Chapter 10 Queen of the Night （Wesley） #2
The house lights dim before I can finish. The chandeliers rise slowly toward the ceiling. The orchestra swells, bright and merciless.
My spine goes ice cold.
Her uncle isn’t just well-connected. He’s Julian Rothschild. He is the franchise.
And she didn’t tell me.
Mozart bursts to life—sunlit, triumphant. I don’t hear any of it.
I sit through Act I locked in place, hands white-knuckled on my knees, smiling and nodding whenever Joy’s mother glances our way, but inside it’s just white noise. My skin feels too tight. My chest won’t expand all the way.
She didn’t tell me.
She slept in my bed, let my mom feed her on Christmas morning, wore my bracelet, and she didn’t tell me.
The world snaps back in when the lights rise for intermission.
Applause rustles around us. Silk whispers. Champagne flutes clink. My body finally registers that I haven’t breathed properly in an hour.
Serena stands, smoothing emerald silk. “Let’s stretch our legs, shall we? There are some people I’d like you both to meet.”
People. My stomach tightens.
We file out into the hallway. It’s crowded now, tuxedos, gowns, low laughter floating on money and perfume. Light glances off crystal and polished brass.
I’m still trying to pull air all the way into my lungs when a cheerful male voice booms, “Wesley Kane!”
A tall blond man in an expensive suit materializes, moving like a person who’s never been bumped in a crowd. His hand is already out. Signet ring, cuff links, family-crest energy.
“Bennett Vance the Fourth,” he says brightly. “I’ve heard so much. Congratulations on the engagement. Serena mentioned it.”
What the actual fuck?
“The engagement looks excellent on paper,” he continues, still smiling. “Serena said you’re very…media-friendly. That’s invaluable these days.”
My jaw tightens. Somewhere way back in my head, I hear that joke from the locker room—pretty boy Kane, walking billboard—but it lands different here, standing in silk and cut glass.
“Thanks,” I say, keeping my smile polite. “Have we met?”
“Not officially.” Bennett’s grin widens. “But I know the Preston family very well.”
Beside me, Joy goes still. “Bennett,” she says flatly.
“Bennett was just telling me about his family’s new endowment for the Philharmonic,” Serena trills, appearing like she’s been staged at his elbow the whole time.
“How generous,” I say coldly.
Bennett chuckles. “Well, when you can, you should. Right, Julian?”
“Ah, yes,” Julian intercepts lightly. “A generous sum, indeed. And while we’re on impact, Wesley here led the push that got half of Anchorage’s youth facilities funded. Rinks, training centers. That’s impact you can skate on.”
The tension shifts. A lifeline disguised as small talk. I should thank him, but my throat won’t work.
Serena’s face falters a fraction. Bennett blinks. Joy’s eyes flick to me, a subtle pulse, there and gone.
Bennett turns away to greet someone else, Serena glowing beside him. Joy’s fingers are digging crescents into my arm.
And then it happens.
I don’t even mean to look. My gaze just slides past Serena’s shoulder to a gleaming brushed-metal panel mounted on the wall.
PRESTON FAMILY ENDOWMENT
Metropolitan Opera House — Est. 1957.
My stomach drops clean out of my body.
This isn’t “my parents do okay.” This isn’t “she grew up comfortable.”
1957 is before my dad was born.
That isn’t donating. That’s underwriting part of the building. That’s your family name literally bolted to the bones of the place.
“Wesley?” Joy’s voice sounds far away.
She knew I’d see this. She knew I’d feel small in this hallway, next to seventy years of her last name, and she brought me anyway.
“Wesley?”
I turn.
Her face is tight. Scared. Guilty.
“You didn’t think to mention this either?” My voice comes out low. Scarier for how steady it is.
“I—” she starts.
Before she can get the next word out, an older couple glides up. Perfect posture. Perfect smiles.
“Serena,” the woman trills. “Your daughter looks radiant.”
“Thank you.” Serena lights up, all polished delight. Then she turns, angled so the hallway can see us. “Josephine, this is Patricia and Charles Whitmore. They’re on the Metropolitan Opera’s board of trustees.”
Josephine?
My chest cinches so hard I see spots.
Who the hell is Josephine?
Patricia turns to me. “And this must be the fiancé.”
“Yes,” Serena says smoothly, before I can do anything but remember how to stay upright. “This is her fiancé, Wesley Kane. He plays for the Defenders.”
Patricia’s eyebrows rise, interested. “How wonderful. Congratulations to you both.”
I nod. I smile. I’m pretty sure I say “Pleasure to meet you.” My mouth moves on autopilot.
But everything inside me is ringing one long, high, metallic note.
Josephine.
Julian drifts in again, steering us toward another handshake, another introduction. “Wesley, Joy, I’d like you to meet the Harrisons,” he says. “Old friends of the family.”
“Julian Rothschild,” the man booms, clapping his shoulder. “Good to see you. And this must be your niece.”
“Yes.” Julian’s hand settles, proud, on the bare curve of Joy’s shoulder. “My niece, Josephine Osgood Yardley Preston.”
What?
Not Joy-from-digital. Not the woman with a camera strap digging into her collarbone, chirping at Sokolov to retie his laces. Not the girl in my hoodie on my parents’ couch.
The floor tilts.
Josephine Osgood Yardley Preston.
That’s not a person. That’s a bloodline.
Heiress. Legacy. Dynasty.
Old money so old, it’s on the wall.
She’s not my girl. She never was. She belongs to this—this marble, this glass, this practiced charm that knows exactly how to stage-manage a narrative.
I look at her, and for the first time, I don’t recognize her at all.
Laughter ripples down the hall. Champagne clinks. A violin phrase floats from somewhere below.
And I just stand there, smiling like a good prop while something in my chest tears.
Julian is already pivoting us politely back toward the box. People are starting to drift to their seats. A chime rings: five minutes to curtain.
Joy—Josephine—reaches for my arm.
I offer it. Because that’s what’s expected and I don’t want to cause a scene. We walk back toward the box under chandeliers that drip light.
Maybe she was going to tell me, some weak voice in me offers. Maybe she tried. Maybe I didn’t listen.
No.
She chose not to tell me. She knew exactly what she was doing.
I lean in, voice low, just for her. “Josephine?”
She flinches like I slapped her. Her smile never moves. “I didn’t have a vote,” she whispers through her teeth.
“A vote?” My mouth tastes bitter. “You didn’t have a vote about your own name? Or about telling me what it is?”
“It’s complicated—”
“You should’ve told me your name,” I hiss, still smiling for the hallway. “Before you let me fuck you, Josephine.”
Her breath catches. Her eyes shine wet. “Wesley—”
“Not here.”
My hands are shaking. I drop her arm.
We slip back into the box. The house darkens around us. The chandeliers rise again, planets lifting. The orchestra swells into Act II.
Onstage, Papageno bumbles across a painted forest calling for his mate—comic, desperate, foolish. The audience laughs.
I don’t.
Beside me, she sits rigid. Silent tears cut tracks through her mascara and catch the spill of stage light. Not dramatic. Not noisy. Just breaking quietly, inches from me.
There’s a part of me that wants to reach for her. Pull her in. Tell her we’ll figure it out.
But it’s not “figure it out.” It’s not a little white lie.
She didn’t just forget to tell me. She built a scene for me to fall into and edited out the parts where I’d realize she was from a different world.
My jaw locks. I stare straight ahead. My chest hurts like someone’s got a hand around my ribs and is squeezing.
But boys don’t cry. Right?
Papagena appears onstage in a burst of color. The music swells, bright and hopeful—two fools finding each other at last.
The audience sighs, charmed.
And I sit there, gutted, knowing better.
We’re not Papageno and Papagena.
We’re a pretty lie.
I didn’t even know her name.