Page 104 of American Royals

Even in the silence, Daphne felt something crackle and spark between them.

Suddenly they were tumbling onto the bed together, a tangle of hands and lips and heat. She yanked her dress impatiently over her head. It fell in a whisper to the floor.

“Are you sure?” Ethan’s breath sent little explosions all the way down her skin, like fireworks. It was the closest either of them came to acknowledging how wrong this was.

“I’m sure,” Daphne told him. She knew precisely what she was doing, knew the promises she was breaking, to herself and to Jefferson. She no longer cared. She felt fluid, electrified, gloriously irresponsible.

She felt, for the first time in years, like herself. Not the public, painted-on Daphne Deighton that she showed the world, but the real seventeen-year-old girl she kept carefully hidden beneath.

“Daphne?” I need to talk to you.” Her mother cut across the dance floor toward them, not even bothering to acknowledge Ethan.

“Oh—all right.” Daphne wondered what the expression on her face had looked like, to send Rebecca rushing over here.

Her eyes briefly met Ethan’s, and she saw his flash of understanding, and of disappointment. He nodded, stepping aside.

Rebecca’s nails dug into the flesh of Daphne’s inner arm as she dragged her away. “You don’t have time for distractions, tonight of all nights.”

“Ethan is Jefferson’s best friend,” Daphne said wearily. “I was just dancing with him for a few songs.”

And remembering the night I lost my virginity to him.

“You could have been dancing with an emperor himself, and I’d still expect you to be present for the royal family’s entrance,” Rebecca hissed.

“Mother …” Daphne’s steps slowed. “Do you ever wonder … I mean, is it all really worth it?”

Rebecca’s grip tightened so fiercely that Daphne barely swallowed back a cry of pain.

“Daphne.” As always, her mother managed to convey a world of emotions in those two syllables. “I’m going to pretend you didn’t ask that. Don’t ever say anything like it again, not to me, and certainly not to your father. Not after everything we’ve done for your sake.”

She stepped away, and Daphne pressed her hands together to hide their sudden trembling. Her mother was right, of course. She had been on this road for far too long to second-guess herself now.

There was a ring of red half-moons on the skin of Daphne’s inner arm, where Rebecca’s nails had been.

A commotion sounded at the Door of Sighs, and the herald emerged to bang his staff against the floor. “Their Majesties, King George IV and Queen Adelaide!”

Daphne watched along with everyone in the room as the king and queen strode in, followed by Beatrice and her fiancé. Moments later Samantha emerged, and then, finally, Jefferson.

He entered the ballroom alone, as was dictated by protocol: only someone engaged to a member of the royal family was permitted to walk alongside them. But he’d only progressed a few yards into the room when Nina Gonzalez detached herself from the gathered masses and came to stand at his side.

Daphne’s stomach lurched as she watched Jefferson hold out an arm toward Nina.

She saw at once that her ploy at Halo had been useless. If anything, Nina looked even better in this: a scoop-necked column dress in a deep gray, its bodice and skirts heavy with charcoal beads.

“You have a job to do,” Rebecca said quietly. As if Daphne were in danger of forgetting.

She forced herself to take a deep breath, fighting back the wave of frustration and resentment and envy that threatened to drown her. She could not afford to lose her cool over some nobody.

Nina might as well enjoy this hour with Jefferson, because it was the last one she would ever have. The moment Daphne could get her alone, she would move in swiftly for the kill.

NINA

Nina had been to a great many parties in the Washington Palace ballroom, but even she had never seen it so enchanted.

The space overflowed with flowers, green hydrangeas and calla lilies and vibrant orange dahlias spilling over every surface. Crystal chandeliers flung ribbons of light throughout the room. The light fell on revolving tulle skirts, on freshly pressed tuxedos, on the jewels that had been removed from vaults and safety-deposit boxes for the occasion as all these courtiers vied desperately to outglitter one another.

And everywhere she looked, Nina saw the B&T wedding monogram. It was printed in gold foil on the cocktail napkins, embroidered on the fabric of the skirted high-top tables, even painted on the band’s drum set.

A dark-haired man, dancing only a few yards away with a woman in a crushed-velvet gown, met Nina’s eyes. He stared at her with a mixture of disdain and boredom.