Empire of Desire by Rina Kent

I expect Sebastian to come back with his own retort, because my parents raised him to always have the last word. But he just says, “The choice where Gwen doesn’t need to sacrifice herself days after her father—and only family, might I add—had a deadly accident.”

My fist clenches so hard, I’m surprised a tendon doesn’t snap.

That’s what I’ve been thinking about since I made this decision but still came up empty-handed about another option.

“If you don’t want to be here, leave,” I say casually, with barely any emotion, ignoring the bright, hot feeling burning inside me.

I check my watch again.

Thirty minutes.

It’s been a whole thirty minutes and she still hasn’t shown up.

Maybe she wanted to doll up, after all. I can imagine her in her princess room trying on one thing after the other.

Or maybe…

I dial her number again and it goes straight to voicemail.

My alerts go up and I try again. When there’s no response, I call King’s house. Martha picks up after a few beeps. “Hello?”

“It’s me. Nathaniel. Is Gwyneth there?”

“She left about two hours ago, said she was meeting you at City Hall.”

Fuck. Fuck!

Something hot and furious wraps a noose around my neck as the ominous feeling I experienced this morning rises from the background and fills the horizon. It’s red now—the horizon, my vision, the entire fucking scene.

I loosen my tie. “Did you check her room, Martha? How about the wine cellar? The closets? Plural.”

“She got into her car and left, sir.”

“Did you see her? Are you sure?”

“Yes, I did. I even gave her a water bottle so she could stay hydrated.” She hesitates, her voice dropping a little. “Is something the matter?”

Yes, something’s the fucking matter. If she left two hours ago, she should’ve been here a long time ago.

A thousand scenarios explode in my head, none of them pleasant. In fact, each one is more dangerous than the previous, bloodier, uglier.

I ask Martha to call me if Gwyneth returns and then hang up.

When Kingsley had an accident, I suspected this would happen. I just knew that she’d somehow be too overwhelmed and would do what she does best.

But I saw her talk to Susan like she owned the world. I saw the determination and the need to protect her father at all costs and that blurred my vision, in a way. It blurred my vision of who Gwyneth actually is and what she does.

She hides.

She goes in so deep that it’s impossible to find her unless she crawls out of whatever hideout spot she’s in. And something tells me she doesn’t want to be found right now.

My hand flexes around the phone and I curse under my breath.

But I will fix it.

I will find her.

I’ll make Gwyneth visible.





9





Gwyneth





I haven’t slept all night.

And that’s sort of a problem because I become jittery and a bit neurotic when I don’t sleep.

Insomnia and I aren’t strangers, especially since I didn’t manage to completely desensitize myself to that word. It might be written in a red Sharpie because it’s one of the words I struggle with the most.

Along with death.

I think I also need to add moving on to the red list because I can’t do that. I’m supposed to, I have to, but my mind is stuck in a different type of loop that I can’t escape.

So I spent the night in the closet. I wanted to stay with Dad, but Nate said in that stern voice of his to “go home and get some sleep” because tomorrow—today—is a big day. He didn’t voice the last part, but I figured it out on my own.

However, I couldn’t just get some sleep. Not even after I blasted Twenty One Pilots on my headphones and exhausted myself by dancing. Not even when I swallowed like three sleeping pills. Or maybe it was five. I lost count somewhere.

My mind was definitely not shutting down. Usually, Dad makes me some herbal tea—with vanilla flavor—and reads me a story as if I’m a little girl. He puts on some soothing music and stays by my side until I fall asleep.

But he wasn’t there in the ghostly house that, with the lack of his presence, felt like the set of a horror movie. And maybe that’s why I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t stop thinking about what I’d do if something happened to him while I was under. What if I couldn’t get to him in time?

What if death strikes him like it did Grandpa?

So I hurried here first thing this morning. I had to see him for myself and make sure the stupid machines are beeping. That he’s alive and didn’t leave me.

They moved him out of the ICU because he can breathe on his own and the swelling has nearly disappeared. However, they need to keep a close eye on him, so he’s now in a private wing of the hospital, where he has a special nurse, a special room, and everything. But nothing is special enough to heal the bruises on his face or breathe life back into his unmoving body.

I fall to my knees beside the bed and hold his hand. It’s scraped and appears lifeless like the rest of him.

When I try to speak, a crushing wave of emotions clog my throat, making the words strangled, closed off. “Dad…you always say to tell you everything because you’re my best friend, right? You’re the only friend I trust enough to pour my heart out to without worrying that I’ll be used down the line. The only friend who won’t judge me, even if I’m a little weird and have a strange phobia of words and people and I can be empty sometimes. I feel that way again, Dad. Empty. And unlike the other times, I can’t find a silver lining. It’s just off and wrong and many other negative words. I thought about it last night like you tell me to whenever I’m stuck. You said I should take a deep breath and think about the root of the issue, because once that’s solved, everything else will be as well.