Royal Ruse - Emma Lea Page 0,90

nailed me with a direct stare and I swallowed. “Do not lie to yourself about how you are feeling. You’re allowed to be sad and you’re allowed to be angry. You need to give yourself permission to feel those things, okay? And when you’re ready to talk, I’m here for you.”

I threw myself into my mother’s arms and buried my face in her neck.

“Thanks,” I mumbled.

She squeezed me tight and then let me go, wiping tears from my cheeks and smiling at me sadly. “Are you hungry? Dad bought home Thai.”

My stomach rumbled and although I wanted to hide away in my room, having dinner with my mom and dad and doing something normal seemed like an excellent idea.

“Will there be enough for me?” I asked as Mom stood and I shuffled out of bed.

“You know what your father is like, he always orders too much.”

I smiled, and it didn’t hurt. It was nice to smile about something simple like my dad having eyes bigger than his belly. It felt good to be back to normal and not have to pretend to be someone I wasn’t. I could go downstairs to dinner wearing my sweats and old t-shirt and I didn’t have to worry about embarrassing anyone. I didn’t even have to brush my hair or do my makeup. I could just be me. Plain old me. No airs and graces. No fancy designer clothes or uncomfortable shoes or bobby pins sticking into my scalp.

Mom took my hand, and we went downstairs together and I could finally take my first full breath since I’d stepped out onto the terrace and saw Lucas and Clarissa with their arms wrapped around each other. I hadn’t expected Lucas to end up with me—as much as I may have daydreamed about it—but seeing him with Clarissa was my worst nightmare. Why couldn’t he have chosen Sophia, or even Elena, for that matter? Why did it have to be Clarissa? My nemesis. Okay, not my actual nemesis, she just felt like my nemesis.

“So did you take lots of photos?” Mom asked.

“Oh Mom, Kalopsia is so beautiful and the water! Seriously, I’ve never seen water that color before in my life. Let me just grab my phone.”

I ran back upstairs and grabbed my phone. I’d turned it off on my flight from the island and hadn’t turned it back on since. I let it boot up as I skipped back down the stairs and then came to a complete stop when I saw all the notifications populating the screen.

Lucas.

Lucas had been trying to call me for the last two days and not just call me. There were hundreds of text messages—and not just from Lucas. Meredith—Meredith—had texted me, so had Sophia and even Elena. There were a couple from Dorian as well and I felt…sad. All these friends I’d made, and I’d just left without saying goodbye to any of them. Yeah, I’d been hurt, but I should have at least explained things to Meredith and Jamie. Me running away was an admission of guilt. I should have at least had the guts to tell them the truth.

“Honey?” Mom called from the dining room. “Are you coming?”

I sighed and swiped away from all the messages and missed calls. I would deal with them all tomorrow. Right now I would have dinner with my family and pretend I hadn’t just blown up my entire life because my heart was broken.

“Coming,” I said as I opened my photo app and headed for the dining room.

Lucas

I lifted the glass to my lips and sipped. Not raïda. There were too many memories tied up in the spirit. Not whiskey either. Whiskey had started this thing. I’d been drinking whiskey when I proposed to Frankie, so yeah, I was staying away from whiskey too.

I was drinking gin.

I couldn’t say I’d ever been a fan of the clear, juniper infused alcohol, but I needed something that didn’t remind me of Frankie and gin was it. I’d briefly considered tequila, but then I was reminded of the time Frankie had gotten completely wasted in college on tequila shots. So no tequila either.

Wine wasn’t strong enough and besides, there was that time I had to pick Frankie up from the country club where she’d been having drinks with my mother and she’d been drinking wine, so…no wine for me.

“Are you sure?” Dorian asked, taking a seat beside me at the bar.

We weren’t in a ‘bar.’ We were in the palace in the room that