Josephine leaned against the wall, staring at me. Almost as if she wanted me to talk to her. In all the years I’d known her, I’d never spoken with her, not even when my father died.
I walked past her without a word.
Maybe it made me an asshole, whatever, I was used to it. I had no desire to have a relationship with Josephine St. Germaine, the woman responsible for my mother’s shriveled heart, my family’s broken pieces.
As I walked down the hallway to my wing, my image reflected back at me, warped in the black glass. Golden dots floated alongside me from the chandelier like fireflies. It was probably snowing lightly outside, but too dark to see. The moon was hidden behind dark clouds, the sky entirely black.
I’m looking out at the moon and I want to pretend you’re here with me.
I stopped short a few feet from the entrance to my wing as Story’s letter came rushing back.
I guess I have another secret from my little wife.
I tried to write you.
I should have assuaged her guilt immediately—I’m a bad fucking person, because in that moment, all I wanted was her lips. I didn’t give a shit about anything else.
I leaned against the cold glass, pulling up my phone.
Every night, I’d replay the last minutes before Snitch left over and over again on a loop, reading all of Story’s letters until I felt I’d memorized every secret path in her soul. At first, the sheets smelled like her, like warmth, like marshmallows. But trying to hold on to her scent was like trying to hold on to a memory.
It slipped through my fingers like fog.
You are Grayson Crowne, after all. You have tens of thousands of people sliding into your DMs. Why would you notice me?
How naive is she? It’s as adorable as it is maddening because it gets her into so much trouble. I would notice Snitch if she were one flickering star among the billion brighter. I could pick out her scent if she were one flower in a wildflower patch. I’d know
her voice if she were a wisp in a windstorm.
I couldn’t not notice her. My only regret was I didn’t see the letters sooner. Almost two weeks had passed before I saw Dear Atlas in my inbox. By then, she’d stopped sending me letters.
I did write her back.
Secretly.
Because I was watched now. My Instagram. My everything. She was the only thing that got me through these two weeks locked in this fucking house, playing the perfect prince. She hadn’t read my letters yet. Maybe for the same reason I hadn’t read hers at first. It was hidden away from an account I didn’t know.
I should have told her tonight.
Even this small secret weighed.
I typed another letter to her.
Dear little wife, every secret I keep from you builds a new thorn around my heart—
“Merry almost Christmas.”
I stopped short at West’s voice, slowly turning around. Blood roared in my ears and my muscles stiffened as the world around me vanished into a pinprick.
I never thought about killing anyone. That line was so far away I couldn’t even see it, let alone cross it. Then Story kissed me, she slid into my sheets and into my veins. I would do anything for her, anything to protect her, and that line became visible on the horizon.
When she got pregnant, suddenly that line wasn’t close—I was about to fucking trip over it.
I don’t like him beneath the sheets.
He’s hurting her.
The only thing stopping me from crossing that line was Story. She saw a future for us, one that wasn’t bloody or pointless.