Page 70 of Save a Wish

If only Beckett were here.

No. It was a good thing Beckett wasn’t here. He would have gotten involved and Cian was a vengeful man. Only more trouble would have resulted in the two of them going head to head. Better if I left quietly. Orla and Fionn would be all right and Beckett would stay safe.

As I sat in the back of the luxury car with Cian wedged in next to me and my mother and father across from me, my gaze rested on the Hartley’s Nest name on my fleece. At least this one souvenir would make it across the ocean and to Verdalach.

“What’s Hartley’s Nest?” my mother asked.

I didn’t answer, choosing to stare out the window as the car pulled away from Hank’s cabin and the successful little life I’d been building bit by bit here in Greenridge.

“You will reply to your mother,” my father ordered. “Immediately.”

I turned disinterested eyes to my mother, imagining her having an elaborate plan to aid in my second escape. Alas, her hands were clasped in her lap and her head was tilted as she waited for me to speak.

“Hartley’s Nest is a wildlife rehabilitation center.” I offered no elaboration though Cian and my parents waited in the silence of the vehicle. I wasn’t about to let them know anything about the Hartleys. If they’d asked about Hartley’s Nest, they likely didn’t have a clue about what that family meant to me and they never would. I’d keep the Hartleys safe in my memories alone.

“Do you have a phone?” Cian asked.

“Yes,” I said, “but it was inside the cabin with all my other things.”

He narrowed his eyes at me as if he didn’t believe me.

I poked my hands into the pockets of the fleece and turned them inside out to reveal they were empty save for a rock I missed when dumping out the ones I’d picked up with Hank earlier. That rock instantly became the most precious thing I owned. A symbol of the life I’d almost been able to live.

“And I suppose there are no pockets on those skin-tight pants,” Cian said. “We’ll burn those as soon as we return to the palace.”

I’d always considered Cian insufferable, but after being in the company of so many honorable men in Greenridge, he was even more of a terrible match for me. I supposed, at least, that by marrying him, I’d be saving another woman from having to spend her life as his wife. That maybe had some merit in it.

Very little, but some. I’d bet that was why my sister had been willing to marry Cian. That would have been just like Maeve to make a sacrifice for others.

I peered out the window of the car from my seat next to Cian. Each tree we passed on the dirt road leading away from Hank’s cabin waved a solemn farewell to me. When we hit the main part of town, my eyes stung as we sped by Sugar Rush Bakery, Ye Olde Wisdom Bookshop, and Patty’s Pit Stop. Catching a glimpse of Faraday’s Hardware and Hank’s pickup parked in front of it nearly made me sob openly.

But I clenched my jaw tightly as I left behind my favorite spots in this lovely small town. I would not cry or carry on. I would not let Cian and my parents know how truly defeated I felt.

I would not let them know that I’d experienced true joy here.

The version of me they would get in Verdalach would be a hollow shell that dressed and looked like Princess Aislinn. Only I would know how truly dead that woman was and how alive Sadie Rodgers was in my soul.

Only I would know how my heart would always be in Greenridge. How it would always belong to Beckett Hartley whether he could have it or not.

How it would always be broken without him.

Chapter Twenty-five

Beckett

“Watch out! There’s a godeon behind you!” I yelled as Zia was nearly pulverized by the scaly, eight-foot monster in Merivia’s Quest, a brand-new fantasy video game the four of us were trying out.

Zia’s avatar ducked and darted out of the way just in time. “Fuck. That was close. These bastards move fast!”

“I think if you hit the A-button double time,” Melvin said, “it makes you shoot faster. Watch. I’ll demonstrate.” He let a godeon approach him, and when it was in close proximity, he blasted it with a stream of electricity that fried the creature on the spot.

“Whoa! That did have some extra sizzle in it.” Leif’s avatar did the same maneuver, and soon all four of us were releasing these uber-lightning streaks at the godeons left and right. In under a minute, we’d defeated the level and a new map appeared.

“Sweet.” I leaned forward in my gaming chair to study the map more closely. “Looks as if we get to choose where to go next.”

“Oh, let’s try the Fabled Forest,” Zia said.

No one objected and our digital party entered a wooded realm where we rescued a herd of unicorns from an evil king.