My phone beeped again, and I growled as I picked it up to look at the display.
Mom: Did you forget to tell me something?
She attached a link to the TikTok video in her text and I groaned again. That was not how I planned to tell her and Dad what happened. I was still waiting to hear from Lucas. If he was freaking out about this whole situation, then he was doing it quietly…or more likely, he’d stuck his head in the sand and was ignoring it.
Me: Sorry, Mom. We need to talk.
Mom: Lunch? Dad and I can swing a break at the same time today.
Me: Okay, what time?
We made arrangements for lunch and I silenced my phone. I didn’t know why I hadn’t done it earlier, probably because I was hoping Lucas might try to make contact. His silence worried me. I knew he needed time to process, and depending on how drunk he actually was the night before, he might not have even realized what he’d done yet.
I was just getting back into the flow of studying when the doorbell interrupted me. I cursed under my breath and dragged myself off the bed to check the video display. All I could see on the screen was an enormous bunch of flowers.
“Hello?” I said, pushing the intercom button.
“Francesca Davenport?” the delivery guy asked from behind the flowers.
“Um, yep, that’s me,” I replied.
“I have a delivery for you.”
“I see that. I’ll be down in a sec.”
I skipped down the two flights of stairs to the foyer and opened the door. The flower arrangement was even bigger in person than it had been on the screen upstairs.
“Sign here,” the guy said, shoving a tablet at me.
I signed my name, and he deposited the massive bunch of flowers—complete with crystal vase—into my arms.
“Uh, thanks,” I said, fumbling with a tip before bumping the door closed with my hip.
Who the heck would send me flowers? My pulse picked up, and I felt a little giddy. Were they from Lucas? He’d never sent me anything before, not even a GIF message or a funny email, he barely even used emojis when he texted me. He’d given me gifts before, but he’d always done it in person.
I carried the enormous flower arrangement through to the kitchen and heaved it up onto the counter. They were beautiful. I couldn’t name all the flowers in the bouquet—not that that was anything alarming, I wasn’t exactly a flower person—but they were lovely all the same. And the colors! They were bright and happy and vibrant. Who knew flowers came in all these different colors? There was not a red rose or a pink carnation in sight.
I searched through the veritable shrub of flowers until I found a card. Not just a card. The envelope was thick card stock and there was a wax seal on the back. I cracked the seal and opened the envelope to pull out the hand-written note inside…okay, not hand-written exactly. It was printed—I’m guessing from an email—but the message had been handwritten in its original form.
Dear Francesca,
Congratulations on your recent engagement.
We look forward to meeting you.
King Christophe Kostopolous
I may have sworn.
I may have even blacked out for a moment.
These flowers were from a king…the king. Lucas’ king.
Holy moly.
This was real, even if it was fake. Lucas and I were actually going to pretend we were engaged, and we would do this by deceiving royalty.
My knees turned to jello, and I lowered myself to a chair as I tried really hard not to hyperventilate.
When I’d agreed to be Lucas’ fake fiancée, I hadn’t thought through the fact that we would have to lie to the king.
Could that be construed as treason?
I didn’t know how the whole monarchy thing worked. Did they still behead people? Or hang them? The closest I came to anything regarding royalty was watching Game of Thrones, and although logically I knew that Kalopsia was nothing like Westeros, the fear was still there. Queen Cersei was not someone I ever wanted to meet, let alone lie to. Neither was Daenerys, if I was honest. Oh, that girl was fierce, and I loved her, but that didn’t mean I wanted to meet her or her dragons.
What had we done? And was it too late to get out of it? I mean, the king already knew we were engaged, even if he didn’t know it was fake. I couldn’t exactly send the flowers back and say, ‘sorry, but it was all a mistake.’ And if I pulled out of the agreement with Lucas, his father wouldn’t let him go to Kalopsia and he would lose his chance to finally be out from under his parents’ thumb. And I would lose my topic for my dissertation.
I bent forward and put my head between my legs as I tried to calm my breathing. Maybe if we explained the situation to the king…
The doorbell interrupted my freak out. I groaned. I was in no frame of mind to talk to anyone and if it was another gift from the king, I might actually throw up.
I glanced at the screen on the kitchen wall and exhaled roughly. Lucas. Thank God it was Lucas. Maybe between the two of us we could work out how to get out of this mess.
Lucas
I smoothed my the front of my shirt and tried to ignore the sweat on my hands as I waited for Frankie to answer the door. I’d tried calling her, but she wasn’t answering and I was convinced she never wanted to speak to me again. I hadn’t realized my mother would share that stupid video to all her social media followers. I didn’t have social media, so it took Effie summoning me to her office for me to realize what was going on.
This entire thing had gotten so far out of hand, I didn’t know what to do. I just hoped Frankie had a plan. Frankie always had a plan.
The door opened and Frankie smiled hesitantly at me. That was new, and I didn’t like it. Frankie was never hesitant about anything.
“Hey,” she said.
“Hey,” I replied, pushing my glasses up my nose.
We stared at each other for a moment and then she swung the door wide.
“Come in,” she said.
I stepped across the threshold and past Frankie, close enough to pick up on her scent. She smelled like chocolate chip cookies. Had I ever noticed that before?
“Can I get you a drink?” she asked, leading me through the brownstone to the kitchen.
“Coffee would be great,” I replied, and she looked at me with surprise.
I wasn’t a big coffee drinker, it usually made my anxiety worse, but I needed it today if only to get over the whiskey headache that was still throbbing behind my eyes.
“Cream and sugar?”
“Please,” I replied.
I might be drinking coffee today, but that didn’t mean I liked the taste of it.
I slid onto a stool by the kitchen counter and watched as she made my coffee. She moved gracefully, almost like she was dancing. Had I noticed that before? And why was I noticing it now? In fact, why was I suddenly noticing a whole lot of things about her I’d never noticed before? Like that little sliver of skin that she bared when she reached up to pull a mug out of the overhead cupboards, or the way she smelled, or the way her hair looked like she’d just crawled out of bed…and not in a bad way.
I cleared my throat and tore my eyes away from her. The atmosphere between us was already weird, I didn’t need to make it any weirder. I scanned the room for something else to pin my attention on and noticed the massive arrangement of flowers.