“Excellent. My assistant will arrange the details.” He smiles at her with warmth. “Welcome to the palace, Miss Cross. I have a feeling you’re going to make history here.”
“I hope so,” she says politely.
My parents are pulled away, and we’re all escorted to a formal reception to celebrate the new artist. It’s agony. I have to stand beside my parents and make polite conversation with judges and dignitaries while Addison accepts congratulations across the room. Each time I glance at her, she’s chatting with someone else. We’re performing for the same audience, playing the same game, pretending we don’t know each other in any way that matters.
Delphine appears at my elbow with two glasses of champagne. “South corridor. Third door on the left. Fifteen minutes max.”
I don’t ask how she knows what I need. I set down my glass and slip out of the gallery.
The study is small and lined with bookshelves, lit only by afternoon light filtering through a single window. I pace the length of it twice before forcing myself to stand still. Three minutes pass before Addison slips inside.
“Delphine set this up?” she asks.
“Apparently.”
She laughs, breathless, and a second passes before she’s in my armswith our mouths sliding together. She tastes like champagne and victory and everything I’m not supposed to want.
“You won,” I say against her lips, so fucking happy.
“I did.” She pulls back far enough to look at me with her eyes shining. “I can’t believe it.”
I brush a strand of hair from her face. “The paintings were gorgeous, Addison. I can’t believe you see me like that. And the note under the chessboard made me smile.”
Her expression softens. “I wondered if you’d see it.”
“I didn’t miss a single detail.” I trace my thumb along her jaw. “You showed them who I am when I’m with you.”
“They loved it.”
“They did. You’re so talented, and I’m so lucky to know you.”
I kiss her fingers and then her mouth before moving to her jaw and then the spot beneath her ear that makes her shiver. As we exist in this space, I believe everything is possible.
She pulls back and looks at me with her face flushed and her eyes bright with happiness. “This is actually going to work. I can feel it.”
I kiss her again because I want to believe her. Right now, in this room, with her taste on my tongue and her hands in my hair and her paintings hanging in the gallery down the hall, I do believe her. I believe we can have this. I believe we can make it work.
The door opens.
My mother stands in the doorway, and the look on her face tells me everything before she says a single word.
“Well,” she says quietly as she steps inside and closes the door behind her, “this explains quite a lot.”
Addison goes rigid in my arms, and I step in front of her without thinking, putting myself between them.
“Mother—”
“Don’t.” She holds up a hand. “You both played me for a fool. Acted as if you didn’t know one another when you’d been meeting for these paintings in secret.”
“It wasn’t a secret,” I tell her. “No one asked.”
My mother exhales a deep breath—something she usually does when she’s trying to keep control of her emotions. “You know, when I spoke to Tatiana, she told me the reason she behaved the way she did was that she thought you were interestedin someone else. It was her last effort to win you over. I assured her she was wrong, but she wasn’t.”
My hands curl into fists at my sides. “Her last effort to win me over? She cornered me in my office. She put her hands on me after I told her to stop. That’s not desperation, Mother. That’s assault.”
“She was emotional and made a poor decision?—”
“She sexually harassed me.” The words come out sharp, and I don’t care. “I filed that complaint because what she did was wrong, and you’re standing here, making excuses for her.”
