His Royal Highness(27)

Cal usually offers me a glass of expensive wine with dinner, and I always accept. Tonight, though, I’m tempted to ask Ava to leave the bottle. Better yet, waterfall it into my open mouth, will you? Cal takes his wine very seriously. His selections are always thoughtful. This vintage was grown during the rainy season in Tuscany. I don’t tell him it could be gas station wine for all the difference I taste.

Tonight, especially, he’s raving about the bottle he’s selected, and I nod and hum when it seems appropriate, but my mind is not present. It seems to be completely absent this week.

He mumbles something.

I nod again. Yes, grapes. I taste them.

Then he catches my attention with his next comment.

“I’m so happy you’ll be there.”

Wait. What?

“Sorry, I spaced out. Did I just agree to something?”

He smiles, unperturbed by my lack of focus.

“I’m hosting a dinner party on Friday. I’d like you to come. You can bring Carrie.”

I open my mouth, scrolling through potential rejections in my head. Women in the ’50s didn’t know how good they had it. That hair-washing excuse? Brilliant.

“It’s settled then,” he says, refilling my glass. “You’ll be there.”





I can’t go on. This week has lasted four hundred years. I’m barely sleeping. Caffeine has lost its effect on me. Every time I walk into my dorm room, that gift card taunts me. Eventually, I pass it off to one of the freshman girls, the first one I see out in the hallway.

“You. Here. Take this.”

I shove it into her hand, hard.

“Are you serious?” she asks, eyes wide. “Did I win some kind of sweepstakes?”

“Yes. Go.”

Get it out of my sight.

I feel better with it gone. I walk back into my room and am glad to find there’s one less thing to remind me of my old crush. I barely think of him at all as I slip into my pajamas and grab my book. I’ve forgotten he even exists as I reread one page three times before slamming the book shut and staring up at my ceiling, angry.

On Thursday, Derek rescues a toddler. I wish I were kidding.

Somehow, a little boy with rosy cheeks and chunky I-wanna-eat-’em-up thighs gets loose underneath the red rope that separates us from the crowd. Unaware of the potential danger, he beelines straight for the one death trap in the entire great hall: a decorative poker resting in front of the hearth.

“Ben! Benjamin!” His mom’s shouts are piercing as they echo off the walls.

Derek steps forward and scoops the boy up, inciting a wave of audible sighs—because duh, the whole image is peak adorableness.

The toddler’s mom comes barreling through the crowd, crying as she thanks Derek—who, by the way, didn’t really do all that much except confidently hold a child in his arms and look good while doing it.

It doesn’t matter. The story gets inflated. Did you hear Derek rescued some kid who fell from the second story of the castle? is the iteration I hear back at the dorm later, during the ice cream social I organized for my floor. I stand behind a table, doling out scoops while the freshman girls twitter on about the story as if it’s breaking news. They’re supposed to be bonding, I think, before realizing they are…over Derek and how “He’s not just handsome, he’s a hero!”

The next day, it gets worse.

After I finish taking a photo with a family, I step back and catch the bottom of my dress on my heel. The tulle gets stuck. I lose my balance and flinch in anticipation of my collision with the ground. Then, suddenly, arms swoop out to catch me, stopping my momentum so I end up horizontal in someone’s arms rather than on the floor.

Derek has a confident hold on me while he leans over, mouth inches from mine.

“Steady.”

His deep voice is a whisper that steals my breath.

A thousand volts of energy surge from where his hand lingers at my waist.

“Whit! Er…Princess Elena, are you okay?” Ryan asks, rushing over to help right me. His reflexes are as slow as molasses. If it were up to him, I’d be nursing a concussion right now.

I swallow in lieu of answering. It was nothing. Not even a trip, just a stumble. And yet my heart is pounding like I fell. Hard.

“Let’s take five.”

Derek’s suggestion isn’t meant to be questioned, but I do anyway.

“Don’t be silly. I’m perfectly fine.”

Perfectly fine might be a slight exaggeration.

After all, Cal’s dinner party is tonight and I have no idea how I’m going to survive it. I’ve spent all week running from one activity to another, keeping myself busy—on purpose. The few moments I’ve been alone, I’ve immediately defaulted to thinking of Derek. Carrie keeps asking me how I feel now that he’s back, and there’s no simple answer for it. My emotions can’t seem to agree. Part of me is still angry with him for how he left things eight years ago. It wants retribution. Part of me is elated that he’s finally come home. I feared he never would. Another, smaller part—the part I wish I could ignore—is still embarrassed by how I behaved back then. Like an overeager puppy.

Proof of this is found in an email I pull up while I’m waiting for Carrie to arrive at my dorm that evening.