Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 72897 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 364(@200wpm)___ 292(@250wpm)___ 243(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 72897 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 364(@200wpm)___ 292(@250wpm)___ 243(@300wpm)
And instead, I found myself clicking every single link, looking at every photo, and reading every interview. With everything I read, my heart squirreled deeper and deeper inside me, like it was trying to hide from all of this.
Not because it was bad.
Because it was way, way too fucking incredible.
Sebastian wasn’t just a flippant prince at all. He’d done amazing things that I hadn’t even known about. Things that he hadn’t even begun to mention to me. He’d been on countless humanitarian trips—offering real help and money to people and countries in need. He wasn’t paying lip service to it, like so many other people in royalty did.
He’d also been the genesis of multiple school programs in the Frostmonte Kingdom villages. In Deercrest, he’d championed an arts program, providing kids with access to instruments of their choice and making sure music and art were stressed in the school programs. In Aldwick, he’d funded renovations of multiple schools that needed it most. He’d even attended many local high schools to promote health and exercise, joining after school events with the kids, leading them through workouts and then taking photos with them afterward.
He wasn’t just a prince. He was a great prince. A cool one, too.
And, of course, I eventually stumbled upon the photoshoot he did for GQ. I pushed the laptop closer up to my eyes, taking in every picture with wide eyes.
It was tasteful. There was only one shirtless photo in the batch, which pictured Sebastian from behind, on top of some castle balcony, looking out onto the villages below. The rest of the photos had him in suits or nice silk shirts, some in black and white, and all of them absolutely arresting.
His eyes felt like they were staring right out at me. I was sure that hundreds of teenage girls across the world agreed with me.
My cheeks grew hot as I looked at the photos, but I couldn’t stop.
I wanted him.
I wanted him so, so badly.
But I was also the only person who knew that Sebastian was lying to the entire world. He had a ruse going, looking like this straight, eligible bachelor, partying with princesses and other royalty day in and day out.
And that hurt me more than anything.
Not even the fact that he was lying to the whole world. He was allowed to make his own decisions. Just the fact that I wasn’t comfortable being anyone’s secret, and I knew I never would.
I slammed the lid of the laptop shut and pressed my fingertips to my temples.
I didn’t need to be surrounded by people, like Tracy was trying to say. What I needed was closure. She was right—I didn’t need to fix up this house. It was going to be months of effort, and months of torture, if I tried.
I would be better off selling it as is. Less money, but still more money than I’d had access to my whole life.
Because I needed to get the fuck out of here. I needed actual closure. I needed to be done with the tornado of Sebastian, once and for all. I needed to say goodbye like I’d never gotten to before. I was so tormented by memories of Sebastian for the first few years in the mountains, and after that, I was numb to it all.
But it had been buried deep inside me because it wasn’t complete. This time, if I could say goodbye to him on my own terms, I could fucking put it to rest, already.
I could stop thinking about him. Forever.
At least now, Sebastian had told me how I could get to the castle without alerting the entire fucking royal family to my arrival.
I was going to go up to the castle, find Terrace View Road, and I was going to say goodbye.
8
Sebastian
“No, the new craft tea,” my mother snapped, her eyes narrowed at Natalia. “I specified. I can’t have black teas this late in the day. Take the lapsang away.”
“Of course, your Majesty,” Natalia said. I cast her a sympathetic glance as she rushed out of the hall.
My mother was perched on one of her many favorite antique Victorian chairs. This one was upholstered with deep azure embroidered silk, and as my mother sat, the blue of the fabric seemed to highlight the ice blue of her eyes. She was working through a stack of papers in front of her, signing each one at the bottom before flicking to the next one. They were thank you letters to some family she had recently visited in Europe, but her assistant had written every single one. My mother was just signing them.
“I take it things are going well with Princess Emma?” she asked, not even looking at me.
I was leaning against the nearby window, watching a pair of squirrels zigzag back and forth through a snow bank four stories below us.