Because she was wearing it.
It hung from her shoulders like a trophy. The sleeves swallowed her hands. The silk of her gown bunched high, cinched at her waist with his belt in a solution that had seemed clever and necessary approximately three minutes ago. Her hair had completely given up on decorum. Her lipstick was no longer only on her lips.
She caught her reflection in the darkened window at the end of the corridor and almost didn’t recognize herself. She looked untamed. Incandescent. Like a woman who had just set fire to her own carefully stacked life.
And okay, yes, her stomach was doing that thing, the one where it felt like she’d swallowed a hummingbird. But the panic could take a number. She had more urgent things to focus on.
“We need to move,” Nate said. “Somewhere private. Somewhere we can figure out the next step without an audience.”
“I know a discreet exit. One that doesn’t involve the front doors and three hundred witnesses.”
Nate blinked at her as if she’d just produced a grappling hook. “You do.”
Honestly. Had he learned nothing about the women in her family?
She nodded briskly. “Old servants’ passages. My grandmother used them to smoke in peace and avoid my grandfather.” Which, in Allegra’s opinion, made her a visionary.
Grabbing Nate’s hand, she yanked him along, the jacket tumbling from her shoulder.
This is fine, she told herself. This is manageable. This is—
They rounded the corner.
And walked directly into hell.
Julien stood at the far end of the corridor. He was spectacularly red, veins pulsing at his temples, his hair disheveled. Behind him, the tribunal had assembled like a firing squad: her father, carved from glacial disappointment; her mother, pale as death; Clara, absolutely beaming; and three security guards who looked almost… hopeful.
The air thickened. Sank into her lungs like wet cement.
Julien’s gaze dragged over Nate, then snapped to Allegra. To the jacket. The belt. The bare feet.
“What the fuck is this?” Julien said, his voice cracking like a teenager’s.
“This,” her father said, “is Ryan Steel.”
She felt Nate flinch beside her.
No. Absolutely not.
She stepped forward before Nate could finish the denial forming on his lips.
“For the last time,” she said, lifting her chin, “his name is Nate Donovan.”
Nate tried again. “Mr. von Wildern, sir. I know you think you know me, but I only have the best intentions for your daughter. I’m not looking to—”
“You shut up,” her father snapped. “Arrest him.”
The guards moved.
Something hot and feral surged up from Allegra’s toes.
Nate shifted, ready to intervene.
Then he stopped.
Allegra stepped forward first. If someone was going to face this tribunal, it would be her.
“Stop, Papa. Just stop. The engagement’s over. I love Nate, and nothing you say changes that.”
