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“He was your friend,” she says softly. “You should get to visit, too.”

I press my lips together, looking down at the grave—the dirt, the stone, the roses lying there. “I prefer to think of him alive,” I say finally. “But whatever brings you peace, Estella. If visiting this spot helps you, then you should do that whenever you can.”

She bites her lip. “I don’t want to go to dinner with Nico Adamos tomorrow,” she whispers. “I don’t want to have dinner with any of them. Vito Bianchi was at the mansion yesterday. He’sveryinterested, he said. The way someone would talk about a piece of property they wanted to buy.” She almost spits out the last words. “I hate all of them.”

Estella wraps her arms around herself, and I have to stop myself from pulling her into mine. “I know,” I say quietly. “I do, too.”

Her lips twist together, and I let out a slow breath. “Your brother would be proud of how strong you’re being.”

Estella looks up at me sharply. “If I were strong, I’d figure a way out of this,” she says bitterly.

“There are different ways to be strong, princess.”

I can feel something crackle in the air between us, something taut and desperate, and Estella turns to face me. “I can’t do this, Sebastian,” she whispers. “I can’t marry one of them. I just can’t.”

I swallow hard. “You have to,” I say slowly, each word costing me. It feels like a dagger in my heart, saying it aloud. “Yourfather will disown you if you don’t. You know that.” My mouth tightens, and I see the pain in Estella’s eyes. It hurts, knowing that I’ve said something to put it there.

“My father,” she says slowly, “is selling me like real estate for his own gain. He doesn’t care about me.”

“He’s trying to protect you in the way that he knows how.” I pause. “Like I am.”

I can see the betrayal in her eyes at the idea of me defending him, even slightly. Her jaw tightens, and she turns away for a moment, her dress whipping around her legs as the wind picks up. I can smell rain in the air, and I wait for just a moment before sighing.

“Estella, we need to go. The weather?—”

She turns quickly, her gaze meeting mine with the bluntness of a cudgel. “Tell me you don’t feel anything, Sebastian,” she challenges. “Tell me you’re just my bodyguard, and I’ll pick one. Maybe even Nico Adamos—he’s handsome enough, right? Boring, but pretty to look at?” Her words dig in, and I know she’s trying to hurt me, the way I hurt her a moment ago. Reminding me that before too long, some other man will be in her bed, undressing her, touching her, maybe even making her come. On purpose, not by accident while she clings to him on a motorcycle.

God, just thinking about that night on the motorcycle gets me fucking hard. But it ebbs as soon as I look at her defiant expression and realize how close we are to a terrible line, one where, if we cross over it, our relationship will become one of cutting jabs and barbed words, taking out the pain that we can’t salve on each other, until eventually, one or both of us are driven away to make it stop.

“I’m not imagining this,” she whispers, and the plea in her words cuts me straight to the bone.

God, I want to kiss her.I hear the faint rumble of thunder in the distance, and I see the dampness on her lips from where shelicked them a moment ago, and I want to grasp her in my hands, pull her to me, and devour her. I want to push her up against the nearest tree, bunch that skirt up in my hands, and fuck her right here and now, graves be damned.

I don’t say a word, and Estella’s face contorts briefly, as if she’s trying to hold back tears.

“You can’t lie to me, can you?” she whispers. “So you’re just not saying anything at all.”

“It doesn’t matter what I feel,” I murmur, a repetition of the same words I’ve said to her before. “Your father would have me killed for even thinking it. God help me if I touched you. This can’t exist, Estella. Whatever I feel, whatever you feel, we need to bury it. Here, if need be, right now.” The words sound bitter as they escape my lips. “What better place than a graveyard?”

Estella’s teeth sink into her lower lip, and I see her eyes well with tears. “So you’re just going to watch me marry another man?”

“I’m going to keep you safe,” I grind out, determination in every word. “The way I promised. I can’t do that if I’m dead, Estella. And you can’t live a life on the run from your father.”

She looks at me, and I know she understands, without my saying the words. “So what now?” she whispers, her voice trembling, and I feel my heart crack, fissures running through it as thunder rumbles through the graveyard.

“Now,” I say, as calmly as I can manage, as I offer her my arm. “Now, we go home.”

13

ESTELLA

Istand in the center of the ballroom, my champagne flute grasped so tightly in my fingers that it might snap. Around me, there are lights and people and music, but it feels like it’s all a swirling haze, like I’m in a terrible dream that I can’t wake up from.

Another one of my father’s parties to narrow down my choice of suitors. Another night for me to be paraded like a piece of fine art, or maybe a particularly sought-after broodmare.

Across the room, I can see my father talking to Vito Bianchi. To my right, Nico Adamos is dancing with another guest, fractured light from the crystal chandelier above illuminating them as they move across the marble floor, but he only has eyes for me.

He’s not the only one. Aleksi Valinov, the son of a wealthy banking family looking to gain a foothold in New York, is another of my father’s prime choices. Mateo Rossi is another possibility, the cousin of a powerful family from California. I see them watching me from their vantage points in the room, circling me like sharks scenting blood, and I want to run screaming from the room.