Maybe.
I think there was something between all four of us. Wrong and twisted, our pain had grown together where love should have been.
“Lottie!” Aundi called her friend, and with a small smile, Lottie left me.
With Lottie gone, the room shrunk. On one side, Lynette laughed with reporters. I spun to another side and found Arthur, the man who hadn’t stopped looking at me like I was his property since I’d arrived back at Crowne Hall.
I spun again and again and again.
The room was a blur of vicious motive.
The only person I hadn’t seen was Beryl, and that just made me more nervous, like I’d wander off alone and stumble into him.
Hello, Story.
They all know my secrets.
I couldn’t breathe.
An arm intertwined with mine just as I felt like I was going to faint.
“Walk,” West commanded.
“I can’t breathe.”
Ignoring me, West led me out of the ballroom and into the sunroom. Grayson was waiting like a knight. Stoic and stalwart, concern etched in his brow. When I saw him, I unhinged from West.
“What’s wrong?” His voice was hard, accusatory—of West.
“What am I supposed to do with this fear?” I demand. “They’re all around me and I can’t do anything. I can’t accuse anyone. I can’t—” I broke off on a breath, falling to the chaise.
Tansy’s chaise.
No one ever sat on Tansy’s chaise and another rack of fear hits me.
“What do I do with this living, breathing fear inside of me?”
Grayson was the picture of calm. He lowered himself to one knee easily in front of me, so we were eye to eye, and pulled my hands into his.
“You have me watching your back. Always. Every second. You’re not alone. And.” He swallowed, muscle in his jaw feathering. “When I’m not there, West is watching too.”
Grayson gritted those final words like they burned coming out.
“But how do I smile at Lynette?” I plead. “How do I hold my drink without shaking when your grandfather is around?”
Grayson pushed the hair out of my eyes, his own softening.
“Stop looking at their shadows,” West said.
I looked outside of Grayson, to West. He stood above us, arms folded. For a rare moment, there was no mocking glint in his warm brown eyes. He was serious, concerned.
It was a little off-putting.
I blinked at him. “What?”
“My mother is just a person. She has fears and hopes, and she acts according to them. My father…” West exhaled, working his jaw to the side. “Is disgustingly simple.” West bent on the soles of his feet, meeting my eyes. “They aren’t all powerful dragons; they are weak and scared because you are a threat.”
Surprisingly, West’s advice helped. It was like these four, all-powerful beings suddenly shrunk down to normal size.