“We’ve assigned you a new guard. This is not like the others you’ve ditched. This man is not there to protect you, this man is to watch your every movement and keep our reputation safe.”
My gut dropped. The Crowne Guard was filled with sycophants who had their noses far up my siblings’ and mom’s assholes. I didn’t have one friend on it. I did have one enemy, but surely they wouldn’t choose him. My mother had always hated Theo, and she’d practically rejoiced when he left. She would never choose him to guard me twenty-four seven.
“So what?” I asked. “He’s going to follow me around?”
Mother nodded. “Twenty-four seven.”
“A male guard?” I nearly gasped. “But surely not at night.”
“Twenty-four seven,” she repeated. “We’ve redone your en suite into a room.”
“That’s not proper,” I stammered. “Rumors will spread. People will think things.” People already thought them. I’d been branded a slut since Rosey, our boarding school, years ago.
Screw the fact I was still almost a virgin, right?
Mom tossed magazine after magazine at my feet. The one where they’d caught me getting out of a limo with my legs—and no panties. The one where I was topless on the yacht, making out with an Oscar winner. The one where I was lip-locked with Hollywood’s it girl and guy.
I said almost.
“Rumors?” She arched a brow, then continued unperturbed. “This will be the least scandalous thing you’ve done. Believe me when I say he was not my first choice,” my mother said, almost bitterly. “Despite my objections, your grandfather is resolute.”
Now I was even more confused. Who had been chosen to watch me? What man could have my mother so bitter, yet be in such good graces with my grandfather?
“Grayson is on the cover of more tabloids than me,” I tried desperately. I don’t know why I even bothered. The bar was always placed on the floor for Gray.
My gaze kept drifting back to the door, beyond my sibling peanut gallery. Had I seen him? I didn’t know anyone else who somehow both stood out of, and blended into, the shadows.
“Abigail!” my mother snapped, and I quickly looked at her. Only I could make my mother snap. I took perverse satisfaction in that; it was the only attention she afforded me, after all. “Did you hear a word I said?”
“Doubt it,” Grayson said. “She’s still standing.”
I glared at my brother in the doorway. My siblings and I were so close in age. Gray was just a year older than me at twenty-two, and Gemma the eldest at almost twenty-three, yet we couldn’t be further apart. Both he and my sister watched me, twisted smiles on their faces. Watching our mom torture me was one of their favorite forms of amusement.
“Grayson isn’t going to marry the son of a man whose company your grandfather has been courting for over three years.”
Everything came to a crashing halt.
I wish I’d heard her wrong, but I knew I hadn’t. I’d known this day was coming for as long as I could remember. You don’t get to be me and not have this day. My sister’s day had come in boarding school. My brother’s would come soon as well. I darted my eyes between my siblings and back to my mother, a sinking feeling growing.
“You’re marrying me off?” I took a step back. “When? To who? Have I even met him?”
My mom waved her hand as if what I’d said was trivial. “Before the end of the summer.”
“This summer?” At my distressed face, behind our mother’s back, Gemma pushed out her bottom lip, pretending to pout for me.
“Fuck off, Gemma,” I said.
Gemma clutched her heart. “Mother, do you see how she speaks to me?” Behind our mother’s back she mouthed fuck you and gave me the bird.
“Enough,” my mother said without heat. “This shouldn’t be news to you, Abigail. Your grandfather has been working on this trade for years.”
“Yes, but—” I started, only to be cut off.
“We can’t afford your little…dalliances…ruining it.”
Gemma laughed. “That’s a nice way to look at them.”
“But—”