There’s a determined set to her jaw when she replies, “There is nothing to tell. There’s not some big secret, no blackmail or coercion. I want to, so I am. Now leave it alone.”

At that, she wrenches herself free and walks away, her book left forgotten on her chair.

Chapter Seventeen

Lainey

Later that morning, I take a guided tour of the villa with my grandmother and a few others. We stroll from room to room, learning about the artwork and the interiors. Then we go to lunch, which turns out to be incredibly dull. My grandmother sits among her friends. Royce seems caught up in conversation with a gentleman from Russia, and Emmett is so thickly surrounded by worshipping fans that I couldn’t fight my way through the throng if I wanted to. I’m bitter about it through the whole meal, scraping my food around the fine bone china until it finally feels appropriate for me to stand and leave, having finished two bites of a goat cheese and cucumber sandwich and nothing else.

I don’t notice Royce following after me until he calls my name. My initial reaction is slight annoyance, but I turn and try a smile on for size as he hurries to catch me.

“I was going to see if perhaps we could finish that walk we started yesterday?”

My manners kick in before I even have to consider them. “Of course. I’d love to.”

It feels so eerily similar to yesterday, the crunching of the gravel marking every awkward step, only this time I try harder to come up with topics of conversation we can discuss. I want to make this feel natural. I want to be walking alongside a friend, and to do that, we have to get past this beginning phase. After a few failed attempts to find mutual footing, I bring up the book I’m reading, and Royce’s face lights up.

“I love McCarthy’s writing, though I haven’t read that one yet.”

“Then I’ll lend it to you when I’m finished. I’m almost done.”

And just like that, we’ve begun to bridge the gap between us. I feel infinitely better, already imagining how happy my grandmother will be when I tell her about my afternoon.

Then, we turn the corner back toward the house and I come face to face with Emmett walking alongside Marie Shaw.

I’ve met her before, back in the States. She’s a soda heiress. Two years older than me, she’s slightly more than an acquaintance but not quite a friend. She’s classically beautiful, feminine and sweet. You could even say angelic with the sun beating down on her pale blonde hair oh so perfectly. The few times we’ve found ourselves in conversation, she’s barely uttered a word, not because she’s shy, but because she hasn’t deemed me worthy of the effort. She seems to have found her voice now though as she looks up at Emmett with shining eyes. It’s like he single-handedly hung the moon. I watch—barely suppressing a gag—as she drops her hand to his forearm, leaning into him to laugh, and I just don’t think anything could be that funny. What, is he a stand-up comedian now? Please.