“I’m trying to win you back, Angel.”
I quickly shifted the conversation away from me, from anything personal. “What are you doing if you’re not here all day?”
“I’m still here. Working.”
“On what?”
He gave me a look. “Our happily ever after.” My gut churned. I couldn’t help the feeling that every time I spoke, no matter the subject, I was giving him what he wanted. I didn’t feel safe—at all.
He stepped toward me. “I think I’ve just had a breakthrough.”
I stepped behind the broken cobblestone wall, putting a barrier between us “And what did you find—”
West gripped my chin, dragging my neck over the wall, cutting me off. “When you’re alone with me, you can talk. Always. But when we are with company, you must never talk. Ever.” His grip bruised. “This is very important.”
His eyes traveled beyond me, where the du Lac servant with green eyes walked the fields. When she was gone, he let me go, spearing his pockets.
“What about…” I trailed off, taking my bottom lip between my teeth as the words those girls had spoken earlier spun in my mind.
Is it true you’re the Cinderella of Crowne Hall?
My—rather, our, all four of us—twisted little fairy had traveled the world.
“What about the paparazzi when I become your mistress? How are you going to explain that away?”
West straightened his shoulders. “What about the paparazzi?”
“The paparazzi will wonder. The world will wonder. I’m not just a nobody anymore.”
He laughed. “Any stories that got out about you, were only because I wanted them there.”
I opened and closed my mouth.
That couldn’t be true, could it?
“Even the one that got me attacked?”
Pain flickered across his eyes, almost making me think he was sorry, but it vanished in an instant.
“Yes.” His voice was stone. “Even that one.?
?
“You’re evil.”
His eyes flashed to mine, but he said nothing.
“You can’t silence the internet,” I gritted.
“Josephine used to be a famous model, she was on the cover of magazines, on runways, and at one point you couldn’t turn on the TV without hearing her name. Josephine St. Germaine was going to be the next Marilyn Monroe. Have you ever heard her name?”
I sucked in lungfuls of air.
No…I only knew her name because I’d worked at Crowne Hall.
“You’ll be forgotten too, Angel, because that’s what the internet does best.” He gave me a look of pity. “In a few months, something shiny will come along and everyone will forget about the Cinderella of Crowne Hall.”
I stared at the wispy, flowing grass. The sun was setting, lighting the green on fire in bursts of orange and white.