Page 80

From within the pages…

"Well, looks like I'm not going to the ball after all. Prince Heinrich will be crowned king tonight, every eligible bachelor left in Little Alabaster will be there, and I'm going to miss it.”

Molly came crawling out of the closet a moment later, red-faced, sweaty auburn curls plastered to her cheeks.

“I’ll have to accept the fact that I'm going to die a lonely, shriveled up, impoverished virgin."

The first three of those maybe, but we both knew the ship had long sailed on that last. Moll was in her feelings right now, so I let her get away with it. But the muttering had been going on for the past hour, and it clearly wasn't going to stop until I gave her the attention she was looking for.

I set the jeweler's loupe—a small magnifying glass the size of a large coin—next to the mound of gleaming stones I'd been studying and spun my chair around.

"What's the problem?"

She let out a snort. "The problem is that I have nothing to wear, and no matter how deep I dig into the closet there is no magical tree within growing gowns that would be suitable."

"What about in your cedar chest?"

“I sold all those for oats and cabbage.” Molly ran a hand over her riot of curls. I peered past her to see what was left hanging. Only four dresses left that I could see. Things were tight, and we were both doing our best to keep our heads above water.

“How about the green one?”

Her cornflower eyes went wide as she pushed herself to stand.

"You're kidding right? It’s so out of fashion right now, I’d be arrested for assault of the senses.

The shape of it makes me look like a bloody pine tree anyway.

I planned to sell it next week at the market.

" She sighed heavily. “This is the Winter Jubilee , Harm.” She pressed her knuckles to her lips and shook her head.

“If I show up looking anything less than perfect, they're going to spot me as an outsider. I need them to believe I’m one of them if this is to work. "

I wanted to argue...call her vain or silly.

But, while she could be a bit of both at times, she was also sort of right.

She was attending the party with a forged invitation, courtesy of yours truly.

Calling attention to herself would be bad.

If she got caught in Little Alabaster on a normal day, she'd be beaten.

If she got caught in the palace crashing a royal ball while impersonating a noble?

She would be hanged. A chance she was willing to take, despite how much I tried to talk her out of it.

My only question was, why were we talking about this now? The party was only a few hours away.

"I know what you're going to say, but I did have a plan," Moll said in a rush.

"Stefan was supposed to take me to the shops yesterday, and I'd hoped to get him to buy me some ribbons and notions.

Apparently, a hog needed butchering, though, so he canceled.

I was going to fix up the purple gown, add some lace and such, but. .."

But , we were dirt-ass poor, so we couldn't afford lace or such, no matter how many dresses she sold over the last few months. Hell, there were weeks we barely scraped together enough to eat. Frippery was far off the menu, unless Moll’s sometimes boyfriend, current friend Stefan was buying.

But her dreams hinged on always looking her best. In the twenty-plus years we'd known each other, she'd plotted her course like a decorated general strategizing for battle.

She attended every event in Little Alabaster that she could, legality be damned, and eventually, she hoped to make one of those rich men fall madly in love with her. That was her plan.

So madly would said man fall, that he would take her—correction, us —away from all this.

“ All this ” being the two-room hovel we shared at the heart of The Hollow.

The Hollow was a shanty-town full of have-nots, where the largest part of Alabaster’s population lived, worked, and barely managed to eke out an existence. As pretty as Moll was with her striking coloring, people from Little Alabaster almost never married people from The Hollow.

Regardless of the odds against her, for the past ten years, Moll had used her amazing talents with makeup, clothes, and hair to disguise herself before worming her way into every fete, festival, gala, and ball she could in hopes her “prince” would come and sweep her off her feet.

First, it was Lady Ashlynn Coddington, on a visit all the way from Bryngarde. A porcelain-skinned beauty with straight, waist-length black hair and an intriguing mole above her lip.

Then, it was Lady Letitia Meriwhether. With her honey-colored locks and heart-shaped face, she’d been so convincing, even I was fooled.

Miss Caroline Theobold had been a personal favorite.

A golden blonde with a waist corseted so tightly, two hands could’ve spanned it, I’d even managed to create a pair of eye lenses that had changed the color of Moll’s irises from blue to green.

Alas, poor Miss Caroline wound up fainting in the powder room from lack of oxygen and had to leave that particular gala early before anyone could see them.

But despite creating a line of beauties, each more charming than the last, Moll had come home at the end of each party the same as she’d left.

Single and broke as a church mouse.

She'd done everything right, gotten the proper accent down pat, knew to nibble on the hors d’oeuvres but not truly eat them, regardless of her growling stomach.

She knew how to charm and cajole and tease.

But so far, all she'd managed to get were a few rushed, sloppy kisses followed by a slew of broken promises.

And now, at the ripe old age of twenty-nine, I could see her fraying at the edges.

I glanced at my friend's tear-stained cheeks and swallowed back the acid that had risen to burn my throat.

Just because I didn't agree with her strategy to escape our lot didn't mean I wouldn't help her.

She was the only person I truly trusted in this world, and there was nothing I wouldn't do for her.

Even if it made me want to puke for fear of her being caught.

I met Moll's teary gaze, bit back my irritation, and forced a smile. "Alright, so let's get into problem-solving mode here, shall we?"

"Yeah." She sniffled and nodded, her eyes lighting with hope. "Yeah, alright."

"You drag out that one red dress—it’s your best and most current, even if you think the purple is— and get a needle and thread ready.” I shot one last wistful glance at the faux gemstones and swept them into my hand. “Add some sparkle with these."

I'd managed to create the little beauties using a gadget I’d invented that tumbled mundane stones over and over against even harder materials until they glittered like diamonds of every shade.

Then, I’d painstakingly faceted each one.

It had taken nearly two months to complete the process from start to finish.

And now I had to give my first batch away.

"Are you sure? They are so beautiful!" Moll gushed as she rushed forward to accept the stones.

I wanted to say no. I wanted to tell her to forget her plans and remind her of the danger. But she’d point out that she hadn’t been caught yet in all these years. Even I couldn’t argue with that track record.

“I’m sure, Moll.”

She ran a hand over the stones, spreading them across the table, watching how they caught the light. “I'll sew them on tight. As soon as the party is over, I'll give them right back!”

She wrapped her arms around my neck from behind and squeezed so hard, she nearly crushed my windpipe.

“I love you like a sister, Harmony Marie Fallowell,” she whispered.

“Still not my middle name,” I reminded her for the thousandth time. I knew my first, and I’d taken my foster family’s last, but if I had a middle name, I didn’t remember it. Yet another little perk of being a foundling with amnesia left to be found in a forest.

Huzzah.

“Oh, no.”

I untangled myself from Moll’s chokehold and stepped back to see her stricken face. “What now?”

"I have no shoes to match. You’re right about the red dress—it’s the only one that suits— but it’s cut shorter at the front and will show off my shoes.” She covered her face with her hands, bowing her head. A sob rippled from her.

Damn it. I hated to see her cry.

But maybe there was still something else I could do.

I made my way over to a basket in the corner of the room and dropped to a squat.

It took a minute to sort through the broken crap that I hadn't gotten around to fixing, but then I found it.

The brown box I'd tucked away for a rainy day, and today, it was raining like all the be-damned summer monsoons.

Moll's tears didn't usually bother me too much.

She'd be the first to admit she was melodramatic.

Which made them even more pathetic than usual.

Because today, she'd figured out what I'd known for a while now.