In this world, those are friends.
Snitch was in my head, in my blood. Every step I took, she swirled like a shimmering ghost around me, her wide as walnut eyes following me. I couldn’t reach the columns fast enough. I pulled a joint from my inner suit pocket, lighting it quickly and taking a long drag, trying to banish her.
Mother really wanted the world to believe we were perfect. The ballroom was covered in white roses. Morbidly fitting, white roses were the symbol of both weddings and death. The goodie bags—sponsored by designers and including boutique tech, streetwear, items you couldn’t get anywhere save this wedding—were already trending.
I couldn’t wait to see that shit pop up on eBay.
Everyone here was smiling, laughing, enjoying the couple of the century’s wedding of the century.
I’m the only one you don’t have fooled, Grayson.
I inhaled smooth smoke, staring out windows lining the ballroom at stars piercing the velvet sky. This party would last all goddamn night. Another inhale, and a rocky, jagged exhale.
I’d once thought Snitch was poison ivy, but getting her out of me was going to be like ripping out thousand-year-old tree roots. If I ever managed to succeed, I would die with it.
I must have stayed between the columns for at least thirty minutes, getting so stoned the gold-and-white wedding started to blur.
I watched Lottie as she made the rounds. She wore the Crowne tiara and glimmered under the chandelier light. Her dress hugged her curves…I remember something being said about hand-cut lace roses.
Whenever she thought someone wasn’t looking, her smile flickered and died.
Sometimes I watch you.
I shook my head, trying to lose Snitch’s raspy whisper.
Lottie was beautiful, perfect, gorgeous—and just a few hours of being my wife was slowly draining her. I kicked off the wall, determined to join her and salvage as much happiness as I could from this wedding.
“I told you to stay the fuck away.” Snitch’s angry whisper perked my ears.
I stopped short. For a second, I thought my ghosts were actually talking back.
I must really be going fucking insane.
Then West spoke, and ice filled my veins.
“You’d rather stay here and work for my sister?”
I looked around, trying to find them.
Why the fuck was she with West?
“What you’re offering isn’t much better,” Snitch hissed.
West laughed.
“You raped me,” she snapped.
I must’ve heard wrong.
This is a nightmare, not a dream.
“Stop fucking saying that!” West growled. “If I raped you, then why did you want me to call you back? Why did you cry over me, Angel?”
An icy calmness came over me as I listened to West dig his own grave. I focused on where I’d heard them. It sounded like they were just on the other side of the column, probably near one of the chocolate fountains.
I’m gonna kill him.
“Pictures!” My mother’s wedding planner appeared before me like a specter. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you. A little birdie told me you like to hide. First the bride and groom, then the family, then…”
I could barely hear her. The muscles in my hand fucking hurt from how much I flexed them.
“Grayson?”
If he could breathe after I finished breaking all the bones in his face, maybe I’d let him live.
“Are you okay?”
I always knew Westley du Lac was a fucking snake.
Pot calling the kettle black, maybe. I shook out of it, pushed past the petite woman, but she grabbed my arm.
The fuck? She might not be a servant, but she had no right to grab a Crowne. I stared at her fingers, then slowly lifted my gaze to hers.
Lottie.
I blinked, coming out of a fury-fueled daze.
Lottie had grabbed me.
“Lottie?” I looked at her hand on my arm again.
Lottie snatched my hand, tugging my fist open. I stared at my hand numbly, at the streaks of char against my golden palm and the red burn marks from squeezing it so hard. I forgot I’d had a blunt.
“What’s wrong with you?” she asked.
“I…uh, zoned out.”
She gave me a bereft look, eyeing my burned palm. “Do you need to go to the doctor?”
We both knew that wasn’t an option.
Grayson Crowne couldn’t disappear from his own reception, not after the video.
She handed me a thick cloth napkin. “Hold it until the bleeding stops.” Her lips thinned, and her stare hadn’t let up. “You were supposed to lie low. You’re making a scene. Can’t you just play pretend for a few hours?” She shot looks at the wedding planner watching us with shrewd eyes, the paparazzi a few feet behind her. “We’ve been doing it our entire lives…”
I gripped Lottie’s shoulders and her eyes grew. “I want to do more with you than play fucking pretend, Lottie.”
Her eyes grew at my words.
I looked around, trying to spot Snitch.
“You’re still looking for her,” Lottie said, hollow.
I owed Lottie. Now there were people in the world who knew the truth of our wedding night. Knew I’d fucked someone else.
But rape?
Fucking rape?
I found Lottie’s eyes. There was nothing to make this right. I’d ruined the most special day of her life.
She exhaled, trying to shrug out of my hold. “Let’s go take pictures.”
I tightened my grip, holding Lottie in place.
Everything in me said to go find Snitch. To make sure she was okay.
Or to beat Lottie’s brother to a pulp.
What do you do when you want to do the right thing, but whatever right you choose will end up wronging someone? How do you choose?
“They’re waiting,” Lottie said softly.
It was tense. Awkward. Wrong. My mother knew I’d fucked someone else. Her mother knew. Hell, I’d bet the famous photographer positioning us, muttering something under her breath about contrived, knew.
The only one who didn’t know everyone knew yet was Snitch herself.
Still I couldn’t stop thinking about Snitch. All the times I’d been jealous about West, had goaded her, had used it against her.
I was fucking trash.
She hadn’t opened up to me. There was still so much she kept from me.
“Grayson, you’re not smiling,” Lottie whispered miserably.
I affected the smile. The famous Grayson Crowne smile, the one no one knew meant I was miserable.
No one but Snitch.
We took photos until the reception blurred into glittery gold. Until I didn’t feel the muscles at my cheeks twitch. The bodies next to mine were interchangeable, so I didn’t pay attention to the arm landing on my shoulders until he spoke.
“Hey, bro,” West said, the smile in his voice like oil.
My blood went cold.
The music died.
I craned my neck slowly, meeting his dark brown eyes. It seemed to happen in slow motion. He smiled and made jokes with the photographer, joked with his dad and my mom.
As everyone—my mom, grandfather, sister, Lottie and her brother, parents and grandparents—posed for a family photo, I threw a right hook, crunching into West’s jaw.
It was a sucker punch, but I still felt pretty fucking good when he landed flat on the marble floor.