It read:
Your father has cancer. He needs to go to California.
Aria blinked.
She stared at the note. She read it again.
"What?" Aria whispered into the quiet bathroom.
Aria crumpled the note in her fist, shoved the bathroom door open, and marched out into the hallway.
Richard was standing a few feet away. Aria shoved the black garment bag containing her ruined, torn glitter gown into his chest. Richard took it without a word.
Aria spotted Damien leaning against a marble pillar near the entrance to the main auction hall. He was watching the doors, his posture casual.
Aria didn't say a word. She marched right up to him, grabbed him by the wrist, and hauled him down a corridor. She dragged him effortlessly until she found a set of glass doors leading out onto a secluded, wrap-around smoking balcony.
She shoved him outside and slammed the glass door shut behind them, sealing them into the cool night.
