If it wasn’t for the sadness in her eyes, it might have sounded like a threat.
My wife.
Maybe the most tragic one in all this.
STORY
* * *
Moving in as Westley du Lac’s wife, in Crowne Hall. I used to dream of my happily ever after with West—he’d sweep me off my feet like a Cinderella.
Now I was married, and I was also the Cinderella of Crowne Hall…
I remember Lottie’s question on her wedding day. Had fate listened to our wants and given us the most twisted version possible?
West took my clothes out of my hand.
“I can get it myself,” I whispered, throat scratchy.
“You’re my wife now,” he said simply.
My gut did that thing…not a pancake like with Grayson, but a twist. I’d gone into this marriage focused on one thing: survival. Determined not to let the past pretzel its way into the present.
So what if parts of me were still begging to pretty all the dark things that happened between us?
I don’t want to be the girl that keeps getting her heart broken.
I took a seat on a soft, buttery leather couch that overlooked Crowne Beach as the sun fell behind the iron ocean. I picked at my bottom lip, focusing on my breathing.
I was married to Westley du Lac.
He stood in front of me, blocking the beach with his jeans. “Having second thoughts?”
I shook my head, placing a smile on my face that felt like someone was stretching my skin with strings. I couldn’t let it show in front of Grayson, in front of his family, but was I having second thoughts? That was all I had.
West was supposed to marry me, get me out of Crowne Point. In return, I promised him two months…that was all. Two months. If by the end I didn’t love him, he would let me go.
Two months I could do.
In two months I would barely be showing. I wasn’t going to be my mother. I would make a safe, happy, beautiful life for my baby. I could handle two months of this. I’d handled much worse. In two months I’d have a full bank account—and freedom.
Was I stupid to believe it? Does it even matter when I had no other choice?
“You promised you would get me out. This is the opposite of out. West, it…” I took a breath. “It feels a little bit like you wanted to stay here.”
West laughed. “Angel, why would I want to stay in Grayson Crowne’s house?”
I frowned.
I didn’t know.
He sat down next to me, taking my chin in his hand. “Grayson’s right. We need to get out ahead of this. If we don’t, they’ll never stop following.”
Shivers raced up my spine at the thought. I was already stalked online…but to be followed in broad daylight?
“We can leave,” I whispered. “Somewhere no one cares.”
West stood so fast I nearly got whiplash. “Let’s go. I’ll stash you away on an island, somewhere the paparazzi can only get a blurry picture.”
I’d suggest leaving Crowne Point entirely, if you ever want to work again. Maybe try someplace in…fuck, I don’t know, maybe Portugal?
Grayson’s words from our first night echoed in my head.
Stash me away…an inky feeling filled my veins. “Maybe some place like Portugal…” I whispered.
I told my uncle I would get away, but it wasn’t freedom to run; it was just hiding. When I leave Crowne Point, I want to be free.
Sensing my disapproval, West sat back down on the coffee table opposite me, legs spreading as he leaned forward.
He gripped my chin, dragging me forward. “You know, Angel, it’s easier to get revenge when you’re right in front of him.”
I ripped my head away. “This isn’t about revenge.”
But my voice wavered.
I’d liked the look in Grayson’s eyes when he saw me with West.
Too much.
I don’t know why West agreed to marry me, why he wanted to in the first place. I told him I needed his name, his power. That I wanted to get out of Crowne Point, and I needed someone like him to do it. I refused to sign anything but the marriage certificate.
West hadn’t demanded a prenup.
He’d taken me directly to the courthouse.
I had all the cards, didn’t I?
I lifted my head. “What are you getting out of this marriage?”
“You, Angel.” He grinned.
A part of me felt like I was turning the table on West, and I liked that.
A sick part.
When we were kids, he’d tricked me into thinking he loved me, and had stolen something precious. Now I had the power to take everything from him, because he had fallen in love with me.
So I had to fight that urge. I had to go into this with honesty. It was already a dirty thing we were doing. There had been no god or love in our wedding. I needed to be so clear, so honest, to try to keep whatever pieces remained of my soul.
This wasn’t about love.
This wasn’t Abigail Crowne running away with Theo.
“I don’t love you,” I said softly. “I’m not even sure I like you.”
The humor on his face faded. “I get it, Angel. You’re using me.”
I opened my mouth…to what? Argue? That’s exactly what I was doing. Using him like all those girls had used Grayson.
West stroked a knuckle along my jaw. “I have two months to get you to love me, Angel. Two months to open your eyes to what I see.”
I got lost in his warm brown eyes, in the boy I’d loved years ago.
“What do you see?” I asked.
A slow smile speared his plump berry lips. “That we were made for each other.”
I jerked out of his touch, heart hammering.
“Are—” I swallowed, trying to change the subject. “Are your parents going to excommunicate you?” Why was my throat so thick? My chest pounding? “I need you to be a du Lac.”
West watched me, giving me nothing in his look. After a moment of intense, probing brown eyes, he spoke.
“And you’ll get a du Lac, Angel. You know…the du Lac name comes with the du Lac publishing house. You’re my wife now, I said I could get your poetry published and I wasn’t lying.”
“I didn’t marry you to get my poetry published,” I gritted.
“Why not? You have no problem using me, Angel.”
My lips parted.
Another moment of silence passed before he stood.
“I’ll sleep in the other room.”
My chest hurt. He was being too kind. I needed him to be a villain.
I needed someone to be the villain.
Someone other than me.
“West.” He stopped at my voice, throwing me a look over his shoulder. “Why don’t you hate me?”
His brow furrowed; then he gave me an easy smile.
“I’m hoping it’s the same reason you agreed to marry me.” I blinked, waiting for him to elaborate. “We’re both building our happily ever after.”
I couldn’t speak, but he didn’t wait for my response. He shut the door, leaving me to reel.
A happily ever after with West du Lac? Maybe this was what fate had meant for me all along.
Twenty-Two
STORY
* * *
Lottie du Lac and I walked hand in hand through Tansy’s garden maze, the paparazzi a few feet behind us. Gray and West were at our sides, and occasionally Lottie would break to kiss her husband.
I’ve lived here for only two days, and in that time Grayson hasn’t so much as looked at me.
I watched him. I didn’t want to, but I couldn’t help it. It was like before, when he didn’t look back.
There’s a huge weight on his shoulders.
West wrapped his arm around my waist. It was a cool autumn day, with a cold but sweet salty breeze, and the leaves a mosaic of tangerine and citrine. Outside we were the perfect fairy tale. Inside we were off-tune keys, playing the wrong song. We turned to the paparazzi, and West, L
ottie, and Gray smiled. I still hadn’t quite gotten the hang of the thing, smiling through the lies.
“We were fast friends,” Lottie lied through her teeth to some question I didn’t catch.
The plan was to get out ahead of it, the rumors that would surely start once everyone got wind that the Cinderella of Crowne Hall had married Grayson’s wife’s brother. Tansy was the one who’d come up with the spin: Grayson was helping us keep our forbidden love secret, but Lottie was the one who made it iron clad: all we had to do was show some of our old texts.
“Story?”
I blinked back, finding everyone’s eyes on me.
“She asked when we first met,” West said, lips against my ear. I caught Gray’s jaw clench.
“Oh, um…” I rolled my lips. “As teenagers.”
“You could say we were sweethearts,” West supplied. “I always loved her.”
More clicks, furious note writing.
On paper, all our stories were so romantic.
Soulmates, all four of us. An inspiring happily ever after.
Gray’s eyes locked with mine.
Earlier, when we’d come up with the spin, I’d felt myself sink deeper and deeper into the lie as though I was drowning in oil. I did have those texts with West; we did have a history. It made sense. But I’d never hated myself more than those minutes we shared over a lavender custard breakfast.
“Any babies on the horizon?”
Our heads snapped back.
“Oh, we’re trying,” West replied, and everyone laughed.
“A picture with the new sisters. You both could be sisters by blood,” he said. “It would be easy to mix you up.”
Lottie and I let out strangled laughs.
Later we all sat beneath a mosaic of changing leaves, drinking tea. The magazine had changed, but I never would have known had the reporter not introduced herself. It all blurred into a kaleidoscope of questions and pictures.
I snuck a clandestine glance at Grayson, leaning back on his mother’s white antique tea chair, his arm draped around the back of Lottie’s. How did he do it all these years?
His eyes drifted to mine. I quickly looked away just as the reporter spoke.
“Your style is so unique.” She eyed my dark-lace blouse and long cotton skirt. “Are they handmade?”
Gemma’s laughter from yesterday rang in my head. I wore clothes I’d had since high school, while the people around me wore outfits that cost as much as a mortgage payment once and then never again.
I had enough money to buy a new wardrobe, but I didn’t know where to start, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to. I was never frivolous, and now that I had someone else to look out for, I didn’t think I should start.
“Oh, I…” I never finished, reaching for my tea. A second later I gasped, dropping the cup to the ground with a shatter. Mine was boiling. It burned the roof of my mouth.
I breathed with my mouth open as my tongue throbbed and everyone looked in my direction, waiting for me to say something. Grayson’s eyes narrowed as the second stretched without my explanation.
“I, uh…clumsy,” I managed.
Everyone moved on, talking about nothing as we were photographed looking beautiful and happy. The broken porcelain lay scattered on the cobblestone as, not even seconds later, two darkly dressed servants came to clean it up.
They paused as they scraped chunks into a dustbin, but not before looking me dead in the eyes.
I watched them leave, dread weaving its way into my veins. I shouldn’t be here. The longer I stayed, the more I pushed my luck. The Crownes didn’t want me. The du Lacs didn’t want me. The servants didn’t want me.
No matter my last name, I still wasn’t welcome.
After tea we had a momentary respite before the next event, which would include everyone in the garden. I ducked where the garden went off path, into the flowers, needing a minute to breathe.
A moment to apologize to my baby for being such a fuck-up. For putting her in this position. I held my stomach and stared at the sky. A bright blue, cold mid-November day. I would get us out of this; she would not live as I had, constantly in the dark.
A crack of twigs had my head snapping to the left. I pushed aside a veil of flowers and found him. It smelled sweet and musky. Grayson leaned against a tree, a sucker in one hand, a joint in the other.
His eyes found mine. A second later, he dropped the joint to the ground, stamping it beneath his shoe.
“You don’t—”
“I’m not going to smoke around you.” His eyes lingered on my abdomen.
As silence and awkwardness bloomed, my grief flowered. I missed Grayson. Missed talking to him. I was so lost in the pregnancy. Scared.
I didn’t know what I was doing.
What to do.
Grayson looked away, and I couldn’t take it, being ignored by him.
I cleared my throat. “I’ll go. Didn’t realize this hiding spot was taken…”
“What the fuck was that back there?” he asked my back.
I paused. “What?”
“Your smile with the photographers. It was fake as shit.”
I turned around to face him. “You do it. Lottie does it. West does it—”
“You’re not like us, Snitch.” He gripped my face, the smell of sugar on his lips mixing with the flowers in the air. “Don’t ever smile when you’re sad. Promise?”
So taken aback by the abruptness of his touch, the strength in his grip, my words were charred. “I won’t if you won’t, Grayson.”
His blue eyes cracked like lapis lazuli.
Leaves rustled around us like coins.
“I was wondering where—” Lottie stopped, spotting us.
“I was…” I pulled away, for some reason tripping over what I was doing. It wasn’t like Grayson and I had done anything. So why did I feel so dirty?
“I was getting a smoke,” Grayson finished for me, dropping his hands and then brushing by me as if I were nothing. And like that, whatever had happened between us vanished. The honesty gone.
I stared at the spot where he’d been, sunlight dappling the ground. I urged the pounding in my chest to vanish as he had. I thought Lottie had gone, too, but a minute later her soft voice drifted like wind.
“Why are you back?”
I spun. Lottie’s shoulders were down, but her eyes burned.
“Every day I have to watch him love you!” Her voice raised. “His arm is wrapped around my waist, his lips are on mine, his body is in my bed, but his heart is with you.”
It was the opposite from my point of view.
Everything he did was for her.
She shoved me, and I nearly fell into the lily pads. I caught the rosebush just in time, scraping open my palm.
Lottie didn’t take another step toward me, just stayed there breathing heavily. I held the thorny stem as blood wept down my wrist.
“What would you do if you were me?” she asked. “If you were in my position?”
“I don’t know.”
She quirked her head like she’d been slapped. “I think you do.”
She turned on her heel, going back to the group.
GRAY
* * *
Oh, we’re trying.
Fucking West.
After a tea time that rivaled Wonderland’s in length, Mother had prepared an evening cocktail hour in the garden, and I searched across the cobblestone, looking for the asshole who hadn’t been with his bride for over thirty minutes.
If Story were my bride, I wouldn’t leave her side ever.
Fuck him.
It’s like he wants to get punched.
“Grayson.” Lottie tugged at my elbow. “You haven’t moved from this spot for thirty minutes.”
“Are they cutting West off?”
Hurt flitted across her features, but she slowly shook her head. That didn’t make sense. West was set to take over Du Lac Industries soon. There was no way he could marry someone like Snitch without any repercuss
ions.
None of this made any fucking sense.
What the hell was he getting out of this marriage?
“I’m going to make the rounds…” Lottie said softly. “I’ll come find you in a little. Please eat something. Your mother has your favorite, steak crostini.”
“Lottie, shit, wait—” I broke off. She’d already joined her friends.
I exhaled, gaze wandering to the girl on the terrace as a lighthouse to a lost ship. Everyone here was like a reanimated zombie, going through their final movements before death. But Snitch? She was bright. Alive. Tasting and trying new things.
She was so fucking adorable.
And about to make a fool of herself.
Gemma walked across my path, and I snatched her elbow, yanking her back.
“Hey, what the fuck?” She jiggled her arm in my hold. “Let go.”
“Go tell her that’s decoration, not food.”
Gemma looked at me, then followed my line of sight to where Story was about to pull a garnish off a tower of fresh fruit. Gemma laughed.
“No way.” She pulled out her phone, and in the same instant I snatched it out of her hand and threw it to the ground. It shattered.
She snapped her head to mine. “Dick! That was limited edition.”
“Go warn her,” I gritted.
“Why don’t you?”
Because every time I’m within a few feet of her, I can’t decide if I want to pull her to me, lock her in my room and stop her from ever leaving, or force her out of here and throw away the key so she can’t ever come back.
I went with silence.
“Let it be noted I’m only doing this because it will be funny to see her face.” She blew a strand of rose gold hair from her forehead, then went over to Story.
A few seconds later, Story’s gingerbread cheeks deepened.
Better than some asshole socialite telling her.
I dragged my hands through my hair, chest in knots. Fucking West. Did he not prepare her at all for this? She was still dressed in her nun clothes. There was no way for her to blend in, and this was different from some party. These people were waiting to crucify her.
“Can you imagine her at Thanksgiving?” Gemma said, sidling up next to me to reach for the rosemary honey vodka spritzers a servant was carrying behind me. “Do you think she’ll dress like that?”
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