Zane’s expression softens and they make no further comment. As much as we like to tease each other, my family is a sensitive topic, and Zane knows it.
“I don’t want to take up too much more of your time,” the queen says, “but I hope you’ll stay for my book club meeting. We’d love for you to do a reading for us if you’re open to it.”
“Of course I’m open to it.” Edwina’s voice is rich with wonder. “I’m more than open to it. I insist!”
“Lovely. Oh, and…” Queen Gemma pivots toward me as if she only now recalls this signing hosts two authors. “You as well, Mr. Haywood.”
I bow my head in acquiescence, for what else can I do before a queen? She may not be the reigning monarch of any of the courts—only one with fae blood can hold such a position—but she is the wife of Elliot Rochester, Unseelie King of Winter. To be honest, I’m a little starstruck.
As the queen turns away from the table, the guests in line step aside, offering curtsies as she passes.
Edwina sucks in a gasp. “Oh God. I didn’t curtsy. William, I didn’t curtsy!” She looks at me with wild eyes. “Should I run after her? Apologize? Throw myself at her feet and beg for forgiveness?”
She’s so frantic, I’m almost of a mind to tease her, but I don’t have it in me today. “It’s fine, Weenie. She wasn’t upset, and she’s not even your queen.”
She deflates a little. “Ah, I guess you’re right. I suppose none of the fae royals are my monarchs.”
Am I imagining the disappointment on her face? Edwina is from Bretton, which means she only needs to respect the fae and follow our rules while visiting. After our tour is over, she’ll return home.
Unless she wins the publishing contract, that is.
Which I can’t let her do.
I need the contract. Cassie needs it. I will not fail my sister.
Something tightens in my chest, a sharp thing that claws at my bones. I shift in my seat to distract myself from it. Luckily, Edwina doesn’t notice my discomfort as the line has surged forward in Queen Gemma’s wake, and her next guest is chattering her ear off over her love of Edwina’s books.
I force my eyes off her and face ahead. At my nonexistent line. At the very empty space in front of my table. Only then do I feel Zane’s gaze burning into me.
“What?” I snap.
Zane looks from me to Edwina. “Nothing,” they mutter, their lips curled with a mischievous grin.
The signing is unbearably slow.For me. Not for Edwina. Our roles have reversed, with her enjoying an endless line of excited guests while I have the occasional visitor. It’s nothing less than I expected. I knew all along that Winter Court would be Edwina’s domain, and she continues to glow with every book she signs, every word of conversation.
My only entertainment comes from a game I’ve created. It involves seeing how many times I can covertly slip my book onto her stack and get her to unwittingly take it and almost sign it. It’s the same copy I’ve already tried to give her. Over the lastseveral hours, as day has crept toward evening, the title page has grown more and more clustered with writing. When she first discovered the book in her hands, her pen poised to sign, she found my reply that I wrote to her:Well, I don’t like you. Or your book. Stop trying to give this to me. Beneath that I’d scrawled:You don’t have to like me to use me, Weenie.
She slammed the book shut so fast she startled her reader, cutting off the young man’s effusive praise. Edwina set the book on her lap until she had a lull in her line. She glared at me while writing her next message, which ended up being a crude rendering of a penis with my name under it. It was so juvenile, I could only meet it with an equal measure of immaturity. The next time I passed it back to her, I wrote a page number on the title page, and when she flipped to it, she found not only a handful of flower petals that fell upon her lap, but a poem I’d edited, crossing out lines and replacing them with insults. My favorite of which compared the shade of her hair to a boiled carrot.
She hastily went to work making edits of her own, changing the part about carrots to reflect the size of my cock. And it was a baby carrot this time. Predictably.
I’m enjoying this game more than I should. As the signing is nearing its end, I probably only have one more chance to trick her into taking my book again. I edit another poem for her, turning a brooding love sonnet into an explicit ode to a girl with carrot-colored hair, from the perspective of an amorous shriveled carrot.
I do this while half listening to the man standing in my line. Zane has been chatting with Monty and Mr. Cordell at the front counter, leaving me alone with my insufferable reader, a Mr. Gavin Aston. I’ve given up on playing my part as the seductive poet, as Mr. Aston seems more interested in hearing himself talk, rather than speaking with me. He’s been droning on abouthis favorite piece of Brettonish literature, a pretentious work calledInfinite Suffering in the Garden of Happenstance. I nod as he speaks—because of course William the Poet likes the same trite shit as Mr. Aston—and continue scribbling new lines over the sonnet. Once it’s complete, I covertly lean toward Edwina’s table and slide the book onto her stack. She’s so immersed in speaking with her current guest, the same way she is with every reader, that she doesn’t even glance at her stack of books as she gathers one to sign. Her eyes crinkle at the corners, her grin as sweet as nectar?—
Until she finds my book’s title page beneath her hands yet again.
Baring her teeth, she cuts me a murderous glare.
Blooming hell, I could live for that look.
I purse my lips to keep from laughing and force my attention back to Mr. Aston. He’s been listing all the ways he’s similar to the main character inInfinite Suffering, and it’s a miracle he hasn’t floated away from the sheer mass of his inflated ego.
Disappointment sinks my chest as I don’t catch Edwina writing anything else in the book. Has she finally tired of our game? Her last guest leaves and—thank the All of All—so does Mr. Aston. Only a handful of guests remain, and Queen Gemma has returned. With the shop closing for the evening, it must be time for the book club meeting.
Edwina and I leave our tables so Mr. Cordell can rearrange the nook for the meeting. She has my book in her arms, hugging it to her chest. My breath hitches at the sight, and I’m suddenly jealous of an inanimate object.
“I’m keeping this,” she says, hugging the book tighter. “Otherwise, you’re going to continue to annoy me.”
