Chapter 88

Kayla

Nicholas stood in the doorway for a long moment, not saying a word.

I must have looked utterly stupid as I stared up at him, my eyes wide and my mouth hanging open like a fish out of water. Did he hear everything I had just said? If he did, then what did he think of it?

Hell, what did I even think of what I’d just said? I didn’t even know if it was me or the wine talking at that point. I certainly hoped it was the wine, and that this would all just be something to laugh about in the morning.

But to my surprise, his eyes flicked over to the stack of cards on the coffee table. He nodded toward them as he casually began unbuttoning his snow-dusted leather jacket. “What are those?”

I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding, suddenly immensely relieved. So he didn’t hear me after all. Or so it seemed.

Reaching for one of the cards, I handed it to him. “The print shop burned down, so we couldn’t get the seating cards printed. So we made them ourselves.”

Jade and Emma were quiet, sipping their wine with apprehensive looks on their faces, as Nicholas hesitated before taking the card from my hand. His fingers brushed across mine, and they were as cold as the winter air outside. I tried to hide the subtle twitch in my arm at the contact by quickly folding my hands in my lap.

Nicholas studied the card for a moment, and I felt my stomach drop just a little as one of those dark eyebrows of his shot up.

“You made these?”

Blissfully, before I had to say anything, Emma jumped in. “Jade drew the design, and Kayla and I did everything else,” she said, a proud grin on her face. “Do you like it? Say you like it. If you don’t, we’ll kill you.”

Jade snorted into her wine glass, but I was still too tense to react.

Nicholas studied the card in silence for a moment longer. I wondered what he thought of our pack sigils being combined like that; perhaps it was too much. In fact, in retrospect, it was suddenly beginning to feel like a stupid idea. It wasn’t like we were actually combining our packs, or—

“I do like them.” He tossed the card back down on the coffee table and finished shrugging off his jacket, hanging it on the hook by the door. “The sigils look really cool intertwined like that.”

For the second time, I let out a breath of relief. Emma and Jade seemed relieved, too; that was, until Nicholas plopped down on a floor cushion by the coffee table and tucked a strand of dark, windswept hair behind his ear.

“But I have some suggestions,” he said, reaching for a fresh piece of paper.

Jade, Emma and I all watched with rapt fascination as Nicholas worked. His large fingers moved with surprising deftness for someone who had likely never done arts and crafts a day in his life—although, I supposed that working on engines resulted in better fine motor skills than any of us gave him credit for.

Over the next few minutes, Nicholas had carefully stamped a new border around the edge of the card, used cursive text instead of Times New Roman, and had even added the faintest touch of gold glitter to the border for good measure.

When he was finished, he handed the card to Jade, nodding silently to her. She took it, hesitating for a moment, before she sketched the sigil onto the space beneath the name. When she handed it back, he studied it briefly, then pressed his lips into a slight smile and held it up for all of us to see.

“Much better. We’ll leave the sigils like this—just linework. I think it’s more dignified without the color.”

Indeed, when the three of us leaned in to get a better look, we all realized that he was right. The new design looked sleek and formal, but the faint touch of glitter around the border added a pop that was sure to sparkle under the lights of the reception hall.

With that, the four of us got to work remaking the cards in the new style. With Nicholas’s help as well as a few more snacks and two more bottles of wine, we managed to finish all of the cards that night.

When we were finally finished, we stacked all of the cards neatly and bundled them together. Our fingers and clothes—Nicholas’s included—were all covered in glitter and our heads were fuzzy from too much wine, but it was a night well spent.

And as for the comments I’d made before, Nicholas didn’t mention them. I wasn’t entirely sure if he had heard me and was just not saying anything to be nice, or if I had finished my confession before he walked into the room. I hoped it was the latter.

Either way, I wasn’t about to press the matter. Honestly, I just wanted to forget what I’d said. And if he heard me, then I wanted him to forget it, too.

And so the four of us went our separate ways for the night.

After a hot and steamy shower to soothe my aching muscles, taking care to avoid scrubbing my injured leg, I hobbled my way to bed and climbed under the covers. I was still buzzing a bit from the wine and not feeling very tired yet, so I grabbed my phone and scrolled for a little while.

It didn’t take me long to start seeing the effects of the day’s events on social media; news of the check I had written to the print shop owner had already been circulating the internet for hours. Some people said I was just being a Mary Sue, trying to fix my image with false acts of kindness, while others were pointing it out as proof of my ‘selfless and down-to-earth nature’.

I didn’t really care either way. I didn’t give that old man that money to garner praise.

But soon enough, I did come across the interview between Nicholas and the journalist. And my stomach twisted as I saw him sitting in that chair, his legs crossed and an easy smile on his face.

“Kayla is easily the most selfless person I’ve ever met,” he was saying. “She would never, ever cheat on anyone. And to think that anyone could ever accuse her of being so cruel and soulless breaks my heart…”

My eyes widened a little as Nicholas spoke. The interview was just supposed to be a form of damage control—we both knew that—and yet…

Suddenly, he leaned closer to the camera and sternly declared, “Kayla, if you’re watching this, I love you. You don’t need to prove yourself—everyone who truly matters knows that you’re a kind, caring person. And I’m not going to let anyone make you out to be anything but that.”

My breath caught as I looked at the footage. It came to an end, but I continued to hold onto the phone, staring at the frozen image of Nicholas’s stern face.

Something about the tone in his voice didn’t seem fake. And something about the sparkle in those amber eyes of his seemed awfully genuine.

But I knew it was just wishful thinking on my part, though. After all, he only did that interview to protect our public image. And we certainly didn’t love each other.

Sighing, I scrolled down to the comments beneath the video, and my eyebrows went up in surprise. Nicholas had left a comment that was now pinned at the top.

“We’ll be holding a public party on the Nightshade estate this weekend,” he wrote. “If you’re reading this… you’re invited!”

My eyes widened, and I sat up ramrod straight in bed.

This weekend… was my birthday.