Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 88960 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 88960 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
For a long moment, neither of us speaks.
The dressing room suddenly feels very small. Two otherworlders, standing in a bridal boutique, both carrying secrets that would sound insane to anyone else.
“The world I came from,” Abigail says slowly, “my father was a violent drunk. He’d come home angry and stay angry, and my mother and I learned to be very, very small.” She pauses. “Here, he’s just...cold. Distant. A workaholic who buries himself in business so he doesn’t have to feel anything.”
Her voice drops.
“All I ever wanted was a father who actually saw me. Not an asset. Not a tool for alliances. Just... me.” A hollow laugh escapes her. “Stupid prayer, right? Some things can’t change no matter which world you’re in.”
Oh.
I know that story. I lived a version of that story—my father’s voice shaking the walls, my mother’s silence filling all the spaces in between. Learning to read moods like sailors read the sky. Learning to disappear when the storm was coming.
“You’re also, um...” I hesitate, not sure how to say this without my voice cracking. “You mentioned you’re going to marry—”
“One of the kings.” Abigail lets out a small, startled laugh. “Imagine my surprise when I found out I was engaged to a mafia king. I was single in my world. Completely, utterly single. And then I wake up here and apparently I’m about to become royalty.”
“Did you ever write any of this down?” I ask. “The otherworlder stuff?”
Abigail shakes her head quickly. “Never. Too risky. I kept a journal, but...” She shivers. “If someone found it and read that I thought I was from another world? They’d lock me up. Or worse—use it against me.”
Smart. Paranoid, maybe, but smart.
Her smile fades.
“But I have to warn you. There’s this guy from my old world—”
“Amos?”
Her eyes fly wide. “How did you know?”
“I think we’re from the same world.” The realization settles over me like a cold blanket. “I know Marilyn.”
Abigail’s face darkens. “So you know how Amos stole her life savings?”
“I...didn’t, actually.”
“It’s his pattern.” Abigail’s voice has gone hard. “He’s good at sweeping women off their feet. Makes them feel special, cherished, like they’re the center of his universe. And then he convinces them to take out loans—for wedding surprises, romantic gestures, whatever story he’s spinning that week. Only the surprise is that he disappears with the money and leaves them drowning in debt.”
My stomach turns. That’s...that’s genuinely horrible. Like finding out the cream filling in a beautiful pastry is actually rancid.
“When I saw him here,” Abigail continues, “I recognized him immediately. Same face. Same charm. Same wrong feeling in my gut.” She takes a breath. “I’ve been trying to figure out what he’s planning. Watching him. But I can’t prove anything yet.”
“Does he know? That you’re watching him?”
“I don’t think so. I’ve been careful.” Abigail’s fingers twist together. “But there’s something different about him here. Something... more. The way he looks at me sometimes...” She shudders. “I can easily imagine him causing trouble on my wedding day. Showing up where he shouldn’t be. Watching. And if I’m right about what he is...”
She doesn’t finish. She doesn’t have to.
The wedding day.
On the original wedding day—the day I stumbled into the chapel and saw a woman in white fleeing through a hidden door—I assumed she was running from Devyn. From the marriage. From the terrifying mafia king who’d caught her trying to escape.
But what if I was wrong?
What if Abigail wasn’t running from Devyn?
What if she was running from Amos?
“You never told me your name,” Abigail says, pulling me back to the present.
“It’s Bailey.”
“Bailey.” She tests the name, then nods like it passes inspection. “Well, Bailey...I know this is last minute and horribly shameless of me, but...” She bites her lip. “Do you think you could come to my wedding?”
Her wedding.
To Devyn.
I’m going to watch Devyn marry someone else.
Something in my chest folds in on itself, like origami made of hurt.
“I need someone to keep an eye on Amos,” she continues, oblivious to the small internal crisis I’m having. “Someone who knows what he is. I don’t want to worry the king—I don’t know how to explain Hewhay, and I don’t want to lie to him either. But if someone could just...watch. Make sure Amos doesn’t try anything.”
She looks at me with those rain-colored eyes, and I see it now—the fear she’s been hiding beneath the poise. The loneliness of being an otherworlder with no one to confide in.
I know that loneliness.
“I promise I’ll pay you handsomely once we’re married,” Abigail adds quickly. “Whatever you want. Name your price.”
I don’t want her money.
I want her to live.
I want to rewrite the ending I saw in that dungeon—Abigail’s body cold and still, her honey-blonde hair matted with blood, her rain-colored eyes open and staring at nothing.
I want to give her the future that was stolen.