“You have so much to offer, Daphne Elizabeth,” she continued. “You’re funny, you’re beautiful, you’re kind…” She didn’t add, When it comes to Alaric, though, you seem to forget all that, but the unspoken thought hung in the air between them. Jaya waited, worried she’d overstepped her bounds.

Daphne Elizabeth didn’t speak for a long moment, her face a mask of defensiveness. But when she looked up at Jaya, perhaps seeing the lack of judgment in Jaya’s expression, the fight went out of her eyes. Running a fingernail along a crease in her bedsheet, she sighed. “I don’t know. I guess… I feel like Alaric was the first person to really see me. I mean, sure, I’ve dated other guys before, guys who got off on the fact that they were dating the McKinley heiress. But it never felt like this. For some reason, when I’m with Alaric, he doesn’t seem like he’s looking through me. He tells me all the time that when he saw me, it was like a gong went off in his head and he just knew.” She uncrossed her arms and played with a pencil on the table.

“Knew what?” Jaya asked, expecting Daphne Elizabeth to say, He loved me.

Instead, she said, “That he had to have me.”

Jaya paused. “He… he had to ‘have’ you?”

Daphne Elizabeth waved a hand. “That sounds bad, but the way he said it, it really felt like he meant it. You know? Like, that he just had to have me in his life. He pays so much attention to me, Jaya. I’m not invisible when I’m with him.”

Jaya leaned forward and put a hand on Daphne Elizabeth’s ankle. “You’re not invisible at all, Daphne Elizabeth.”

The girl smiled a little. She tried to make it look brave and nonchalant, but it just looked sad. “Maybe not to you, but try telling that to my parents. Sometimes I swear I’m half human, half a pane of glass.” She rallied. “But it’s okay. I know they’re super busy, super important people and all that. They’ve been telling me that my whole life.” She shrugged. “But on occasion, it’s just nice to be seen, you know?”

Jaya forced a smile. “Mm.” She turned back to her book.

“And what about you?” Daphne Elizabeth, who clearly had no intention of either studying or letting Jaya study, asked. “Anyone you’ve got your eye on?”

“Well…” Jaya looked up from her book. “There is someone… but I’m taking my time with him.” Taking my time burrowing into his life, she thought, but didn’t say. Like a little rabbit. A little, vengeful, heartbreaking rabbit.

“Well, he’s a goner, whoever he is,” Daphne Elizabeth said, laughing. “You’re what they call a hot-tee with a capital ‘tee.’ ”