Jet Set (10 page)

I
was nervous. I mean, sweating bullets. It was our first tennis match, and we were playing a school that was also known to have a fantastic tennis team. It was just a “scramble,” meaning that it was supposed to be for fun and not count, since the real tennis season didn't start until the spring, but I had been told that in truth everything counts. In fact, Coach Sachs had made it clear that our days and nights would be brutal if we didn't nail this one. I had called my parents the night before in a panic.

“Sweetheart, you're a wonderful tennis player. I'm sure you
will do great,” said my ever-supportive mother.

“But, Mom, you're used to me playing against people who don't really matter. This is major. We're playing a team that has a former Olympic coach leading them.”

“Don't worry, it will be fine.”

My dad was no better but in a different way. “Go get 'em tiger—you know you need to win to get a good tennis scholarship for college,” he commanded. He always had tennis scholarship on the brain. Sometimes I wish he would back off a little. But when I thought of my sister and her only option being an ROTC scholarship, I knew deep down he was right. I wanted to go to a good college, and tennis was the ticket.

Thankfully the game was to be on our home turf. I didn't want to deal with traveling somewhere, and this team was flying in from Les Abeilles in the Loire Valley. I got to the courts early, determined to stretch and be fully limber by the time practice started. It was still dark when I got to the locker rooms to change, and the sun was just rising when I made it out to the court. I shivered a little in the cold and was a bit dismayed to see how my breath hung in the air, but I knew as soon as I did some laps I'd warm right up.

“Hey,” said a voice behind me.

I turned around, startled.

“Hi, Oliver.”

“Couldn't sleep either?”

“Nope,” I said, placing my rackets on the bench and stretching
my arms out to keep warm. “I'm kind of a nervous wreck!”

“Me too,” Oliver admitted. He smiled and shook his head. “My bloody nerves get me every time.”

I loved that Oliver always seemed to tell the truth. You'd think that he would be more rigid, being a prince and all. It was very refreshing. Since kissing Antony on Saturday night, I'd fully had Antony on the brain. I was always the type who liked the guys who liked me—not some delusional chaser of the It boy. And seeing Oliver now, I realized that since he would never be a possibility, and didn't need to be, it would be really nice to have him as a friend. So what if it caused problems with Angelina and the Diamonds? That was actually more
their
problem than mine.

“Wanna do some laps?” I asked. Then, not knowing what seized me, I sprinted ahead. “Race you!”

“Hey, no fair!” said Oliver, tearing off his sweatshirt and taking off after me.

We did several fast loops around the court, teasingly passing each other now and then. We ultimately slid into a steady jogging pace, determined not to overdo it before the game. It was fun running with someone else. We didn't say anything, really, just smiled at each other every once in a while.

As we rounded the court for something like our sixteenth lap, a loud giggling shriek pierced the air. I saw Chérie, the buxom blonde who worked in the school store, walking out of the flower-covered gazebo with her head thrown back in laughter. Everyone knew Chérie. She was in her early twenties, and the rumor was
that she was “available for a good time” for any young man at school who had a sizeable bank account. Which was every guy in school. Supposedly a lot of boys had lost their virginity to her. I thought it was odd that she was up and about so early, but I kept up my pace. When I rounded the court again I could have sworn I also saw Antony walking by the same gazebo that Chérie came out of. I waved as I jogged on, but then suddenly realized that what I just witnessed was even more strange. Was that really Antony? What was he doing there? And was he with Chérie? I had gone by so quickly that I didn't see if he waved back, but I didn't want to stop now and have Oliver think something was up. I kept running, faster now, but when I came around to the corner where I had seen them both, no one was there. Was I hallucinating? The boy I had spotted was wearing the same peacoat that Antony always wore, had the same brown hair—although a lot of kids at school had the same coat.

“I gotta take a break,” I said, stopping when we got to the bench. I bent over, hands on hips, and took deep breaths. Had Antony been hooking up with Chérie? Was I paranoid?

“Well done, Lucy. You should consider track,” said Oliver.

“Yeah,” I mumbled before I took a large swig out of my water bottle. “Hey, you didn't happen to see who was out in the gazebo, did you?” I asked, pretending to be nonchalant.

“Oh, er,” began Oliver. “I think I saw Chérie.”

“Did you see who she was with?” I asked, emboldened somehow. I did not want to be made a fool of. If Antony was getting
down with Chérie, I wanted to know.

Oliver looked at me carefully. “Listen, Lucy, I wanted to talk to you about Antony.”

“What do you mean?” I asked. Could he read my mind? Or had he seen what I did?

“He's…he's tricky. He has one thing in mind, and—this will come out the wrong way—you are not his usual type of girl, which makes me worry. For you. I just don't feel that he has the right intentions,” Oliver said with a sigh.

I was speechless. Should I feel good that Oliver was protecting me? Or was there something else? I was about to speak when we were interrupted by none other than Antony himself.

“There you are! I was just coming up to wish you good luck,” said Antony, giving me a big hug. I stared at Oliver over Antony's shoulder. He looked away and excused himself, mumbling something about practicing serves, and left us alone.

“Antony, did I just see you with Chérie?” I asked flatly.

“You
did
! That old cow! She was leaving Rolf's room and lost her shoe along the path. I was helping her find it. I told her she'd better learn to keep her clothes on.”

Relief swept through my body. Antony hadn't even paused or seemed remotely disconcerted when I brought up Chérie, the Van Pelt school bicycle (everyone's had a ride). Either he was an Academy Award–winning actor or he was telling the truth.

“Oh, because, you know, I wanted to make sure it wasn't
you
and Chérie in that romantic gazebo,” I said, looking him in the
eye. “Sofia told me that's where people go to fool around.”

“Look at you!” said Antony, his eyes crinkling with laughter. “I didn't fancy you to be the jealous type! But no, I can assure you I would never go for that skank. She's been around the block more times than the ex–Mrs. Federline. Dirty.”

Okay, fair enough. I felt somewhat relieved.

“So, Luce, what were you doing with Mr. Majesty? That bloke is such a wanker.”

I stiffened, feeling weirdly defensive of Oliver. Antony obviously read my reaction and reached for me.

“Come here,” he said, taking my sweaty arm and steering me to the side of the court. I decided to take the plunge.

“Antony, what's the deal with you and Oliver?” I asked. I mean, elephant in the room.

Antony sighed and looked up at the sky. “I can honestly say I don't know!”

I gave him a quizzical look and he continued. “Okay, there was this time when I was going after this girl—I think she's, like, his cousin or something, in that poshy London scene he runs around with. Anyway, he totally talked her out of me. I think honestly that he is just a huge snob. My parents are not as wealthy as his are and I think he has a problem with it.”

“That doesn't sound like Oliver.”

“How well do you know him?” asked Antony, cocking his head to the side.

“I don't know, he just doesn't seem like a snob.”

“Did you know he got in huge trouble last year for yelling some nasty comment at another bloke at a football—er, soccer to you—game? Started a whole riot.”

“That can't be true.…”

“It is. Check it out,” he said, nodding vehemently. “You'd be surprised by the prince. He isn't all that regal.”

I glanced over at Oliver, who was practicing his perfect ace of a serve. He just didn't strike me as the type to do something like that.

“He's always nice to me,” I said feebly.

“And why wouldn't he be, my dear! You have it all—looks, brains, class, money…”

I laughed at the last part. “Oh yeah, big money.”

“I love your audacity!” said Antony with a laugh, putting his arms around me and leaning in.

We managed to steal a quick kiss before Coach Sachs and the rest of the team arrived and it was time for real practice. Antony reluctantly waved and left for his rugby practice, but he promised to come back and watch when it was my turn to play.

Invigorated by his being in the stands, I managed to whip my opponent's butt, 6–love, 6–love. Only, when I looked up in the stands and saw Antony pumping his fist in the air with every point I scored, I felt like I was the one getting the love.

“T
here is something about that here,” said Sofia, pulling out an old issue of
Gab!
from the storage boxes under her bed.

She handed me an article from the previous year that was titled “Spoiled Prince Disses Common Man.” I couldn't believe my eyes. The article told how Oliver had caused a
major
meltdown at a Chelsea–Tottenham soccer game. I was shocked. I couldn't believe it was my Oliver—I mean, um, Oliver Oliver. So weird. But sure enough, there was a picture of him, looking angry and being restrained by cops. Wow. I guess you never know people.

“Funny, right?” asked Sofia, staring at me.

“Yeah, I can't quite put that together with him. He seems so sweet.”

“He is divine-looking. So tell me about Antony. Now
he
is hot!”

I spent the next half hour filling her in on all the nitty-gritty of my burgeoning relationship. We were seated on her fluffy rug, the fire was going, and as she asked question after question, I was all too eager to tell her every little detail, every innermost thought.

“That's fabulous,” she said when I was finally done.

“So what about you? Is there anyone you like?” I asked, feeling bad that I had been such a conversation hog.

“I have my eye on someone,” she said, smiling. “But it's too early to tell. I'll let you know.”

“Okay,” I said, suddenly wishing that I had not downloaded every gory deet to her when she was being as closemouthed as a president under investigation. I had that sensation you get when you eat too much Chinese food or popcorn, which is great while you do it, but afterward you want to vomit. Had I revealed too much?

“What I do want to discuss is how awesomely our little project worked! Come here,” she said, leading me over to her computer.

She sat down and clicked through several files, and suddenly Victoria, Iman, and Antigone's rooms all came on the screen. I was shocked. Victoria wasn't in there, but Iman was sitting on her
bed chatting on the phone, and Antigone was doing yoga on a mat. I was riveted.

“Oh my God!”

“I know,” said Sofia, beaming proudly. “Okay, this is just boring stuff. Let me show you what I got from a few days ago.”

Sofia scanned through her files and clicked on one called “Extremely Entertaining.”

“I've already had fun doing some editing. You're going to die! Here, sit down.”

I slid into Sofia's seat while she stood and leaned over me from behind. I watched as the screen changed to show Antigone's room. There she was, totally naked, and, um, having a go with Moabi. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. It was pretty graphic. I could tell Sofia was watching my face, and when things got a little too heavy, I had to look away.

“Brilliant, right?”

“Sofia, we can't do anything with this. It's total invasion of privacy,” I said, suddenly panicky. What had we done? This was major.

“Of course we can! They're evil. We can do whatever we want.”

“But, Sofia, this will totally ruin her reputation. Her parents will kill her, we could get thrown out, it's so so bad.…”

Sofia furrowed her brows. “No, we can! No one will know it's us. And besides, it will probably be the best thing that ever happened to her. Look at Paris Hilton! She was nothing until her sex tape.”

“But the difference is that Paris
knew
that guy was taping her, and everyone suspects she even leaked the tape. Antigone had no idea. No, we can't do anything.”

“Yes we can, and we will,” said Sofia, crossing her arms defiantly.

It became a staredown.

“Sofia, you know this is not right,” I said gently, trying another tactic.

“Why is it not right? It is, after all, against school rules to have boys in our rooms, never mind doing what Antigone was doing!”

“But we were spying on her!”

“So what? It's her fault,” said Sofia. “Listen, Lucy. These girls are nasty tarts. I don't know why in the world you would stick up for them. They are evil, evil, rich snotty wankers and we have to get back at them. We have to ruin them. Destroy them. They deserve it. We need to tarnish their reputations, cut them up into little pieces. And if you're not going to help me, fine, but I won't let you stop me!”

The vein in her forehead was throbbing, and I could see she wasn't going to listen to reason. As she was talking, I surreptitiously slid my hand over the keyboard and hit the Delete button.

“What did you do?” she screamed.

“I can't do this anymore,” I pronounced, standing my ground. Enough was enough. Not matter how awful the Diamonds were.

“Move over!” she commanded, and pushed me off the chair. I fell to the floor as I watched her furiously type away on her com
puter, trying to retrieve the file.

She calmly turned and gave me the most horrible, evil smirk. In that exact moment she morphed from quasi-friend to demonic, fire-breathing emissary of Hades.

“Do you really think it's that easy to erase the file? You, on the other hand, are easy enough to erase now that I know what a loser backstabber you are. Get out!” she yelled in a virtually
Exorcist
-ian grunt.

“Sofia!”

“Get out!”
she said, rising, grabbing me by the hair and opening the door. She literally threw me out of her room and slammed the door after me.

I was in shock. What now?