Page 4 of Royal Games (The Royals of Monterra)

“Whitney. Your best friend, Whitney?” he asked behind me.

I wished he didn’t remember everything and that he wasn’t so smug about knowing so much about me.

“You don’t need to call her. I can drive you. It’s no problem.”

“I don’t want your help. I don’t need it. And I don’t need you.” I didn’t know why I’d felt the need to tack on the last sentence or for whose benefit it had been. I let myself in the front door and slammed it behind me with a satisfying sound. Thankfully, Aunt Sylvia had made herself scarce. I was in no mood for an interrogation. I called Whitney, and she didn’t hear anything in my voice that made her concerned or ask questions. She said she’d be by soon. I was going to get my shower after all.

I picked up my overnight bag from where I had dropped it earlier. Straightening up, I saw Rafe through the window. He had opened the hood and was fiddling around inside Old Bess’s engine. Weird emotions flared up inside me. I did not need this stress.

What I needed was for him to leave.

But how was I going to make him go away?

Chapter 2

Whitney honked at me, but I was still brushing my hair. Where only minutes earlier I had felt beyond exhausted, I now looked suspiciously sparkly. My cheeks were bright pink, my hair behaving, my skin clear. Like my whole body was saying, “Yay! Rafe is back!”

Glaring at my reflection, I threw my hair into a ponytail and headed downstairs. I called out my goodbye to Aunt Sylvia. She shouted back that she’d see me at the town meeting later on.

When I got outside, I stopped short when I saw my very married and very pregnant best friend flirting with Rafe. Not to mention that my shepherd collie, Laddie (short for Sir Galahad), was sitting at Rafe’s feet, looking up at him adoringly. I couldn’t be too upset about it, though, because Laddie loved everyone. If we ever got robbed, that dog would take the thieves on a personally guided tour of the house.

Whitney, on the other hand, was a different story. She knew better. I walked up to hear her ask how he knew so much about cars. “I’ve always loved mechanical things,” he said. “The mechanic at our boarding school spent a lot of time teaching me about cars. I almost never get to use that knowledge.”

“Such a shame,” she cooed.

I cleared my throat. She jumped. “Ready?” I asked pointedly.

“Yes.” She seemed very flustered. “So nice to meet you, Rafe.”

“The pleasure was all mine,” he said, and Whitney nearly knocked into me while she twirled the end of her hair. I half expected her to start giggling, so before she could, I elbowed her. She got herself back under control, and we headed down the driveway. When we got into her minivan, I asked, “Why were you standing out there talking to him?”

“I was going to come inside and get you, but I got distracted by tall, dark, and yummy over there.” She started up her car and waved one last time before putting the minivan in reverse. I didn’t look to see if he waved back.

“You’re married. And about to give birth,” I reminded her.

“Married and pregnant, not dead. And not unable to appreciate that he is even more gorgeous in real life than he is on television. How do you not spontaneously combust from lust? And why didn’t you tell me he was here?”

I grimaced and crossed my arms across my chest. “To avoid the conversation we’re about to have.”

She pulled out onto the town’s main road. “You mean the one where I tell you that you are a much better woman than I am if you’re planning to resist all that? What is that saying from yourStar Trekshow? Resistance is feudal?”

“It’s ‘resistance is futile.’ And he’s very resistible. Are you saying you can’t resist him?”

“Don’t give me that. You know I’d never cheat on Christopher in a million years. But you should totally make out with Rafe. You’re letting good lips go to waste. Personally, I think you should lower your shields and prepare to be boarded.”

If she had been anyone else, I wouldn’t have talked with her about him. But Whitney was special. After my aunt took me in, I was too scared to leave the house. At my request, she even homeschooled me for a couple of years. I justified it by saying I had a lot to catch up on, but fear was the main motivation. When I finally felt confident enough to go to school, I made the mistake of choosing freshman year in high school as my introduction into normal society.

As I walked into the main hallway of the high school, tentative and afraid, Tommy Davis had offered to show me around. He was the first regular boy to ever speak to me. He was a junior and seemed so nice and sweet. At the time, I didn’t know that he was Brooke Cooper’s boyfriend, and as such, I was apparently forbidden to speak to him. She cornered me to let me know the many rules that I had just broken, and I could only stand there with tears in my eyes as she detailed exactly how she was going to ruin my life.

Whitney had watched this all happen and jumped into the fray. She told Brooke off, threatening to tell her dad just what exactly Brooke and Tommy got up to after the football games. After Brooke and her cheerleading posse sulked away, Whitney turned to me and said, “Girls like that make me sick. Don’t worry about Brooke. You and I are going to be best friends.”

And we were. Whitney might sometimes be tough and prickly on the outside, but inside she was all gooey with love, devotion, and loyalty. Like a marshmallow. She would deny it, but it was true.

It was one of the reasons why I had been immediately drawn to Lemon Beauchamp, a fellow contestant onMarry Me. At least, I thought she had been a contestant. She had reminded me of Whitney, all Southern sass and strength, but sweet, compassionate, and motherly underneath. She had been a good friend to me, supportive and helpful even when she thought we were falling in love with the same man.

But Lemon had lied to me too. About who she really was and why she was on the show. She had even been engaged to someone else. All things she kept from me.

After everything fell apart, she had showered me with phone calls that I wouldn’t take. The pain was still too raw and powerful, and I blamed her unjustly. It was an annoying tendency of mine to sometimes take things out on the people who deserved them least. It wasn’t Lemon’s scheme that caused it all to fall apart. That was on Dante and Rafe.

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