Chapter 44: The Dinner

NINE

Kade doesn't leave me alone for days following the incident at Vince's birthday, and I can't decide if I find his hovering comforting or suffocating. He lingers at his desk, insisting he has a lot of work to do, but every so often, he'll leave his seat and engage in tidying or endless snacking. The only time I can enjoy solitude is when he orders me to the balcony on the third floor to prepare for a supposed meeting he's having over dinner at sundown.

I place my palms against the stone banister and peer down at the garden. Overlooking me, the mandarin sunset paints the skyline in brilliant streaks of amaranth and blood orange. Above the display of colour, stars twinkle like diamonds nestled on a velvet cushion.

Ambrosial and fresh wafts of lily and rose hit my nose on the tail end of cool evening zephyrs, and, in the distance, the silhouette of an old city carves its way across the skyline.

I sigh. For a moment, I imagine I'm on the balcony of my own castle, in a dress not as s