Lucky Charm (Reverse Fairytales Book 2)(65)

“My wedding?” I gulped. I’d already had one ruined wedding. I couldn’t bear another.

“We will get a lot more guards on duty on the week leading up to it, but your current guards should be aware. We’ll do our best to keep everyone safe.”

I could barely wrap my head around it all. Yesterday, I still had two men to choose from and a wedding to look forward to. Just twenty-four hours later, one of the men was gone, and someone wanted to kill me.

“I want you to leave,” I said to Leo.

“I’m sorry? I know this must be distressing, but I can assure you, I’m doing everything I can.”

“No, it’s not you,” I said, realizing how he could have misunderstood my intentions. “You are brilliant. It’s just that Elise is pregnant. I don’t want anything to happen to her. Can you take my mother too?”

“As much as I want Elise to be safe, I don’t think taking her away from the palace is a good idea right now. She was fine for the party yesterday, but the pregnancy is hitting her hard. She can’t travel. I’ll make sure she is safe, as I will your mother and everyone else in the palace. If we all evacuate now, The Regent and the rest of the MDS will know. We are safer at the palace than anywhere right now. I’ve instructed quite a high number of the police to guard the palace leading up to the wedding.”

I wasn’t so sure, but I nodded my head. I had to trust him even though the thought of my sister’s life being in danger terrified me much more than my own safety.

“What about the Freedom of Magic? Can they help us? They’ve been gathering information on the MDS for years.”

“I’m sure they could be very useful; however, we have one problem with that. We don’t know who they are and without Cynder to tell us, we have no way to contact them.”





Wedding Plans





The next two months passed slowly and in a state of fear. I warned the royal guard to be extra cautious and, true to his word, Leo sent police to bulk up their numbers. I wasn’t sure if the extra security made me feel safer or more nervous, but I couldn’t get a moment alone at all. The palace was always filled, and I felt like I was constantly being watched. Guards stood in every corridor, and yet, every unexplained noise had my heart jumping. All packages and letters for us were diverted to a local sorting office where specialized bomb squads opened them and checked their contents. Despite the fact that I kept the media out of the palace, I had more eyes on me than ever. The only solitude I got was when I was in my room at night. I’d not heard from Cynder in over two months. Luca’s parents confirmed that he hadn’t returned to Thalia or, at least, not to his job at the royal castle, and the media hadn’t caught up with him. It was probably for the best, but every night, I gazed out of my window looking for a light in his old apartment that never came.

Most of my days were filled with wedding plans. My mother, Xavi, Jenny, and occasionally Elise when she felt up to it, would sit with me in the dressing room going through swatches and photos of wedding gowns. The only good thing that happened over the two months leading up to the wedding was the fact I got to stop an order of the most flouncy horrible meringue gown I’d ever seen that my mother had picked out for me. Instead, I sketched out something, something plain that Xavi promised to have made for me. I was in no doubt she wouldn’t be able to make it without adding her own touches, but anything was better than the meringue gown. Elise’s bridesmaid dress was a much easier choice. She picked out a beautiful pale golden dress that could be let out to cover her burgeoning belly. Thus, the theme of the wedding became gold and white. It enabled my mother to pick matching flowers and centerpieces and the million other things that a royal wedding seemed to require. At least, they were all happy, and partly, so was I. It was nice to spend time with them. I’d been so busy in the previous months that I’d forgotten what it was like to be around family.

Luca took up a lot of my duties, leaving me to relax as much as possible, and, as such, I saw very little of him. The only people I saw to do with work on a frequent basis were Leo and, occasionally, Dean when he came up to the palace.

Little progress was made on the identity of The Regent, although they had narrowed it down to someone who had connections to the capital. I tried not to worry about it. After all, the palace security was at an all-time high. Even the demonstrations outside the palace seemed to have dwindled to a few hard-core people with banners.

All in all, in the week running up to the wedding, I was beginning to come out of my funk and actually look forward to the occasion. The cathedral was booked and decorated. The palace ballroom, swathed in bunches of gold and white material with flowers to match looked as beautiful as it had ever been, and I even had a dress I was halfway happy with.

On the morning of the wedding, I woke up to glorious sunshine filtering through the curtains. Opening them wide, I knew it was going to be a magical day. People had come out in droves to see us and were already jostling for a good view at the back gates. I knew that there would be ten times that number at the front gates.

Jenny kindly brought me a breakfast of fruit, and when I complained about the lack of bacon sandwiches, she winked and lifted the silver cover, revealing one.

“How are you feeling?” she asked as I grabbed for the sandwich.

“Good, I suppose.”

“You suppose?” She arched her brow, sitting on my bed. She knew me too well.