his. “But the GPS on the truck still shows it a half-block away.”
“So what the hell?” Kate voices it for us all, which does not stop me from jiggling both knees, fighting the acid-dipped nettles in all my nerve endings. Kate finally leans over, attempting to calm me while raising expectant brows at Doyle. “Give a girl a hand here, Knight. Turn up the damn volume.”
With a resigned sigh, Doyle complies. We are just in time for the start of the woman’s broadcast. She beams teeth like stadium lights, highlighted even more by her candy apple lipstick. Her voice fills the room with equally sticky sweetness. “And good morning once again, everyone. I’m Chantal Dunne.”
Chantal Dunne. I do not know the woman, but in the last hour, she has become my gut punch of a nemesis. The well-known anchor of the Top Global News Network’s People and Places segment, with her doll-like eyes, freckle-sprayed nose, and trendy but prim dress, is the perfect package for delivering three minutes of half-truths and speculation every half-hour. After all, who would dare question the veracity of such a cute little ginger?
The question—and its obvious, sickening answer—have turned into the lead ball now lodged beneath my ribs.
The woman lifts a conspiratorial smile before beginning her segment. “I’ve got just one question for everyone. Are you ready to be taken to court again?”
“Fuck. Me.” Doyle slams his ankle to the opposite knee. “The woman can’t even come up with a different lead-in than last hour?”
“The interns were busy playing beer pong.” Mallory gives a delicate smirk. “At least she’s not running for office.”
“Not yet,” Doyle mumbles.
“Bite your tongue,” Kate adds.
On the screen, the window with my face changes to a montage of images, no less shocking than they were during the first broadcast. In one, Cassian and I are holding hands by candlelight over a private table at Daniel, both of us in elegant black cocktail wear. In the next, from the same meal, he’s feeding me a handcrafted wafer slathered with caviar. In the third, we are both in denim and dark T-shirts, taking playful pictures of each other with the costumed characters beneath the iconic Times Square billboards.
The next one makes me grit my teeth harder. It is from this past weekend, when we escaped out on his friend’s yacht on the harbor. We had felt free and alone with the sun, the wind, and the water, and took full advantage of the situation—not to the point of impropriety, but certainly pushing decorum to the naughty edge. Those moments explode to life on the screen now: shots of us cuddling, kissing, and even groping beneath each other’s clothes in our hunger to have each other…
I want to throw up.
Private moments. Intimate memories.
The world sees them all now.
Narrated with gusto by a smirking Chantal Dunne.
“Could there be another salacious scandal rocking the halls of Temptation Manor this week?” she drawls. “As many in New York’s social elite are already aware, Cassian Court returned from a ‘business trip’ to the beautiful Island of Arcadia with more than just some new business deals and a few seashells. Rumor has it that the gorgeous god of a billionaire, fresh from separating from socialite bombshell Amelie Hampton, fell hard at first sight for an Arcadian local, Mishella Santelle.”
Doyle humphs. “At least they got part of it right.”
Next to me, Kate emits a wistful sigh. When a twinge in my belly compels me to glance over, she murmurs, “Was it like that? He really ‘fell hard at first sight’?”
Despite the sliceable stress in the air, a smile emerges. I hear the ache in her voice, but also know I owe her more than a lie. “No. It was not like that.” I squeeze her hand. “I fell first.”
And one day, a god of your own is going to fall in front of you, Kate Robbe.
She sees that message in my eyes—evidenced by the little pssshh that bursts off her lips. “I’m just happy you make him happy, lady.”
Chantal Dunne makes it impossible for us to indulge any more feel-good moments—especially after new photos flash to the screen beside her.
“Wall Street’s prince of passion flew the foreign beauty back to New York himself nearly two months ago, where they appeared in public together shortly thereafter, at the Manhattan Literary Guild’s annual formal gala.”
I cringe. There is no other word for it. Viewing the images of Cassian in his finery from that night only makes me remember how most of them