Betrayal: Abby's Guilt (The Betrayal Series) Read online

  “Hi,” Abby breathed once she was standing in front of Brianna.

  “Hey, yourself,” Brianna replied, gazing at Abby’s gorgeous brown hair which had been pulled back into a gentle half ponytail. The heavy bangs that normally covered Abby’s forehead had been combed back and were being held in place by shiny, silver pins that matched her earrings and the jeweled bust of her gown. The hairstyle made Abby look a couple of years older than she was. Brianna no longer wanted to go in and listen to the orchestra play songs she did not understand or care for. Instead, she wanted to spend the night staring at the angel with the piercing brown eyes standing in front of her.

  “I thought you weren’t coming. I was about to send a search and rescue team for you,” Brianna joked.

  “I’m so sorry. The traffic in New York City is normally pretty bad on a Saturday night. Add an accident to that and well…,” Abby remarked as she gazed up at the woman who had been keeping her up at night questioning her identity. As her eyes rolled down the elegant, mermaid-styled satin gown that hung perfectly over Brianna’s exquisite curves, Abby came to the conclusion that it should be illegal for someone to be that attractive. That off-white, floor-length gown-probably made by a designer with an Italian sounding name-made Brianna look every bit like the movie star she was aspiring to become.

  “We have to go in now. The concert is about to start,” Brianna breathed, and the two women began to walk towards the entrance of the theater in a hurry. “You look lovely tonight, Abby,” Brianna said over her shoulder as she sprinted through the hallway that led to the entrance of the theater.

  Abby grinned, feeling heat creep up her cheeks. “You look amazing too, Brianna.” Abby took a peek at the back of Brianna’s backless gown and her eyes widened at how dangerously low the back of Brianna’s dress was. Abby gazed at Brianna’s flawless, exposed back and wished she had Brianna’s measurements and the confidence to pull off such a daring but beautiful dress.

  After handing the tickets to the usher, Abby and Brianna walked inside the theater and made their way to one of the boxes. Abby’s eyes bugged out and her jaw dropped when she realized she was going to be listening to The New York Philharmonic and to Yo-Yo Ma live, and for the first time in her life, from a freaking box. Brianna had not mentioned that little detail to her. She couldn’t hide her glee. She was like a kid in a candy store inside Disneyland on Christmas day.

  Brianna could not help but giggle at her date’s exuberance. Abby kept grabbing Brianna’s arm and pointing at things. Brianna had no idea there was such a thing as a hardcore orchestral music fan until Abby Sloan began to chew her ear off about the songs that were going to be played that night, the instruments, the history of the orchestra, the theater. She even knew the names of all the musicians. Even though the theater was full of celebrities, Abby could not care less about any of them. She was all about the music.

  The performances finally began, and Abby watched and listened intently, turning occasionally towards Brianna and grinning like a little girl. Even though the theater was stunning, bathed in beautiful lights, and wonderful orchestral music was caressing her ears, Brianna could not help but stare at Abby. Abby’s angelic beauty, her child-like enthusiasm, her disarming smile, were the real show to Brianna. She began to wonder if she could ever be satisfied with just being Abby’s friend.

  After the show ended, Abby could not stop tugging at Brianna’s arm and gushing about the concert. They walked out of the theater and made their way to a tent where the traditional post-concert dinner was being held. Just when Abby thought her night couldn’t get any better, it did. At the dinner, she got to talk and even take pictures with The Philharmonic’s director, the musicians, and of course Yo-Yo Ma. She was also introduced to several celebrities she had seen on TV or heard about, but she was not as impressed with them as she was with all the talented musicians in the room.

  As Brianna watched the adorable brunette go into full fan girl mode at the dinner, she couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed. She had been forced by her manager, who was also at the event, to mingle with the celebrities and theater people in attendance. “It’s good for your career,” he said to her repeatedly. But the only person Brianna wanted to mingle with was her new friend, Abby. She had hoped to talk to her and get to know her, but it looked as if none of that was going to happen that night.

  After a couple of hours of mingling, fangirling and delicious food, Abby and Brianna left the dinner and walked outside.

  “Thank you so much for tonight,” Abby grinned, gazing up at Brianna while they both stood on the sidewalk outside Lincoln Center. “I can’t begin to tell you how much fun I had tonight.”

  Abby did not need to tell Brianna how much fun she had. It was written all over her face.

  “You’re very welcome,” Brianna replied, almost inaudibly and with a smile that did not quite reach her eyes. She couldn’t hide her disappointment over the fact that their night was ending and they had barely said a word to each other.

  “I had fun too. We should do this again soon,” Brianna suggested. She was racking her brain trying to come up with an excuse to spend a little more time with Abby.

  The smile on Abby’s face vanished. She remembered Kyle forbidding her from seeing Brianna. She wanted to be Brianna’s friend and get to know her. She also wanted to get the truth behind Kyle’s hatred for his sister. But Abby knew she couldn’t keep lying to Kyle just to hang out with Brianna. He was going to find out sooner or later if she kept sneaking around to be with the woman he despised. After the great evening they had spent together, Abby did not have the heart to tell Brianna they couldn’t hang out anymore. So she decided to tell her some other time. “It’s getting late. I have to go home. Thank you again for the concert, Brianna,” Abby said, her voice wavering as she stepped to the curb to hail a taxi.

  “You don’t have to take a taxi. My limo can drop you off at your apartment,” Brianna proposed, walking to the curb and standing next to Abby.

  “It’s okay, really. I don’t want to inconvenience you,” Abby countered, still waving her hand at the passing cabs and avoiding Brianna’s gaze. Suddenly, Abby’s phone began buzzing inside her clutch. She pulled it out, and her stomach twisted in knots when she saw it was Kyle calling. With shaky hands, and hoping she didn’t have to tell Kyle any more lies, Abby went to answer the phone. As she was bringing the phone to her ear, someone bumped into her arm and sent the phone flying out of her hand. The phone landed face down on the concrete of the busy sidewalk. When Abby bent down to pick it up, a morbidly obese man with a phone to his ear walked by and stepped on it. Abby let out a short scream when she heard a cracking sound coming from beneath the man’s foot. In typical New York fashion, the phone crusher mumbled an insincere apology to Abby and kept walking away.

  Both Brianna and Abby squatted down to pick up the crushed phone. Abby cursed softly when she flipped the phone over and saw the phone’s screen was cracked. Thankfully, though, the phone itself appeared to be still functional. She also noticed Kyle had left her a voicemail.

  “What am I going to do now?” Abby lamented as she dusted some dirt off the broken iPhone.

  “Don’t worry about it. I’m sure your phone insurance covers that. Apple will fix it or replace it with a new one, right?” Brianna asked a very bummed out Abby.

  “I don’t have insurance, and the phone it’s out of warranty,” Abby grunted before sucking her teeth. Phone insurance was a luxury for a broke college student like her, and she did not have $600 lying around to get a replacement.

  “I have a brand new iPhone in my hotel room that I won’t be using. You can have it,” Brianna offered as both women stood up.

  Abby shook her head. “No. I can’t. That’s very nice of you, but I can’t accept such an expensive gift.”

  “Please take the phone,” Brianna insisted. “It’s okay. I got it for free. I get a couple of new phones a week. There’s always one of those phones inside the gift bags they hand out at all
the celebrity events I attend. It’s no big deal. Please accept it. Just stop by my hotel room to pick it up. My limo driver will take you home afterwards.”

  “I can’t.” Abby continued to shake her head and stared at her shoes.

  “Please Abby. Just take it. I told you I got it for free. I’ll probably get a couple more of them before the week is over.”

  Abby raised her gaze and took a deep breath. She didn’t have enough money in her bank account to buy a new phone, and her credit card was almost maxed out. Rejecting Brianna’s offer would mean having to borrow money from her parents, and she did not want to do that. She was proud of the fact that after arriving at NYU, she had relied on no one but herself. All of her student loans were on her name only. Her parents did not cosign any of them. Even though her school workload was heavy, she went and got a job where she worked between 25 and 30 hours a week. She hated to be seen as someone who could not take care of herself. That’s why she was reluctant to accept the free phone Brianna was offering her.

  “Okay… But I will pay you back as soon as I can,” Abby finally replied.

  Brianna simply nodded. She knew better than to spend precious time convincing Abby she did not have to pay her back.

  “Okay. Let’s get you a new phone,” Brianna grinned. She mentally thanked the heavens and rude, overweight New Yorkers for making it possible for her to spend a few more minutes with that adorably stubborn brunette. A stretched limo pulled in front of the theater, and the driver stepped out to open the back door for them. “After you,” Brianna breathed, gesturing with her hand for Abby to get inside the limo. Brianna got in after Abby, and the driver took them to Brianna’s hotel.

  The limo ride was very short. Abby wondered why they did not just walk over. When they arrived at the hotel, an impeccably dressed doorman, wearing a hat and white gloves, opened the limo door and helped them out of the car. As the two women strolled through the palatial lobby to get to the elevators, Abby gazed, wide-eyed, at the enormous crystal chandelier hanging from the ceiling, the gold-plated columns, the gold plated stairs and the high end furniture. There was even a state of the art fountain in the middle of the lobby. As someone who had only stayed in Holiday Inns and cheap motels when she traveled, Abby felt uncomfortable and a little intimidating walking through that hotel lobby and hoped no one noticed she didn’t belong there.

  When they made it to the elevators, a polite operator, also impeccably dressed and wearing white gloves, escorted them to Brianna’s floor.

  “Wow, being a star definitely has its perks,” Abby remarked to Brianna after getting off the elevator. Her eyes kept bouncing around as she followed Brianna down a long hallway.

  Brianna giggled as she gazed at the gorgeous girl walking beside her. She couldn’t get over how dazzling Abby looked in her ball gown. “I wouldn’t call myself a star yet, but yeah, this line of work definitely has its perks. I can’t complain. And I’m not even paying for this suite. The producers of the musical are.”

  After walking the length of the fancy hallway, they finally made it to Brianna’s room. Brianna opened the door with her card key, and Abby’s eyes immediately flew to the breathtaking New York City skyline that could be seen through the floor-to-ceiling glass doors that separated the living room from the terrace. The contemporary styled living room area was bigger than hers and Kyle’s entire apartment in the village.

  “Have a seat, Abby.” Brianna gestured towards the white leather sofa that sat directly across from the terrace before walking towards the kitchen. “Would you like something to drink?”

  Abby nodded. “A glass of water would be fine. Thanks.”

  Brianna stopped at the kitchen’s doorway and raised an eyebrow at her. “Water? Really? How about a glass of wine?”

  Abby nodded, and Brianna disappeared into the kitchen. Abby sat on the sofa and pulled her broken phone out of her clutch. She stared at the time on the cracked screen and saw it was getting late. She worried that if she did not make it home soon, Kyle was going to get worried or suspicious. So she decided to give him a call.

  “Hi, honey. It’s me,” Abby said after Kyle picked up.

  “Hey babe. I called you a few minutes ago, and you didn’t pick up.”

  “I’m sorry. I had to put my phone on silent for the concert and forgot to turn it back on.” Abby winced as the lie came out of her mouth. She had told Kyle more lies that day than in the three years she had known him.

  “Where are you? Shouldn’t the concert be over by now?” Kyle asked.

  Abby began to stammer, “Oh, the girls and I decided to go to a bar for drinks after the concert.” Another lie.

  Brianna came back to the living room area holding a couple of glasses of wine in her hands. She gave Abby a questioning look.

  “All right. Have fun and be careful,” Kyle said.

  “I’ll be home in a bit, honey,” Abby replied, raising her gaze and meeting Brianna’s.

  “I love you,” Kyle said.

  “I love you too, Kyle,” Abby replied before ending the call. She quickly shoved the phone back inside her clutch.

  “The girls?” Brianna asked, raising an eyebrow as she sat on the couch next to Abby and handed her one of the wine glasses. “Kyle doesn’t know you are out with me, does he?”

  Abby took the wine glass from Brianna’s hand and stared at the floor for a moment. “I’m sorry,” she said, raising her gaze to meet Brianna’s. “After our meeting at the café, I tried to talk to him about you. When I brought your name up, he just shut me down. I wanted to invite you over to our apartment for dinner, but he didn’t even let me get that far. The mere mention of your name had him seething with anger.”

  Brianna shrugged as she took a sip from her wine. “I told you it was a lost cause. He will never change. I’ve come to terms with the fact that he will never accept me or even tolerate me. I can’t make him love me, Abby. That’s just the way things are.” Brianna placed her glass down on the coffee table.

  The resignation in Brianna’s voice made Abby profoundly sad. She too placed her glass of wine on the coffee table without taking a single sip. “But Kyle said the fact that you are gay is not the reason why you two don’t have a relationship. He told me to stay away from you because you are a liar and have done some disturbing things. What was he talking about, Brianna?”

  Brianna scoffed. “He doesn’t know what he’s talking about. He was just a kid when I left home. My family filled his head with lies about me. I’m not going to go into details, but I can promise you I didn’t do any of the disturbing things he was told I did. He chose to believe the lies and never gave me a chance to explain my side of the story.”

  Abby scooted over and placed her palm over Brianna’s hand, giving it a squeeze. “I’m so sorry, Brianna.” Abby’s heart was breaking for her. She had two brothers and was very close to them. She couldn’t even begin to imagine what it would feel like to have one of them shun her the way Kyle had shunned Brianna.

  “I guess you and I won’t be hanging out anymore after tonight, huh?” A bitter smile twisted Brianna’s face. “I don’t want you to lie to Kyle. I don’t want him getting mad at you because of me.” Brianna freed her hand from Abby’s and reached for her drink.

  Abby refused to throw in the towel. “I’ll talk to him again. I will get him to talk to you so you two can straighten things out. Just give me some time.”

  Brianna chuckled at Abby’s naive stubbornness. It touched her heart that Abby wanted to fix her relationship with Kyle so badly, but she knew that it was a lost cause. She had spent years trying to do just that to no avail. Brianna tucked a leg under her and twisted her body so she could face Abby. Resting her elbow on the edge of the sofa and her head on her hand, she gazed at Abby curiously.

  “You know, I don’t know what my brother did to land such a kind, sweet, and adorable girl like you, Abby. I hope he realizes how lucky he is and appreciates what he has.”

  Abby cast her gazed downward as heat crept up
her cheeks. “He does,” she cooed before raising her gaze. “He’s a good guy, a kind, reasonable man, Brianna. He is kind to every person he meets regardless of who they love or how much money they have or what god they worship.”

  “I know he’s a good guy. He’s just been brainwashed by some very twisted, fanatical people.”

  “Let me fix this. I want you in our lives. I won’t give up until you and Kyle fix your relationship.”

  Brianna chuckled. “You know what? I don’t want to talk about Kyle anymore.” She waved her hand dismissively in the air. “I’d rather spent the few minutes we have left together getting to know you.” She narrowed her eyes and held her lower lip between her teeth. “So, you are a diehard classical music fan, huh? I couldn’t believe how giddy you were about meeting those musicians. You were all over them at the dinner.”

  Abby shifted her body and tucked one leg under her so she could face Brianna. A crinkle appeared between her eyes as she leaned her elbow on the edge of the sofa. “Oh my God! Was I that bad? Did I embarrass you in front of all those important people? I feel terrible. I’m so sorry. I…”

  Brianna shook her head and chuckled. “Relax. You did not embarrass me. I thought it was actually refreshing and adorable how you were acting. The musicians whose ears you were chewing off seemed to enjoy it too. I bet they don’t have a lot of hard core fans who worship at their feet.”

  They both giggled as Brianna reached out and placed her hand on Abby’s forearm. The smile on both of their faces vanished as a shock of electricity ran through both of them. Abby stared into Brianna’s eyes and did not see the gaze of a friend. She saw desire and longing mixed with pain. Abby stared at Brianna’s perfect glossy lips and wished she had the courage to lean in and take those lips into hers, but she knew it would be wrong. She was a straight girl in a long term relationship with that beautiful girl’s brother. Kissing her would be wrong for too many reasons. Abby turned her gaze away from Brianna’s piercing blue eyes and reached down for her glass of wine. She downed the contents of the glass in a single gulp. She couldn’t look Brianna in the eyes anymore. She was certain Brianna could tell how badly she wanted to be kissed by her, to be touched by her, to feel what she felt that fateful night at Ryan’s birthday party.