Chapter 55
FIFTY-FIVE
GEMMA
One Week Before
“Kill me,” I said.
Grim stared back at me, the look in his eyes a mix of anger and irritation. An insanely inappropriately timed thought came to mind. His face reminded me of that one SpongeBob episode.
How many times do we have to teach you this lesson, old man?
I nearly laughed, but instead put a hand to his heart, calming him. “Gemma Crowne has to die. My family is at risk. Your family is at risk. And as long as I live, you’ll never be free.”
“Gemma—”
“But,” I interrupted. “Just because Gemma Crowne has to die doesn’t mean I do.”
Suspicion narrowed his eyes, but something else glimmered in the dark depths—hope. He rose up next to me, hands planted in sand silver with moonlight.
“What are you thinking, Rich Girl?” He gripped my chin between his thumb and forefinger. “Say it clearly.”
“We fake my death.”
He rubbed circles in my chin with his thumbs, eyes unreadable. Our breathing created wispy tendrils of hot-white smoke in the cold. Beyond Grim, the hedge maze towered, golden lanterns flickering against the black-green leaves.
After a moment he released my chin. “You can’t go back from this.”
“I don’t want to go back,” I said, grabbing his hand. “I want to go forward.”
The pure, concentrated devotion in his eyes nearly floored me. He shook his head, exhaling, and turned toward the ocean.
“If I were a better man, I’d try to talk you out of this,” he said, rubbing his forehead, eyes still on the ocean, moon reflecting broken shards.
I grabbed his face between my palms, turning him back to me. I leaned forward on a smile I couldn’t contain, and kissed him.
“Good thing you’re not a better man,” I said against his lips.
When I pulled back, some of the heaviness cloaking Grim had dissipated. A soft smile curved uneven on his lips.
“It’s too cold for you,” he said, rubbing the goose bumps off my arms. “And we have a death to fake.” He reached for his shirt, discarded in the sand.
“You’re the one who’s shirtless,” I said, but let him drape the black fabric over my arms.
Grim stood and held his hand out for me. I clasped it and he dragged me up off the sand, into his arms. He wrapped one arm around my back, the other caressing my cheek before sliding into my hair.
I felt safe. Protected.
He inhaled, eyes searching my face for something. Then he crushed his lips against mine. His palm cradling my face, his hand on my back pushing me closer. He kissed me with a devotion I felt in my bones.
When he pulled back, I was dizzy. Our breaths heated the small space between our heads.
“I don’t actually know how to fake a death,” I admitted.
He dragged his thumb across my lips, a knowing smile on his face, as if he knew something I didn’t.
“It’s been almost an hour,” he said, and stepped back, but not before encircling my hand in his. “The guys should be finished cleaning.”
Still, we went into the maze to double-check. Grim’s hand in mine was a welcome heat in the cold. The maze was spotless, the only sign that something might have gone awry the occasional protruding leaf.
“Is it done?” Grayson’s voice carried into the hedge maze. My hand still in Grim’s, we walked back out to find my brother.
My brother raked his hands through his rose gold hair, his dress shirt unbuttoned at the top. When he saw us, he continued.
“I can’t hold them off any longer. Story is distracting them long enough for me to warn you.”
“The place is clean,” Grim said. “No one will ever know.”
Grayson visibly relaxed. “Okay.” He exhaled. “Good. Well…” He glanced between Grim and me warily, before landing back on Grim. “You should still get going.”
“We will,” he said. “But first, I’m calling in your debt, Crowne.”
Grayson turned his attention to me, brows pinched. My lips parted, because I didn’t know what Grim was thinking either.
“Gemma wants to die,” Grim continued. “We need your help.”
Too many emotions flashed through my brother’s face—anger, despair, anger again. He opened and closed his fists. Grim knew what he was doing by saying it that way, and he probably did it to get back at me for the way I told him earlier.
I elbowed Grim. “That sounded so fucking dramatic. I don’t want to die for real. I want to fake my death. I want to be free, Gray.”
Grayson stared at me for a long time, and I could see the words in his eyes.
We’d never had a chance to be siblings. We lived in a home where emotions were considered uncouth.
The way we bonded had been backstabbing.
Abigail and Grayson had got out, and they’d hoped the same for me. Maybe then we could be a real family.
But I was asking for an out.
That future dissolving as quickly as the hope for it came.
On a deep exhale, Grayson turned to Grim. “I don’t see what I can do.”
“The press,” I said, sensing what Grim had in mind. “Tell them I overdosed. Tell them I was troubled. Make them believe it. Give them something juicy—and believable—enough that they don’t look deeper into my death.”
His brow cinched, mouth twisted in a grimace. “I’m not going to say that about you.”
I grabbed his hands in mine. “Please. You dissolved my engagement because you wanted me to be free. Now let me.”
The groove in his brow deepened. “This is what you want? Truly?”
For the first time in my life, I knew who I was. I knew what I wanted. I could answer the question that had plagued me ever since Abigail asked it. What do I want?
“Yes,” I said. “I want this.”
He searched my eyes, looking for the lie. When he didn’t find it, he released another exhale. “Fine. I’ll handle the press. I’ll get you out of this world in print, but I don’t see how any of this matters if we have nothing to put in a casket.”
I released Grayson’s hands, stepping back. Right, that’s kind of an important piece of the puzzle.
“We have a guy that can fake an autopsy,” Grim said.
Grayson laughed bitterly. “Of course you do.”
After a bit of back-and-forth on what else was expected and what needed to be done in order to kill Gemma Crowne, Grayson left. But before he did, he dragged me into a deep, brotherly hug. The type of sibling affection we’d heretofore never exchanged.
“So what now?” I asked when Grayson was gone, turning to Grim.
Grim grinned. “You finally get your wish, Rich Girl.”