Page 22 of My Dark Prince
Instead, shespedup.
Her sneakers squeaked along the marble as she ducked her head and bolted out of the entrance, bypassing a cluster of bellboys and doormen.
“Mr. von Bismarck, has your mother not taught you to take a hint?” Scarlett tooted from behind me, taking her sweet time.
I ignored her, running faster after Briar. I realized I was acting irrationally. Perhaps even predatorily. Either way, itdidn’t make a difference. Even if I wanted to explain why I’d disappeared all those years ago without a word, which I did, I couldn’t.
I couldn’t communicate it to her via letters, emails, or phone call then, and I couldn’t now. I’d made a promise not to breathe a word about what had happened, and I intended to keep it. But she was the only person I ever wanted to tell the truth to.
Briar picked up her pace. “Leave me alone.”
It was cold, dark, and damp. The last dregs of a February day. Though Briar was sensibly dressed, I remembered how cold she’d always get. Even in the summers.
“Stop. Let’s go inside and talk.”
I never pleaded.
I did now.
But Briar kept zipping down the walkway, a bundle of chaotically stylish clothes getting further away from me. “I’m not giving you the time of day.”
I quickened my pace as we edged toward a row of moonlit trees. “It won’t take long.”
The golf course loomed beyond the trees, currently under construction. Closed to the general public.
Briar ran faster. “Who could believe you’d grow up to become an empty suit?” The wind slapped her voice, slurring it to an uneven volume. “Actually, me. I can believe it pretty easily. You were never one to mean what you say.”
I was not an empty suit.
I was holding my family’s business together while my parents drowned into deep depression and my brother remained MIA.
“I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
She ignored me, taking a sharp turn to the right, past the trees and into the golf course.
“You need to stop,” I ordered. We were both stumbling downhill in the pitch black. “Someone’s gonna get hurt.”
“As long as it’s you, I’m not bothered, empty suit.”
“I amnotan empty suit.”
A muscle jumped in my jaw. Normally, on Grand Regent grounds, I welcomed this misperception. But with Briar, I wanted her to know the truth for some reason. It didn’t even matter. The night would end, morning would come, and we’d go our separate ways. No other option.
“Besides … an intimacy coordinator?” Itsked, wondering if I could piss her off into stopping. “That’s not even a real job.”
It worked.
Briar froze, just a few feet shy from a water hazard.
“Yes, it is, and unlikeyou, I actually support myself doing what I love.” She pursed her lips, whirling around to face me. “You know, my entire life, I dreamed of someone who would protect me. Who would look out for my interests and welfare. That person never came. Not my mother, not my father, not my biological dad, and sure as hell notyou.”
Her voice shook around the last word, like the very thought of me disgusted her. I wanted to die there and then. To perish at her feet for failing her.
“Briar—”
“No. You don’t get to interrupt me.” A cloud formed around her lips as her words met the crisp air. “At the end of the day, I didn’t choose this profession. It chose me. I wanted to dedicate my life to making others feel protected when they’re vulnerable. I like to walk into a set knowing that my actors trust me to have their wellbeing in mind at all costs. My job allows me to be someone’s mother and father. Sister and friend. The world wasn’t kind to me. So, I made sure to be kind to others. To right this wrong.”
I read between the lines. I was the wrong that needed righting. And she did not want me to fuck up her life again. Message received.
