“Cat got your tongue?” I taunt, but his mouth stays glued shut.

He’ll talk about anything but Val, huh? Very, very interesting.

“Fine, don’t talk, but just know that Val’s an awesome girl. Don’t play with her.” It’s not an overt threat, but Wade should know me by now. I’ll hurt him if he hurts her.

“Is that what you think?” he bursts out. “That I’m the problem? Women,” he mutters and then adds something under his breath that I can’t make out.

I raise my eyebrows, but he turns up the music, and I drop the subject because his outburst is answer enough.

By the time we make the turn into the Bayview Country Club property, Wade’s natural good humor has resurfaced. He loses his stiffness, and his characteristic easy smile is back on his face. “Sorry I snapped at you. Val and I are…complicated.”

“I’m sorry I pried. I just love Val and want her to be happy.”

“How about me?” he says in mock offense. “Do you want me to be happy?”

“Of course.” I reach out and squeeze his hand. “I want everyone to be happy.”

“Even Jordan?”

“Especially her,” I tell him as he pulls up in front of the club’s entrance. “If she’s happy, I think she’d be less of a terror.”

He snorts in disagreement. “Doubtful. She feeds off the fear and unhappiness of others.”

The valet opens my door before I can respond, but Wade’s assessment is depressingly correct. Jordan does seem to be happiest when everyone around her is miserable.

“Be careful. It’s my baby,” Wade tells the valet as he tosses his keys over. Then he pats the hood and winks at me. “Cars are less complicated than women.”

“Can’t have a conjugal visit with a car,” I remind him.

He snickers. “Good point.”

I haven’t been to the country club before, so I don’t know what it looks like when it’s not decked out in the Astor Prep blue and gold, but it’s pretty tonight. Wide swaths of white fabric hang from the center and outward, making the room look like a huge, luxurious tent. Along the white fabric hang tiny Christmas lights. Decorating the room are round tables covered with pristine white tablecloths and chairs wearing giant, shiny blue-and-gold ribbons. But despite the long line of cars outside, the room is surprisingly empty.

“Where is everyone?” I ask my date.

“You’ll see,” Wade says cryptically, leading me to a table at the entry.

Behind the table, a man and a woman dressed in black suits rise as we approach. “Welcome to the Astor Park Prep Winter Formal,” chirps the lady. “Name, please?”

“Wade Carlisle and Ella—” He stops and looks at me questioningly. “Royal? Harper? O’Halloran?”

“I have an Ella Harper.” The woman holds out a silk bag and a mini bottle of sparkling cider with my name on it.

“What’s this?” I ask slowly.

Wade grabs everything and moves me away from the table so the couple behind us can get their goodies. He tucks the bottles in one pocket and the silk bags in the other. “You’re given five hundred dollars’ worth of chips to play in here.”

“Here” ends up being a room filled with felt-covered gaming tables and so many people that I feel a bit suffocated. The girls are beautifully dressed, most of them wearing slinky gowns with slits up the side. The guys are wearing black tuxes. It looks like a movie set.

“I wish Val was here,” I whisper.

I think Wade says, “Me, too,” but I’m not completely sure.

“So I use the chips to play these games?” I wave a hand toward the casino tables, trying to take both our minds off our missing friend.

“Yep, and then you bid on stuff.”

We wander in. There are two tables—one where kids are playing poker and another where they’re playing blackjack. “What kind of stuff?”

“Trips, jewelry, experiences.”

“Who pays for it?”

“It’s all donated. But your chips are paid for by a parent or guardian, I guess.”

“Is this why there’s no dancing?” Deeper in the room, I see a table full of purses, envelopes, and baskets. It looks like a raffle table at a bingo hall, only much nicer.

“There’s dancing in the dinner area.”

I vaguely recall a small open square in the middle of the tables. “But that space is so small.”

“No one dances.”

Well, duh. Who wants to dance when you could gamble? “When did this start?”

“Maybe ten years ago?” Wade slaps the hands of one of the football players as we pass by. “None of the guys danced, and a huge number of them just stopped coming altogether, so some smarty set this casino thing up. Boom, boys were back in town.”

We stop in front of a table. The items range from purses to jewelry to placards with the words Aspen and Las Vegas and Puerto Vallarta written on them. Those must be the experiences Wade referenced. “None of these is five hundred,” I tell him, pointing to the bolded numbers on the bottom of each explanation sheet.

“Right, well, you’re supposed to win the chips and then your date’s supposed to give you his.”

“That’s not sexist,” I mutter under my breath.

Wade snorts. “Astor Prep’s not real enlightened. You’re just figuring that out?”

I wonder if this is why Val didn’t come. On top of the dress, there’s the added cost of buying five hundred dollars’ worth of chips to buy what I presume to be worthless stuff. “Sucks if you’re a scholarship student.”

Wade frowns. “You don’t have to play.”

I turn to inspect the room. “I don’t see Liam Hunter here, either. Isn’t he a scholarship student like Val?”

“Huh.” Wade’s eyes widen as the realization sinks in of who exactly attends these charity dances.

The whole setup reeks of rich kids keeping the poor kids out, and some of the magical gauze that covers the place is torn away.

Impatiently, I check the door. “Where’s Reed?” Everything’s more tolerable when he’s around. Only if he has his way, he won’t be around much longer.

I shove that depressing thought aside.