Page 77 of Save a Wish

I didn’t agree with that, but the fear in my friends’ eyes had me acquiescing. “All right. I’ll go to dinner if you two promise that you’ll come up here tomorrow. We’ll go riding together.”

An anxious look passed between them.

“Look, being with you two is the only thing—and I mean the only thing—that will allow me to survive this place.”

“We’ll come.” Orla elbowed Fionn. “Won’t we?”

“We will.” His lips turned up in the hint of a grin. “If only to keep her out of trouble.”

“Or get her into it,” Orla said with a matching little grin. “Our history together implies the latter is the most likely.”

Laughing, I hugged them both and walked them to the door. We parted ways as they headed for the kitchen and I journeyed to the dining hall.

Where my parents, Cian, and a host of dignitaries were seated at what had to be a ridiculous hour. I searched for a clock, but the dining hall didn’t have one. The wall of windows on one side of the hall, however, showed the darkness of night. Or was it early morning? In all likelihood, these dignitaries had been hauled from their beds to attend this dinner that was nothing more than a façade. All because Cian and my parents had insisted.

Cian rose from his seat when he saw me and pulled out the chair beside his. “Your Highness.” He motioned for me to sit.

I lowered, wishing with every part of me that the table in front of me was the long, wooden one in Mrs. Hartley’s farmhouse, or the sleek countertop of Beckett’s kitchen island, or the knotted pine table in the kitchen of Hank’s cabin, or the slated tile tabletop of a booth at Bear Belly Tavern. Anything besides the ornate, mile-long, exotic wood table heaped with food I didn’t want in the palace dining hall.

I also wanted the faces around the table to be different. I wanted the Hartleys and their mates and their children. I wanted Hank and Sarah. I wanted Jimmy. I wanted Patty. I wanted everyone who had been so kind to me in Greenridge.

I wanted the man I loved.

Cian stayed standing beside me as he raised his wine glass in salute. “To the safe return of Princess Aislinn Síomóin of Verdalach.”

Everyone lifted their own glasses in toast to me. I had no idea what the dignitaries had been told about my absence, but they all smiled at me, seemingly genuine in their welcome back.

I picked up my own glass and returned their salute. “Thank you.” I could play the game in front of others. In private, however, Cian would get the absolute worst of me.

I expected Cian to sit and for the meal to begin. Instead, he kept his glass raised.

“If you’ll indulge me in one more toast.” He clasped my upper arm, gently at first then with more pressure when I didn’t automatically stand. Once I was on my feet beside him, however, he said, “A toast to our wedding, which you’re all invited to.”

Demure applause sounded from the dinner guests. One of them, an earl, asked, “When is the wedding?”

Cian waited for me to look up at him. “Why, tomorrow, of course.”

Chapter Twenty-seven

Beckett

I sat in Darius’s living room with my siblings gathered around. We waited for Jimmy to arrive for this meeting he’d requested with us. Conveniently, Mom was in Canville, helping with a seminar on animal care over at Silver Moon Wolf Sanctuary. My brothers and sister still didn’t appear to have an inkling about why Jimmy wanted to meet. Or if they did, they weren’t admitting to it.

Whatever. I could hardly think about anything but Sadie’s disappearance yesterday afternoon. Hank had suggested we go to the police, but that arrest order was proof police had already been involved—ones from Verdalach. Apparently, when you were a runaway princess, your home country sent out its own officials to collect you.

And why would I want to find someone who had lied to me?

“She’s wanted for something back in her country, which, I guess, is no surprise. If she could lie so convincingly to all of us, she is probably capable of engaging in quite the caper,” I’d said to Hank as I’d gestured to the official arrest order he’d pieced together. Sadie’s—pardon me—Princess Aislinn’s name wasn’t on any of the recovered scraps of paper, but she wasn’t here so she had to have been caught and brought back to Verdalach.

I was pissed she’d lied to me, but I was also upset that she’d left without contacting me. Not a single fucking word. Did Verdalach not allow its criminals one phone call upon arrest? More likely, the princess didn’t think she owed me the courtesy of letting me know what had happened. I was, after all, way beneath her station. Just some dude she’d met in Vermont, pretended to have a relationship with, and easily left behind when the law had caught up to her. I hope she’d had fun with her stupid little game.

I was angry with myself too. Shouldn’t I have developed a better nose for liars by now? I’d had enough experience with women putting forth false versions of themselves that I shouldn’t have fallen for it again.

But Sadie—Princess Aislinn—had been skilled in the art of deceit. She’d masqueraded as a simple girl with a great business idea and an interest in me and I’d fallen for her act.

Fallen hard. Too hard.

“Hey.” Isaac came to sit beside me on Darius’s couch. “Why do you look like shit? You never look like shit.” He gestured to my feet resting on the coffee table. “Your socks don’t match.”