She came to the sink beside me, washing her hands slowly, delicately, as if I was nothing. In a dark emerald gown with fine gold detailing, she was every bit the elegant woman I remembered. She reached across me to grab a handkerchief embroidered with the Crowne seal.
“Good to see you finally embracing your role,” she said quietly, drying her hands. “See you don’t forget it.” She smiled at me sweetly, handing me the used handkerchief.
The urge to speak back was so strong it gave me a stomachache. I could tell she knew, because she smiled broader. In the end, I said nothing, and she left, the door shutting softly behind her.
I stared at the used napkin in my hand, hating myself.
Then Lottie groaned, followed by the unmistakable sound of vomiting.
I pulled at the threads of the embroidered seal. The last time I saw Lottie, she wished I would die. The last time I saw Lottie…she’d announced she was pregnant, and Grayson chose me.
Another groan followed, and I went to her. She was on the floor, both arms cradling the toilet, head resting on one arm as a pretty emerald dress similar to her mother’s pooled around her body like water.
Lottie lifted her head. “Mom, I told you to leave me—” She froze.
We both did.
Her, like she’d seen a ghost, and me with the cloth I’d grabbed for her midair, staring at her stomach.
Lottie and I were exactly the same months along, our stomachs rounded similarly. Unlike me, she didn’t have to hide it under an empire waist gown.
The whole world knew she was pregnant.
If anyone found out the baby in my belly was Grayson’s…
I swallowed past the lump in my throat, and thrust the napkin at her. She eyed the cloth like it would burst into a thousand spiders, but then she lurched, head back into the toilet.
I got to my knees, taking her hair in my hands.
“What are you—” she broke off on a lurch, and then for a few minutes, I held her hair.
Soon, Lottie calmed down, and I released her hair as she fell against the ornately carved wooden stall. I did the same on the opposite side. Her face was drained of color, eyes glassy and lips cracked.
Lottie du Lac, the beautiful billionaire heiress. The princess that was always meant to marry my prince. After a minute her eyes found mine, as if registering I was there for the first time.
“The last time we spoke, I wished you would die.”
I nodded…I remembered.
“I do, you know.” Her eyes flitted to mine, red, glaring. Then she blinked, looking away. “I mean, I don’t. I…I—” she broke off, eyes wide as she spun around vomiting into the bowl. I reached for her hair again, but she was finished quickly, and she leaned back against the wall.
“You look different,” she said.
I feel different.
“People have been mistaking me for you all night.” She grabbed the cloth hand towel without taking her eyes off me. “They keep trying to get me to speak out of turn.”
She arched a brow, noting that I hadn’t spoken a word.
“You’re wearing silver velvet and I’m in green silk but—” She threw up her hands.
Moments passed in silence. I think Lottie was feeling better, yet she didn’t move to stand, and neither did I.
“Why did you do it?” she asked softly, eyes slowly lifting to mine.
I had a feeling she wasn’t referring to me holding her hair back.
I worked my lips to the side. Which part? Our history was tangled in bad choices…bad, inevitable choices.
“You were supposed to leave after a month.”
I blinked, not sure what to say, because this was news to me.
“You were supposed to leave and then…he would learn to love me again. I was okay waiting for that. That…I could handle.”
She played with the soft fabric of her dress. She wasn’t angry, just resigned, as if reciting a sad part of history long forgotten.
Slowly her eyes wandered back to me. “He was going to give up everything for you. You won.”
I know I should stay quiet, but I couldn’t.
Not about this.
“And he would have been so miserable.”
Her brows caved at that, tears filled her eyes, and her ministrations froze in the fabric.
“I hate you.” She sounded like she was saying it more to affirm it to herself.
I didn’t do anything, I don’t think she wanted me to do anything. I think in a weird way, we were the only people who understood. We’d both murdered all the decent things inside us for love.
The same jagged shard had pierced both of us.
“I hate you,” she said again, with more emphasis, staring at me.
Waiting.
“I hate you too,” I said.
She exhaled a deep sigh, like good.
“Does Grayson know you’re this sick?”
“Hopefully I’ll lose it.” She shook her head and whispered so low I barely heard it. “It’s the least I deserve.”
Before I could say anything to that, she stood. I followed suit, as outside the sound of Christmas got closer—bells and giggles and orchestral music. She lingered, holding the handkerchief, a look in her eyes I recognized too well.
From Grayson.
It felt like she wanted to tell me something, but kept stopping herself.
What was she to me now? What was I to her? Lottie and I weren’t friends, we hadn’t ever been acquaintances. First, she was the woman whose happily ever after I stole. Then, the love of my life’s fiancée. Now my secret husband’s wife. My once sister-in-law.
Fate seemed determined to make us enemies, but I’d never once hated her. Not really.
Were we just two hearts destined to collide?
So I did the thing I’d learned too well from Grayson. I stick my heart on my sleeve and bleed.
“Lottie, do you need someone?”
She blinked, and I saw it for a moment—fear, heartache, and self-loathing.
Then she hardened her face. “From you?” Anger washed her features. “Do you have any idea what you did?” She shook her head ruefully. “Maybe, or maybe not, because this is the real you, isn’t it? You act nice, but you destroy everyone. Do you have any idea what’s happened to him because of you? If you loved him, you would have left with him. You wouldn’t have left him.”
My mouth dried. “What happened?”
“The next morning, after Grayson didn’t run away with you…” Lottie opened her mouth, then closed it.
“What?” I gripped her arm. “What happened while I was away?”
Dread coiled in my gut the longer she went without speaking.
Slowly, her icy eyes met mine. “He’s a prisoner in this house because of you.”
Grayson Crowne, a prisoner in his own home?
I didn’t believe it.
I couldn’t.
“You’re lying.”
She tore her arm out of my grip. “I think that’s your specialty, Story.”
She spun on her heel, the door slamming shut behind her.
I stared at the closed door, her words spiraling on repeat in my head.
They poked at all the worries that had been burrowing holes in my heart.
Was this the real me?
Had I made a huge mistake?
And what the fuck happened to Grayson? Prisoner.