Belle,” I continued. “We forget about her, Preston. We’ve all got too much to lose.”
“Agreed,” Carter said.
Preston shoved off the couch, storming to the bathroom.
He can fight it now, but eventually he’ll accept it. Nothing good comes from falling in love with Belle Adler.
Chapter Three
“BELLE, WHERE ON EARTH have you been?”
Mom shot out of her seat, abandoning her matcha tiramisu, and pulled me into a smothering hug. Proof enough that I scared both of them. The dame never rose from the table until the meal was finished, and why display affection in public when private worked just as well?
I buried my face in her neck, eyes stinging. What kind of fucking idiot was I falling for Preston Desai’s tricks?
A hand rested on my hair. “We checked the gardens and couldn’t find you,” said Dad. “Your phone was with us. We were worried sick, Belle. Please, no matter how mad you are with us, don’t put us through that again.”
My stomach twisted thinking of what must have gone through their minds. “I swear, Dad, I wasn’t trying to scare you. I... ran into someone outside and they offered to give me a tour of the mansion. I should have told you.”
Mom released me. “All that matters is you’re okay. Now, sit down and eat before they clear the last of the food away. You missed the entire meal.”
The last thing I cared about was green tiramisu. I let them steer me to my seat, trying and failing, to push the last couple of hours from my mind.
It killed me that I hadn’t assumed from the beginning that Carter and Nathan would be here. But not as much as my idiocy in not remembering that boys like that always find each other. Swimming in the same circles. Feasting on the same prey.
I went to school with Carter up until junior high. Then he went to Blackburn Academy like most people in our community do. The school Nathan returned to after his summers in my part of the world, Bracknell. And the school where Preston Desai must have attended—where Carter and Nathan poured their tales of me into his ear, and Preston told them all about the girl from the gallery.
As pissed as I was at them, it didn’t compare to what I felt toward myself.
So much for being immune to his kind.
Preston spun some words, made me laugh a few times, and I was ass up on his desk in less than half an hour. I should’ve known that story about his cousin wasn’t true. No one in their right mind would share a secret like that with a stranger.
The three of them are probably upstairs right now, laughing in every position Preston had me in.
I clenched my jaw, fists shaking under the table. It wasn’t an option before, but now there was no question of me going to the cove. I’d spend the summer washing wrinkled old testicles before I suffered through three months stuck in a manor with them.
Carter and Nathan weren’t the first beautiful boys to hurt me, but I swore they’d be my last. They and their twisted friend, Preston, would not undo the excellent job I’d done over the years of cutting them completely out of my life.
“Ma’am, shall I clear?”
Blinking, I came to. A server stood over me, preparing to take my dessert.
“No, leave it, please,” I said. “Would you mind bringing me hot water and the collection of teas? Or we could skip over that and go straight to the chamomile. Two spoons of honey.”
He inclined his head. “Right away, ma’am.”
“Thank you.”
I needed food to clear my head and tea to settle my stomach. I had a talk with Pop and the dame coming up and I needed to prepare my arguments.
“Excuse me.” A sharp, smoky voice reverberated through the ballroom, silencing the dull chatter.
Standing on the dais, smiling at all she surveyed was a woman in a floor-length lace mermaid gown. One look at her and Preston shone through in her honey eyes and bronze curls.
Rosalie Desai.
The woman who’d taken over managing the events at Citrine Cove for the last fifteen years and extended the invitation to my parents for me to join.
How had I gotten on her radar and why in the hell couldn’t she and her spawn have left me alone?
“Good evening, everyone, and welcome to the Citrine Cove marriage reception.”
Applause rang through the room. I didn’t join in.
“It’s an honor to have all of you with us. An honor I share