A Reborn Bride Pearl Emerging from Dust by Sally Garcia

Over the past few days, everyone had noticed how Monty and the others who used to shamelessly cozy up to Calliope were suddenly bending over backward to be nice to Lisette instead. It felt like things had gone back to how they used to be. And honestly, when Calliope wasn't around, the group could get a little out of line.

Calliope walked into the cafeteria with a friendly smile, nodding at people as she passed.

Lisette and her group hadn't expected Calliope to be back already. They'd been in the middle of a cheerful lunch, chatting and laughing over burgers and fries.

Suddenly, they heard someone at a nearby table whisper and they whipped their heads around—just in time to see Calliope and Franco heading their way.

All four of them looked like they'd just seen a ghost.

Monty shot up from his seat, clearly caught off guard.

"Callie! When did you get back? You didn't tell us you were coming in today. We thought you were still out!"

He glanced at his lunch tray, looking guilty about sitting with Lisette, almost like he'd just been caught cheating on a test.

"Just started back today," Calliope replied, totally unfazed. "Figured I'd just show up. Either way, I was bound to run into everyone eventually, right?"

She brushed past them and went straight to the food line.

close behind, shooting Monty and the

he was about to break into a cold sweat. Horatio and Valerian's faces had gone pale, but Lisette just looked smug, as if she'd

knew Calliope would be annoyed. After just three days away, the

how to play the Jewell family crowd. She could lose them for a moment,

to compete with

said, "Now that Callie's back, you guys should go eat with her. If you sit with me,

dropped her eyes,

torn. "But if we go,

don't want

Callie probably won't see

just too nice," they said, looking genuinely

sympathy, the group started migrating over to

were coming. We would've picked you up at the airport!" one of

everything go?

with Lisette because, uh, well, it wasn't

as you showed up, we came right