Page 6 of Beware of Dog (Lean Dogs Legacy #6)

Jamie blinked, and then her face screwed up with comical disappointment.

“Oh, man.” She threw herself backward across her bed with a whump from the covers.

“That suuuuucks. You finally make it to Sig Blackmon’s and you miss most of the party?

” She twisted around so she lay on her side, head propped on a raised fist. “Was Sig cool about it?” The grin returned.

“Was he disappointed you had to leave? I bet he was.”

Cass shrugged. “Maybe. I was kind of out of it.”

“He invited you once. I’m sure he’ll invite you again.”

“Yeah. Maybe.”

Jamie frowned and sat back up. All her moving around was making Cass dizzy. “What’s up with you? You were stoked to be going to that party.”

“I don’t know. It was just a party.”

Jamie’s mouth fell open in overdramatic shock. “ Just a party? Cass, this is Sig Blackmon we’re talking about.”

“I know .”

Oops. She hadn’t meant to snap.

The problem, she reflected with honesty now, was that it had been far too easy to cave to the hormone-fueled hype about Sig.

Sig was short for Sigmund. His mother was an heiress, the beauty of her youth spoiled by too much rich food, and wine, and all the vices that accompanied an excess of money.

His father was a psychology professor here at NYU, hence Sig’s name.

He lived on campus with the other students, but rode around in a chauffeured Mercedes.

He dressed like a hacky-sack kid from the early 2000s, but the individual clothing pieces were all from sought-after designers.

He always sat in the backs of classrooms, kept quiet and let others seek him out, slouching down low in his chair, but his artwork was consistently praised by all the professors.

He had a natural talent for realism that he slapped with bold colors in an imitation of street art.

His was a carefully cultivated persona, and he was hands-down, without question the it guy of their class.

He was handsome enough, sure, but not the most handsome, nor the funniest, nor the kindest. But his reputation had its own magnetic field, pulling in admirers of both sexes, wannabe friends and girlfriends alike, all convinced there was something magic about Sig that could help them achieve their dreams. If he invited you to one of his parties, you were the envy of everyone left out.

If he was seen holding a girl’s hand in public, she became the topic of every conversation, some of the stories about her true, most of them pure fiction.

Cass had gotten swept up just like Jamie, and her other friends, and everyone, really.

But in the cold light of day, with a lingering headache and a foul taste on her tongue she couldn’t brush away, she was embarrassed by the fact.

She’d harbored crushes for Reese, and then for Toly, who both now had the misfortune of being her brothers-in-law, but the only thing Sig had in common with either of them was his slender build.

Only, unlike them, Sig was slim because he didn’t do anything; he wasn’t tight and honed from wetwork the way the other two were.

Not to mention he would probably scream and run if anyone tried to hand him a gun.

Today, she couldn’t believe she’d ever found him attractive.

She didn’t want to get him in trouble without hard evidence, though.

“I don’t know,” she told Jamie, “Sig’s just a guy. A party’s just a party. It’s not that big of a deal.”

Jamie blinked. Then she frowned. “What the hell?”

“Sig’s not that special.” She shrugged. “So I had to leave early. Oh well.”

She had expected a reaction, perhaps even a dramatic one. Lots of over-the-top no way and uh-uh and you’re kidding . She hadn’t expected anger, but that was what she got.

Jamie surged to her feet, balled-up fists slamming down to her sides. Her face screwed up, mouth pinched in a grimace. “What did you do?”

“What?”

“You weren’t sick. You did something to offend him, didn’t you? Did you get all bikery? Did you insult him?”

“ What are you talking about?”

Color bloomed high on her cheeks. She blinked hard and looked like she might cry. “I knew you would screw this up for us! I knew it!”

Bemused, Cass held out both hands in a bid for peace. “Jamie—”

“When he invited you, you said you would get in good with his friends, and then you’d bring me with you next time. You said . You were going to introduce me to all of them.”

“Jamie, I don’t think they’re the sort of people you want to hang out with.”

“Of course they are!” Jamie burst out. “They have money, and they have influence! If I’m in with them, I can get my work put in a museum show!

You don’t even…” She dissolved into an anguished sound and grabbed two fistfuls of her own hair; tugged on it hard.

“You don’t get it. Your sister’s rich and famous.

You can have anything you want,” she said, bitterly.

“People like me have to scrape for everything, and you won’t even help me make connections. ”

In a milder echo of last night, Cass felt like the world was tilting around her, all that she’d come to know and rely on in her roommate splintered to bits. “I’m sorry. I’m not trying to hurt you, but I don’t think Sig and his friends are interested in helping anyone.”

Jamie stared at her, disbelieving, breathing harshly through parted lips. Then she spat, “Fuck you, Cass,” snatched up her purse, and stormed out.

Cass sat staring at the open door for a long minute, wishing she was actually shocked.

As a general rule, she didn’t tell her classmates that her sister was the Raven Blake, model-turned-agent/fashion designer and one half of the newly launched Garden Room Club, a safe but chic hotspot for socialite nightlife.

People tended to have two reactions to the news: they either hated her on instinct because they were jealous of Raven, or wanted to cozy up to Cass in the hopes of landing a getaway in Monaco.

Likewise, she kept her Lean Dogs ties secret.

She hadn’t told Jamie about either side of her life for the whole of the first semester, but they’d become good friends.

Or so Cass thought. She’d confessed right before they parted for Christmas break, when she got the call that Raven was going into labor.

Jamie had hugged her tight and congratulated her on becoming an aunt.

“I’m already an aunt,” Cass had said, laughing.

“Yeah, but it’s different when it’s a sister’s baby.”

It was.

But she couldn’t help but wonder if her friendship with Jamie was irrevocably different now, too. If it was even still a friendship at all.

Cass shook off the worry and tackled her homework. Jamie didn’t return until after lights out. Cass rolled over in bed, intending to ask her if she’d cooled off, but Jamie had her back to the room.

Cass stared up at the ceiling until sleep finally claimed her.