“Get in, girls.”
Tremaine steps over me. Silk wafts across my cheek as my stepsisters follow him. Hoofbeats and the squeak of carriage wheels precede a spray of dirt.
I have no fight left in me. My tears water the earth. I am ready to die right here in the mud. No hope left in my heart.
No future to live for.
“Poor child.”
I jerk my head up to find Maxine on her knees, peering at me with pity as she strokes Tom’s back. I sit back on my heels, examining my ruined gown. All that work, for nothing.
“You deserve better than your awful stepfamily.”
“I know. I just don’t know where else to go. Can I stay with you?” I ask, pleading. She chuckles and offers me a hand up, heedless of the filth. A tingling sensation crawls along my skin. Glancing down, I find the dirt melting away. The dress remains ragged, but at least I’m clean again, thanks to her magic. Perhaps it isn’t as dangerous as I thought.
“You have better places to go than an old witch’s cottage in the woods,” she says. “The ball, for example. You have a prince to meet.”
“I don’t want to meet the prince.” Fleetingly, I think of the man who almost ran me down with his horse two weeks ago.
“There is someone else?” Maxine arches one brow. Blushing, I nod. She smiles knowingly. “Perhaps can I convince you to try this? I promise it won’t hurt you.”
She holds out the glowing slipper charm on the rhinestone-encrusted chain. I take it with a sigh. Then, I yank the stopper free and pour the contents down my throat. Sweetness floods my tongue. A tingling sensation races through my body.
Seconds later, Iexplode.
7
ALISTAIR
“Presenting Lady Mullins.”
The instant her name is spoken, I’ve already forgotten it. This woman’s hair is hair-colored. Her eyes are both the same color, whatever it is, a shade of brown or blue or something in between. It doesn’t matter.
“Write her name down.” The royal secretary sighs heavily and adds her name to a lengthy roster of names of women I’ve already danced with this evening.
Why am I still here?
I could be gone.
Yet I’m still watching for her to walk through the banner-bedecked archway. Delusional, I know. My heart aches with yearning for a phantom. She would be mine. We would be happy together.
Hours pass. She doesn’t come.
The red-headed girl is a figment of my imagination. I know this, and yet I can’t let go of the fantasy.
I lead Lady Mullions or Mullins—whatever her name is; I don’t care—onto the dance floor. A slow song plays. Every song this evening has been slow. Droning. Practically a dirge. I feel as though I’m attending my own funeral.
“Have you made a selection?” asks the scribe when I return the lady to her chaperone.
“Yes,” I bark curtly. I have resigned myself to marrying Lady Cockburn, unfortunate surname and all. Hers is the only name I recall from this evening. “The first one.”
“Cocklebur.”
Whatever her name is, she’s to be the next queen of Belterre. Despite my eagerness to end this miserable evening, the king scolded me for thinking I could escape dancing with each and every one of the maidens in attendance this evening.
We invited them. It is up to you to show the young ladies proper respect.
Fuck etiquette. I am a powder keg of frustration and each simpering girl is a match that threatens to ignite my temper. There are too many of them. More than three hundred girls. I could have selected my wife by choosing at random, but my father wanted to teach me a lesson.
