Page 65 of Desperately Yours

Just about the time I had forgotten her, Mother interrupted my thoughts.

“Surely she can’t be married in this.” Mother protested, waving her hands at the purple gown Sadie had selected. “She looks like an under taker, not a bride.”

“And what do you suggest, Mother? We’re two hours from midnight. I thought you were on a timetable.”

“We are, but that doesn’t mean we have to throw away every tradition. In fact, I have a few options at my disposal,” she spoke as if this hadn’t been her plan all along, “and they happen to be in Sadira’s size. I will send them to her chambers along with a host of lady’s maids to prepare.”

“If it’s not too much to ask, Your Majesty,” Sadira’s mousy voice barely carried, “the dress Michaela planned to wear tonight is positively breathtaking…”

“You would wear her dress?” I nearly showed my hand, all too defensive in the face of her outright disrespect toward the woman I loved. “Why?”

“You said you would see her every time you gazed at my face. I thought it might make it easier for you.” She pressed her lips together, hesitating for a moment. Did she sense my irritation? “Perhaps it would bring us both a modicum of comfort, my friend, your love. A tribute?”

“I’ll send someone for it right away. Along with the others.” Mother clapped her hands loudly and spouted orders. “Reginald, get them to work. You know where the dresses are located. Fetch them to Lady Sadira’s room with great haste. I think if we call the…” Reginald followed on her heel, taking her orders as she strode quickly down the empty hallway toward the grand staircase.

I turned my focus on Sadie once more. “You’re sure about this?”

Again, I expected some declaration about a possible future together and, once more, she said words I never would have expected.

“I believe, Your Highness, this is the best for all of us.”

While there was no way I could ever believe that, as far as I could tell, she did.

Michaela

“How do you get yourself in these situations?” I asked myself out loud as I inched along the ledge outside the palace window. “This is the gate all over again. Leap first, ask questions later.” I was really losing it, having an entire conversation with myself. “But look where it’s gotten you? Fifty feet above the ground, one strong sneeze away from being a pavement pancake. Real nice there,Princess Coco.”

I slid another step to the left, staring over the courtyard below me. It looked like I was coming up on the arches that I’d seen in the gardens when I arrived. I’d been trying to get a good look at the gardens since day one, but an arial view like this one wasn’t my plan.

Still, the outdoor lights caught the snow and sent twinkling beams in every direction and I couldn’t deny the beauty… despite my pounding heartbeat. My feet grated on the ledge, one tiny step at a time. I refused to focus on the fall though.

I counted rose bushes. I tried to gauge the distance from the palace to the outer walls that surrounded the property. I even spotted the dang gate that I’d gotten wedged in weeks ago when Reginald had found me. It felt like a lifetime since then, but alsomaybe only a day. So much had happened, the greatest of which was falling in love with my best friend.

Oh, Fitz. Where are you? Why haven’t you come for me?

What if he believed the letter? What if he married Sadie instead? In the millisecond it took to think of it, my focus split.

My foot slipped.

Gravity captured my frame and yanked me downward.

My heart leapt up like it was making a break to climb to higher ground. Pain ripped through my palms as I clawed at the palace wall behind me, trying to find purchase. I whimpered as my vision bounced around the fall below me. No amount of ordering myself to stay calm would help. My heel ground against the ledge and finally created traction that drove me back against the wall. I closed my eyes and panted, tears rolling over my cheeks.

I had to get off this ledge. It was bound and determined to kill me and I couldn’t let it. I drew in a soft breath, forced it in a tiny stream between my lips. In through my nose, out through my mouth, counting six then eight, and refusing to give into the voice that shrieked in my head and tried to make me believe I was going to die on the ledge.

Shaking, I slid my leg to the left. Rough stone scratched at my calf as the outcropping barred my way. The lanterns on this side of the palace didn’t offer as much illumination, but as I peered carefully to the left, I noted the way the wall jutted forward a couple of inches. Some kind of adornment or decoration or… trim. Like on a window.

My mind started racing. Why hadn’t I seen it before? I’d been staring at this arial view of the garden for weeks, not from the death-defying ledge, but from my window in my chambers. I wanted to scream out in joy! I’d found my window! I found a way in!

And, if I was right, that meant I’d found a way to access the secret passageway.

I held my breath as I angled my body to take on the corner and its awkward angle. It made my wrist ache to turn my hand to grip the trim around the window, but I had no choice. Exhaling slowly, I didn’t look down, not even when the tiny pebbles beneath my feet tumbled over the edge and descended in a free fall to silently land three stories down. Because of the way the trim came out and the window was tucked well inside of it, I couldn’t simply pull myself around, not without tipping the scales of my balance and sending myself careening forward. But, if I could manage to keep my grip, I thought I might be able to swing myself around the edge, like a spin on the dance floor, shift from forward facing to back facing the fall, and hope my momentum would carry me in through my unlocked window.

Oh my gosh.

I did leave it unlocked, didn’t I?

That wasn’t a thought I could entertain.

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