Chapter 5
Five
Daphne
Isettled into the plush leather seat of the Caliran government jet and dropped my bag onto the one beside me.
The cabin smelled faintly of citrus and the sea.
I shut my eyes, pretending I was already home.
Calira was a tiny Mediterranean island where my mother had grown up and I’d spent half my childhood.
We were small but definitely not irrelevant. Rare minerals kept world leaders interested, billionaires fought over cliffside estates, and our beaches looked so unreal that people assumed the photos were edited.
I loved Calira. It had just stopped feeling like home after I moved to the States.
My mom lived there permanently now and expected me to move back after graduation.
When I’d asked what I had to do to stay in the States, she had looked me straight in the eye and said, “You have to become a Fawn and convince your Night Son to marry you.”
I’d almost laughed.
If Brooks chose me, in no universe would we ever fall in love.
I’d probably go down as the first Fawn in history who murdered her Son.
That meant it was either Calira or prison.
People heard princess and imagined my life was a fairy tale. Mine sure as hell wasn’t.
My happily ever after came with an arranged marriage to whatever man everyone decided would make the best king. Love was optional, which was heartbreaking to a princess.
It was also why my mother had left in the first place. She’d only returned after my father’s scandal destroyed her reputation.
Now my grandfather, King Octavian Vermont III, was already searching for her next husband.
“Mind if I take this?”
I looked up to find Cory standing in the aisle.
“The seat, not the bag,” he joked, lifting my bag while waiting for my reply.
“All yours,” I said. “The seat, not the bag.”
We hadn’t spoken since the whole janitor’s-closet disaster.
He cracked a smile, called for the flight attendant, and passed her the bag. “Please stow this somewhere safe for the princess.”
Salana glanced at me for permission, and I nodded.
She left with the bag, and Cory didn’t even try to hide that he was checking out her ass as she tucked it away in a cabinet.
Salana was a former Miss Calira and gorgeous enough to be modeling in Milan instead of serving drinks to my family. But the women in her family had worked for mine for generations.
According to castle rumors, they’d also served the kings in other ways. Her mother was my grandfather’s mistress.
Salana disappeared from our view when she entered the cockpit.
Cory stretched out his legs. His pants lifted at the ankles, showing off black loafers embroidered with the Caliran flag—a single rose above ocean waves.
He looked unmistakably Caliran with olive skin, wavy black hair, and the distinctive nose nearly everyone back home shared. He was hot. But him leaving me alone with Brooks in the closet had knocked several points off his attractiveness score.
“My father said we might as well share a flight,” he said. “You know, since we’re considered the most eco-friendly country in the world.”
I side-eyed him. “Mother Nature appreciates your sacrifice.”
I was pissed at him, but kicking the prime minister’s son off a government plane in front of Salana probably wasn’t princess-like. It’d also piss off the king.
The pilot announced we were ready for takeoff. I stared out the window as we raced down the runway and climbed into the sky.
“Would you like something to drink, Princess?” Salana asked when she returned.
The way Cory irritably shifted in his seat made it obvious he wasn’t thrilled she’d addressed me before him.
Before Brooks bulldozed his way into the Fawn situation, I’d honestly thought Cory would make the better Son for me. We’d grown up together. During recess one day, a boy had nailed me in the face with a dodgeball so hard my nose bled. Cory had broken the boy’s in return.
“Just a water, please,” I started before changing my mind. “Actually … a vodka soda.”
No way in hell was I surviving this flight sober.
Being twenty, I wasn’t legally allowed to drink in the States.
Not that it ever stopped me.
But in Calira, the drinking age was eighteen.
We were flying there, so that was close enough.
Salana dipped her head. “Yes, Princess.”
“Bourbon on the rocks,” Cory told her.
He kept staring at Salana’s ass on her walk to the bar, so I elbowed him in the side.
“Shit,” he grumbled, rubbing at the spot.
“Did you really want me as your Fawn?” I asked him.
“Hell yeah. I didn’t stand much of a chance once Brooks got involved, though.”
Sons weren’t supposed to discuss Fawn selection, but I wasn’t about to rat Cory out. They’d kill him for it.
Salana arranged glasses behind the polished, walnut bar, crystal clinking softly.
“Why did you want me as your Fawn?” I asked him.
“Because I’ve known you since we were kids.” He shrugged. “You’re one of the few people I actually like being around at SVU.”
Salana returned with our drinks, setting mine down before handing Cory his.
“Brooks wants you,” Cory said when Salana left, swirling the melting ice in his glass before taking a drink.
“Why?”
“My guess is to punish you for your father’s crimes.”
I already knew that.
Didn’t mean I liked hearing someone else confirm it.
I chugged my drink. It wasn’t very princess-like, but oh well.
“If it gets too bad, you come to me, okay?” Cory squeezed my arm. “No one fucks with my princess.”
His face had lost the cocky look he’d worn most of the flight.
Well shit.
Maybe he can earn his way off my shit list.
My phone vibrated, and I tugged it from my blazer pocket. I took one look at the screen and knew I’d need another drink.
Brooks: Remember when I fucked you on the Resolute Desk?
Of course that’s his opening line.
I knew replying to him was a big mistake, but I did it anyway.
Me:
Brooks: I heard you’re going to Calira.
Brooks: Maybe I’ll come and fuck you on your grandfather’s throne next.
Me: Too bad. I already scheduled that with Cory.
Just to make his eye twitch, I snapped a photo of Cory looking down at his phone and sent it.
Me: You probably shouldn’t choose me as your Fawn.
Me: I hear you don’t like sharing.
Brooks: If I find out he touched you, someone’s losing a hand.
Brooks: Correction.
Brooks: I’ll make you cut his off first. Then I’ll do yours.
Me: You’re seriously demented.
Brooks: Don’t be the reason that idiot can’t write a sentence again.
Me: May the best man win.
The typing bubble appeared almost instantly.
Brooks: My personal Helen of Troy.
Personal.
That asshole and his ownership issues.