Page 34 of Desperately Yours

Midnight.

Once more, next to the embossed frog on the stationery, he’d drawn three horizontal lines to indicate the key to the secret passage. He wanted to meet me again, but I wasn’t sure what it meant.

“What does it say, Lady Michaela?” Dahlia pressed her lips together as if fighting back tears. “Was he called away on a matter of business? Or is he with the king?”

I shook my head. “The production crew, the schedule isn’t working out tonight so they’ve cancelled.”

That didn’t sit well with Sadie. “Surely, they’ve been promoting it. They wouldn’t stop on account of a few crew being gone.” She started my way, hand outstretched. “Let me see it. Maybe you misunderstood.”

Before she could take it, Bishop snatched it from my grasp. “Yes, let us see what it really says here.” He made a show of reading what looked like a full paragraph with the way he drew it out. Once finished with his act, he scoffed. “You thought you’d trick us, didn’t you,Miss Caldwell?” He waved the card in the air as he turned away from me. “The real truth is much worse. Almost incriminating.”

Where was he going with this? Was Bishop going to rat me out?

He pointed at the row of candles that lined the windowsill, seemingly distracted for a moment. “Love this whole cathedral bit you have going on with this ambiance, by the way. Super macabre and just a little bit Poe. I expect a raven to land on the turret at any second and start in with the third stanza.”

Sadie’s stare bounced between Bishop and me, looking for answers before she blurted out. “What? What does it say?”

“Oh!” Bishop pretended as though he’d forgotten. “Merely that he had planned to send her home at the last choosing ceremony and Esmerey’s sickness interrupted his plans.” He let his hand with the card flop to the side, limp and uninvolved with the story. “Yes, they are friends, but friendship isn’t enough to carry a marriage.” Using his other hand, he cupped his mouth as though divulging a secret. “He should have learned that with Gwendolyn, yeah?”

“I don’t believe you.” Sadie took a couple steps in his direction. “Let me read it.”

Before she took another step, the card caught fire. Bishop’s lazy posture had brought it entirely too close to the candle’s flame. “Oh! Oh my!” He waved the card, but it only increased the flame. “What do I do?”

“Drop it!” Dahlia yelled. “Stomp on it.”

“Yes! Great idea!” Bishop agreed. “Put it out the window. Excellent!”

“No.” Sadie rushed forward, but he had already unfastened the latch. At the exact moment she took hold of his arm, Bishop released the flaming piece of paper from the third-story window. Though I couldn’t see it, I imagined the flitting card burning as it fell, leaving nothing more than embers as it landed on the new snow.

“There.” Bishop took hold of the window and pulled it shut. “All better.”

Dahlia and Sadie stared at him with gaping mouths, as if they couldn’t believe what he’d done.

“Well then, big day tomorrow.” He clapped his hands together, then nodded toward the door. “Everyone should get some sleep. Hate to have dark circles under the eyes when you’re named the victor, right, Sadie?”

“Lady Sadira,” Dahlia corrected him. “And it’s not bedtime yet. The sun hasn’t even set.”

“Yes, of course,” Bishop agreed with the slightest bow, ignoring her second point entirely. “I’ll escort you out.” It wasn’t a request. He was letting them know they had to leave. To drive the point home, I fell in step with him and helped usher them out the door.

“Goodnight, Michaela.” Sadie hesitated in the doorway. “I really am sorry about your date.”

This time I actually believed her, and it made the guilt over my secret that much worse.

“It’ll be okay. Thanks for…” I motioned to the room around me, “all this stuff. I feel so much safer.”

“Of course.” She gave a weak smile and slipped into the hall.

Bishop hovered in the doorway, obviously watching until they were out of sight. Leaning forward he said, “It rather smells like someone lit a pond on fire in here if you ask me. Toads and all.”

“That’s the sage.”

“I would stick to lavender, if I were you. Perhaps roses, a favorite of Leo’s.” His nose scrunched. “This is not what I consider the mostromanticscent.”

Point taken. I probably needed a shower before my secret rendezvous to get all the cleansing sage smoke off of me.

“Thank you, Bishop.” I squeezed his hand. “For everything.” I hadn’t always appreciated his meddling in the past, but time and time again he’d saved me. No matter what happened with Fitz, I hoped my friendship with Bishop would continue.

“Just so you know,” he dropped his volume even further, “it wasn’t his idea to cancel.” Bishop squeezed my hand back. “It washers.”

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