I throw my hands in the air. “Is that not what I’m doing? We needed the money, and she asked me to do this for her. No one wanted to publish a nineteen-year-old girl’s sexy poetry. Not until she attached it to my name and credentials as an actor. She was overjoyed when she received the publication offer.”
“That’s not what it means to show your support. That’s reinforcing the idea that a young woman can’t succeed on her own.”
Her words slap me across my face. Cassie has never expressed anything but enthusiasm over our arrangement, but is Edwina right? Was I wrong to agree to this opportunity?
I shake the doubts from my mind. “She doesn’t want the spotlight. She just wants her work appreciated during her lifetime, even if it isn’t attached to her name.”
“Everyone wants their work appreciated, William, and we all fight for it. No one gets a ticket for an easy life.”
Rage boils my blood. An easy life. That’s what she thinks we have?
“Not everyone can afford the pride of being a starving artist,” I say through my teeth. “Not everyone shares your ideals. Ideals don’t feed your family. Ideals won’t keep my sister alive long enough to enjoy the fruits of her labor after she’s spent her final years striving and fighting for renown. Not everyone wants that fucking life!”
Her cheeks flare crimson. “Is that how you see me? Just a ball of stubborn pride living off ideals?”
I close my eyes and run a hand over my face, doing all I can to cool my temper. I don’t want to yell at her. I want to pull her against my chest and bring us back to that beautiful place we were in when she first stormed into the room. But when I open my eyes, she’s no longer before me. Instead, she’s tugging at the door, both handles still wrapped in my vines.
I stride after her. “Where are you going? Are you done with me, just like that? Without giving us a chance to work through this?”
She keeps her eyes pinned to the door. “I don’t know. I just…I knew this was going to happen.” She mutters the last part under her breath.
“You knew what was going to happen? That we’d fight? That you’d find a reason to push me away? Is that why you asked about June before you agreed to dissolve our bet? Were you just looking for any excuse to keep this advantage over me?”
She whirls to face me. “This isn’t just about the bet. But maybe you’re right. Maybe I was waiting for this to happen because my past has taught me it will. Men lie. They present themselves one way and then turn out nothing like their pretty promises?—”
“Do not compare me to Dennis Feverforth,” I say, dropping my voice. “This has nothing to do with him or your past. This is happening now, and you are running away.”
She releases a groan as she tugs the handles again. “I’m not running away. Just let me out. Get rid of these vines so I can get away from you and breathe for a minute.”
The panic in her voice slices through my chest. I hate the thought of her leaving while things are like this, even if she’s only going to her room. Every instinct in me yearns to cling to her, to hold her while we yell and talk and fight until we come to a solution, even if only a temporary truce. Even just a promise to try to understand each other. But she isn’t me. Maybe she processes hurt differently than I do. Maybe she processes it alone.
I can’t force her to be anyone other than who she is.
Because I love who she is.
I love her.
Even if she hates me now.
Slowly, I lower my fingers to the handle. My chest tightens at how she flinches away, yet I extend my magic and dissolve the vines.
“I won’t keep you here,” I whisper, “but please come back to me if you find it in your heart to want to work this out. I know you’re hurt, and I understand why. I know this fight feels fuckinghorrible, but please, Edwina. Please don’t let this end what we’ve begun.”
Her throat bobs and she gives a single jerky nod.
The last of the vines fall to the floor, and she turns the handle at last. She storms out of the room, leaving me colder than I’ve ever been before.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
EDWINA
By morning, I’ve alternated between seething in rage and feeling like a complete asshole a thousand times over. I’m so mad William kept his secret from me. So angry on behalf of his fans, whom he’s lied to. And his sister, who’s been relegated to the shadows because no one valued her work until a man presented it. I’ve been there, and I can’t shake my anger over it.
But then again…he was right about me. Not everyone is privileged enough to cling to ideals as tightly as I do. Having well-to-do parents and siblings has always given me a safety net. I can strive for my career and take risks, knowing I can always go home. At the cost of my independence, yes, but I won’t starve.
Meanwhile, William and Cassie faced crippling debt—a situation I’ve never been in—before they were offered the publishing contract. Agreeing to the deal kept Cassie out of the workhouses. Now that I’ve met her, I can’t help but agree thatWilliam was right to go to any lengths to protect her from such a fate.
Yet it still hurts. And there’s a jagged piece of my heart that saysI told you so. Taunting me that everything I’ve cherished between me and William was never real to begin with. It was always a lie. Always an act.
