Page 12 of Go Luck Yourself (Royals and Romance #2)

Frantic, I think back over our texts—I’ve been responding. Haven’t I? Plus Dad’s with her, so she’s getting attention.

The last time she called me was over a year ago. She gave me shit for not being able to get Coal to talk to her; Coal then came to Cambridge and subsequently also gave me shit, but more lovingly, when he found out I hadn’t left my room in a day or two.

But I’d been sick.

A little.

I’d been sick with guilt over the fact that I couldn’t be what Mom needed. Sick over the fact that a little voice was whimpering in the back of my head, If you could do what she wants you to do, you could fix her; but you can’t, you’re a fuckup, and it’s no wonder she left you.

My spiraling panic holds me in place so long that her call ends before I can decide whether to answer.

“Kris?” Loch tries to get my attention, leaning down, but when I don’t look away from my screen, he steps closer. “Christ, Kris—you’re pale. What’s wrong?”

A few seconds later—I’ve barely caught my breath—my phone pings.

A text.

MOM

MOM

Sweetheart, your father and I are renewing our vows on the island this weekend. I expect you and Nicholas to both be here.

Holy what?

My vision whites out.

I fight to keep from absorbing any of this yet, especially as texts pour in, one after another, not giving me time to respond, even if I could:

MOM

Do not deny me my children at such an important moment in my life.

You should be able to do this one thing for me. Do not be selfish, not now.

SAY SOMETHING

Kristopher, I’ve only ever wanted you to be the best you can be. This behavior is NOT that.

It should not be this difficult for you to do the right thing.

“Kris?” Loch is in front of me.

My hands are trembling again, but I manage to copy Mom’s first text about the vow renewal and forward it to Coal.

COAL

Did you know about this?

A second later, he tries to call me.

I decline it.

Not now. With Loch.

What the fuck?

COAL

it’s bullshit. we aren’t gonna go and i didn’t want to stress you out.

call me when you’re free. please.

fuck, i told her i was responding on behalf of us both, i told her not to fucking contact you.

Coal talked to her?

Coal talked to her.

He said he’d be the front line of defense against our parents for me. But he—

He talked to our mother.

It’s both a weight and the lifting of a weight in one, opposing forces dragging me in two.

All the months, years she’s spent guilting me into getting him to talk to her, and when he finally does, she doesn’t say a goddamn thing about it to me?

I want to pace, want to run, want to move. But my body stays motionless, internally vibrating, every organ and muscle shuddering. I put my phone against my forehead and breathe. Try to breathe, at least, but the air gets trapped in the back of my throat until I cough, yanking in breaths that go nowhere. I breathe in, in, in, I can’t breathe out—

Loch eases me back onto that bench. “Bend forward,” he orders. “Elbows on your knees. Breathe— out, too, Christ—wait here.”

He leaves, and by the time he rushes back, I’ve managed one breath, maybe; the alley is spinning, that painting in front of me, all purples, reds, the green of the grass too—purple, red, green—

Loch sits and catches me as I topple towards him. “Kris! Shite—”

He rights me and something cold, freezing, lands on the back of my neck.

A second passes, and whatever it is starts to feel the good kind of cold, shocking the panic from my nerves.

A breath goes in. All the way. And all the way back out.

Another.

“There ya go.” Loch holds that cold thing on my neck with one hand, has his other locked around my forearm, thumb rubbing soothingly against my coat. “Kris—what happened? Is everyone all right? Do you need to go back to Christmas?”

“No. No. I’m—”

“Christ, boyo, do na say you’re fine.”

A laugh squirms out of me. It’s humorless.

In lieu of having to explain, and probably because I’m still weakened and unstable, I find myself showing him my mom’s text thread.

His eyes glide over the screen, and his expression transforms, emotion spreading down his face so I can track each muscle change that pushes him from concerned to furious.

“Your mam speaks to you like this?” he growls.

I snort.

His eyes whip to me like I might be hysterical. I probably am.

“She must know your uncle,” I say before I can think not to. I wince. “I didn’t mean—”

“Shut up, Kris.” He adjusts the thing on my neck, his fury not banking, not exactly, but becoming something I can’t put a name on. “What a matched set we are, eh?”

I gawk at him.

How dare he say that to me? We’re not a set at all. Yeah, we have shit in common, but he’s the one who put a stop to it, and now he’s sitting here looking at me like he wants to go to war on my behalf?

Holy shit. That’s what that look is.

Loch pulls the thing off the back of my neck—a bag of ice. “You feeling better now?”

Hardly.

But I motion at the ice in his hand. “How did you know to do that?” Some of my anger recedes. “That was… useful.”

“Finn gets this way.” He pauses. Clears his throat. “Do na tell her I told you that. She’ll rip my balls off.”

I pocket my phone and drop my head into my hands, relishing air going into and out of me unobstructed.

My panicked reaction to my mother has never been that bad in public before. Breathing is sometimes a struggle, sure, but getting so dizzy that I very likely would’ve ended up on the ground if Loch hadn’t caught me…

It is possible my brother was right and I do have panic attacks.

I NEED TO STOP

HAVING REVELATIONS

ABOUT MYSELF

AROUND LOCHLANN PATRICK.

His other hand is still on my forearm. He squeezes, and it shoots off a ricochet of fire up my body.

I’m supposed to be mad at him.

But I feel hollowed out.

“I’m not sure what I would’ve done if you hadn’t been here,” I admit into my palms. “L—”

I almost say Lucky you found me, trying to get back on level ground, but— did his luck magic lead him to me? At the exact moment my mom pulled this shit.

My hands drop, jaw tight.

His wonky magic needs to back the fuck up, I swear to god.

“She shouldn’t speak to you like that,” Loch tells me. It’s a delicate brush on the side of my face. “She does na deserve you.”

Oh, fuck him, fuck him and his empathy and his calm, steady presence.

“She doesn’t deserve a mess?” I glare at him.

His face slackens. “I did na mean it.”

“Come on. Let’s get those press shots.”

I shove to my feet and I do not teeter, I do not get dizzy.

Loch stands too, his hands out like he might need to catch me again, but I refuse to need his help anymore.

There’s hardly any space between us. The warmth off him is a barrier wrapping around me and I think, maybe, he’ll say something else. Something… more.

He deflates.

I walk off into the festival, an ache rising up the back of my neck as he follows.

The Holiday paparazzi, a few of them, are outside the largest tent where a fast, uplifting overlap of fiddles permeates from within.

Loch angles us for the entrance, ignoring them.

But I come to a halt.

The reporters are ready, cameras grabbing shots of other people too, to keep in line with our world being hidden.

I don’t know if it’s the emptiness of being emotionally drained. I don’t know if it’s Loch’s maddening combination of pushing me away and supporting me.

But I find myself walking directly up to the paparazzi.

“Kris?” Loch realizes I haven’t followed him and pivots after me. “What are you—”

“Hey. You’re from 24 Hour Fête ?” I stop in front of one reporter I recognize. Not enough to know or care about the guy’s name. Coal probably knows, but they’re one reason our lives sucked so much. Now here they are, ruining Loch’s life the same way, making it easier for Malachy to keep control of his Holiday and feed Loch lies about who he is until he believes them, he sits there and thinks he’s a screw-up, thinks he can’t do anything right—

My eyes burn, but I hold my ground.

The reporter’s surprise shifts to interest almost immediately. His gaze cuts around before he goes, “Kristopher,” no title, no weirdness to give anything away in public. The fiddle music helps drown us out too.

“Asshole,” I say back.

The guy’s brows go up.

The other reporters, three of them, have recording devices out now.

Yeah, Prince Kristopher doesn’t act like this. Prince Kristopher fades into the background and Prince Kristopher is a nonexistent, anxiety-riddled pushover.

Well, maybe I’m sick as fuck of being Prince Kristopher.

Loch leans close to me from behind. “What are you—”

“I’ve learned a lot from my short time in Ireland,” I say to the reporter. “Mostly that first impressions are hardly ever right and often conceal a far more complex story. We do ourselves a disservice by only seeing things through one narrow lens. Loch taught me that, how St. Patrick’s Day is generally dismissed as a Holiday of drinking and green beer, but it’s a Holiday of Irish cultural heritage and unification. We never get to see that part because we’re taught to focus on the headline-grabbing bits—like you’ve done with Loch. He’s loyal and dedicated, and he does more for this Holiday than anyone knows because no one ever reports on that. You’ve been following us around these past few days and you’ve been obsessing over him for even longer, but have you paid attention to what he does? To who he is ? Stop being so lazy and try reporting the truth for once.”

I spin away, leaving them slack-jawed.

That did nothing to vent any of my shit and only made me feel more, feel stupid —

Loch grabs my arm. I fight him off, but he keeps ahold and hauls me into the tent.

The music slams into us, what was muffled by canvas now roaring. He drags me over to the side, towards a group of tables that are empty because everyone is dancing, the tent packed with people centered around a stage up front. No one looks at us, no one bats an eye; the reporters don’t even follow us in. I’m still unused to Holiday events not somewhat centering around the ruling family, and the anonymity is jarring.

We weave through the tables until we’re in the farthest corner, then Loch rounds on me.

He’s still holding my arm, and despite the layers of clothes, the skin there goes to froth.

But he doesn’t say anything. He wants to, his mouth bobbing, and him being on the back foot brings him into focus, the man behind his facade.

Suddenly, seeing him like this isn’t upsetting. It’s a privilege.

“You didn’t have to do that,” he says quickly. A toppled rush.

Heat crawls up my face and I drop my eyes to the floor. “Probably made things worse.” I relive everything I said and wince. “Shit. I shouldn’t have—”

Loch tightens his hold on my arm and I look back up at him.

His eyes coast over my brows and dip down, to the space between my parted lips. That awareness zaps through me, brings my body to attention in an involuntary lurch.

The fiddle music rises and rises, then crashes in a slam of percussion.

“Do you dance?” he asks.

My head tics in confusion. “What?”

Without taking his eyes off me, he nods at the crowd, the noise of the tent, the cadence of celebrating, and repeats, “Do you dance?”

That’s what he’s asking? That’s what he wants to talk about?

I go along with it, barely, the words feeling heavy on my tongue. “Irish dancing? What do you think?”

He grins. That asshole. Grins like that’ll make everything okay.

It doesn’t.

It definitely does not.

Nope.

Shit.

“I can teach you,” he tells me.

“Can you? Finn and Siobhán seemed to think otherwise.”

“They would na know talent if it kicked them in the shin.”

“Which you probably did, according to their estimation of your talent.”

He smirks. “Ah, go on, have your fun slagging me off.”

My eyes widen. “ What- ing you off?”

“Slagging. Like—eh—taking the piss. Having a laugh.” His smile is insufferable, sharp and manic. “What did you think it meant, boyo?”

I think it means you’re messing with me again.

I wait for even the barest gloss of self-preservation to crackle in my chest. Like any amount of I shouldn’t let him off the hook so easily, and I’d be out of the tent so fast.

But nothing comes.

Now that I’m giving myself permission to be selfish, that apparently also means I’ve lost all common sense.

“Sure.” My voice is clipped. “Teach me to do an Irish dance. God, this’ll be good.”

He locks his hand on the back of my elbow. His cologne is a drug and so is how angry I am, how exhausted from that shit with my mom, how confused because he still feels like a soft place to land.

Loch steers me into the crowd, not quite dragging me like he did a bit ago, and I hate how much I like him taking charge.

On the stage, a band draws a riotous song from their instruments and dances as forcefully as the people below, sweaty and grinning. There doesn’t seem to be a designated dance floor, just a free-for-all of fun, and Loch stops us a few paces within the crowd, the sheer, unadulterated force of the joy around us nearly knocking me off my feet.

Some of the people closest to the stage are wearing traditional Irish dance outfits, decorated emerald vests and bodices over frilled skirts and leggings, though they don’t seem to be performing, merely enjoying the song like everyone else. Most people are trying some moves, laughing when they land a step, laughing more when they falter. Legs kick and hands spiral in the air and a group of four people merges, parts, reshaping across the floor in a fluid ebb like the song is physically guiding them into geometric designs.

Loch comes up alongside me, the hard plane of his chest down the length of my arm. I get halfway to facing him and stop so he’s beyond my eyesight.

The song transitions to a new one, still uproariously fast and saturated with happiness. The crowd cheers and more people pour inside to dance until there’s enough bodies packed in here that the two of us won’t be targeted for sucking too much.

He adjusts his hold on me until I face him.

The music blares around us, its potency a cocoon.

Loch walks into me, forcing me backwards, and I’m hit with such a vivid overlay of the way he pressed around me last night that I trip. But he grabs my other arm and holds me steady, and we’re two stones in a sea of dancing and kicking. The crowd’s joy and laughter thuds against our stationary bubble, relentless, determined for us to feel this joy, for us to laugh too.

My hands come up, fisted against his chest, the tempo of his heart going so fast my knuckles rattle. I think we should be dancing, or moving, or doing something, but when my gaze connects with his, there’s only one thing I want to do and I’m not sure it’s something we should do with reporters lurking around.

But his eyes intensely darken on me, and yeah, yes, I would kiss him in public. I’d kiss him anywhere. I’m stretched bubble thin for him.

I move in closer, chin angling up, but the moment I do, I feel my own stupidity, pushing too far in a drive of need, not reason. None of this has been driven by reason, and I hear everything he said to me in the parking lot paired alongside my internal monologue from last night when I chose to kiss him over doing my duty, a Greatest Hits rebound of my screw-ups the past two days.

But I’m here, face tipped up to his, hoping.

That darkness in Loch’s eyes withdraws as he rolls them shut in a grimace.

“Kris,” he moans, and the music tries to dampen it.

I get whiplash with how fast I go from wanting his tongue in my mouth to being livid with him. “Don’t. Just—don’t.”

I try to pull away, to leave with my pride intact— ha, pride? I barely know her—but Loch keeps his clawed-finger grip on my arms.

His look is pleading. But firmer. Resolved. “I did na mean what I said,” he repeats. His lips curl on themselves and he pulls in close, but it isn’t charged. “I’ve fallen in with a whole parade of directionless dipshits, and I know what being around the wrong people can do to our positions. And I canna—”

“So I’m a directionless dipshit now?” I jerk back, face on fire. “Fuck you for—”

“No! Christ, Kris, I’m saying I’m that for you. ”

It’s so much the opposite of what I thought he was saying that I can only stare.

“That was what I meant earlier. I did na mean to say that you were a mess. I was angry at myself—I have too much going on with my Holiday. And then you said—” He groans, and the air alters to make room for it. “You said you do na know what you want. That’s fine, it’s fine, Kris. But I canna be the one to help you figure it out. I canna give you what you need.”

“Did I ask you to help me figure anything out?” I demand.

“Was it na a mistake to you?” Loch asks. He isn’t accusing. He sounds dejected. “Tell me it was na a mistake for me to kiss you. That I dinna get blindsided by my own stress and spring that on you when you told me you did na know what you wanted.”

The skin across my chest is too tight.

He looks so ashamed, so pissed off at himself.

“It wasn’t a mistake,” I tell him.

Loch’s self-admonishment doesn’t change. “What was it, then?”

“It was—”

It yanked me out of a half-life I’d been living.

If I don’t kiss you again I feel like every nerve in my body will wither away.

That single kiss was more transformative, more vast, more excruciatingly important than anything that’s ever happened to me and you’re the most noble, caring person I’ve ever met, and it breaks my heart that you don’t see that what you’re doing is so spectacular.

In some alternate universe, I say all of that.

But in this one, I hear those thoughts as if from a distance, and I hear what Loch said, and it rotates into focus.

One kiss.

We had one kiss.

All this shit building up in my throat sounds a helluva lot like a love profession, which is categorically insane. He has so many problems going on with his Holiday, with his uncle, and I admitted my uncertainty to him last night. And, oh yeah, I’m investigating him.

He may have said he didn’t mean to call me on being a mess, but he wasn’t wrong. I mean, the fact that I’m wobbling back and forth like this is proof enough. The fact that I basically threw myself at him again, even with him saying it’d been a mistake, validates all of this.

To my silence, Loch gives a resigned nod and lets me go. “I’m sorry, Kris. I should na have kissed you.”

“Wait.” Even saying that comes out choked, garbled. I’m drowning in unsaid words.

“I have to make rounds.”

Wait—

The crowd parts for him.

And I stand there, trying to catch my breath, a hundred versions of No, it wasn’t a mistake, kiss me again lying limp and useless in my throat.

It was a mistake though.

Wasn’t it?

My phone buzzes, spiking my anxiety, but it’s Coal, asking me to call him so we can talk about Mom.

I don’t want to talk about her. I don’t want to give another second of thought to her.

But that’s my problem. Never talking about it. Never acknowledging it. Until it’s become such a beastly, hulking part of me that I’m a scrambled mess who has no idea who he is because of her, because of how I’ve repressed the shit out of my every response to her.

Is that why I couldn’t get myself to say anything to Loch? I never address my own problems. I avoid, and deflect, and ignore.

But I’m tired of being that way. I’m tired of wallowing in not knowing what I can do to be useful, to contribute, to matter. I’m tired of feeling like I’m bobbing along, waiting for something to give me purpose and make me happy, mercilessly at the whims of time and fate.

I plunge into the crowd and angle for the exit, only to remember the journalists I told off are likely still outside. Thankfully, there’s another exit across the tent, and it dumps me out in an empty path between this tent and another that’s blasting guitar music.

It’s nowhere near time to head back to the castle, but it was, what, a twenty-minute drive? I could conjure up some mistletoe and find a doorway to get there, but I can walk that. I need to walk that. I need to run that, but I’m in dress boots and jeans.

I set off through the festival, walking through the cold March air. I hurry past booths selling crafts, more woodworking and paintings, woven bags and jewelry, musical instruments and photographs of dancers. Green Hills Distillery has another tent I avoid, though I would’ve heard if Malachy was in attendance.

How many of the other vendors are here because of Loch? What else has he been doing to compensate for being unable to affect his Holiday through magic? He’s an impromptu talent scout and coordinates cross-festival interactions. What would Coal and I be able to do for Christmas if we had no magic? Like maybe bake cookies or some shit? And here Loch is, getting spotlights on parts of his Holiday, his culture, all on his own.

I cut up the road we took to twist down into the village and hike my way into the Irish countryside.

My fingers itch. Stretch absently in my pocket.

I pull out my phone. Swipe to a notes app.

And write.