I didn’t have friends, but Ellie was the closest thing. We’d worked together in the kitchens, and though she hadn’t moved up with me, we’d remained close-ish.
“Where have you been?”
“I, um,” I rubbed my forehead, no idea where to start with an explanation.
“Your bedroom was cleaned out when I went to say good night. There are rumors spreading about you and Grayson Crowne,” she whispered. “Stephanie swears she saw you go into his wing.”
“I did,” Stephanie said. “So either you’re fucking him or you’re lying. You’re a code-breaking slut.”
I glared, and she shrugged. There are two types of servants. The lifers, and the rest. Lifers watch each other’s back. We cover for one another, a family without blood. Because we live by a code. It’s us vs them, and you don’t cross the line.
“I’m fucking Grayson Crowne? That makes as much sense as you being on time for a fucking shift.”
Stephanie flipped me the bird.
The servants had set up their own spread of food, nothing like upstairs, but I quickly grabbed a piece of pizza, not sure when I’d get the chance to eat again.
“Which one of these chicks is Lottie’s girl?” I asked Ellie, shoving the pizza into my mouth. She raised a brow, and I shrugged, having no way to explain it. But Ellie was Ellie, and she trusted me, so she pointed to a small brunette on her phone.
I plopped down next to her on the worn plaid couch. “Uh, hey.”
She didn’t look up from her phone. “What?”
“So…” I said. “I need info on Charlotte du Lac.”
Her brows popped, interest piqued, and she lowered her phone, looking me up and down. After a second or two, she said, “You’re the one fucking Grayson.”
“T-That’s—” I broke off as the mainline phone to the Crownes started ringing and everyone shouted:
Shot, shot, shot, shot!
“No!” I shouted over them.
She rolled her eyes. “Whatever, you know how it works. Pay up.”
I narrowed my eyes. “One week’s wages.”
“Two.”
“One and a half.”
She arched a brow, then said, “Fine.”
“I need something Lottie loves. Something no one else knows.”
The brunette furrowed her brow, thinking; then a slow smile speared her lips. “Lemon cakes.”
“Charlotte du Lac…loves…lemon cakes,” I told Grayson, out of breath from running to find him—scared that if I didn’t get to him soon, he’d think I was up to something.
He didn’t look up from his phone.
Twinkling lights glimmered above us, and the black ocean glittered at his back. Behind me, a gold-flecked white chocolate fountain streamed like water. The party was getting late, easy to tell by the feathery fans every woman held. They’d lost their haughty edge, now mirroring their owner’s tipsiness, flitting and floating like butterflies.
What would it be like to be one of them? The women dressed in white? The swans?
Seen.
After a minute of silence, I said, “That’s what I learned.”
Slowly, as if with great effort, Grayson put his phone in his breast pocket. “That’s your great plan? Lemon cakes?”
I made a fist.
I paid nearly two weeks’ wages for that information.
“No one knows she loves them,” I added.
“Maybe because it’s not worth finding out.” He exhaled and shook his head. “It’s my fault. I enabled…this.” He cast a disinterested hand in my direction, then moved to leave.
I grabbed his arm.
“Everything is worth finding out. How are you going to convince her you love her when you don’t even care enough to learn her favorite food?”
A wrinkle formed between Grayson’s perfectly smooth golden brows. For a moment it was like he was looking at me—Story. For once, his stony blue gaze wasn’t cutting or bored. It was open…soft, almost.
Then it wandered to my grip on his arm, and I dropped him, folding my arms, as if that would hide what I’d done.
“So…” he said, still eyeing where my hands had been. “Lemon cakes.”
Unsurprisingly, it was easy for Grayson Crowne to conjure lemon cakes. Less than an hour later and fresh from the kitchen, we were on our way to woo Lottie du Lac. I followed Gray like a puppy out of Crowne Hall and back onto the beach. No one noticed me; all eyes were on Grayson, and I was back to being invisible.
This I could do. This I was used to. Blending in was as second nature to me as breathing.
I’d barely stepped off the stone steps and onto the sandy grass when someone shouldered me—that I was also used to. About to stumble, I was steadied instead.
It all happened in less than a second. Grayson’s firm hand, steadying my shoulder. His slight squeeze, as if making sure I was good to stand. Then his reach beyond me and his yank on the collar of the guy who’d grabbed me, tugging him back.
“Are you blind?” Grayson growled.
The tendril of possession weaving fire in his voice sent goose bumps up my spine. It was like in the antique room, and it lit the thing in my soul on fire, the one I need to rip out.
The guy blinked. “Dude, what?” He was one of the boys from earlier—Alaric or Geoff, I still wasn’t sure. This boy had dirty blond hair, clear brown eye, and a sharp square jaw.
In one hand Gray held Lottie’s lemon cakes; his other held Alaric-or-Geoff by the back of his suit collar.
Gray’s jaw flexed. “Look where you’re going, dumbass.” He shoved him forward, making him stumble like I had. Alaric-or-Geoff walked a few paces away, situating himself on a stone wall that wrapped around the terrace. He pulled out a cigarette, eyeing me with a wrinkled brow.
When I looked away, I found Grayson watching me. This time his eyes burned; they smoldered and crackled.
“Grayson?”
The moment snapped in two. Grayson looked away, and I turned to find Lottie du Lac. Her two best friends, Aundi and Pipa, flanked her. If Lottie was a princess, the same couldn’t be said for her friends. They were like every mean girl stereotype in existence.
Lottie looked between us. “Were you asking for me?”
“Yeah.”
Lottie looked at me again, and I quickly stared at the floor. Did she recognize me from the night before? It was unusual, though not entirely rare, for a non-Crowne to look us in the eye. We were instructed never to look back.
Lottie’s soft, melodic voice continued. “If this is about last night…”
“It’s not,” Grayson said almost immediately.
“Oh shit, what went down last night?” Alaric-or-Geoff asked from his perch on the wall. He pretended to jerked off into the air toward Lottie, and Aundi shoved him.
“Shut up, Alaric,” Aundi said.
Alaric. The blond one is Alaric. I made a mental note as he fell backward into Mrs. Crowne’s favorite lilacs, laughing.
Grayson shifted the box he was holding, decorated in a sparkling white bow and feathers. Inside sat four lemon cakes with the cursive letter L.
Lottie rolled her softly glossed lips together, as if not wanting to ask her next question. “Who did I see you with last night?”
I stared at the grass like it would grow holes.
“Some random. Meant nothing.”
I wished I could scarify his words on the part of my heart that wouldn’t won’t stop fluttering. The part of my soul that kept trying to sneak peeks into his.
This is the girl he’s going to be with. This is his future wife.
I’m just a thief.
None of this is for me.
Grayson thrust the box out without emotion. “Here, this was lying around, and I heard you liked them.”
Lying around?
I wanted to shout out, strangle him. Tell her how much trouble you went to to get that damn box. How much you care. Stop lying.
“They’re lemon—” Grayson started, only to be broken off by Lottie’s scream.
I looked up just in time to see her drop the box. In the distance, pop pop pop. The fireworks going off early. At the same moment, screams sounded. I followed them to smoke rising above the trimmed green hedges of Tansy Crowne’s beloved garden maze.
“What the fuck, Gray?” Aundi snapped. “Are you trying to kill her?”
Just like that, fire forgotten.
“She’s allergic to lemon. Just smelling it can put her into anaphylaxis.”
“He didn’t know,” Lottie said, sounding scared. “He couldn’t.”
“He’s Grayson fucking Crowne. He knows everything,” Aundi said.
Alaric started laughing.
“Not funny,” Pipa said. “Are you okay?”
“Right,” Alaric laughed. “It was fucking hilarious.”
“I think they used fake lemon,” Lottie said, voice still shaken. “Gray?” She looked at him, eyes wide. Hurt. “You didn’t know I’m allergic, right?”
“You’re allergic to lemon,” Gray repeated, but the venom icing his tongue was meant for me.
Fuck.
Nine
STORY
* * *
“I didn’t know,” I said for what must have been the umpteenth time. “I really didn’t know.”
Anger rolled off Gray and turned into terror inside me.
I’d followed his silent fury until we were just inside the gardens. He didn’t say a word after Lottie rushed off with her friends. The sprawling maze flanked us on both sides. The party had ended early due to the fire, and it was eerily silent, only the smell of wet smoke mingling in the dark.
“I promise,” I said. “I was told she loves lemon cakes.”
I’d paid nearly two weeks’ wages for that information. What the hell was that girl thinking? How could she not know her own employer’s allergy? Unless…was it on purpose?
Gray pounded down the cobblestone, and I jogged to keep up. Beside us a pond that stretched over a mile glittered black in the night. Tansy Crowne fancied herself Marie Antoinette—no, that wasn’t right. Tansy Crowne would be insulted at that comparison. Versailles was a parking lot compared to Tansy Crowne’s garden.
Gray took a harsh right into a path of thick, silky flowers. I stopped. You don’t walk into Tansy Crowne’s garden, not unless there is a clear footpath.
Grayson grabbed my wrist, yanking my body to his. His hair had fallen wild over his eyes, but they shined through. Burning.
“Where are you taking me?”
A salt breeze blew and petals floated down, around and between us.
“Lesson number two in training,” he growled. “Follow your fucking master.”
Gray was walking so fast I had to jog to keep up with him, but I also tried to soak in as much as I could. This floral tunnel wasn’t known to servants. We shared all the secrets we found.
And it was beautiful.
Flowers surrounded us on all sides. The smell of smoke from the maze was strong, mixing with the heady scent of roses and lily and orchid. In autumn the flowers above us would fall and their leaves would change to brilliant ambers.
My foot caught and I jerked, lurching forward, the ground rushing to me. I threw my hands out to brace my fall, but seconds before impact, I was yanked back up with twice as much force.
Grayson held me by the collar, lips twisted in annoyance.
“Thank—you!” I finished on a yelp as Gray tugged me by the collar down the flower tunnel, all but dragging me on my heels. I still didn’t know where we were going. Part of me wondered if he was going to murder me.
Then we stopped.
I rubbed my neck, staring at…a shack? It looked like an old gardener’s shack.
I eyed Grayson, wondering if he really was going to murder me.
“What are—” I broke off, stopping myself from asking, What are you going to do to me? Because how many times in the past twenty-four hours had I wondered what this boy was going to do to me, let alone asked? I stared at this shack, determination steeling my spine.
“I don’t care. Make me kneel. Make me tie your shoes. You can’t hurt me.” I swallowed. “I know my place.”
Intrigue flickered in his eyes; then he smiled.
He pushed the door open.
Outside was a shack.
Inside…inside was insane.
Music thrummed low. The walls were dark and glittered like diamonds. The ceiling dripped crystals. I tilted my head back. There must have been thousands of crystals, because you couldn’t see anything but them.
“You sure about that, Snitch?” Gray’s low voice heated my ear, his hand ghosting my lower back. Before my goose bumps had even left my skin, he was standing tall and walking across the room, already talking to some guy.
This was somewhere I couldn’t blend in.
I stuck out like a sore fucking thumb.
All eyes were on me. Each step I took was a scratch on the record. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but their lips moved with their eyes. Everywhere I looked, I found a new set of glowing orbs.
I had no clue where I was. I knew by the outside it was small, only fitting maybe fifteen people, but because it was dark inside, it seemed big. Vast.
Alarm rushed and pounded with the blood in my ears when I realized I was the only servant here.
They didn’t even have a bartender.
“Surprised to see you here, Sis,” Gray said.
In the center of the room, Gemma Crowne and a few others were seated around a softly glowing circular table. She pulled cards and chips from a metal box, but the chips were unmarked.
What were they playing for?
“Ha ha,” Gemma said sarcastically, glaring at Gray. “I thought you weren’t coming tonight?”
Gray shrugged. “Plans changed.”
Grayson took a seat at the table just as I spotted someone. She had changed out of her glittery white tulle dress into jeans and a sweater more expensive than anything I owned.
Charlotte.
Everyone had changed. Only Grayson was still in his suit pants and dress shirt. Because unlike them, he’d traded a valet for me.
Charlotte was laughing with her friends, totally oblivious to me. I knew I should either stay put or follow Gray…but I crossed the short distance to her. Sweat beaded my neck, like tiny pinpricks.
Aundi and Pipa stopped talking once I reached them, glares furrowed on me. Charlotte stopped talking a second after them, slowly turning around at their glares, confusion marring her smile.
It must have been my imagination. The room didn’t go quiet. The music didn’t get lower.
They waited for me to talk first. I wasn’t someone who could just come up to someone like them.
But I could fix it, right here. Grayson was being so fucking stupid. I just had to tell her everything. Every little piece of what happened. Then she could take him back, and pull me out of this hell I couldn’t stop myself from diving deeper into, the place that was starting to whisper more. The place that wanted to take instead of give back what I’d stolen.
“It was my fault,” I said. “I told him the lemon cakes were your favorite. He was trying to do something nice for you. I had no idea you were allergic.”
A moment passed.
Lottie’s pretty, perfectly plucked brows caved. “Who are you?”
“Snitch,” Grayson called out behind me. “Come.”
Still, I stared into Lottie’s wide brown eyes. Tell her what happened last night. I’m the one who stole your moment.
“Snitch.”
Venom threaded his impassive tone, so subtle it barely stung.
I dropped my shoulders, going to Grayson.
He had a lollipop between his lips, and his blue eyes were harder than granite.
“Is she your buy-in?” Gemma asked. “I could use a new maid. I just had to let one go. So unfocused.”
My head shot up, eyes wide on her. I must have misheard, because they wouldn’t bet with people.
So casually Gemma asked i
t, too, like I wasn’t a person. That maid she had to let go? The unfocused one? She was fifty with fucking cancer.
He shook his hand in the air, and I let out a breath I didn’t realize I was holding.
For a brief moment I thought the most I was going to be punished for my mistake was being made to feel like dirt.
How naïve.
When you look at a Crowne, they ruin your life.
When you cross a Crowne…they make sure you wish you’d never been born.
“You don’t want this one,” he said. “She’s defective. She’ll fatten your drinks and think about stabbing you in your sleep.”
My mouth dropped open. My secret. He’d shared it without any hesitation.
“Then why is she here?”
Gray seemed to consider that, rubbing his bottom lip. “Who wants a night with a virgin?”
Ten
STORY
* * *
“Ugh, really, Gray?” Gemma threw her head back, then stood up, grabbing a bottle of tequila. “It’s going to be that kind of night? I’m out.”
She poured the golden liquor into three shots before taking them all herself. I stepped back, but I was like glitter trying to disappear into dust. An antelope hiding among lions.
Grayson Crowne, the lying playboy betting the virginity of a lying virgin. It might’ve been funny if I wasn’t the lying virgin about to lose her fake virginity.
I don’t know when the first tug came, when the first hand grabbed me, but soon I couldn’t differentiate between all the paws.
“She’s dressed like a fuckin’ nun,” someone said. A grab on my wrist, another on my hip, shoved from one person to the next, down the line. I tried to cover myself, but too many people were grabbing at me.
“And not a hot one,” another said, and I was shoved forward, then sucked back into the grabbing hands.
Through it all Gray watched, blue eyes hazy in his smoke, icy and unfeeling.
“I don’t know…” A new voice, another hand. “It’s kind of hot.”
Gray exhaled a musky, twirling tendril of smoke.
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