American Prince

I nodded a little at that. Goran Leffey, my stepfather and Morgan’s father, had been divorcing Imogen Leffey when she died giving birth to President Penley Luther’s son. Despite the pending divorce, he’d taken her death hard, had resented Luther and the child that had ultimately killed Imogen. That was no secret at the Moore lake house—even Vivienne Moore hated the memory of Luther for Goran Leffey’s sake.

“But how did you learn the baby was Ash?”

She rubbed at her temple with her fingertips. “A young woman who deals in secrets and frankly is a little unhealthily obsessed with Maxen, if you ask me. She learned enough from her grandfather to start sniffing in the right direction, and then she came to me. A couple months ago.”

“You’ve known this for two months?” I was incredulous. I mean, Morgan and I had a very business-like sibling relationship, but if I’d found out I had a secret brother whom I’d slept with, at the very least I would have told the brother I already had.

Well, stepbrother. But the point stands.

Morgan stood up and started walking, her arms folded across her chest. “I was gutted at first. Just…gutted. And astounded. How? What were the odds? That of all the men, it had to be my brother? That I would sleep with him and—” she bit her lip, stopping her words.

“But why did you have to tell him like this?” My hostility crept back into my tone as I remembered yesterday. The October rain spattering against the jewel-colored leaves, the low rolls of thunder. Ash’s face when she told him—shocked, nauseated, numb.

I could have killed her in that moment, right in front of Jenny’s casket and its tasteful spray of orchids.

I expected her trademark cruelty now, however. I expected her to defend what she’d done, to attack Ash, to attack me. Clearly she’d felt justified enough yesterday to tell him in front of me, why would today be any different?

But today was different. She stopped pacing, keeping her arms folded, and turned to face me. “I don’t know,” she said tiredly. “I don’t know. I told myself it was to cripple him, to finish off his campaign in case his wife’s death hadn’t, but the more I think about it, the more I think that I was…lonely…in being the only one who knew.”

“So you told him because you felt sad?” My voice held so much disdain it surprised even me.

She glared at me. “I told him because my party has no chance of winning this election. It’s not even his stupid New Party, it’s him. Maxen is handsome, young, a war hero, charming—everything our guy isn’t. And until the Republican Party can run a nominee like him against him, we’re going to lose.”

“But you don’t have anyone like that.”

“No. We don’t. But I thought if I could force him to drop out…” She shook her head. “Anyway, it doesn’t make a difference. You’re right. I think the real reason I told him is because it hurts me. I wanted to hurt him too, and more than that, I wanted him to share the burden of it with me. I thought it would be lighter after he knew.”

“And is it?”

She pressed both hands against her stomach, as if trying to hold in her feelings there, and looked down at the floor. “No,” she replied, her gaze distant.

I stood up, walking close enough to touch her. I didn’t. Even without what happened at Jenny’s funeral, we weren’t exactly the kind of siblings who lavished affection on each other. “You did hurt him, Morgan. Congratulations. He’s miserable and grieving and now he gets to know that once upon a time he fucked his sister on top of all that. He gets to know for sure that his mother is dead and his father never wanted him. The Carpathians couldn’t do it, Jenny’s death couldn’t do it, but you did it. You broke Maxen Colchester. Exactly what you wanted, right?”

She shook her head again, still not looking at me. “I don’t know what I want when it comes to him.”

Fuck, who did when it came to Maxen Colchester? All those years since he proposed to Jenny, and yet I couldn’t make myself move on. I couldn’t stop hungering for the accidental brushes of our fingers and shoulders, those nights when we’d get drunk together and he’d begin running curious fingers along the length of my neck, the stubble-rough lines of my jaw. No amount of fucking or drinking or war drove it out of me, and it never would. I’d be dead before I stopped loving Ash.

But that didn’t make it right, especially now that Jenny was dead. What kind of awful man would I be if I hoped her death made him free to love me back?

You’d be the awful man you already are.

I focused on Morgan again, on the here and now, walking toward the door as I said, “You better figure out what you want, Sissy. Because you’re responsible for it either way.”

“It’s done,” she whispered. “It can’t be taken back.”

“Maybe. But I think if you saw him now, you’d hate yourself for it.”

“You have no idea the things I hate myself for,” she said hollowly. “You have no idea all the things I’ve done.”

“And I don’t care,” I said honestly. “But I do care about Ash. And if you ever loved him, if you ever loved me, then you would care too.”

She didn’t answer. I left her standing in the middle of her sitting room, hands flat against her stomach, her eyes vacant as she stared out of the window and at the empty street outside.

Rap.