Page 412 of Bad Prince

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Jade’s eyes sharpen there.

“What happened in the library?”

I exhale once and stare past the phone for half a second, replaying it.

“She saw Isa with me,” I say. “Didn’t make a scene. Didn’t cry. Didn’t beg. She just…” I shake my head. “She put Isa in her place in that terrifyingly calm Stella way. Told her, without really saying the words, that she wasn’t built to play backup in anybody’s story.”

Jade goes still.

Then she leans back slowly and says, “Wow.”

Leo glances at her.

“What?”

Her mouth twists a little.

“That sounds familiar.”

I look at her.

She gives me a dry, knowing smile.

“Not the exact details,” she says. “But the energy? Yeah. A little bit.”

There’s something in her face when she says it—not pride exactly, not shame either. Recognition. The kind that comes from becoming someone sharp because softness kept getting punished.

I nod once.

“Yeah,” I say. “That tracks.”

She laughs quietly and tucks one leg under herself.

“I think Stella and I would either hit it off immediately or set something expensive on fire.”

“You and Stella would absolutely hit it off,” I say.

Leo snorts. “We’re cooked, Vale.”

“They’d terrify everyone within a three-mile radius.”

“Correct,” Jade says.

Then her attention snaps back to me.

“So where are you now?”

I let my head fall back against the wall. “Still at the game. Locker room. We are leaving in ten, heading to the airport. She told me she wanted me back. I finally stopped acting like that was some kind of threat.” I look at the screen again. “I saw her before we left. In the gym. Early.”

Jade’s eyes widen.

“And?”

“And nothing.”

“Nothing?”

I laugh once.

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