Page 51 of Prince of Masks
Hope he drowns.
I look up as a silhouette cuts into my peripherals. I expect the attendant with my order, but I find Oliver instead.
He drops onto the chair closest to the pool’s edge and, after drying off his hands on a towel, starts to beat up his phone with his thumbs again.
I sigh, “Do you need surgery to remove that phone from your hand?”
The attendant returns.
But I have floated away from the edge.
I watch as, balancing the tray on one hand, he kneels at the edge of the pool and reaches out his other hand for the arm of the floatie.
He manages to get a squeaky grip before he draws me closer to him.
I don’t help; it’s entertaining to watch his attempt.
He sets down my espresso on the attached table, then a glass of water (because my diet means no juice), and a small bowl of fruit (grapes, raspberries, scoops of watermelon and wedges of kiwi).
Oliver’s jaw flexes. “If you must know, I’m texting Serena.”
The attendant pushes the edge of my floatie, gentle, but enough to sway me back out onto the water.
Dray avoids my return by swimming under the floatie when I’m in his way. If we were at Bluestone, he would knock me over and shove me underwater.
I down the espresso, fast. “When are we seeing her again?”
“Rugby Sunday,” he murmurs, then throws up a hand in something of a dismissive gesture, “I hope. I don’t know anymore.”
I frown at him. “She should come.”
Really, what I mean is she doesn’t have a choice.
No one misses Rugby Sunday.
It’s an inner circle event. The closest European aristos come together and form the Coven of Europe.
The Vasiles are one of those families.
Amelia’s voice trills from the table behind me, “What’s that, dear?” I know she’s speaking to me. I’mdear. “You want to see Serena?”
Dray splashes up from the water. Drops strike me all over, like a machine gun sprays bullets.
The look he spares me is dark as he folds his arms on the edge of my floating lounger,mine, not his.
My leg twitches with the urge to kick him away. An awkward strike, since his folded arms border the length of my thigh, too close, much too close.
Not to mention, Amelia’s attention is on us.
So Mother’s and Father’s will be, too.
Harold couldn’t give a fuck about me, so I doubt he’s even looked over from the jacuzzi yet.
But the fact of it stands, I can’t risk shoving him off.
Dray calls back to his mother, “Olivia and Serena have been rekindling their friendship this year.”
I sneer down at him, and my hiss is heard by only him, “Gossip.”
