Page 19

Pace

“It doesn’t even make sense,”Wicker says as we step out of the car into the university lot. He slams his door particularly hard, earning an annoyed glance from Lex.

“The covenants aren’t there to make sense,” Lex insists, snapping his fingers in front of Wicker’s face. “They’re there to keep us all in line.”

Wick blinks, tearing his eyes from the smooth legs of a passing senior. “You know he fucked around on his Princess.” He punctuates this by jabbing a finger into Lex’s sternum.

Lex smacks it away. “Yeah, we’ve done the math. He got Liberty Sinclaire pregnant two years after Michael was born. And look how that turned out.”

“Here’s some more math: the fidelity covenant was added sixteen years ago,” I pitch in, adjusting my bag. “She’s probably the reason he made it.”

We make our way toward the courtyard, trying to ignore all the glances. In no universe would the Princes arrive on campus without their Princess the week following a pregnancy announcement, and that’s spectacle enough.

But some of these people have seen the video.

The video of Lex.

Being whipped.

“Fucking bitch,” Lex mutters, giving a group of curious freshmen the stink eye. “Should have broadcast her cleansing to the whole metro area.”

Image is something Lex and Wicker have always placed a lot of importance on. Maybe it’s because I spent time in the system before becoming an Ashby, but it never really meant much to me. At least, not in the same way.

I step in front, comfortable confronting the gawking head-on. People never look at me for too long; rumors of my stint in the Forsyth Penitentiary are still close enough to the surface of the gossip mill. My brothers would shy away fromthatimage. I harness it.

A girl from my languages class hastily passes, ducking her head.

“Fine,” Wicker grits out, still fuming about the fidelity covenant, “we can’t risk getting someone pregnant. That, I get. What Idon’t get,” his eyes fixed on Forsyth University’s leading track star, Malcolm Tran, “is why thefuckI can’t fool around with other guys. It’s, like… fucking heteronormative whatever.”

Lex snorts. “We also can’t risk passing an STD to the Princess, idiot.”

Wicker’s lip curls up. “As if I’m ever putting my dick in that again. Been there, done—” But his gaze drifts upward, words fluttering away as he comes to an abrupt stop. Lex and I follow his gaze.

Lex huffs. “Shit. It’s Monday.”

Yes, it is.

And Verity Sinclaire is at her spot in the courtyard, collecting her Royal favors.

A line of PNZ members approaches her, one by one. Some of them are wielding our house’s signature white roses, but others have come bearing sparkly, wrapped gift boxes. Probably jewelry. Gadgets. Shiny trinkets.

Baby clothes.

From the first glance, there’s a tug in my gut that I can’t even begin to ignore. It was one thing to be at the coronation, kissing her stomach. It was another to find her sleeping that night, peeling off that gown and seeing the flat plane of her belly. Still, it’s another thing altogether to stand here amidst a crowd that understands what’s inside her.

I release a long, ragged breath. “The fuck is she wearing?”

“For the next four weeks,” Lex says, looking away, “she’s West End.”

She’s wearing the uniform, too.

From her canvas high-tops and ripped-up, black leggings, to the tight red shirt, her cleavage on full display, Verity looks every inch the cutslut she was raised to be. No pristine white. No pearls. No gold or purple.

Red and black.

Without tearing my eyes from her, I ask Wicker, “You were saying?”

I don't even have to look to know his dick is getting hard.