasn’t going to be anything pleasant.

“Shit, shit, shit.”

If she didn’t find that thing and call her mom back in the next five minutes, she had a feeling her mother was going to fly out there to kill her. Either that or Grandma’s ghost was going to do it. Or even worse, the both of them would come after her.

All three ideas made Taliana shudder and pick up the pace of her search. By the time she was done, everything had been ripped off the bed and was lying in a sad heap on the floor, but there was no ring.

Her fingers fisted in her hair as she stared helplessly at the mess on the floor. She tried to calm herself with a few deep breaths, but nothing worked. She was seconds away from having a panic attack when her survival instincts kicked in. Everything would be okay! She could do this! And while she was sure her mother wouldn’t literally kill her, there was the slight possibility she could be disowned.

Oh god, she had to find that ring.

Taliana nearly tripped over her own feet as she continued her hunt, starting with the bags she’d yet to unpack. Her pathetic excuse for a wardrobe joined the sheets on the floor as she pawed through and tossed everything to the side, not caring where it landed. When both her bags had been emptied, her room looked like a tornado had ripped through, and she still hadn’t found the ring.

“No!”

She was standing in the middle of the floor on top of a mountain of clothes when her door banged open and two blonde heads popped into her line of vision.

“What’s wrong?” Vanessa questioned worriedly as her twin took in Taliana’s disaster of a room.

“The ring! I can’t find it anywhere!” Taliana let out a strangled scream and dropped her hands onto her head. “Oh my god, my mom is going to murder me.”

Vanessa took a hesitant step forward, edging around a pile of t-shirts. “When did you last have it?”

Taliana wracked her brain for an answer. “Um, at the party,” she said, trying to think back. “I had it when we got there, and I’m pretty sure I had it when I left with that guy, so it must be—”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Marissa interrupted, shaking her head as she shot Taliana a confused look. “What guy?”

Taliana grimaced and ran a sweaty palm over her pajama pants. “I went back to some guy’s hotel room last night,” she confessed, knowing there was no way she would find the ring if she didn’t fill them in completely. “I woke up this morning and got out of there as fast as I could.”

Marissa gasped and slapped a hand over her mouth while Vanessa simply raised an eyebrow.

“Did you sleep with him?” Vanessa questioned.

“Yeah,” Taliana admitted, heat creeping into her cheeks as vague memories from last night finally came flooding back. “But that’s not important!” she exclaimed as she continued to fight the blush. “What’s important is that I’m pretty sure I left my ring in his hotel room.”

“I guess that’s not so bad,” Vanessa said with a shrug. “I mean, if you know his name, you could call the hotel and ask what room he’s in. Hopefully he’ll still be there.”

“That’s the problem,” Taliana said, blowing out the breath she’d been holding. “I can’t remember his name.”

Marissa bit her lip as she shifted her weight from foot to foot. “That could be a problem.”

“You think?” Taliana shot her an exasperated look. “I don’t remember his name, I don’t remember the room number, and I don’t remember what the hell possessed me to even sleep with him!” She plopped onto the floor when her legs decided they didn’t want to support her anymore. “This is a disaster.”

After sending a pained glance at her twin, Vanessa moved to where Taliana was sitting and knelt beside her. “I don’t want to make you feel any worse, Talia,” she began softly, reaching out to put a hand on Taliana’s knee, “but I don’t think you’re going to get that ring back.”

As much as Taliana hated to admit it, Vanessa was probably right.

With a heavy sigh, she surrendered to her obvious fate. The ring was gone and it would take a miracle for her to find it again.

“I am so fucked.”

***

“I am so fucked.”

Sebastian dragged a hand down his face, marking the end of what had been an unbearably lengthy and disappointingly fruitless search for his former bedmate.

“I have to agree with you there,” Jacob sighed. “All those girls on the list and not one of them was her. Are you sure it was a girl you had in your room last night?”

Marcus, who’d been quietly sipping a cup of coffee in the corner of the hotel room, let out a loud laugh. Michael, however, looked as though he wasn’t willing to risk getting on his best friend’s bad side today.

“We should just give up for the time being,” Michael announced, rising from his seat at the table. “We’re obviously not getting anywhere, and I’m ready to get the fuck out of here.”

“Agreed,” Marcus said as he got up as well. “I say we all go home and try again later.”

Sebastian exhaled and dragged a hand through his hair. While he didn’t exactly want to give up the search, they’d accomplished absolutely nothing in the two hours it had taken them to go over the female half of the guest list.

It didn’t help that they were all running on a few hours of sleep, causing them to act like dumbasses with short tempers. Sebastian especially, since his temper hadn’t been all that great to begin with. Even Marcus, who had the patience of a saint, was suffering. He’d tried to ease his nerves by smoking nearly half a pack of cigarettes, but it wasn’t looking like they’d helped much. So instead of demanding they all stay and continue to look, Sebastian waved a hand in dismissal.

“Six o’clock, my house,” he said as a means of goodbye. “We’ve got to find this girl.”

“You've got to find this girl,” Michael corrected, patting him twice on the shoulder before strolling toward the door with Marcus and Jacob in tow. “But we’ll try our best to help.”

Sebastian rolled his eyes and watched as they left the room, not taking his eyes off the door until it had been closed for a good minute and a half. With a defeated sigh, he finally hauled himself out of the chair and snatched the guest list off the table, deciding to give it one more go over before checking out and heading home.

But another twenty minutes of pacing and reading only gave him the same results as the previous time. Not even one of the people on the list remotely reminded him of the girl he’d been with last night.

She hadn’t been particularly unique with her long, dark hair and porcelain skin, but she’d still stood out from the crowd. Her height was part of the reason, and had he been any shorter, he would have found the fact that she was over six feet tall in heels a little intimidating, but at six foot three there’d still been a comfortable difference between them. She had been thin, too, like the models on the covers of the fashion magazines that Jude always carried around. Her hipbones had honestly been borderline dangerous.

But it was her sharp smile he couldn’t seem to get out of his head. That sinful mouth of hers had been contorted into a half-smile the whole time. Never in his life had he seen a smile that he hated more than hers, but he couldn’t seem to figure out why.

It was all beside the point now that she was gone, but there was a part of him that wanted to see it again. To see her again.

Sebastian finally stopped his pacing and glanced at the diamond ring sitting on the table. He was almost glad this thing was giving him a reason to find her, because, frankly, he wanted to know what was really behind that teasing half-smile of hers.

Whatever it took, he was going to find her. He wanted answers.