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She nods. “That’s probably why he’s so paranoid. I saw it all the time with the Counts.” She says this as if that explains it all away. “A few days in lockup, and they’d get twitchy as fuck.”

Pace is twitchy, that’s for sure, but he was already intense before he went to prison. That, I just so happen to know personally. “The Counts were probably going through withdrawals, that’s why they were so nervous.”

“Verity,” Lavinia says, pinning me with a serious look. “It’s fine. What could they know? We barely talk. You’ve hardly given me any real intel anyway.”

There’s something in her tone that rankles me, and I straighten. “There’s not much to say. My days are occupied with deposits, and sitting through hockey practices and fake presentations on campus. The other night I had to go to this stupid fundraiser with Wicker just to keep him out of trouble.”

Her eyebrow raises. “What kind of trouble?”

I bite my lip, immediately feeling protective. What transpired between me and Wicker at Trudie Stein’s was personal.Toopersonal—and not even relevant. Shrugging, I only halfway lie, “I don’t know. The kind a super-hot rich kid gets into with a bunch of wealthy socialites?” She eyes me and I stare back. “What?”

“Huh,” is all she says.

My eyes narrow. “Huh, what?”

She gives me a tense, sympathetic grin. “You’re catching feelings for him.”

Everything screeches to a stop. “I’m sorry, what did you say?” The accusation hits like a gunshot, reverberating in my head with a wrongness that rattles me.

She gestures to me. “You’re catching feelings for your Princes. That’s why you haven’t been telling us anything useful, because a part of you is protecting them.”

“Are you fucking with me?” I ask, stunned. Offended.Pissed.“I’m stuck in a house with three monsters and their insane father, as they obsessively try to fuck a baby into me—minus the orgasms, by the way–and you think I’m sheltering them?”

Her arms are crossed over her chest, and she still doesn’t look convinced. Should she be? Hadn’t I just felt protective over keeping Wicker’s secrets?

There are just some things that should never be used against a person.

“I know how it is,” she begins, her gray eyes holding mine. “When I first came into the tower, Nick and the others...”

It’s as though my brain just cuts off. Her lips are moving, but I can’t hear her. Not her words, at least. All I can hear, feel, see is this horrifically casual assumption that my Princes and I are anything like Lavinia and the Dukes.

Feelings? I have plenty of them. Resentment, hatred, fear, spite, disgust–the list goes on and on, and none of them are anything but negative.

“I do know something,” I blurt, interrupting her halfway into some story about being locked inside an elevator. “Wicker’s father is a Kayes. He’s the Baron legacy.”

Her expression is frozen for a second, but then she rolls her eyes. “Well, yeah. We already know that.”

My eyes bug out and I lurch to my feet. “What? How? They guard that like it’s gold in Fort Knox!”

Lavinia’s eyes soften. “Nick Bruin has contacts all over Forsyth, across all territories. Beating him to intel is hard.”

“Then what am I there for?” I hiss, physically shaking. “If it’s so easy to get dirt on everyone, then why am I in there getting used and abused every day? Why not just let Nick waltz in and gather whatever information he needs?”

“Waltzing is a bit of a stretch, don’t you think?” She snorts. “I’m sure there was bloodshed involved in him getting that knowledge.”

“Lavinia.” A wave of bone-tired exhaustion settles on me. “I don’t know what you want.”

But even as I say it, I do know. She wants to know their weaknesses, their vulnerabilities. Like how Lex can’t get it up which implies some kind of emotional instability. Or about the scars on his back, which I don’t even want to acknowledge the origin of. Or about Wicker’s exploitation at the hands of Forsyth’s wealthy. Or the root causes of Pace’s urge to hole up and hide away. She and Story–the Monarchs–they want that kind of dirt, but there’s nothing I can give them.

Or maybe I just won’t.

Maybe she’s right.

Shit.AmI catching feelings for them?

“Hey,” she says, grabbing my arm. “It’s okay. I understand that the role of house girl comes with a lot of mixed-up feelings. Getting that info about Wicker being a Kayes? That’s fucking huge. It means they’re starting to trust you, and that trust will lead to bigger revelations.”

“Right.” I exhale and pull away, unable to quiet the black, sick thing roiling around in my chest. “You know, speaking of revelations? On the way here, it was revealed to me that you’re not being totally honest with me either.”