“I lost her. I destroyed her. But I never forgot her.
I never let her go.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

TWO DAYS BEFORE HER BIRTHDAY, her self-imposed deadline, Mira’s search for her parents’ graves had come to an end. She’d come to Beau Rivage looking for closure, hoping to find some sort of peace—but now that she knew her parents were alive, she felt anything but calm.

She was terrified she’d disappoint them, or that they wouldn’t want her—but worst of all, she was afraid her curse would strike before she had the chance to find out. Dread and anticipation twisted inside her like a tightly wound spring. There was a ticking, a kind of countdown in her heart, akin to waiting for a monster to leap out from the dark.

She woke around noon, after spending the night alone. Felix had told her it would be better if she had her own room again, and she hadn’t argued. Given what his touch could do to her, his bed was probably not the safest place for her to be.

She got dressed and went downstairs to kill a few hours in Forest Passage, not wanting to leave the hotel in case Felix had news. She found herself studying the crowds of shoppers, wondering if her parents had ever passed through these halls, if they might be here now—and then looking for them, looking for anyone too beautiful or too damaged to be normal. And as she looked, she thought about Blue.

Last night, he’d reached out to her and she’d hugged him for a long time, like he was broken and she was holding the pieces together. She’d felt his heartbeat, the heat of his skin against hers. She’d felt like he needed her, like he was finally admitting it.

And then Viv and the Knight brothers had bounded down the stairs, and they’d quickly pulled apart. It was better if no one asked questions. Mira herself didn’t know what was going on. Were they friends? You didn’t confess your darkest secrets to someone you didn’t trust. Did he care about her? And if he did, after all he’d told her about Romantics—what did that mean?

She kept seeing Blue the way he’d looked last night when he’d dropped her off at Felix’s door, his eyes dark and sad. That resigned shake of his head, like: Never mind. Do what you want … That’s what you’ll do anyway.

Maybe she should stop by his room. Just to let him know she was okay.

Things had been so much easier when she’d wanted to avoid him. …

Mira rode the elevator to Blue’s floor. She had no idea what to say to him. Hey, I came looking for you because … I keep thinking about what happened last night—whatever that was—and I was wondering: where do we go from here? Now that I know you like me and you know I like your brother and I don’t know if I like you but we both know it’s better if I don’t. …

She knocked on his door and waited. Knocked harder—and kept it up for about thirty seconds, in case he had headphones on, or was feeling lazy and didn’t want to answer. When she was on the verge of leaving, sure that he was out—Blue finally opened the door. He had a bent-up spiral notebook in one hand, open to a page that was covered with messy handwriting.

He looked surprised to see her, and made a big production of peering out into the hall. “Did you … come here of your own free will?”

“Are you going to let me in or not?”

He propped the door open and stepped out of her way. “Enter.”

Blue’s suite was still a mess. His clothes were strewn everywhere, like he never got undressed in the same place. A mountain of notebooks was piled on the table. And the oak doors of the TV cabinet, which were closed now, had been defaced with a Sharpie—as if a vandal had gotten tired of scrawling obscene messages in the boys’ bathroom and decided to use Blue’s room instead.

She was pretty sure Blue was the vandal.

Mira sat down on the couch, which seemed to be where he’d set up for the day, judging by the half-empty Chinese takeout containers scattered around it, and the guitar he’d left behind. The tang of sweet-and-sour something hovered in the air—along with a scent that was distinctly Blue. Metal and industrial-strength styling wax.

“So what are you up to today?” Her long skirt had twisted beneath her when she sat down; now she focused on straightening it, feeling awkward, already regretting coming here. She never purposely sought him out. Obviously, he would think this was weird. …

Blue waved the notebook. “Writing. Pouring out my pain.”

“Are you writing songs?”

He flopped down next to her. “Trying to. It’s all crap right now.”

“Can I see?”

“No.”

Mira paused, trying to think of the right thing to say. She was afraid that if she misstepped, he would bring up Felix, that his tone would turn sharp, and it would pop whatever was in the air between them. This fledgling friendship, trust. She didn’t want to lose that.

“So what do you write about?” she asked.

“Whatever I need to get out of my head. Usually something dark. If I’m lucky, Jewel will like it and we’ll be able to use it. Work it into something she can sing.”

Blue flicked his pen against his notebook, leaned back to get comfortable. “So … you’re here. You’re okay. Can I assume you took my advice and ditched Felix, and I don’t have to worry about you anymore?” His mouth turned up, like he was teasing, but his eyes glimmered with nervousness. He wanted her to say yes.

“Felix isn’t what you think.” She stared at her hands. Why did they have to talk about this? “Last night he brought me to … the place where I was orphaned. The ballroom where my christening party took place. I thought it had burned down, but Felix found out there was never a fire there. He thinks my parents are still alive. That they sent me away to protect me from my curse … and we can find them.”

“Felix is a regular Nancy Drew,” Blue said flatly.

Mira frowned. “Don’t be like that. I thought my parents were dead and they’re not. This isn’t about Felix.”

Blue leaned his head on his hand, his arm propped on the back of the couch. “I know, I’m sorry. Why didn’t you tell me about this right away? I mean, that’s a big deal. Did you think I wouldn’t care?”

“I don’t know. I guess—I’m afraid of them. Of meeting the real them. That sounds bad, I know.”

“Of course you’re afraid. You don’t know them. You just have this vision in your mind of what they’re supposed to be like.” He brought his leg up onto the couch and started picking at the frayed parts of his jeans. “I have this image of my mom that probably isn’t even true—and I sort of remember her. You’re working from scratch, from other people’s memories, right? So you created something safe, something perfect, and now that’s going to be tested.”

She nodded. That was how she felt.

“But even if you don’t like the real them,” Blue went on, “you’ll be okay. If you meet them, and you hate them, or they’re mean to you—or they’re just not perfect, and you feel guilty about being disappointed—you can come talk to me. Cry on my shoulder. Or knee me in the lungs. Whatever makes you feel better.”

“I’ll knee you in the lungs,” she said, a small smile crossing her face.

“Yeah, I kind of figured I’d regret offering that.”

She smiled bigger, biting it back so he wouldn’t see it, and let her eyes stray to the legs of his jeans. There were words scrawled all over them in black ink, the handwriting even messier than what she’d glimpsed in his notebook. Bitten-off phrases and lyrical experiments. Like he needed a place to put his thoughts when he didn’t have a notebook handy. So nothing was lost.

“How old were you when your mom left?” she asked.

“Um. Four, four and a half. I remember she smelled like … I don’t know the name of it, but there was this perfume she always wore, and I forgot about it until my dad bought a bottle for one of his girlfriends, and she wore it out to dinner with us, and this memory of my mom came rushing back. Just a flash of her hugging me, but for a split second, I was right there. It was weird.” He shook his head, a pensive look on his face, like he was still trying to make sense of it.

“But I don’t have a lot of real memories of her. Just flashes like that. And I remember her as always being nice to me, but she must have gotten pissed sometimes. I don’t know. I know she didn’t love my dad; they had more of, like, a business arrangement. And I hope she’s happy, wherever she is. But I think I’d be nervous to see her again. So it’s not just you. Scared doesn’t mean you’re not happy they’re alive.”

Mira nodded. “I guess I was worried I was being ungrateful or something.”

“Nah, you can’t force yourself to feel a certain way. You have to just feel what you feel.”

“Do you?” Her heart beat faster and she held her breath, wondering if he realized what he’d said.

Come on. Just believe it for once … that you can’t force yourself to never fall in love.

“Okay, correction.” He cleared his throat. “I can force myself not to feel things I shouldn’t feel—because I have to. It’s different for me; you know that.”

“You can’t,” she insisted. “You can’t do that to yourself. You can adapt, maybe be a little more careful—”

“A little?” He laughed.

“Fine, a lot,” she corrected. “But that’s different from cutting yourself off entirely, denying that part of yourself forever.”

“Okay,” he said. “If you’re so sure you’re right about this, Mira: hypothetically, if I started to feel that way about you—what should I do? Advise me.”

“Hypothetically?”

“Purely hypothetically.”

She sighed. How had she gotten herself into this?

“Hypothetically, you should do nothing. Because … I’m involved with someone. So there you go.”

“So I should do exactly what I’m doing now. And ignore your advice about feeling what I feel. Perfect, thank you.” He sank back and propped the notebook on his knees. “What rhymes with ‘gives bad advice and is a hypocrite’?”

She rapped his kneecap with a chopstick he’d left on the table. “Don’t write a song about me! Especially not a stupid song.”

“Now my songs are stupid? You are so mean. Do your parents know you’re so mean? No wonder you’re scared to meet them.”

“I’m going to hurt you,” she warned, untangling her long, twisty skirt from her legs, and kneeling up on the couch—so he’d know she had every intention of throttling him.

“Please do.”

She went to whack his head with the chopstick; then reconsidered and stuck it into his hair instead. It stayed there, balanced between two spikes, and he glared at her with exaggerated loathing.

“You did not just stick a chopstick in my hair.”

“I think … hmm.” Mira rested her chin on her fist, pretending to think it over. “No, I’m pretty sure I did.”

“Sticking chopsticks in my hair is forbidden. Verboten. It is an act of war.”

“But you look pretty,” she said, struggling to keep a straight face.

She shrieked as he grabbed her and threw her down on the couch, high-pitched, screamy giggles exploding from her throat. She couldn’t stop laughing; she could barely breathe. Tears wet her eyes as he tickle-attacked her and made ridiculous threats, until finally, she couldn’t take it anymore and agreed to surrender, and instead of a peace treaty he penned a new mark on her forearm: a musical note with some kind of amoeba surrounding it, which she was pretty sure would have been a circle if she hadn’t been wriggling around so much.

“This is not a märchen mark,” Blue informed her. “This is a stupid idiot mark. It signifies that you agree you’re stupid and belong in my stupid songs.”

“If it’s a stupid mark, shouldn’t you have one, too?” she asked innocently. “Or is that why you have that bolt through your eyebrow? Is that like a permanent stupid mark?”

Blue sighed. “You know, I really thought you were going to let me spare you—but apparently, you won’t be satisfied until you are destroyed.”

And the war resumed.

They fought and wrestled and shrieked and kicked over half-empty cartons of Chinese food until they were both on the floor, exhausted, chests heaving, irrepressible smiles on their faces.

Blue had her pinned and was hovering over her, his hands on her wrists. “Admit that you lost,” he panted. “Admit that you bear the stupid mark with pride.”

“No,” she said. “I accepted that mark under duress. I refute it.”

“Then you will pay the price—” His last word hissed out into a smile, and his expression turned soft, hazy. His lips parted for something other than speaking; and she felt the attraction in the air between them, felt herself willing him closer, like there was something in the look she gave him that said okay, that said kiss me—before she realized she was doing it. It just felt right.

But—it was wrong. And they both knew it. Blue abruptly pushed away from her, sprang up, and mumbled, “Sorry, Mira. I don’t know what came over me….”

“Yeah, I don’t know either,” she said, blinking the kiss-me look out of her eyes.

“Good thing you still hate me,” he said with a weak laugh. “You still do, right?”

There was a pause while he waited for her.

“Definitely. There’s still—yes. That hatred. It’s—going strong.”

“Okay, awesome,” he said. Then they just stared at each other. Mira broke away first.

“Well—I only meant to drop by for a second,” Mira said. “So I should probably …”

“Yeah, I should get back to …” Blue held up his notebook.

“You’re coming to the show tomorrow night?”

“Sure, if you guys want me there. And I’m supposed to talk to Delilah.”

“That’s right.”

They smiled and nodded at each other like two dumb bobbleheads, to the point where it was embarrassing. But she supposed it was awkward for both of them, at least.

Blue let her out, and when she stepped into the elevator, she took a deep breath, trying to force the tightness out of her chest. She felt like she hadn’t breathed since he’d almost kissed her.

She wondered if it would’ve been so bad, if he’d actually done it. …

A part of her felt like she was still waiting for it.

But then she got hold of herself.

Yes, it would be wrong! You’re in love with his brother.

Unless there’s some truth to this stupid mark.

She turned her forearm to examine the mark Blue had given her—the now smudged musical note with the wobbly circle bubble—and licked her thumb and started rubbing it away, the ink smearing until it was almost indiscernible.

Getting so much attention from both brothers made her feel like a kid in a candy store. It was like Hansel and Gretel: they came across the witch’s candy house, and they lusted after it, and they were young and stupid so they devoured it without a second thought. Mira had never felt as wanted, as attractive as she did right now; and the heady pleasure of it had made her reckless.

So many fairy tales were about breaking taboos, and being punished for crossing lines you shouldn’t have crossed.

Touching a spindle you’d been forbidden to touch. Inviting a witch into your cottage, and accepting the shiny apples she brought you, even though you knew better, because you wanted them.

And while most heroes and heroines managed to scratch or scheme their way out of peril, it was easier to avoid doing something stupid in the first place. Smarter, better, and infinitely less fraught with regret.

When the elevator opened onto the glitz of the ground floor, Mira went into the bathroom and washed the last traces of Blue’s mark off her arm. There wasn’t room in her heart for more than one person. There couldn’t be.

By midnight, Mira was more restless than she’d been in her life.

Being alone left her with no distractions—nothing to do but fixate on her fears. Stress over the impending reunion piled onto her worries about her curse, and made her sick to her stomach. She couldn’t concentrate, couldn’t read or watch TV. She needed to be around people.

But Felix was busy. Blue, she’d decided, was off-limits. And the idea of calling anyone else, and begging them to relieve her of her anxiety, was too embarrassing.

The night was slogging toward 1 A.M.—too, too slowly—and Mira couldn’t stand it. So she slipped into her new red satin nightgown, which could pass for a dress, and slicked on lip gloss that looked like lava, shining and melting at once. She went down to the casino, where the party was. Where the life was.

She felt sexy, dangerous, free. Tonight, she didn’t look like she needed permission—for anything—and no one questioned her. She made nice with strangers: celebrated their wins, sympathized with their losses. She drank in the manic energy and let the noise push her out of her head, away from her mental list of the ways everything could go wrong. And when she’d had enough, she wandered away from the crowd, and stopped at the mouth of a narrow hall that ended in a set of double doors.

She’d never been down this way before. It wasn’t a place for guests. It was spare and uninviting; it led to an employees-only area.

The hall was empty, but as she stood and stared down it, the double doors opened outward, and four men and a woman pushed through them.

One of the men was Felix.

Mira squeezed her body between a pillar and the wall, so that she was hidden from sight.

As she stood and watched, keeping silent, she saw that the larger two men were holding a lanky third between them, and that he was cowering, his head forward as if he were being dragged to a hangman’s scaffold. His shirt had come untucked and hung loose and wrinkled over his pants. Sweat filmed his face.

The two large men flanked him, their heavy hands shackling his arms. One of them—a member of the Dream’s security team, judging by his bearing—had a thin, vaguely lupine face and a weak chin that seemed at odds with his burly arms and chest. The other large man had round, pink cheeks, and a layer of fat covering his muscles—so that he looked like a cross between a little boy and a wrestler. His lips were candy red, and even now he was cracking a peppermint between his teeth. His bite made a loud, shattering crunch.

Felix stood a short distance from the men, and the lone woman—a curvy, well-dressed brunette—stood across from him, so that they formed a triangle in the hall. The woman’s tailored black suit suggested that she had an official position at the Dream. Mira couldn’t guess what it was, but she radiated authority, and her sly, dark eyes held an eagerness that made Mira uneasy.

Felix was focused on his BlackBerry, his head bowed as if the others were of no concern to him. He wore a charcoal gray suit, a shirt the deep violet color of a plum. Long seconds ticked by before he spoke—and when he did, his tone was as cool as a blade.

“Card counting. In my casino. That was ballsy. Doesn’t seem like such a good idea anymore, does it?”

“I won’t—be back!” the captive man gasped. “You’ll never see me again. I swear!”

“You’re right.” Felix lifted his head. “No one steals from me twice.”

Shifting his attention to the woman, Felix said, “Gretel. You can take this from here?”

Gretel nodded. Her lips curved into a hungry grin. “Bring him down to the Box, boys. I have some toys we can play with.”

Grunting affirmatively, the thin-faced guard and the candy eater dragged their charge through an unmarked door. The card counter moaned and managed to sputter a few pleading words before the door slammed coldly behind him.

Left alone in the hall, Felix sighed and ran his hand through his hair, face tightening in frustration. Then it passed, and his face slipped into the cool, unruffled expression he wore so often. He strode calmly down the hall toward the heart of the casino, and didn’t look back.

Mira had never seen Felix when he hadn’t known she was watching. Never seen that side of him. And his ease at dealing with the card counter—who had surely not been escorted outside and released—sent a chill creeping through her, a sick, damp feeling. She was still suffering the queasiness of that memory when there was a knock on her door.

The clock read 3:57 A.M.

She considered feigning sleep. It was late; the bolt was drawn; she didn’t have to open it.

But she did.

Felix slipped in and shut the door behind him. A single lamp burned in the room, but it was enough for her to see that he was pleased about something. A clear energy ran through him, when he should have been weighted down by what had happened earlier, when he’d sentenced the card counter to … whatever the man’s fate was.

Maybe he was used to dealing with people like that. But it bothered her that there had never been a hint of that coldness, that ruthlessness in him before. He’d seemed—like a good person. But that wasn’t all he was, or could be.

Mira was still wearing her red satin nightgown. She’d wrapped herself in the suite’s king-size bedspread, so that it draped her body like a cloak. A shield to keep him at bay.

Felix didn’t seem to notice that she was being distant. He laughed softly, and fingered the edge of the bedspread. “Did I wake you?”

Then he wrapped his arms around her and hugged her hard, like he’d longed to hold her all day. “You could have stayed in bed,” he murmured. “But I’m glad you didn’t.”

It took all her willpower not to burrow deeper into his embrace. Having his body so close to hers was like a drug that sent reason spiraling away from her, and she had to stop and remind herself that all wasn’t well.

“I was awake,” she said, pulling free less than gracefully. Her voice came out colder than she’d intended. And when she wedged herself into a corner of the couch and tucked her legs inside her bedspread cocoon, Felix quirked his eyebrows.

“Did I do something wrong?”

“I—I don’t know. Maybe.” Mira took a deep breath to settle her nerves. “I saw you tonight. While you were working.”

“You should’ve said something.” He smiled, his face warm with affection, but when she didn’t smile back, furrows of worry took its place.

He sat near her, but didn’t touch her.

“Mira, what is it? Are you mad because I was gone all day?”

She pulled the bedspread more tightly around herself. “No …”

When she didn’t elaborate, Felix rubbed his eyes, looking tired and irritated. “What is it, then?”

Mira’s mouth hovered open. Who are you? she thought. But that wasn’t something she could say.

He was Felix. Of course she knew him—she was in love with him. He was caring and capable, generous with his time and everything else. He was dangerous—she was proof of that—but he did his best to curb that danger.

Or at least, that was what she’d thought. Until tonight, when he’d sentenced the card counter with a few harsh words.

She watched him, trying to figure him out. To see something new.

Normally, there was something exotic about his dark blue hair, his matching dark eyes: they lent him mystery and made him beautiful in a strange way—like a black rose or a yellow diamond. But tonight, he resembled a storm, a pulse of lightning in a roiling black sky.

He sat with his arm flung across the back of the couch, not cool and careful, but restless, frustrated, staring at her like his gaze could wrench an answer out of her. She supposed he didn’t have patience for drama, or whatever he thought this was. If she wasn’t going to be nice to him, he probably wanted to go to bed.

After a few minutes of silence, Felix took a square of paper from his jacket—a thin ivory sheet folded in half—and tossed it onto the table in front of her. “Here. This is why I came up here.”

Loosening the bedspread enough to free her arm, Mira leaned forward. She unfolded the paper and found a phone number written inside. “What is this?” she asked.

“It’s your parents’ number. I tracked them down. I thought you’d want to know.”

Mira froze. She stared at the numbers like they were going to disappear. The news seemed too amazing to be true. Oh god …

“Still mad at me?” he asked.

A laugh bubbled out of her. Or maybe she cried; she didn’t know, didn’t care. Ten numbers and she could speak to them.

Hear their voices. She would finally hear them say her name, say I love you.

She threw her arms around Felix and buried her face in his neck, needing to touch him to be sure this was real. He’d seemed so cold to her a moment ago, but his body felt strong and safe to her now. Her heart drummed wildly and she found herself kissing his face, her tears smearing his cheeks as she laughed. It was real. They were alive.

They were alive and suddenly it didn’t matter if they liked her, if she was the biggest disappointment or everything they’d hoped for. They were alive and they had never burned or suffocated in a room full of fire, and that was a dream come true no matter what happened next.

“You really found them?” she asked. “I didn’t imagine that?”

Felix laughed. “Call the number. You can talk to them right now.”

Mira nodded, possibility held in her fist in the form of a scrap of paper. She wanted to hold on to it a little longer, and prepare herself. This was a big deal, and she wanted their first conversation to be just right.

“I will,” she said. “I’m not ready yet.”

“If you want me to be there when you call, just let me know.” He squeezed her hand.

There was such a crazy, fluttery feeling in her blood—like her heart was about to burst. “Do you think they’ll want to see me? Do you think they’ll like me?”

Felix ran his hand over her hair, cupped the back of her neck. “They’ll love you. Don’t worry. It’ll be fine.” His face had lost its impatience, relaxed to something softer. “I’ll let you sleep. Maybe tomorrow you’ll tell me what’s wrong.”

“Wait!” She grabbed his arm to stop him. “I’ll tell you now.”

Questioning who he was seemed silly, now that he’d given her the one thing she’d longed for her entire life. What percentage of his day was spent punishing people who tried to cheat his family’s business—two percent?

He’d spent so much more time than that worrying about her, trying to make her happy. Could she really blame him for doing his job?

Felix sat back down, so close to her their bodies were touching. The bedspread had fallen away when she’d thrown her arms around him, and become a rumpled coil around her waist. Her red satin nightgown shined like fire in the lamplight, and she felt his gaze on her body, on the sheen of the satin and the curves beneath it, and the look on his face made her short of breath.

“I saw you earlier,” she began, “with two of your … I think, security guards, and a woman, and there was a man you’d caught counting cards. You were threatening him.”

“Oh, that,” Felix said quietly. “Did that scare you?”

“A little. You seemed—like a different person. Almost cruel.”

“Some people deserve it,” he said. His hand went to her shoulder, caressed her bare skin. Like it soothed him to touch her, and like it did the opposite, too.

“You’re sweet, Mira; I hope you’ll always be that way—and I would never want to hurt you. But some people …” His hand stilled, and he met her eyes. “No one steals from me—from the casino. I don’t allow that.”

“So … what happened to him?” Don’t stop, she thought, leaning into him so he would touch her again.

“We sent him home with a slap on the wrist. Will that help you sleep at night? Don’t think about it anymore. I mean it—he’s not worth your time.”

Mira nodded. He’d glossed over her question—but in a way, that was what she wanted. She didn’t want to hear the gory details any more than he wanted to tell her. And at this point, she had other things on her mind. Felix had insinuated his thumb under her nightgown’s satin strap, and now he slid it over the rounded curve of her shoulder, the satin whispering against her arm as it fell, the bodice straining against her breasts.

The nightgown was tight; she’d had to wriggle to get into it, and it would take the same effort to get it off, but his hands didn’t exactly seem discouraged. He bowed his head to kiss her neck, his lips trailing luxuriously over her skin, every nerve in her body startling awake.

Her breath sounded wild in her ears.

Last night, he’d shown her the crumbling ballroom under the stars—and then deposited her in a new hotel room, untouched. As if mindful of the strength he’d stolen.

The strength she had in abundance now.

Two days had passed since he’d kissed her in the flower shop—and he kissed her as if that had been two more than he could stand. She grasped at his hair as his mouth worked its way from her throat to her collarbone and lower, his tongue sending shivers all through her body. Her blood was burning; her dress was disappearing. … Her head felt like a feather, airy and light. She wanted to surrender to that feeling … but she was afraid to. Her life was precious to her; she didn’t want to lose it.

“Who—who were those people you were with?” she asked.

Felix lifted his head and she squirmed away from him, shifting into a less kissable position. His mouth gleamed in the light. His dark blue brows were two puzzled arcs. “What?”

Mira adjusted her nightgown. “The security guards, and that woman, Gretel. Is she Gretel from the fairy tale?”

Felix nodded. “That was Gretel, and her brother, Hansel, and Louis—the Wolf from ‘Red Riding Hood.’ ”

“Friends of yours?”

He studied her, like he wondered what she was up to. But then he must have realized, read it in the flush of her cheeks and the darting of her eyes. “Sure, you could call them that. They were blackballed by the Marked community. So I found a place for them at the Dream.”

She’d only meant to interrupt—to delay him until she could think straight—but now she was curious. She’d known there were heroes and villains in the fairy-tale community. She hadn’t considered that there might be outcasts.

“Why were they blackballed? I thought Hansel and Gretel were captured by a witch. How is that their fault?”

“It’s not their capture that’s a problem. Gretel was eleven when she killed the witch … in a particularly brutal way. It was self-defense, but she pushed the witch into an oven and she watched her burn. She doesn’t feel remorse. She’s strong—she had to be, to save herself. And people don’t like that; it makes them nervous.”

“She likes to hurt people,” Mira said, as understanding dawned on her. “That’s her job here, isn’t it?”

“Let’s just say she’s fond of retribution.”

“And the Wolf? People don’t like him because he tried to kill an old woman, too, right? Red Riding Hood’s grandmother?”

Felix grimaced, his gaze shifting past her, like he was revisiting a memory that was far too vivid. “He did eat her grandmother—although he never did swallow the girl. A hunter arrived and shot him. Then he cut Louis open to save the old woman, and filled his stomach with rocks and sewed him up again.”

“That’s torture,” Mira said, disgust filling her. “What was the point of torturing him?”

Felix shrugged. “Fairy tales aren’t pretty things, Mira. You know that. I’m sure Red Riding Hood thought the hunter was a hero. Anyway,” he went on, “Louis would have died—but Gretel and I found him and brought him to Delilah, and she cleaned the rocks out and saved him. That was a few years ago.”

“Delilah,” Mira murmured. “Weren’t you—aren’t you—afraid of her?”

“Why would I be afraid of her?”

“Blue’s afraid of her,” she said.

“No …” Felix shook his head. His eyes went distant again. “Delilah has her price—for everything … that’s true. But Blue isn’t afraid of her. Blue’s afraid of himself.”

There was no rest for the wicked.

After the party, when all he wanted was to sleep, or to take a page out of Viv’s diary and drown himself in the Deneuves’ well—his father insisted on a dinner.

He was shell-shocked, barely able to speak, and he missed her—already, he missed the soft warmth of her in his arms, the brightness of her laugh. He wanted to see her. Wanted to be near her. Wanted to die.

Instead, he sat stiffly, almost catatonically at a table for four in one of the private banquet rooms at Rampion, the Dream’s finest restaurant, waiting for their fairy dinner guest to arrive.

His father catered to VIPs every day—but fairies were in a class of their own.

Fairies were revered by the Marked community. Some people courted them, begging for a curse—like Viv’s late mother, who’d pricked her finger when she was pregnant and asked for a girl as white as paper, as black as ink, as red as blood, because she wanted her daughter’s life to be “dramatic.” Then there were families like the Knights, who invited fairies to christenings to bestow virtues on their future heroes and heroines.

But ultimately, fairies had the power—to enchant you, destroy you. It had been that way from the moment fairy and human blood had mixed.

Once upon a time, fairies had been fairies and humans had been humans, and they were as separate as fire and water. Occasionally, a fairy would enchant a worthy human, but for the most part, fairies viewed humans as tedious creatures, as silly as butterflies or bees.

That was before love arrived, and changed everything.

Fairies were female, and solitary. And while they lived a long time, they did not live forever. every so often, a fairy would seek out an enchanted male—the North Wind, perhaps, or Dawn, Day, or Night, who dragged the hours along on red, white, and black horses—and they would mate to perpetuate their race. They did not fall in love. They were too haughty and proud with each other to be that vulnerable. And yet love called to them—from a very different place.

The fairies and their male counterparts discovered love by observation—by watching humans. They descended from their peaks of isolation, their palaces and clouds, not to interfere or enchant, but to fall in love; and they lay with human men and women for the pleasure of it. Such unions were forbidden, but they were kept secret.

Until the half-blood children were born.

Their existence was a scandal.

The hard-hearted fairies believed the impure offspring had to be punished. The kindhearted fairies fell fast in love with the children—and chose to protect them, to offer them gifts and assistance. They quickly split into factions, for and against.

And so the curses began. The tests. Rites of passage. Punishments. Rewards.

Happily-ever-afters, and utter ruin.

Over the years, as the population of part-human, part-magic children grew, the fairies relaxed their vigilance, choosing to curse some of their mixed-blood descendants, and not others. They groomed them to be heroes or villains—after their own hearts. And because their hearts were involved, even the wickedest fairies could become attached. They saw, in the villains they marked, miniature versions of themselves.

Delilah had that sort of affection for Blue’s father, because he had made something of himself; he was smart, charismatic, unafraid. She hadn’t marked any of the Valentines herself, but she knew Blue’s curse had awoken, and she’d invited herself to dinner to celebrate.

Blue’s father considered it a great honor.

Delilah arrived twenty minutes late, while Blue’s father was sipping champagne and quizzing Felix on something work related. She carried a thin parcel wrapped in silver-black paper and handed it to Felix.

“It’s a book of William Faulkner stories,” she announced before he could open it. Her eyes slanted like a cat’s when she smiled, like Blue’s mother’s had. “I think you’ll like them.”

“Thank you,” Felix murmured, too polite to show he was puzzled, if he was.

“It was Blue’s birthday,” Blue’s father reminded her—scolding her playfully. “Did you bring him something, too?”

“I hardly think Blue wants another present from my kind,” Delilah countered silkily. “He looks like he needs time to recover from the last one.”

She smirked, and her expression cut him to the core; because she knew what he had done, and it amused her. Jane, though miraculous to him, was merely human. Barely worthy of the fairy’s notice.

Delilah turned to his father, and the two discussed business, and gossiped about other Cursed, other fairies. Felix interjected when appropriate—just enough to show he was following the conversation. Mostly, he stayed silent, only breaking from his polite, attentive pose to unwrap the book under the table, and then to leaf through it out of boredom.

When Delilah ran her black-taloned hand across the back of Felix’s neck and up through his hair, like he was her lover instead of a boy centuries her junior, Felix barely even flinched.

“How’s louis?” she asked pointedly.

“Recovering,” Felix said, his gaze locked carefully on the book. “Thank you.”

Their father laughed, a little drunk from champagne. like Felix was an innocent schoolboy Delilah was trying to seduce. Or already had.

Blue watched them through a haze of despair. emotionally, he felt destroyed—and he clung to that destruction, to remind himself of what he’d done. Because physically … he’d never felt better. A delicious energy coursed through him, along with a hunger he’d never known. Because he’d never known what it would be like to give in to what he really was.

He would see a girl now—a laughing girl surrounded by friends, or a tear-streaked mystery girl—and his heart would beat faster, desperate to know her. His lips would burn with the need to kiss her, to feel her pulse throb beneath his lips. Pulse and pulse and drum with the thrill of it—then fade.

He needed love so badly he felt like he would die without it.

And he hoped he would.