Page 24 of A Dark Duet

She looks at me with a smirk. “You slept with him, didn’t you?” Brie asks with a knowing smile.

“So? You slept with Jaden. I can tell as you have that thoroughly fucked look on your face I have seen before.”

“Yeah, but it’s nothing compared to you. It was your first time, and you gave him your V-card.”

I roll my eyes, tilting my head back. “I know, Brie. I just feel different when I’m around him and when he touches me, it’s like a fire that begins to burn inside me, and he’s the only one that can put it out.”

“You have fallen for him, haven’t you?” she asks.

I sigh.I look at her, thinking about how I feel. “I don’t know, Brie. I’m scared, and I honestly don’t know how I feel about him right now. He lives in a different world than we do and I don’t see how it can work. I wanted my first time to be with someone I’m strongly attracted to where I can feel safe and wanted. He is all of that and I have never felt what I feel with Nate. We just met and we both know it’s most likely not going to go anywhere.”

“ True.I get it, I don’t blame you.”

“So how about you and Jaden?”

She smiles and giggles. “Let’s see. He’s amazing, nice, funny, and he eats pussy like a porn star. I hope you couldn’t hear my moans last night.”

“You meanourmoans,” I say as we laugh hysterically.

We finish at the café and head back to Nate’s house to get ready for the evening charity event they invited us to. Brie and I decide to get ready in the guest room that I used when Nate requested me to come over and dance for him privately.

I’m wearing the latest Chanel dress and the lingerie Nate wanted in the dressing room. I told Brie what had happened earlier, and she teased me.

“He knows what he wants, apparently,” she says.

“I guess. He is intense, and this is all new to me. You know how my parents were when I was growing up.”

I remember and wish they were still here, and my heart aches as the sadness briefly washes over me.

“Hey, they were the best parents a girl could ask for and you were lucky to have them as long as you did, even though they were taken from you too soon. It’s better than being the daughter of the town whore.”

I can’t believe I’m so selfish and didn’t stop to think of Brie’s situation growing up with a drug-addicted mom who turned tricks and an absent father. Look at what happened with Jace and his treatment of her when he didn’t want to be seen with Brie because of who her mother was.

“I’m so sorry, Brie. I didn’t stop to ask. How is your mother?”

She scoffs. “The same as always, asking for money and living in the trailer.”

My eyes grow sad. “She still gets high on that stuff, doesn’t she?”

“Yeah, I go to visit her once a week and sometimes there’s an eviction notice. I have to pay to keep them from kicking her out or having the electricity shut off.”

The sadness in her eyes tells me the sorrow and anger she must feel. I know I would be disappointed and helpless to be the only one to deal with a mom like that. To know that she doesn’t want help because she feels it’s a daughter’s duty to help their only parent.

“If you need anything, money or anything else I can help you with, just let me know, and I will help you, Brie. You’re the only person I have left,” I tell her with tears in my eyes.

She is the only person in my life right now who I can count on to be there for me, and I would do anything to help my best friend. I have no family left, my parents have no other relatives, and I’m an only child.

She gives me a big hug. “We need to stop crying if we’re to look good tonight, you know,” she says, smiling with tears in her eyes.

Blinking back the tears in my eyes, holding her in my arms, I whisper, “I love you, Brie.”

“I love you, too. You’re my sister, not just a best friend. Let’s get ready and have a great time and learn to live life.”

When we’re finishing the last touches of our makeup, there is a knock on the door, and when I open it, I’m stunned, looking at a handsome Nate in a tuxedo. He absolutely takes my breath away. If I thought he looked good before, he looks even more gorgeous with his clean-shaven face and the intoxicating scent of his cologne.

The tuxedo tailored to his frame, fitting like a glove. We stand there, gazing at each other, and I suddenly hear a clearing of a throat. I turn around to a smiling Brie.

“Are you two going to just stare at each other all night or are we going to a charity event?” she says.

---