Prince Emmett De Vere
There’s a knock at the door, but I don’t bother getting out of bed. The golden clock on the mantel says it’s past nine, but I haven’t moved since Ivy left at dawn.
It’s playing in my head on a loop, her pale skin in the dark, how she looked splayed out under me and undone. She let me touch her like I’d been dying to since that night in the coaching inn. Earlier than that, if I’m being honest with myself.
I’d had to keep my hands balled into fists at my sides to keep from devouring her as she whimpered in her sleep and wrapped her arms and legs around me. I thought that was torture, but now I realize I didn’t know anything about pain, or how bad it was about to get for me.
If I were a better man, good, like Bram, I’d feel guilt or shame about what we did last night, but I’m not good and I’m not ashamed.
I wish I could relive last night forever, nothing else, just Ivy on an endless loop. There was a man who bargained for something like that a few years ago. He ended up going mad and throwing himself into the Thames.
Bram lets himself in, as he always does. Dread punches me in the stomach at the sight of him. He and Ivy should be on the road by now.
He greets me. “As productive as ever, I see.”
“Aren’t you supposed to be getting engaged tomorrow?” I ask as casually as I can manage. My voice is hoarse. A discarded ribbon from Ivy’s nightdress is beside me. I shove it under the quilt hastily before he sees.
Bram throws opens my curtains, flooding the room with light. I squint my eyes and groan.
“That’s what I came here to talk about. I’ve had quite the morning.” He plops himself down at my desk and kicks his boots up all over the papers.
“I hate it when you do that,” I say.
“I had a little predawn visit from Ivy Benton.”
“Oh?” I feign surprise but want to throw up. Her face flashes through my mind, how she looked on top of me, her porcelain skin in the dark.
I love her. I should have told her that.
Bram smiles a little. “She said my mother told her she’d lost. Classic Mother, always with the power plays.”
“What did you say?” I’m desperate for more information. Where is Ivy?
Is she safe?
“I asked her to elope with me. Who else was I going to marry? Olive, who was so obsessed with the idea of me she nearly swooned every single time I spoke to her? Marion Thorne, who literally fell asleep the only time Id. The golden tried to have a full conversation with her? Emmy was suitable, but there’s ce Ivy left at something special about Ivy, even if you don’t agree.”
“But here you are, not eloped.”ark, how she “I’m getting to that part. I was packing my things, ready to go, whenlike I’d been Mother came to my room, very unlike her, and said, ‘It’ll be Lady Ivy if I’m being Benton, is that suitable?’ I said yes, of course.”
Fear strikes me. “Do you think she knew you were planning on running
o keep from away?”rms and legs Bram shrugs, unbothered. “If she did, she gave no indication. I think shedidn’t know just wanted to play one final game, you know how she gets.”
“I do.” The damn fae and their love of games. With Bram, it’s endlessme about what games of billiards. Sometimes he whips himself into a near frenzy over it, and we play until dawn. The queen’s tastes lean bloodier.on an endless I should be happy. I’m getting everything I wanted. In a few short weeks,a few years if I’m right, her reign will be over and my kind, reasonable brother will be king.the Bram stands. “Anyway, just thought you’d like to know your favorite brother is engaged. I’ll let you sleep. You look like absolute shit. Hungover?”
“Yes.” It feels like it. I’m wrecked. k as casually Bram reaches the door, bends down, and tosses a large white box onto my
from Ivy’s bed. “This was at your door.”
“Thanks,” I reply, and the door shuts behind him. t. I squint my I lift the lid and find a black wool coat folded neatly and wrapped in tissue paper. On top, tucked under the ribbon, is a letter with a single creasemorning.” He
and my name.
I unfold it and begin to read.
Emmett, s through myI love you. No, that’s not how I should begin. I’m sorry. I’m so
sorry. I can only hope that one day you’ll understand. If you don’t lost. Classicunderstand, then I can only hope that you hate me. It would be easier if you hate me. Please hate me.
Where is Ivy?I was told this morning that I am to marry Bram.
It appears that telling me I had lost was just another of Mor’s marry? Olive,tricks. He will propose tomorrow and I will say yes. every singlePlease believe that I wanted to flee the throne room screaming. e only time IThat I wanted to run away with you. I wanted it more than I’ve ever e, but there’swanted anything.
But this is bigger than the two of us. If we run, we may be destroying our only chance at unseating Queen Mor. I’m doing this to go, whenfor Greer. For my sister. For Eduart. But mostly I’m doing this for be Lady Ivyyou and your father.
Bram deserves a wife who loves him, but I know I could never g on runninglove him if he’s competing with you. So I finally know what bargain I will make. Once I have written this letter, I am going to ask Queen n. I think sheMor to remove all memory of you from my head. It’s the only chance any of us have for peace. I know you will find happiness with someone , it’s endlesswho isn’t me. I pray I am able to become the wife Bram deserves. enzy over it,Somewhere, across time and space, there’s a version of me and a version of you, wearing matching rings, tangled up in front of a short weeks,fireplace, together. I have to believe that’s true. other will beIn another life, it would have been us, but not in this one.
I can’t have you in the way you deserve to be had. your favoriteKnow how desperately I love you.
Hungover?”Know how sorry I am.
And know that I’m doing the best that I can.
box onto my
Ivy
p.s. I owed you a coat. d wrapped in I read the letter twice more, trying to understand. It isn’t until I set itsingle crease down that I realize I’ve torn the edges, that’s how tightly I’ve been gripping it.
There’s nothing but roaring in my head. White-hot fear like a forest fire has been set alight, and there’s nothing but the animal instinct to run.
I nearly throw the door off its hinges sprinting out of my room and down
the marble staircase. I have to stop her, if I could just explain— I pause at the second-floor landing. Do I make a break for the throne room or the cottage?
There are voices coming from the main hall, the sound of hooves as a carriage pulls up.
I grip the railing, taking the stairs two at a time.
Ivy and Queen Mor are standing in the middle of the soaring foyer. Ivy’s blond hair is in two braids. She’s wearing a simple gray dress, and her pale skin is covered with dappled light filtering in through the leaves of the tree growing up through the staircase.
I stand there panting, and they both turn to me.
There’s a dazed look in Ivy’s soft brown eyes. She sinks her teeth into the skin of her full bottom lip and tilts her head. She’s so beautiful, it nearly knocks the wind out of me.
She curtsies to me hurriedly, saying, “Your Highness, it’s nice to finally meet.” There’s something odd about her teeth. I look closer and realize there’s blood stuck between the gaps of them. She presses her lips together self-consciously, as if she realizes it at the same moment I do.
She can’t meet my eye as she tucks a stray golden curl behind her ear.
“Bram speaks highly of you. I was quite hoping we could be friends.”
It feels like I’ve been shot. I look down at my own torso, surprised to find my rib cage intact. Musket balls don’t pierce. They blow everything wide open into a bloody mess. That’s how this feels.
“Friends?”
Mor’s gaze snaps to mine, and she shakes her head slightly. If I didn’t know her better, I might think she feels sorry for me.
“Ivy—” I say it under my breath. I can’t help myself. Every inch of me is begging to reach out to my girl, take her in my arms, kiss her until she remembers. My guts are splattered all over the frescoes on the wall behind me, and the only one who knows I’m bleeding is Mor.
Ivy’s eyes flit to the ground. “If you’ll excuse me—” She curtsies again, until I set itand the footman takes her hand in his and helps her down the steps and into been grippingthe carriage. Leaving me standing in the foyer, frozen.
Mor turns to me. “It’s for the best,” she says. e a forest fire“What did you take in return?” I ask, thinking of her bloody teeth.
She huffs out a small laugh. “Only a molar. The bargain itself seemed om and downpunishment enough. But you’ll find another girl of the week and Bram will
be happy. It’s a win-win situation as far as I’m concerned.” or the throne“That’s easy for you to say. You always win.”
She walks back into the palace, and I follow her up the stairs to our hooves as arespective quarters. She pauses at the top and shrewdly sizes me up with those uncanny eyes of hers. “I gave her the option to marry you.”
The fae can’t lie. I used to love that about them, but I hate knowing that g foyer. Ivy’sshe’s telling the truth. and her paleReckless, selfless Ivy. It only makes me love her more. es of the tree I don’t sleep for the next twenty-four hours.
I spend every waking minute in the library, pulling book after book off teeth into thethe shelf, hoping for some new clue, any message from my father. ful, it nearlyIt’s agonizing, like an infected wound, to know he’s under the same roof I am and we cannot speak. What will we do when the bargains are broken? I ice to finallycan only hope my father knows, because I do not. r and realizeI’ve never been this reckless before. I’m usually meticulous to leave no lips togethertrace, lest the queen get wise to us, but I don’t care anymore. The shelves are mostly empty, and I’m standing in a sea of half-open books scattered around her ear.the library.
Finally, in a volume of medieval poetry, I find a series of faint pencil prised to findlines, each underneath a new letter. SOON. rything wideI’ve only ever known love through codes and things half-said. Ivy says exactly what she’s thinking at all times. I wish I could be more like her, instead of constantly chewing at the ropes I’ve tied myself in. y. If I didn’tSOON.
It has to be soon, or I’ll have lost her forever, and that’s not something inch of me isI’m strong enough to bear. her until sheI think of my father, somewhere in this same palace, but he feels farther wall behindaway than ever. I can’t help but feel that I’m failing him, the mission, all of England. Ivy was only ever supposed to be a means to an end, not a weakness urtsies again,I couldn’t afford. But I know now, the thing about love is that you don’t teps and intorealize you’re in it until it’s too late.
The next day, Bram bursts into my room as I’m preparing for the ball at the Kendalls, I know I shouldn’t go. I should make the same excuses I always do and go drink until I can’t remember my own name at some shitty pub in itself seemedthe East End. I dismiss my valet as my brother walks in. nd Bram willBram sinks down into the chair across from me, his face tight with
paternal worry. “Are you going to tell me why you asked your valet to collect your bank statements?” stairs to our“I should fire him for gossiping.” me up with“It’s not gossip, it’s valid concern.”
“You’re always encouraging me to be more responsible.” knowing thatBram sighs. “Please don’t tell me you’re planning on gambling it away.”
“You have to spend money to make money,” I reply with a smile I know will drive him up the wall.
“You’re not nearly as funny as you think you are.”
“I’m laughing.” fter book offBram passes me the stack of papers from the bank. A quick glance at the statements confirm what I suspected. My stipend from the Crown is basically e same roof Izero, but I have enough inherited from my mother’s side of the family that I are broken? Icould take Ivy and me anywhere in the world and build her the kind of life she deserves, then leave the rest to her family. s to leave noI asked for the statements a week ago, but I was too late. Now I think I’ll e shelves arego somewhere alone, somewhere I don’t have to see Ivy at Bram’s side every ttered aroundday.
“Please don’t tell me you’re thinking of doing something stupid,” Bram f faint pencilgrumbles.
“I’ve never done anything stupid in my whole entire life.” I grin, even aid. Ivy saysthough it hurts. ore like her,Bram pulls a small green leather box out of his jacket pocket and flips it open. Inside is a rose-cut diamond set on a narrow gold band.
My stomach hurts. ot something“Isn’t it beautiful?”
“She’s going to love it,” I say honestly. feels fartherBram pockets the ring box. “You’ve been in a foul mood. Is it Faith mission, all ofFairchild again? She’s all yours if you want her. I don’t get the appeal. She’s ot a weaknessso goddamn mean. The one time I tried to kiss her, she bit me, but I know we at you don’thave different tastes.”
I look at him in the mirror and force a smile. It looks unnatural on my or the ball atface with the dark circles under my eyes and the too-long hair. uses I always“You’re still coming tonight, right?” he asks. shitty pub inIf I had any sense of self-preservation, I wouldn’t, but I can’t make myself stay away. My father used to tell me I was a master at hurting my own ce tight withfeelings. No one tortures you like you do to yourself, my dear boy, he’d
alet to collectmutter as he bandaged my skinned knees. I didn’t understand what he meant at the time, but I do now. There’s never been a wound I won’t pick at just to make sure it still bleeds.
“Of course I am. I wouldn’t dream of missing my favorite brother’s engagement party.”
smile I knowThe Kendall estate is covered in candles and fresh roses. We’ve arrived late enough that it’s easy for me to slip through the crowd and find a corner to disappear into.
The band whines to a halt and the crowd parts as Bram strides to the glance at thecenter of the floor, Ivy’s hand in his. n is basicallyShe’s wearing a pale pink gown, pearls wound into her hair. The firelight family that Icatches her, and she looks like something from heaven. But there, right on the e kind of lifeedge of her dress where her neck meets her shoulder, is the mottled yellow of a healing bruise. The one I left that night. w I think I’llI’m never going to touch her again. The realization hits me like a blow. m’s side everyBram drops to his knee. He’s looking up at her with so much love it radiates through the room. Ivy blushes, smiles, clutches her hands to her tupid,” Bramchest. They’re happy. It should be enough, but I’ve never been a selfless person. It should be me. That’s all my one-track brain can fire off. That I grin, evenshould be me. That should be me. That should be me.
I can’t take it. In the end, I’m not strong enough to look. et and flips itI push my way through the crowd as the clapping starts and white rose petals rain down from the rafters. Everyone is too distracted to watch me walk out through a side door into the night. I tilt my face up to the sky and try to catch my breath. It’s raining. It’s always raining in this goddamn country.
I vomit pure champagne into the Kendalls’ rosebushes. It burns like the d. Is it Faithdevil coming up, makes my eyes water, or maybe I was already crying. I appeal. She’scan’t really tell. ut I know weThere are footsteps behind me, and I look up to see who is witness to my shame. atural on myIt’s Faith Fairchild, concern all over her face. I’ve seen Faith in a dozen different rooms, in the middle of the night and sleeping through midmorning.
I’ve seen her so angry she’s thrown a glass at my head. I thought I’d seen her can’t makein every situation, but I’ve never seen her look quite like this. rting my own“Emmett.” Her voice is thick with pity. “It was always going to end this he’dway.”
hat he meantBut Ivy was already mine inside my head. pick at just to“You’re getting all wet,” I reply. The rain runs down across her face. Her hair is already ruined. rite brother’s“I don’t care about that,” she says gently. “I care about you.”
She approaches me like I’m a feral animal who might bite her and then lays a gloved hand on my shoulder. “You love her, don’t you?” e arrived late“It doesn’t matter now,” I say. d a corner to“Of course it matters.”
I collapse onto her shoulder, unable to stop the sobs that rack my body. I strides to thehaven’t cried like this since my father gave me up. I hate it. I’d rather be vomiting.
The firelightShe doesn’t rub my back in circles or whisper hush into my ear. Instead, e, right on theshe grips me in a vice-tight embrace and holds me until I stop shaking. led yellow ofWe’re both soaked to the core now, not that it matters. I’m not going back to the party.
Faith ducks inside for a minute to get Marion, and together, the three of much love itus hop into a carriage back to Kensington Palace. hands to her“Do you want me to list Ivy’s worst qualities?” asks Faith. “Would that en a selflesshelp? She breathes so loud when she sleeps. It made me want to smother Thather.”
“I don’t think you’re helping, darling,” Marion whispers.
Faith refuses to leave me alone. I give her and Marion my bed and sleep nd white rosein the armchair by the fire. I tend to it all night, thinking of Ivy with each to watch meshower of sparks. e sky and tryBram is glowing with happiness the next morning and all through the next week. I should leave. I should beg off and drink myself into a stupor in burns like thesome lord’s hunting lodge, like I have every other time something in my life ady crying. Igets hard. But I just can’t bring myself to. What if she needs me? That’s the thought that goes through my head anytime I get close to calling a carriage witness to myand running away.
We are getting fitted for new suits when my brother asks me the question th in a dozenI’ve been dreading. In the end, the answer comes easy. “Of course I’ll be
midmorning.your best man.” t I’d seen her
ng to end this
But Ivy was already mine inside my head.
“You’re getting all wet,” I reply. The rain runs down across her face. Her hair is already ruined.
“I don’t care about that,” she says gently. “I care about you.”
She approaches me like I’m a feral animal who might bite her and then lays a gloved hand on my shoulder. “You love her, don’t you?”
“It doesn’t matter now,” I say.
“Of course it matters.”
I collapse onto her shoulder, unable to stop the sobs that rack my body. I haven’t cried like this since my father gave me up. I hate it. I’d rather be vomiting.
She doesn’t rub my back in circles or whisper hush into my ear. Instead, she grips me in a vice-tight embrace and holds me until I stop shaking.
We’re both soaked to the core now, not that it matters. I’m not going back to the party.
Faith ducks inside for a minute to get Marion, and together, the three of us hop into a carriage back to Kensington Palace.
“Do you want me to list Ivy’s worst qualities?” asks Faith. “Would that help? She breathes so loud when she sleeps. It made me want to smother her.”
“I don’t think you’re helping, darling,” Marion whispers.
Faith refuses to leave me alone. I give her and Marion my bed and sleep in the armchair by the fire. I tend to it all night, thinking of Ivy with each shower of sparks.
Bram is glowing with happiness the next morning and all through the next week. I should leave. I should beg off and drink myself into a stupor in some lord’s hunting lodge, like I have every other time something in my life gets hard. But I just can’t bring myself to. What if she needs me? That’s the thought that goes through my head anytime I get close to calling a carriage and running away.
We are getting fitted for new suits when my brother asks me the question I’ve been dreading. In the end, the answer comes easy. “Of course I’ll be your best man.”
