Jess and I try on every dress at the boutique, finally settling on a lush emerald green one for her—it makes her look like a goddess—and a fitted fuchsia sheath for me. I don’t have Jess’s stunning blue eyes, but the bright pink next to my skin makes my dark orbs look more mysterious than boring.

She’s called in her prep team to the boutique, so at six o’clock I flip the elegantly calligraphed sign on the door to “closed” and lead the duo into a little setup I’ve got in the storage room—chair, vanity, lighted mirror.

“This is Candy and Harold,” Jess says, and Harold gives me a grin. His hair is styled to within an inch of its life.

I grin back. “Like what you see?”

“I like a beautiful brunette.” His accent is polished style, all poise and elegance. “Are you ready to be styled?”

I pull out my hair clip, letting my locks spill down over my shoulders. “Am I ever.”

We all laugh, and then the two stylists turn serious as they transform us into amped-up versions of ourselves.

“I didn’t expect to look like royalty when I woke up this morning.” Harold is doing something complicated and lovely to my hair. I can’t wait to see what it looks like when it’s done.

“Oh, you don’t look like royalty,” Jess jokes, sticking her nose up in the air. “For that, you’d need to wear a crown.”

“My, my, how high we have risen!”

The two of us laugh again, and it dispels some of the ache forming in my chest. Who cares if I don’t have a date? If, once again, I’m seated next to someone’s plus-one at the party? I’ve been lucky before. I could be lucky again.

And, I remind myself, it’s better for Rainflower Blue if I’m…unattached. Men have a way of becoming distractions.

By the time Harold has turned my hair into an exquisite creation—half-up with curls doesn’t begin to do it justice—and he’s switched places with Candy, my skin is buzzing, electrified with jolts of anticipation.

An old friend is in town and hosting a massive party. There’s sure to be an uptick in site traffic…but more than that, I can’t wait to be there.

* * *

The undercurrent in the room is obvious the moment we step inside the Purple Swan’s main dining room. It features a huge dance floor up at the front of it, a stage where a jazz quartet is playing—low-key for the beginning of the evening, but by the time the last people stagger out of this place, it will be anything but background noise.

Jess claps her hands when she sees Alec waving to her from the second tier of tables. It’s full of our friends, plus a couple other faces that seem familiar. Jax Hunter is there with his wife, Catherine—he leans down to whisper something in her ear, and her cheeks flush pink. On her other side is Chris—Eli, I tell myself sternly, Eli—with Quinn at his side, her hand wrapped around his bicep. My chest starts burning, but then we’re at the table, Eli has stood up and is coming around to kiss both of my cheeks, and I’m swept up in the conversation of the moment. Jess sits down beside me, Alec is next to her, and I accept the first glass of champagne that comes my way as all of my friends talk over one another.

But there seems to be another conversation happening. Am I making it up? All over the room, people are whispering to each other, nodding—a couple here, a couple there.

Am I so desperate for a juicy rumor that I’m seeing and hearing things?

I lean back in my seat. Two tables away, a woman with bright red hair shields her face with her hand and says something to a blonde next to her, then nods, again. “Yes!” I hear her say, her voice blending into the cacophony of chatter reverberating around the rest of the room.

“How are sales at your boutique?” Eli says, sliding into the empty seat to my left, causing me to startle at the closeness of his voice.

“I had one good client right at the end of the day,” I say, nodding my head toward Jessica.

Eli grins. “She cares about fashion now?”

“She’s done well for herself.” Nobody else at the table is paying the slightest bit of attention to us. Quinn has a tuxedoed waiter by the arm and is having an involved conversation about something, and everyone else is laughing at a joke Jax is in the middle of telling. “What do you know, E?”

“About what?” Eli’s blue eyes sparkle. Since things have settled down, he’s found a happy medium—he’s still the life of the party, but not quite so intense.

I flick my eyes around the room. “Are you going to tell me that everyone at the Swan tonight is whispering about something different?”

He follows my gaze, then gives me a wide smile. “You’re making things up.”

I slap his bicep. “Tell me.”

“They’re talking about….” He leans in close, like he’s about to divulge a state secret. “Ace Kingsley.”

I roll my eyes. “Don’t screw with me.”

“I’m not.” Eli’s face is all sincerity. “You don’t know who that is?”

“Ace Kingsley?” It sounds like the name of some fake rich person in a made-for-TV movie? “No.”

“He was two years ahead of us in school.”

“You are making that up.”

Eli laughs. “I’m not. You don’t remember Aaron Kingsley? He started going by Ace after he graduated.”

A vague memory starts filtering back to me—a tall, skinny guy with blue eyes and blonde hair, like Christian’s, but he was less outgoing, less confident.

“What about him?”

“He’s back in the city.”

The way he says it makes the hair on the back of my neck prick up, but I can’t put my finger on why.

“And there’s some speculation that—”

“Eli!” Jess calls over to me. “Tell Alec about that thing we used to do in school.”

Eli winks at me. “You sure he’s ready for that?”

I turn toward Jess, ready to play my part in the story, but my mind has Ace Kingsley in its claws, and it won’t let go.

Rumors swirl around me, but I can’t get at them.

Not yet.