“I gathered that. I know he’s rich, but—”
She grabs my arm and squeezes. “Sophia, Alicia Faust is the one you saw Seven talking to at graduation. Alicia was onceengagedto Seven Delaney.”
ChapterFourteen
Iblink at Grandma like a cursor on a computer that’s trying to process its last command. I try to say no! and what now? at the same time, and somehow it comes out “Snow, what?”
Grandma gets my meaning. “The dark-haired woman I pointed out to you at graduation… While you were gone, Alicia and Seven were an item for a while. They were matched at that big leprechaun thing they do in the summer.”
“The Gilded Gala?”
“That’s the one.”
My skin prickles at the news. No one but us knows about Arden, but what are the odds her son would take an interest in her? I don’t believe in coincidences. I smell a rat, although I can’t think of what possible cheese it might be after.
“How long ago was this, Grandma?”
She rubs her chin. “Well now… I’d say at least five years. Maybe six.”
“Did the relationship last long?” Do I really want to know? Probably not. But I ask anyway, like I’m prodding a sore tooth.
“About a year, I think,” Grandma says. My heart clenches. “Oh, she always seemed more enthusiastic about the relationship than he did.”
“What makes you say that?” It wasn’t like my grandmother regularly ran in the same circles as leprechaun society.
“TheHatter. In every picture, she’s gazing up at him adoringly and he’s staring at the camera with a wooden smile and dead eyes.”
That bit raises my spirits. “How did it end?” Barreling into the ground in streaming flames, I hoped.
Grandma grinned from behind three fingers that warned me of impending salacious gossip. “Well, I heard from Nancy Buttercup who heard from Auria Singh that Alicia grew tired of waiting for Seven to propose and bought herself an enormous diamond ring. Then she let it slip that they were engaged. Only Seven had never agreed to marry her. She probably assumed the social pressure would be enough to force him to go along with the ruse and tie the knot, but he didn’t. Instead, he broke it off. Although he never humiliated her by coming right out and saying what she did, they attended the Yule ball separately and she was no longer wearing the ring. She was forced to give a statement to theHatterthat the engagement was called off for personal reasons just to get them off her back.”
“Holy shit.” I laugh a little too joyously. That was better than I was hoping for.
“I might still have a copy of theHatterwhere they broke the news if you want to read it for yourself.”
“Uh, no, thanks. Frankly, I’d love to forget it ever happened.”
Grandma purses her lips, her eyes narrowing knowingly on me. “The question is if Alicia has forgotten, or if it will become an issue. I’d just hate for our sweet Arden to step on a land mine with that one. She has such stars in her eyes for Edmund.”
I sigh. “About that, did anything strike you as odd about that boy?”
She snorts. “Leprechauns always strike me as odd.”
“I mean he’s very precocious and smooth-talking for a teenager.”
For a moment she thinks about that, then says softly, “Seven was the same way when he was that age, Sophia. You just didn’t notice because you were blinded by your own stars.”
Flabbergasted by the assertion, I try to think back. Certainly Seven was always charming, especially when it came to parents and teachers, but it was as if it was expected of him, being who he was. I chide myself for my stupidity. Of course Edmund has the same expectations. He represents the Armon/Faust family line, and his mother has probably groomed him from birth to be as smooth as butter and as sweet as honey in any social situation.Fuck.I have a new appreciation for what my parents went through with me and Seven. How could you ever know for sure if a leprechaun’s feelings were true when their entire lives were on display as the social royalty of our species?
The sigh I heave is laden with worry. “What do you think I should do?”
She toys with the lacy fringe of one of her elbow-length sleeves. “I’d never tell you how to parent your child, Sophia, but if I were Arden, I’d want to know this information so that I could prepare myself. If you’re not comfortable talking to her about it, I could let it slip sometime when she was within earshot.”
That would be the easy way out, but I owe Arden more than that. We’ve always had the type of relationship where we could talk about anything. “No. I’ll tell her myself.”
Grandma pats my hand and returns to the dining room.
* * *
