Platinum (All That Glitters #3)(7)

Her phone dinged just as she got into the apartment.

Too loud to hear your voice mail.

Trihn stared down at the message and grated her teeth before replying to Neal’s message.

Left the club early. You were right. Stay with me tonight?

I know I’m right.

Trihn rolled her eyes at the return message. She was jotting out a response when she got another text from him.

I’m going to be out all night. I’ll just stay at my place.

Should I come over in the morning?

Trihn waited and waited for a response.

“Fuck that,” she groaned with a shake of her head.

She tossed her phone onto her bed and changed into something more comfortable. She didn’t know what the hell she was doing. She could go to The Kiln to see Neal, but she honestly hated that place. And he wasn’t responding to her message. The last thing she wanted was to get there and start an argument. She was tired of arguing. Lately, every conversation had been ending up in an argument, and it was getting to be exhausting.

Rubbing her temples, she pulled out her sketchbook and flipped it open to her latest work. She was lucky to be in the Teena Hart School of Design as a fashion design major. After discovering that her boyfriend, Preston, had been secretly dating her sister, Lydia, behind her back, Trihn had dropped out of NYU to come to LV State two weeks before school started her freshman year.

When the whole thing had blown up in Trihn’s face, her sister had chosen Preston over Trihn, and rather than be around them, Trihn had chosen to leave New York City for good. She still couldn’t believe that Preston and Lydia were still together a year and a half later. Preston was a manipulative cheating scumbag, and Lydia had never held a boyfriend for longer than a couple of weeks. They were a match made in hell.

Thankfully, Trihn had ended up loving Las Vegas, and the design school was a dream come true. Teena Hart herself—a world-renowned fashion designer with her own line and a boutique in Caesars Palace—would personally work with the students. Trihn had been taking art classes to fulfill major requirements, and she completed her first round of intro design classes last semester. This semester she would be into more advanced program work. If everything went as planned, she might even get to help with the senior fashion show in the spring. The winner would go on to New York City in the summer.

In her spare time, she would work on her own clothes. It seemed to calm her down when her anxiety took over.

Like right now.

Trihn worked on her artwork until she heard Bryna and Stacia coming home. Not wanting a confrontation with them, she quickly switched off her light and got into bed. They knocked on her door as they passed, but Trihn ignored it and pretended to be asleep. She just lay in her bed and stared at the ceiling until she finally fell asleep late that night.





TRIHN WOKE UP BLEARY-EYED at the crack of dawn. She had slept horribly with a serious case of nightmares that she had been haunted with since she had found out about that bullshit with Preston a year and a half ago.

Trying to shake off the lingering feeling of unease, she dialed Neal’s number. Even though it was early, he was usually up long before she was, no matter how late he’d stayed out the previous night. When it went straight to voice mail, she frowned. He was probably just getting in a few extra hours of sleep or something. She figured she might as well help him with that.

She hopped into a quick shower. When she got out, she threw her wet hair up into a perfect ballet bun and then hurried into a pair of destroyed skinny jeans, a black tank, and her leather jacket—her favorite wardrobe staple.

She skipped out of the house hours before Bryna or Stacia would surface and drove her red hybrid to Neal’s house. Even almost two years after leaving New York, it was still strange to have to drive so much. She had gotten her license in the city only to prove that she actually could. Truth be told, it had taken her three times to get it, too. But with all the driving she had done in Vegas, she had gotten exponentially better.

Trihn pulled up in front of the house that Neal rented with a few of his art friends. When no one answered, she knocked on the door and tried the knob, but it was locked. She had a key, but her purse was stuffed with so much shit that she knew it would take forever to find.

She pounded on the door again and then started digging around in her bag for the key. She found an extra pair of workout shorts, two pairs of socks, a mini sketchbook, a to-do-list journal, and half a dozen tubes of lipstick, but no key.

Just when she was about to give up on her quest and try Neal’s cell again, the door opened to reveal a mussed Neal.

“Trihn?” he croaked, as if he had just rolled out of bed. And he looked like it, too. His dark hair was a hot mess, his shorts and T-shirt were rumpled, and he had bags under his eyes.

“Hey. I tried to call you, but you must have been sleeping,” she said, mustering an enthusiastic smile.

“No, I wasn’t,” he said. He crossed his arms over his chest.

“Oh. Okay. Were you ignoring me?”

“I was going to call later but might as well get it over with now. I think we should break up.”

Trihn’s heart plummeted to her stomach. She gasped in disbelief. Her mouth hung open. There was ringing in her ears, and she could feel her pulse all the way through her fingers and toes.

“What?” she asked.

“This has been coming for a long time, Trihn. We’re not compatible. You’re a different person than who I thought I was dating. I’m over it.”