Nicholas My mind would not let me rest at all that night. My body was at rest, finding comfort in knowing Piper was safe and within reach. But my thoughts constantly reminded me that soon, when the competition ended, Piper would be gone from my side. Soon, I wouldn’t be able to protect her. To
The King and Queen were sitting at their table, eating breakfast. “Nicholas?” the King said when he saw me. “You look like hell.” “I have reason.” I walked to him and showed him the footage on my phone. The King watched it all with a furrow in his brow. “Terry’s behavior last night was beyon
Waking up in bed alone, with Nicholas nowhere in sight, I felt rejected. I adamantly fought against the feeling, telling myself everything was fine, Nicholas was a very important and busy man. But the hurt was persistent, rooted deep within me. Worse, I was now also humiliated. It was early, but
I carried her back to her chair. Then I took the chair beside her. Tiffany and Veronica were sitting on the other side of the table. Tiffany gave me a soft, sad-looking smile. Veronica just flatly stared. I pulled a waffle from a stack at the center of the table onto my own plate. As I began to
Her threat made me go silent. I wasn’t flirting with Terry. He was flirting with me. But maybe that was still enough to be held against me. “You seduced my brother,” the Luna said, “And you will not get away with it.” An angry flame burned in her eyes. Her usually demure expression was filled with
The ferocity of Nicholas’s protection of me gave me more comfort that it probably should have. I certainly didn’t want Nicholas to kill anyone, but knowing that he would go to any limits in order to keep me safe helped me feel truly cared for. Still, I decided to move beyond that topic, for fear t
Julian was angry, that much was clear, though I couldn’t exactly fathom why. Yes, it would be irritating to be excluded from Nicholas’s confrontation of the King and Queen, but Julian usually handled irritation with cutting humor and sarcasm, not outright anger. “Your presence wouldn’t have made a
“It’s simply difficult to talk about,” I said as an excuse. It wasn’t a lie. Answering the King’s demand about Terry was difficult, though not entirely for the reasons he might have thought. His mouth pressed into a hard line. I couldn’t tell if he believed me or not. “Do the best you can.” I to