“Your challenge will be a simple one. You see this man here?” he says, pointing to Easton. “You will have to go on a date with him.”
Easton’s face remains expressionless and I have no idea if this is news to him or not. The girls, on the other hand, get excited. They clap and cheer and one of them even jumps up and down.
I can’t bring myself to feign that level of exuberance.
“So, what about you, Ms. March?” the King calls me out. “Everyone seems very happy with this news. How about you?”
I shrug before I can stop myself.
“I’m pleased, your majesty,” I say.
“You don’t look pleased.”
“It’s just that I’m wondering why the task is to go on a date with your son when we are in competition to marry you?”
The words just come out of my mouth before I can stop myself.
Shut up, Everly, I say to myself. Just shut up.
“Well, since you asked… I trust my son. He has a good head on his shoulders and I want to see you all on a date. But maybe because I have other things to do at this point.”
He doesn’t need to offer me this explanation, of course.
I mean, who the hell am I here? But he does and I appreciate it. Even though I doubt that it’s the truth.
“I appreciate your explanation,” I say graciously. “Thank you.”
“Okay, then.” The King claps his hands. “I will be retiring for the night. So, I bid you farewell.”
The servers open the doors for him and he leaves. Easton quickly exits behind him.
“So?” Olivia turns to me as soon as they both leave. “What happened? You already know Easton?”
Her eyes glisten with excitement. She’s holding my hands in the air in front of hers in anticipation.
“It’s nothing,” I mumble.
“Oh, c’mon! Don’t lie to me, girl!” she says.
“Yes, tell us. What’s the deal?” Savannah asks.
The rest of the contestants, the girls I have yet to meet, gather around me. I’m on the spot. I want to tell them the truth, but I don’t know if I should.
“Nothing.” I shrug. “It’s really nothing.”
“Oh, c’mon, it has to be something,” Olivia presses.
I know that I won’t be able to get away with just saying nothing.
“Well, if you must know,” I say, leaning closer to them. “I met him before. In the garden. He was just sitting there and we started talking. I had no idea who he was. That’s why I was so surprised when he came in here.”
“So, you didn’t know he was the prince?”
I shake my head no and try to look as innocent as possible. I must be getting better at this lying thing because they all smile and nod at me, waiting for my next lie.
“I had no idea,” I say with a big shrug. “Honestly, if I had, I would’ve probably freaked out or something. He was just sitting and we got to talking. I told him my name, stuff like that.”
“Did he tell you his?” Olivia asks.
It’s a challenge. I think. But I’m not sure. I roll the dice.
“Yes, he did. Just his first name though.”
“I can’t believe you met the Prince,” Savannah squeals. “And he’s quite easy on the eyes, too.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“You guess? Are you blind?” Olivia asks.
I laugh. “I was just joking. Of course, I know he’s hot.”
We continue to discuss the Prince’s various virtues ad nauseam. It’s not that I don’t agree.
Yes, he’s attractive.
Yes, he’s dashing.
But I know a lot more about him and that sort of taints my overall picture.
After a while, Mirabelle returns and politely nudges us to retire for the night. I let out a big sigh of relief. Finally, I can get some sleep. I’m one of the first girls to climb the stairs. As soon as I get to my room, I immediately climb out of my clothes and let out an even bigger sigh of relief.
As I get into the shower to wash the night’s festivities off me, my thoughts return to Paige. Oh, how I wish she hadn’t reacted like she did back there. She does not deserve to be eliminated. Not for that.
Of course, that’s not why they took her away. It was not the simple act of attacking that man that threatened them. It was the fact that her mere presence was a challenge to their way of life.
Paige had become unpredictable.
Volatile.
She stood up to them and they couldn’t deal with it.
Tears start to run down my face. I didn’t know her well, but I miss her terribly.
After I turn off the water, I wrap myself in a big puffy towel that goes all the way to down to the floor and I don’t bother to towel myself off.
I walk straight to the bed and get under the covers.
How many more days of this can I handle?
My nervous system won’t be able to manage it. I know that.
And yet, I don’t have a choice.
I hate this place, but there’s nothing I can do about it. I can’t change my circumstances. All I can change is how I think about them.
And with that, I turn off the lights and close my eyes.
Tomorrow is another day.
I need to gather my strength to make it a good one.
Chapter 13 - Easton
When darkness descends…
That look on her face.
It consumed me. Tormented me.
I could see the anguish through the facade of darkness.
Come back to me, Everly, I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs. Come back to me!
I need you to believe me.
I didn’t do that for him.
I didn’t do it just because of the order.
I did it to protect you.
Also, I did it because to touch you is to touch heaven.
As I stand before her with a stoic expression on my face and watch my father make a mockery of everything that is beautiful and kind, I try to remember the last time I felt this way toward someone.
Alicia understood a part of me.
She was there for me.
A good friend.
A lover.
A beautiful soul who deserved so much more than what I could offer her.
But the connection I feel toward Everly now…it’s so much more than that.
After only a few days, I feel like she gets me. We don’t have to speak. In fact, we can’t. Not really.
And yet, I look into her eyes and it’s like she understands. At least, that’s what it felt like on those glorious days that she spent with me in my chambers.
And now, looking at her face, despite the blank expression that she has painted on it, I know that she feels pain. I know that she hates me.
She blames me.
She despises me.
But what can I do?
I go through the motions. I participate in my father’s little show and dance and then leave. I’ve had enough of this place a long time ago.
I want to disappear.
Escape.
Never come back again.
But I can’t.
Now, I’m invested.
Now, there’s someone who I can’t leave behind.
Even when I step outside the mansion’s door, I can still sense her. She has put up a wall around herself to protect what’s inside. If I ever want to connect with her again, I’ll have to break through those walls.
Will I be able to?
Is it even worth trying?
I wander around in the moonlight. The palm trees lining the walkway sway in the breeze coming off the ocean. Some of them are bending so hard into the wind that they are practically lying down on the ground. But that’s how they have to be to survive the hurricanes that slam into this place in the fall.
They have to be flexible and nimble.
The ones that aren’t will break by the force that comes at them.
I know that’s how I need to be as well.
/>
In order to beat my father at his game, I need to learn how to play it well. But what does that mean exactly?
When I was younger, my father taught us to play chess. It is his favorite game and he uses it as a type of litmus test, a way to gauge how intelligent someone is.
Naturally, as a kid, I was never very good at it. I mean, I could make some moves, play the game, but he would inevitably beat me.
And he always did.
Over and over again.
He never let me win.
Later, in therapy, I learned that he wouldn’t let me win because of his ego. His ego was so fragile that he couldn’t even pretend to lose to a child to build up my confidence and self-esteem.
At that time, however, he said that he would never let me lose to build up my character. That way, were I to ever beat him for real, then I would know that I had indeed beat him.
Well, I never did.
Not once.
After a while, we stopped playing entirely. He got bored and moved on to other character-building exercises.
He never let Abbott win either, but they stopped playing when Abbott lost his temper and punched a hole in the wall.
I’m not sure what this says about me.
Perhaps, it just says that I’m not very good at chess.
But life isn’t really chess, is it? People who like to play chess think so, but where would we be if there were only chess players in the world?
Even though I never beat him at chess, I do have to beat him at this. Or die trying.
Suddenly, I hear a familiar voice coming from the other side of the pool, just past the grotto. I duck behind one of the thicker trees. My father is talking to one of his oldest advisors.
I know him only as Dagger and he has been in my father’s employ since the founding of the House of York.
Dagger is a tall snake of a man with sharp eyebrows and a long tongue, which he uses every opportunity to show off.
I can’t quite make out what they are saying until my father says, “Let me know if Easton starts to fall for that March girl. I like her.”
“Yes, I can see that,” Dagger says. “You’ve gone out of your way to protect her on a number of occasions.”
“She has spunk; you don’t see that much nowadays.”
Their conversation about Everly makes my skin crawl.
“And of course, I wouldn’t want the same thing to happen to her as what happened to that little bitch who was going to run away with him,” my father says with a loud bellowing laugh.
What? What did he say? Did I hear that correctly?
I shake my head in disbelief.
My throat seizes up.
The blood in my body seems to stop circulating and my hands get clammy.
Dagger laughs. “Don’t even mention her. You don’t know how hard it was to get to her and lock her down there while keeping him away. They were quite inseparable, as you remember.”
“I know, I know,” my father says, waving his hand. “You are a master.”
“I’ve been your loyal subject for a long time.”
“Loyal friend,” my father corrects him. “You know, Dagger, you need a wife. And children. I can’t tell you how much fun they bring into your life, especially if you aren’t the one taking care of them.”
“I’ll work on it, sir.”
Part 3
Chapter 14 - Easton
When I see red…
I stand stunned by what I just heard. Father and Dagger walk away laughing, but I don’t follow them.
My head is spinning out of control.
How could he do that to me?
He knew how much I loved her.
He knew that we were planning on starting our life together and he just swept in and took it all away from me.
He took her away from me.
My father killed Alicia.
The thought seems foreign and strange. I’ve had my suspicions, of course. I’ve had plenty of those.
He made derogatory comments about her. He made his jokes. He tried to get me to break up with her.
First, by trying to manipulate me.
Then by spreading lies about her.
And finally, just by putting in an order.
Dagger was the one who actually did it.
But how?
My thoughts return to that day.
We thought our departure was a secret.
We thought that no one would know.
We thought that we could just sneak out at night and sail away from everyone and everything. But someone knew.
I was running away because I hated Father’s hatred. I hated everything he stood for and I needed to start my life away from him.
But he couldn’t let me go.
He could’ve just let me disappear.
He could’ve just pretended that he didn’t know. But he didn’t.
My father hates everything about me, yet he wants me around.
A few years ago, I went to a shrink to talk about this because I felt like I was suffocating with each breath. After a few sessions, he told me that my father wants me around because he wants to control me.
He wants to control everything about my life. I didn’t believe him at the time. Back then, I thought that my father still had a shred of love or affection toward me.
But now I know that he was right.
The fact that I loved Alicia didn’t matter to him.
She was taking me away from him and he couldn’t have it. She had to go.
Of course, it had to be an accident. She was the daughter of a very important person in his company.
There were appearances to keep up.
I clench my fists. My head starts to throb, as if these thoughts are physical things that are running into the walls of my brain.
The pit of my stomach fills with anger and hate.
I lust for revenge.
He will pay for what he did to her.
They both will, I promise myself. How? I don’t know yet.
A part of me wants to do it quickly.
I’m not Abbott. I don’t respond immediately with anger.
But on this occasion, it takes actual restraint to stop myself from following Dagger and just stabbing him to death.
He’s the one who actually killed Alicia.
But what about my father? If I act now, without a plan, I will only be able to get one of them.
That’s not good enough.
That’s nowhere near good enough.
And if I do get Dagger? What will happen then?
I won’t be able to get off this island without getting caught. Not without a plan.
And if I do get caught, what then? A trial? A guilty verdict for killing one of the King’s men.
A death sentence for treason, or maybe worse; a lifetime in prison?
And what about my father?
He was the one who ordered the murder. Does he just get away with everything forever?
I imagine going to my father’s chambers and attacking him. I imagine my hands wrapping tightly around his throat, squeezing the life out of him.
I imagine the way his eyes would bug out of his skull and him pleading for his life.
I want that. Oh, how I want that.
But a quick death like that isn’t good enough for the King of York.
Oh, no.
The King of York needs to suffer.
And he will suffer most by losing everything that he has built.
To properly avenge him and all of his sins, the King of York needs to lose his whole fortune and then his title and this place he calls home.
He needs to see his life’s work go up in flames.
And then, and only then, will I end his life.
How does that line go again?
Revenge is a dish best served cold.
Cold because it needs to be planned.
Cold because it cannot be over in a moment.
Just taking their lives isn’t enough.
Al
icia deserves so much more.
She deserves the destruction of a place that forces women to do things against their will.
It will not be easy and it will not be quick.
But nothing worth doing is.
It is effort and determination, which make the most daring of dreams a reality. It is effort and determination and, hopefully, a bit of luck which will give me my revenge.
The rage and anger that consumed me only a minute ago seems to dissipate.
Suddenly, my life has a purpose.
A goal.
My father wanted to keep me from running away from York.
My father wanted to keep me from pretending that this place didn’t exist.
Well, he is getting what he wants.
I will no longer close my eyes to the realities of this place.
From now on, my life’s only purpose will be to work toward destroying everything that Alistair Bay built and everything that he is.
Chapter 15 - Easton
When I go through the motions…
Over the next few days, I fulfill my duties as a loyal son.
I go on a bunch of dates and act cordial and polite.
We go out to dinner, eating by the ocean, and talk about who we are.
Well, mainly I ask about them. I focus my attention on them so that I don’t have talk too much about myself.
They are only too happy to oblige.
They go into their backgrounds and their life stories.
I only half listen.
None of them seem to notice.
I keep waiting for the one person I do want to have a date with. But the closer I get to seeing Everly, the more nervous I get.
“So, what made you want to come here and participate in this?” I ask the girl named Olivia. She’s easy on the eyes and knows how to carry herself. She easily moves among different topics of conversation, jumping from literature, to art, to history.
“It sounded exciting. I’m single so I thought, why not?” she says, kicking her foot under the table toward mine. I force a smile.
“Are you okay?” she asks after a moment.
“Yes, of course.” I try to snap out of it.
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