A Formal Affair by Veronica Chambers Read Free Book Online Page A

everything—just because she can.”
    Listening to the other girl speak, Carmen was reminded of Alicia and Jamie. They were both so close, but, like Carolina and Patricia, so, so different. For a long time, Jamie had thought Alicia was rubbing her nose in it that her family was well off and Jamie’s was not. And for an equally long period of time, Alicia had thought Jamie had a chip on her shoulder about money. Carmen had played referee between the two of them long enough to know that in any riff between close friends, chances were good that nobody meant to be vicious and that both parties were equally hurt.
    Carmen took a sip of her latte, which had gotten just cold enough not to taste good, but not cold enough to pass for iced coffee. “Is it possible,” she asked hesitantly, “that because you guys are primas hermanas , because you are more than friends—you’re family—that maybe there is more going on than just Patricia trying to hurt you for some reason, and maybe you just haven’t seen it because you’re so close? That maybe she has a reason of her own for really wanting this crown, too?”
    Carolina’s eyes flashed, and Carmen knew her words had touched a nerve.
    â€œYou don’t get it,” Carolina said, her dark gray eyes filling with tears. “Everything I have—the good grades, the friends, the clothes—I’ve had to work really, really hard for. Patricia is one of those lucky people who never plan or struggle for anything, but everything turns out perfectly for them all the same. For once, there was something I thought I could do and have just turn out perfectly. And now that chance is gone.”
    Carmen handed the girl a tissue and gave her a hug. “I’m going to be completely honest with you,” she said. “I think Patricia has a right to run for winter formal queen. It’s a free country; she can do what she wants. But I also think that you are tougher than you think. You’re not just any pretty, popular girl. You’re a rock star, inside and out. You are the winter formal queen our school deserves.”
    Carolina’s eyes widened as she used the tissue Carmen handed her to wipe her tears away. “Do you really think so?”
    Carmen nodded. “I know so. Consider me your first fan. I’m on Team Carolina. And together, we are going to make you a belle!”

OVER AT STARBUCKS , Patricia was busy giving Jamie her side of the story. Which sounded eerily similar to Carolina’s tale of woe. The crux of Patricia’s complaint was that her cousin had been the family favorite since the day she was born.
    â€œShe was born a week ahead of me, and I feel like I’ve been playing catch-up ever since,” Patricia complained. “Carolina is that picture-perfect, cashmere-sweater-wearing, tennis-playing, honor-roll girl. She can do no wrong. I, on the other hand, am constantly trying to prove myself.”
    Jamie could identify with Patricia’s outsider perspective. Even though she’d moved to Miami at the end of junior high and had known Alicia and Carmen almost as long as she’d known anybody, Jamie still felt a bit like an outsider around them, as though she could never make up for the history that they had built together, or the ease with which they navigated Miami’s social circles. Yes, her boyfriend was a rising golf star. Yes, she spent more time at country clubs and resorts than she had ever in her life imagined she would, thanks to Dash, and yes, because of him, wherever they went together, people treated them like royalty. But part of Jamie always resented girls like Carolina, whose money and looks got them everywhere they wanted to go.
    Of course, the truth was that Patricia was no less privileged than her cousin. But in her own story, she’d cast herself as the underdog, which meant that she had a fan in Jamie.
    â€œIs it true that you’ve known since you