Page 89 of Prince of the Palisades

Ime examines her half-eaten dinner, peeking at Annika, then me, through her thick eyelashes.

Annika is steady, unmoving. Silent. A shell of the sister I grew up with.

“Restroom,” I mutter, pushing my chair back. The force tips over my half-empty water glass. I don’t stay to clean up the mess.

“You know,” Grace says, startling me when I emerge from the restroom, “no one talks to my dad like that.”

I sniff. “I’m honored to be the first.”

She doesn’t react to my sarcasm. Instead, she leans against a marble wall, sizing me up. I cross my arms, smiling coyly.

“Is there a problem, Grace?”

“I’m trying to understand you. You’re all ‘no comment’ at school and parties, then you show up at a protest.”

I shrug. “I contain multitudes.”

“And just now,” she continues like she’s not satisfied with my answer, “with my dad—you looked like the Jadon from that video.”

My teeth clench hard. “What’s your point?”

“Is that the real you?”

The heavy silence between us is broken by my knuckles cracking. My hands ball into fists at my sides. Tension ripples through my body. Grace’s eyes don’t leave mine. She’s waiting for an answer.

I refuse to give it. “Why weren’tyouat the protest?”

Morgan told me Nathan had an orchestra commitment he couldn’t get out of. But she never said where Grace was.

“Isn’t Morgan your friend?” I challenge.

She inhales, lips pursed. It’s her turn to avoid questions.

“Don’t pretend to know what happens between me andmyfriends.”

“Don’t pretend to know me,” I hiss. “You have no idea what I’m dealing with—”

“I was eight when my mom died,” she inserts. “Ten when the press said my dad rode the wife-died-from-breast-cancer sympathy train to his first election. Fourteen when a classmate sold me out to the highest-paying media outlet.”

My mouth snaps shut when reality sinks in. Her pink headband, the ribbons she wore all last month. Her mom died from cancer, just like my pépère. Her whole world changed after that, just like mine. Her friend sold her out, just like Kofi.

I didn’t know any of this about her. I never bothered to ask.

“I don’t do a lot of things because of who my dad is,” she says. “Because it’seasier.”

Her voice cracks. The smallest chip in the armor I’ve always seen Grace wear.

“My friends are allIhave,” she goes on, sounding nothing like Senator Miller. Her eyes are shiny. “I don’t always agree with my dad. But why fight him? Dealing with the backlash isn’t worth it.”

“So, you do nothing?” I ask.

“I play my part,” she says with a stubborn chin lift. “Stay out of trouble. Study hard. Look perfect. Act like—”

“You don’t care?”

“You’re not the first person to think I’m cold. A bitch.” She releases a harsh breath. “I do what I’m supposed to. For now. Until I’m at Harvard or Yale. Anywhere but here. Nate and Morg know I love them.”

I narrow my eyes. “Do they?”

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