Chapter 28: My Dark Prince: Chapter 27

“There’s something off about that baby.” Oliver scowled at his phone, seconds after confirming our friends would be here any minute now for my Congrats-on-Surviving dinner. “They’re probably bringing Luca tonight.”

“He’s practically your nephew.” I kicked my legs up on the coffee table, unused to living in a home so big the furniture didn’t touch the walls – or was I? “Anything weird about him, he absorbed through you via osmosis.”

“How do you know it’s not Dallas and Romeo’s fault?”

“Because I’m engaged to you. I don’t need to remember them to know it’s one hundred percent you.”

“You might eat those words once you actually meet them.” He stopped, ushering one of the caterers away from the south wing. “Especially Dallas.”

The second Oliver left me alone, I planned on investigating just how big his hoarding problem was. Any day now. The only problem? He hadn’t left my side since the hospital discharged me. Didn’t he have a job? Hobbies? Friends?

I shivered as a gust of wind licked my arms. “What’s wrong with Dallas?”

Ollie frowned, kicking the patio doors closed. “For starters, when she found out she was pregnant, she bought the entire neighborhood matching sets of sweans.” He tucked me in beneath a thick woven quilt. “Literally went door-to-door with them like a bible salesman.”

I scrunched my nose, wiggling in my new cocoon to get comfortable. “What are sweans?”

“Half sweats, half jeans, and one hundred percent crime against humanity.”

“Maybe she was preparing to wear them throughout her pregnancy and didn’t want to be the only one.”

“Huh. That’s exactly what she said.”

I perked up, breaking free from my cocoon. “Did I just remember something?”

“Maybe,” he dismissed, sliding the blanket back over my shoulders. “You’re still always cold, huh, Cuddlebug.”

“Not exactly fresh news. You act like you haven’t been dealing with me for decades.” I leaned forward, bumping my nose against his. “What’s up with baby Luca anyway?”

He swung back from me fast, drawing a frown out of me. “I often catch him staring into my soul. It feels like he fought two world wars, croaked in the last, and Benjamin Buttoned his way back into the universe, just to judge me.” Ollie decanted water from the carafe into a diamond-studded glass, chugging half. “He even has a wrinkle.”

“Babies are surprisingly wrinkly. Speaking of, when are you putting one in me?”

He spit water all over my quilt. I frowned at the reaction. Did he not want babies? Back then, he’d always told me I’d start a family of my own, and he’d be there every step of the way.

I jerked back against the couch cushion. Tiny pieces clicked together. Maybe that was what we’d fought about that night. I could see a major blow-out fight about kids. I wanted them. Desperately. We both knew this.

Right when I opened my mouth to ask, a horde of people burst through the front door in varying degrees of chaos. Five absurdly attractive humans waltzed into the home like they owned it – so beautiful, I found it difficult to keep my jaw shut tight. No baby Luca tonight, I noticed.

“I think I broke your lock,” the pink-haired goddess announced.

She wore a barely there slip that might’ve been actual lingerie and the unimpressed pout of a tired heiress. One I’d unfortunately grown familiar with at boarding school. Before I could stop it, I tensed, lowering my blanket, unsure if I’d stepped back into the ice-cold halls of Surval Montreux.

“BOSS!” She raced to me and threw her arms around my shoulders before I could react, toppling on top of me in the process. “I’ve missed you. Do you like my new hair? I dyed it. It’s better, right?”

This had to be one of the Townsend sisters. Oliver had warned me about their energy levels.

“I don’t remember your old hair.” I looked to Ollie, who tugged her off me, depositing her back onto her five-inch heels. “I’m your boss?”

“Were my boss.” She pouted. “I got fired.”

“You were never actually hired, Franklin.” Ollie directed her away from me and back into the foyer before he turned to me. “She invited herself onto your set after she heard you needed an assistant. Then promptly started a fire.”

“Oh.”

Okay. As far as my memory served me, I’d always lived as a loner. I couldn’t believe these were my friends. They were so … out there.

Oliver nodded. “The audacity is low-key inspirational.”

“Speaking of inspirational, I’ve decided to become an influencer.” Frankie linked her elbow around someone who vaguely resembled her. Dallas, I surmised. “I promise it’s a real job, sis. Stop icing me out as punishment.”

“Not a job that will keep you out of trouble, which is all Rom and I want.” Dallas unlooped her scarf around her neck, taking her time to drink in the mansion. “I can’t believe you’ve never even let me in through the front door, Oliver.”

He hadn’t? Better question – why didn’t I?

“I let you get married here.” Oliver rested a hand on my lower back, guiding the crowd into the dining room. “And gave you a room to get ready in.”

“And you shoved me into it through the back door like an overstuffed burrito.” She pivoted to me, lacing our fingers together. “I’m Dallas.” She jerked her thumb to the broody, towering man behind her. “And that’s my husband, Romeo.”

Romeo nodded but didn’t say anything. He helped his wife out of her coat, hooked it on the rack, and pulled out a seat for her before claiming the one beside her. Frankie sat on Dallas’ other side. Across from them, the remaining couple settled into their chairs. Zach and Farrow.

“Farrow.” The girl offered a mini wave and a friendly smile. Tall, and slender, and golden, she could pass as a Victoria’s Secret model. “But you can call me Fae. Congrats on being alive.”

“Thanks.” I smiled back, turning to her husband. “And you’re Zach, right?”

The Zachary Sun I remembered from Ollie’s description as kids was a black-and-white painting. Intricate, mournful, stunning, and in desperate need of a splash of color. Seemed like he got it. He looped an arm around the back of his wife’s chair, the poster child for Xanax.

Oliver pulled out the seat for me at the head of the table. I sat, watching him stroll to the opposite head, expecting him to sit there. Instead, he dragged the chair over to me, squishing himself into the small gap between me and Zach.

I edged mine over to give him space, unable to help the frown that feathered across my face. He literally hadn’t left my side since the hospital.

I patted his thigh. “I’m not going to drown if you leave a two-foot radius.”

He shrugged, snapping his fingers until the catering staff began dishing out food. Laksa risotto, kare kare pork shank, soft shell crab, and vegetarian tom yum pasta for me.

I spiraled the bucatini noodles onto my fork, addressing the whole group. “Can you guys describe what it was like to meet me for the first time?”

“Sure,” Romeo drawled, surprising me. I didn’t expect him to volunteer first. “I remember it like it was today.”

“You mean yesterday?” I raised a brow, shocked by the American education system. “The phrase is: I remember it like it was yesterday.”

A ghost of a smile haunted his face. “Yeah. Sure.”

Dallas elbowed him in the gut. “What Romeo meant to say is, before you guys met face-to-face, he didn’t believe you existed.”

Farrow nodded. “Neither did Zach.”

Zach moved the carbs onto one side of his plate and started on the protein. “We thought you were an imaginary friend Oliver made up on occasion out of sheer loneliness.”

Oliver scowled, working his jaw back and forth, his knife still speared into his porkchop. “Why would you think that? I mentioned her often enough.”

“Seb told us she’s made up.”

“When did he do that?”

Farrow turned to Zach. “Who’s Seb?”

I straightened, shocked that I’d forgotten to ask about him in the chaos. “Where is Seb?”

Dallas spoke around an entire crab leg, “What’s a Seb?”

Frankie whistled. “Seb sounds hot.”

Zach answered first. “Sebastian von Bismarck is Oliver’s little brother.”

Dallas’ fork clattered to her plate, flinging laksa onto her blouse. “Oliver has a brother? How did I not know this?”

Good question. He was her husband’s best friend’s absurdly pretty, freakishly talented baby brother. They shared the same street. Surely, Seb visited all the time. I remembered Oliver saying back then that his parents made him promise to let Seb sleep over whenever he wanted.

Romeo dabbed the sauce off Dallas’ shirt with a cloth napkin. “Because Sebastian decided to throw his rowing talent in the trash in favor of living out of his backpack like a retired techbro in the midst of a midlife crisis.”

Seb? Quitting rowing? Living out of his backpack abroad? The same Sebastian von Bismarck that couldn’t eat a meal without turning it into a competition? What happened?

Beside me, Oliver paled. I knew better than to ask him in front of so many people, but I most definitely would the second everyone cleared the house.

Zach nodded. “Truly, I should thank him.”

Farrow arched a brow. “Oh?”

“For years, every time my mother would begin to lecture me, she’d always look across the street at this home and remember that it could always be worse. In hindsight, her horror could be directed at Oliver, too.”

Farrow sighed. “Oh, Constance.”

I stared at Oliver, who’d suddenly found his rosemary bread particularly interesting. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t updated me about Seb. After all, I’d just gotten discharged from the hospital with clear instructions to take it easy. What mattered was that he seemed deeply uncomfortable, and I wanted to help him.

I racked my brain for something positive to say about Seb. A lot came to mind, but I went with the one thing everyone noted the first time they met him. “Seb is beautiful.”

Oliver’s head snapped up. He glanced at the door as if he expected Sebastian to waltz in any second without invitation.

Frankie licked her lips. “I just knew he’d be the more delicious von Bismarck.”

“You’ve never even seen him.” Dallas stole a scallop from her sister’s plate, then a prawn from her husband’s. “You’ve known of his existence for point two seconds.”

“And what a glorious point two seconds it has been.” She leaned toward me. “Tell me more.”

“He’s ripped,” I started. “Absolutely shredded. Wildly competitive. Funny in a weird, hate-the-world kind of way. Freakishly smart without even trying. Whenever he enters a room, I swear every head turns in his direction.”

With every description, Oliver tensed. I’d never seen him so … upset. Not that he didn’t do a stellar job of hiding it. But I’d known this man all our lives, seen every nook and cranny of him, and held him as he grieved his grandma. Oliver was upset. Maybe he’d gotten in a blow-out fight with his brother. Seb did have a lot of bark to his bite.

I decided to change the subject, turning to Dallas. “Tell me a little about yourself. What do you do for a living?”

“I’m a stay-at-home mom.”

“And before?”

“A stay-at-home hostage.”

“Oh-kay.” I waited for her to elaborate, but she didn’t, so I focused on her husband. “And you?”

“I’m an international arms dealer.”

The knife clutched between my fingers clattered to the tiles. “Like … actual guns?”

“And tanks, and missiles, and fighter jets.” He flashed me a predator’s smile, all sharp teeth. “If you’re ever in the market for an M67 grenade, you know where to find me.”

“Oh. Okay.” I hid my horror with a forced smile, shifting my attention to Farrow. “And you?”

“An athlete.”

Finally. Someone normal.

“What sport?”

“Fencing. Well, former fencer. I got caught cheating. It was a whole scandal. Team USA almost dropped me, but I quit anyway and became a coach.”

Oh. My. God. These were my best friends? Were any of these people normal? Zach. It had to be Zach. Oliver once told me he was a total square with no funny bone in his body. (“That would require f-u-n, and he’s allergic to that.”)

I swiveled to Zach. “And you?”

“I dabble in investments.”

“Any companies I know?”

“Dot Cum.”

“Dot Come?” I frowned, racking my brain and coming up short. Must’ve been new. “What’s that?”

“The largest porn site in America.”

No one. Not one of them. Not a single normal person. Not even Frankie, who’d apparently crashed my job and set a fire.

I stared straight at Oliver, who avoided my gaze, even when I kicked his shin under the table. He winced but kept his eyes trained into the bottom of his wine glass.

“It’s such a great site, too. Throbbin’ Hood 7.” Frankie bunched her fingers together and kissed them. “Chef’s kiss.” She shook her head, disappointment tainting her pretty face. “And they say sequels are dead …”

“Well, this has been a lovely dinner.” Oliver faked a smile, slinging an arm around my shoulders. “Aren’t you all glad to welcome back our best friend?”