Blonde Ambition Read Online Free Page A

Percy was the right thing to do. After all, Anna and Adam had met at her own father’s wedding when Anna had shown up on Ben’s arm as his mystery date. So, actually, Sam was responsible for their having met in the first place. The least she could do was take Adam out for a nice dinner and try and seduce him.
    As for Anna being back with Ben, Sam knew it was true because Ben had called her to tell her so. That day at school she and her friends Cammie Sheppard and Dee Young had gone to their favorite place at Westside Pavilion for sushi (although Beverly Hills High hired cooks straight out of the California Culinary Academy, there was just something so
ick
about eating in your high-school cafeteria). When Ben had telephoned, Sam didn’t let on to Cammie and Dee who she was talking with. Since they’d simultaneously been on their own cells, they hadn’t asked.
    Ben couched the call as a thank-you, since Sam was the one who’d told him that Anna had escaped to the Montecito Inn in Santa Barbara. Ben had followed Anna there. Crashing waves, passionate kisses, fade to black.
    A hot guy Sam recognized from an underwear billboard walked by her table on his way to the men’s room. She immediately sucked in her stomach and tossed her hundred-dollar blowout—plus two thousand dollars’ worth of hair extensions—saucily off her shoulders. She was wearing a new Plein Sud electric blue silk shirt with Fini black pants and her favorite black patent leather, stiletto-heeled Jimmy Choo boots. Her makeup was, as always, perfect. But Sam knew that in spite of the thousands she spent on upkeep and maintenance, she was a long way from a ten on the Beverly Hills Hot-or-Not scale. She’d gotten her too-wide nose done, and there was an implant in her naturally receding chin. But there was nothing she could do about her fire-hydrant calves and fat ankles. Sam wasn’t even a nine. You couldn’t be a nine if your pants size was eight.
    The hot guy looked right through Sam. Shit. She decided he was gay and sipped her spring water with mint just for something to do.
    Adam was late. While she waited, she felt ambivalent about recent developments. A few days ago she’d thought she wanted Anna. Now that Adam was available, she thought she might want him. Her famous psychiatrist, Dr. Fred, had suggested that Sam was confusing the intimacy of true friendship with the intimacy of sexual love. Sam had no idea. Though she’d had many friends and more than her share of sex, she hadn’t had the intimacy part. Ever. With anyone. Maybe she was just acting on the possibility that Adam or Anna was capable of offering this.
    “Hey, Sam. Sorry I’m late.” Adam kissed her cheek before sliding into his seat.
    Sam smiled. There was something so appealing about Adam. He’d moved with his family to Beverly Hills from Michigan and was probably the most decent guy on the West Coast. That he was offbeat-Ben-Stiller-but-taller, cute, and charming kept him in the margins of the BHH A-list, extra points added because he didn’t care about being on it.
    “Not a problem,” Sam said easily, though normally it irritated the hell out of her not to be the one keeping the other person waiting.
    Adam looked around the restaurant. “I told my mom you’d invited me to dinner here. She was duly impressed.” He grinned his disarming grin. “And I’m kinda surprised. What’s the occasion?”
    Before Sam could respond to that, the black-clad waiter was at their table, handing them menus. The name of the restaurant came from the fact that there were only eight appetizers and eight main dishes from which to choose, so the menu fit comfortably into one hand. The waiter, who reeked of cute-struggling-actor, rhapsodized about the various dishes until Sam broke in.
    “Tell you what. Bring us half a plate of one of each.” She took Adam’s menu and handed them both to the waiter.
    The waiter faltered a moment. “You want
everything?
”
    t was a trick she’d learned