Chapter 207: Is This Your Bed?

Killian had spent the night in the armchair by the window.

The "roommate" had the bed.

She lay in the middle of it under her pink quilt, flat on her back, one arm flung across his pillow. Her blonde hair was spread over the silk. She had snored from the moment he put her down.

The jackal, Ezra stood by the door with his arms folded. His twin brother, Elias sat on the arm of the sofa, eating an apple.

Killian sat at his desk. In front of him lay a sheet of paper with two names on it. MARSH, IVY. GREENE, HEATHER. He had ruled a line under them and left the rest of the page white.

Sun came through the tall window in a wide band across the desk. Every so often he moved his chair to the left to stay in it.

"Your Highness," Ezra said. "Beast Law begins in twenty minutes."

"Then it begins without me."

The bed creaked.

"She’s up," Elias said.

She sat up. The quilt slid to her waist. Under it she wore a thin white gown. She pushed her hair out of her face and looked around. At the silk sheets. At the carved posts of the bed. At the green velvet curtains, the sofa, the Jackal at the door and the Jackal with the apple.

At Killian.

Her mouth fell open.

Killian waited for the scream.

She pulled the quilt up to her chin. Then, slowly, she lowered it again and smoothed her hair down with both hands.

"Your Highness," she said.

"Miss Greene."

"Oh my god. You know my name." She pressed a hand to her chest. "Okay. Okay. Can I ask one question?"

"You may."

"Did it go through?"

"Did what go through?"

"My contract." She glanced at the twins and lowered her voice. "The breeding contract. The royal one."

The pen stopped in Killian’s hand.

"With whom?"

Heather looked down at the bed. Then at him. She gave him a small, encouraging smile.

"With you?"

Elias choked on his apple.

Ezra’s eyes went to the ceiling.

"No," Killian said.

"But I’m in your bed."

"It is the only bed in these rooms."

"Right." She nodded slowly. "Totally. That’s what I’d say too, with people listening." She tipped her head at the twins.

"They work for me."

"So they’re staff." She brightened. "Then it’s fine."

Elias leaned forward with his elbows on his knees, the apple in one hand, and smiled at her. "Elias. That’s Ezra. We’re not staff."

Heather looked him over. Slowly, from his shoes to his face. Then over at Ezra by the door, and back.

"Twins," she said.

"Twins."

"Are you both his?"

"We are."

She tucked her hair behind her ear. "Good to know."

Ezra’s eyes came down from the ceiling. They stopped on her bare shoulder, where the gown had slipped, and stayed there a second. Then he looked at the door again.

Killian set the pen down. "Miss Greene. What is the last thing you remember?"

"The party." It came out at once. "The senior one. I had a cup, and there was this panther, total waste of time, and then someone said there was an offer. A real one. Royal." She spread her hands at the room. "And here I am."

"Who said it?"

She opened her mouth. Then she frowned.

"Someone," she said. "They were super nice." She frowned harder. "Why can’t I—"

She had lifted a hand to rub her forehead, and she stopped. She was looking at her fingernails.

The pink polish had grown out halfway. A pale band of bare nail showed above every cuticle.

"Who did this?" Her voice went high. "I never let them get like this. Never. I painted these on Friday."

Killian looked at Ezra.

Ezra looked at Killian.

Heather turned her hand over. On the back of it, below the knuckles, sat a small dark mark in a ring of yellow bruise. She pressed it with her thumb.

"Did someone stick me with something?"

"You were unwell," Killian said.

"I don’t get unwell." She pushed the quilt off and swung her legs out of the bed. "Where’s my bag? I need a mirror. I need my whole bag, honestly. I look like I’ve been dead."

Elias’s smile slipped.

Killian pointed his pen at a door across the room. "Through there."

She padded across the rug in her bare feet, holding the back of the gown shut with one hand. The bathroom door closed behind her.

Elias looked at Killian. "Your Highness. Should she—"

"She will see it today or tomorrow," Killian said. "I would rather it were here."

The tap ran, then stopped.

The band of sun moved off the corner of the desk. Killian moved his chair.

Elias turned the apple over in his hands.

Heather screamed.

Glass smashed on the bathroom tiles.

Elias was off the sofa. Ezra reached the bathroom door first and shoved it open.

Heather stood at the sink with both hands clamped over her left eye. A tumbler lay in pieces around her bare feet.

"What is that?" Her voice cracked high. "What is that? What did you do to me?"

"I did nothing to you," Killian said from the doorway.

She dropped her hands and looked in the mirror again, and screamed again.

"It’s a lens. Somebody put a lens in." She pulled her lower lid down and pinched at the white with her fingertips. She flinched hard. Tears ran out of it. She pinched again. "Get it out. Get it out—"

Ezra caught her wrist. "You’ll hurt it."

"It’s my eye!" She twisted against his grip.

Ezra held on.

Elias crouched and swept the glass away from her feet with the side of his hand. "Don’t step."

Heather stopped fighting. She stared into the mirror. She covered the white eye with her free hand. Then uncovered it. Then covered it again. Her breath came short and fast.

"Can you see out of it?" Killian asked.

She covered the blue eye instead.

For a long moment she stood very still.

"Yes," she whispered.

She lowered her hand. In the mirror the left eye was pure white from lid to lid, iris and pupil gone, and wet at the edges.

"Is it permanent?"

"I don’t know," Killian said.

Her chin shook. She pressed her lips together until it stopped.

"I want Blair."

"Not today."

Ezra let go of her wrist. Heather walked past all three of them, back across the rug, climbed into his bed and pulled the pink quilt over her head.

Killian looked at the lump in his bed for a while.

"She does not leave these rooms," he told the twins.

"Is that in my contract?" came from under the quilt.

"There is no contract."

The quilt came down to her nose. Her eyes found him.

"Then what am I?"

Killian considered it.

"A guest."

"Of the Crown Prince."

"Of these rooms."

Heather looked past him at the twins. "Do guests get breakfast?"

"Guests get whatever they like," Elias said.

"Within the rooms," Ezra said.

Heather smiled at both of them and settled back into the pillows. She turned on her side, facing the window. Her lashes drooped.

"Can someone close the curtain?" she mumbled.

"The sun is good for you," Killian said.

"It’s not the sun." Her words were already slurring. "They keep looking in."

Killian turned in his chair.

Beyond the tall window lay pale winter sky and, far off, the bare tops of the trees.

"Who?"

Her breathing had gone slow and even.

Elias set the apple down.

Killian looked at the window for a long moment. Then he stood, drew the curtain across it and sat back down at his desk, in the shade.