Page 133 of Rags to Royals

Cian: I heard your mom talking to her and then on the phone with Amber. She set Diane up to help Amber instead.

of course she did.

Mariah sent me the list of ingredients for the chicken parmesan bake. It’s cubed chicken breasts, sautéed with garlic and butter, penne pasta, heavy cream, and a ton of Parmesan cheese.

It sounds perfect. It actually doesn’t require much time in the oven. Just enough to melt and brown the cheese on top. Still, it will be delicious and will smell great when Scarlett gets home from work.

More, it will hopefully cheer Mariah up and give us a chance to talk.

Today at school was another shit show.

This time I got to witness it.

Leah had approached Mariah in the lunchroom. Yes, I had lunch duty on my second day.

There was a new podcast this morning and Mariah, Scarlett, Ruby, Henry, and I had already checked it out. We weren’t going to get caught unaware again.

This time, Lindsey and Jen talked about the fact that my grandfather wants all of us married.

Thankfully, it didn’t mention that he was arranging our marriages. There also wasn’t discussion about the poker game or Alfred. They made it sound as if my grandfather really just wanted us all married and happy.

There was no hint that Abigail and Torin were married for reasons anything other than true love. They didn’t say a thing about Linnea being the assumed queen since she was four years old, or the fact that she had been engaged to Declan, then Torin, then kind-of me for about two minutes. There also wasn’t a single mention of Astrid.

Still, Leah had felt the need to bring up to Mariah that it seems Cian…I—yes, this is all very weird—am spending time with this mystery woman with the assumption that she will soon be a princess.

While all of that was true, Leah is also under the assumption—rightly so, to be fair—that this woman is not Scarlett.

Again, proof in her mind that Mariah has been lying about my previous relationship with Scarlett.

They actually got into a shouting match across the lunchroom.

Mariah had insisted that Cian—I—proposed to Scarlett. Leah had tossed back that clearly he has moved on if that ever wasthe case. Mariah insisted I—Cian—is in love with Scarlett. Leah refused to accept that for obvious reasons. Mariah told Leah that she has no idea what she’s talking about, and Leah laughed.

Mariah had stomped out of the lunchroom without eating her lunch.

I had found myself literally fighting to keep from crossing the room and doing whatever I could to cut Leah Lawton down to size.

Of course there were two problems with that. One, that would mean exposing myself, and I couldn’t do that without talking to Scarlett about a plan for what would happen when everyone found out the truth.

Two, and probably more importantly, a grown man didn’t do that to a teenage girl.

Mariah steps into the kitchen as I’ve finished dicing the chicken.

“This is as far as I’ve gotten,” I tell her.

She swings her backpack off her shoulder and onto one of the kitchen chairs. She looks over everything I have laid out on the counter. “That’s a pretty good start,” she tells me.

Okay, we’re speaking. That’s a good first step. I wouldn’t blame her if she was angry with me. All of this is really my fault. I’m not sorry that I came to Emerald and I’m not sorry for respecting Scarlett’s boundaries when she said she didn’t want anyone to know I am here for her. But my spontaneous decision to go undercover has created a much bigger issue that I definitely did not think through.

Mariah goes to the sink and washes her hands. She reaches for a towel and is drying them when she says, “My mom thinks that you should just live your life and be a good example of what you want people to think of you. But you shouldn’t have to tell people who you are and what you believe in. People should just know by how you act and the things you do.” She hangs the towelup and turns. “Mom says that words can be weapons and that we should be careful with them. That we should judge people by what they do, not what they say.” Mariah braces her hands on the edge of the sink and leans back. She studies the floor instead of looking at me.

I stay quiet, grateful that she’s opening up and honestly, not totally sure what to say anyway. But I put down the utensils and turn to face her, giving her my full attention.

“I think about that with my grandfather,” she goes on. “He tells the kids at church that he wants me to come to youth group and to services, he says he wants me to be closer to God, but he doesn’tdoanything to get me there himself.” She scuffs the floor with the toe of her shoe. “I used to think that sending the kids after me was him doing something but…it’s not. That’s easy. He can send them and then blame them when it doesn’t work.” She takes a breath. “My mom used to talk to Brian about stuff. But anytime she wanted to talk about God or the church, Brian made herdostuff at the same time.”

“Yeah, she told me,” I say. “She said that’s how she learned to fix cars.”

Mariah nods her head. “Yeah, but other stuff too. He told her he listened better if he was doing something while he was talking. So sometimes it was fixing someone’s screen door or taking them groceries. Things like that. He’d always make her go along. And if she wasn’t giving him a “lesson”, he’d sometimes call and tell her he wanted to talk about something.” Mariah smiles. “She told me that in the end, those actions always made a bigger impression on her than my grandpa’s words on Sundays. She would hear him preaching from the pulpit about taking care of our neighbors or welcoming strangers, and she’d think about Brian.”

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