Friends with Benefits Read Online Free PDF Page A

bizarre lifestyle. Did she actually think that seafoam dresses and actresses on
Letterman
and relatives of Princess whoever were important? How shallow could any one rich woman be?
    â€œI’m sorry, I’m blathering on like an idiot,” Diane apologized. “Ignore me; I get like this every year before FAB.” She smiled and folded her hands in her lap. “Anyway, I need to tell you about tomorrow. The twins are going to be in Emily Steele’s World Culture Kids fashion show. She’s an amazing designer. Anyway, my girls will need some training in how to walk the runway, all that. They need to be at their agent’s at one. You’ll have them ready?”
    â€œCertainly,” Esme promised as she tried to digest the fact that the twins had an agent.
    â€œGreat.” Diane seemed genuinely relieved. “I’m so excited about this—we’ve never done a children’s designer before. Her influence this year is Japanese. Last year was Colombian. Isn’t that ironic?”
    â€œIronic” wasn’t necessarily the word that first came to Esme’s mind. She knew Emily Steele’s clothes—the twins’ closets were filled with her outfits, at four hundred dollars a pop. If Diane hadn’t adopted Easton and Weston (whose names had been changed the moment they arrived on American soil), they might well have grown up to be the dirt-cheap labor who would hand-embroider some future Emily Steele collection. That wasn’t ironic. That was sad.
    Diane left; Esme went back inside to shower, realizing just how close she’d come to disaster. As she stepped into the steaming hot water, she thought that maybe God had just sent her a wake-up call: she had to end things with Jonathan.
    The only question was whether or not she’d be smart enough to answer it.

4
    â€œMaybe he’s gay,” Lydia opined to Kiley, then wrapped herself in her aunt’s white Irish linen swimsuit cover-up. The late-morning sun had just ducked behind a bank of puffy cumulus clouds and Lydia had skipped breakfast—very unusual for her. Low blood sugar always made her cold. As for Kiley, she’d arrived at the country club pool only minutes before and immediately started to yammer about Tom Chappelle; she was so excited that the hot young model had actually asked her out.
    Lydia had quickly learned upon her return to America that her tendency to speak her mind without sugarcoating the truth could be off-putting. The way Kiley’s face fell as she stepped out of her no-name jeans confirmed that, but it was too late for Lydia to take back her words about the possibilities of Tom’s sexuality.
    â€œI never thought of that,” Kiley admitted. “But wait. What about when I met him? I told you guys, he was in the next suite at the Hotel Bel-Air. I would swear there was a girl in there with him. At least she moaned like a girl.”
    â€œThat proves it,” Esme said sharply from the chaise on the other side of Lydia. Lydia thought she looked curvy and luscious in an aqua Shoshanna halter-top bikini that she’d told Lydia had been a gift from Diane after she’d stayed up late with the twins one night. “He’s not gay.”
    â€œHe could be gay and was using her as a beard,” Lydia countered. “Maybe he’s using both of you.”
    Kiley pulled her T-shirt over her head. Lydia saw she wore the same tank suit as on the day they’d met. “And a beard is . . .?”
    â€œGay guys go out with a girl and a guy and pretend they’re with the girl so no one will know that they’re really with the guy,” Lydia explained knowledgeably.
    Esme closed her eyes and raised her face to the sun, which had peeked out from under the clouds. “Don’t tell us,” she murmured. “You read it in a magazine.”
    â€œHa, y’all are wrong this time!” Lydia crowed. “You know X? Anya and Kat’s