Page 3 of A Princess, Stolen (A Kiss of Revenge, Blood, and Love #1)

I turned and a beam of light as wide and bright as a stage spotlight fell across the grass, weeds, and broken marble. It was brighter than all the others.

Nathan ran into the light and spread his arms. “She’s here.

She’s listening to me.” He looked up. “I’m sorry, Lea!

” he called out skyward. “Do you hear? I’m so very sorry.

” And even though he was standing in the sun, his face was full of shadows.

Full of grief. He seemed to be waiting for an answer, but the light went out as if a switch had been pressed.

“She’s gone,” I said, just to say something.

“Yes…but she must have heard me.”

I didn’t ask him if we should dance again. Besides, I had to get back before anyone noticed my absence.

When I told Nathan that, he wordlessly took my hand and led me back to the hedge.

Since dancing together in the Palace of Shards, we had formed a bond.

Maybe it was because we had told each other something about ourselves that we didn’t tell everyone.

Maybe he sensed it too, at least, that’s how it seemed to me.

“Are you coming back tomorrow?” I heard him ask after I had crawled through the hedge.

I stood and looked around, but everything was as before except that Mr. O’Brien was no longer mowing the lawn.

“Of course,” I said. “Of course I’ll come back tomorrow.

We have to see if Lea will listen to you again.

” He was silent and I was afraid I had annoyed him, but then he reached his hand through the bare spot in the hedge.

“Hey, Will,” he said gently. His nickname for me sent a sweet shiver down my skin. “I have something else for you. I worked on it all night.”

Awkwardly, I fished something out of his fingers. It was a smooth heart carved from the driftwood in the swamp. “It’s beautiful,” I replied softly, feeling my own heart pounding wildly. “Thank you.”

“It shines when you hold it up to the sun.”

I smiled and suddenly wanted nothing more than for him to pull me back to him by my braids and kiss me, but the hedge was between us.

“See you tomorrow, Will,” I heard him utter before his footfalls moved away.

I stared at the shimmering heart in my hand and a strange happiness glowed deep inside me. A nameless, silent, priceless happiness.

If only I had known how briefly that happiness would last.

Later that evening, there was a huge commotion at the main gate, attracting Dad, the bodyguards, our gardeners, and all the maids. I too wanted to run down the wide steps to see what was going on, but Delilah held me tight and pulled me back into the mansion.

Nobody told me what had happened at the gate, but Dad came and ushered me into one of the three conference rooms at Rosewood Manor.

He sat me down on a chair and asked me a series of questions about the strangers who had been hanging around the area lately, a boy and a young adult who were wandering around the edge of his property.

He asked when I had first seen them, if I knew their names, and what the boy had been doing near the property.

I said he was collecting wood in the area as I secretively fiddled with my bracelet, which was still over Nathan’s band.

I didn’t tell Dad his name or about my little trip even though I knew you shouldn’t lie.

Dad forbade me to speak to anyone except the staff.

“I’m worried about you, darling. I just love you too much.

” For a moment, his gaze rested on my frilly dress, which had been torn by the hedge.

I quickly put my hand over it. I didn’t want to make him sad, he had already lost Mom, and I was a good child, he had said so himself.

I could sense he was afraid for me. It’s easy to sense other people’s feelings in a large room, easier than when you’re standing at the garden gate and suddenly being kissed.

You’re caught off guard and don’t notice if the other person is as excited as you are.

In a large room with only two people, it’s as if the entire atmosphere is filled with the other person’s feelings, so strong that you can breathe them in.

And now Dad’s fear seemed as overwhelming to me as the sea in which Mom had drowned.

Nevertheless, the next day, a strange force drew me back to the hedge behind which Nathan was waiting.

But as I was about to slip through the bushes, my bodyguards appeared out of nowhere.

One chased Nathan away and the other escorted me to Dad, who was waiting for me in the reception hall.

He was standing under the portrait of Richard Hampton, his father, my grandfather.

Like a plantation owner, he looked down at me sternly as if he were still scolding me from the grave.

Dad had lost his parents when he was four years old.

Dad always lost everyone he loved, which was why he was so scared.

However, now, he looked terribly disappointed. In his hand, he held a few colorful ribbons from the dress I had worn yesterday—and the driftwood heart.

“We didn’t find the ribbons on the property.

Do you have something to tell me, Willa Rae?

” he asked, more resigned than angry, which made me feel even worse.

I owed Dad so much, almost everything. Why didn’t he yell at me?

And why couldn’t that yellow-eyed Richard Hampton stop staring down at me so reproachfully as if he could see into my innermost being? His amber eyes frightened me.

I hung my head. “I’m sorry, Dad. It will never happen again.”

I was right because the next day, when I tried to hide candy, eggs, and bread in the hedge so that Nathan wouldn’t have to steal anymore, Dad caught me. That same evening, we left Rosewood Manor, the gigantic trees, and the lush gardens, and never returned.

I, however, have never forgotten Nathan and the Palace of Shards.