The ballroom is too hot, too crowded, too full of people who look at me like I'm a curiosity instead of a person. Helena's talking—something about security protocols, about getting me out of here safely, about how her organization will protect me now that Blake's proven himself untrustworthy.
Yeah, I didn’t have to tell her. She could tell by the look on my face.
But I can't process any of it. Can't think past the roaring in my ears, the way my chest feels like it's caving in, the absolute certainty that everything I thought I knew was a lie.
Blake knew my mother.
My mother asked him for help.
He sent her away to die.
And he wasn’t ever going to tell me.
"Peyton." Helena's voice cuts through the noise. "Are you listening? Now that Edmund knows where you stand, we need to move you somewhere secure."
"I need a minute.” The words come out strangled as I start moving toward my destination. "I need some air."
"The terrace is too exposed?—"
"I don't care." I'm already moving toward the doors, toward the cold, toward anything that isn't this suffocating room full of lies and dangerous men. "I need out. Now."
Helena follows, along with two portly women I vaguely recognize as members of the Frost Society. They flank me as I push through the terrace doors into winter that hits like a slap.
The cold helps. Clears my head enough to think, to process, to start putting together pieces that should have been obvious from the beginning.
Blake's guilt. His desperate need to protect me. The way he looked at me sometimes like he was seeing a ghost.
He wasn't protecting me because he cared. He was protecting me because he owed my mother a debt he could never repay.
"Peyton." Helena's beside me now, coat draped over my shoulders. "Talk to me. What exactly did Edmund tell you about Mr. Delano?”
"The truth. Finally." I grip the railing, knuckles white. "Blake knew my mother. She came to him for help three years ago, and he turned her away."
Helena's quiet for a moment, processing. "Did he tell you why?"
"Does it matter? She asked for help, and he refused. Three months later, she was dead." Tears are freezing on my cheeks. I don't bother wiping them away. "He's been lying to me since the moment we met.”
"Men like Blake carry their failures like anchors," Helena says quietly. "They let past mistakes define their present choices. It doesn't excuse the lie, but it might explain it."
"I don't want explanations. I want—" What do I want? My mother back? The last week erased? To never have met Blake Delano and fallen for a man who would have lied to me for fucking ever?
"You want justice," Helena finishes. "For your mother. For yourself. For every woman this town has crushed under the weight of the ruthless men in this town.”
"Yes."
"Then we give it to you." Helena turns me to face her, and her eyes are fierce, determined. "Edmund made you an offer to sign away your power in exchange for safety. But there's a third option he didn't mention."
"Which is?"
"You activate your inheritance claim. Tonight. Right now. In front of every witness in that ballroom. You become a Kingsley publicly, legally, irrevocably. And then you use that power to destroy everyone who hurt your mother—Edmund, Silas, the entire corrupt system they've built."
"Edmund basically said he'd kill me if I don't accept his offer.”
“Image means everything to the Kingsleys, and it's harder to kill a public figure than a private one. You’ve already set things in motion in the courts, but once you tell all of Wintervale, you’ll be officially recognized, and you’ll become exponentially more complicated to eliminate." Helena's smile is sharp. “My organization will stand with you. We have resources, connections, and decades of documentation on Kingsley and Delano crimes. Together, we can burn them all down."
I cock my head to the side and look at Helena through clear eyes instead of heartbroken ones. “Why?" I ask. "Why do you care? I’m not giving you my votes or my money. So, what's in it for you?”
“I’ve explained this. We want balance and reform to Wintervale's power structure, and out from underneath male dominance." Helena doesn't lie about her motivations, at least. "But also justice. Your mother came to us once, years ago, and we turned her away. I thought the risk was too high and the evidence too thin. I was wrong. And have regretted it ever since."
