Page 22 of B & E Ever After (Fairy Tale Quartet 3)

Irrationally afraid my stolen booty in the trash sack would disappear if I left it here unattended, I snatched it up, even as I left my street clothes behind so I could hurry into the bathroom to see myself in the mirror.

It only showed me from the waist up, but I paused anyway, my breath stalling in my chest. As if in a trance, I lifted my hands to my hair and wound the locks up into a quick makeshift bun. After securing my hair into place with a scrunchy I perpetually left around my wrist, I dropped my hands to my sides and stared.

With my shoulders bare and no necklace on, my neck looked rather long and incredibly elegant. I turned to the side, wanting to see more.

Growing frustrated because the mirror didn’t show my full length, I hurried from the bathroom, and when I didn’t spot a full-length mirror in the bedroom either, I darted through the doorway and down the hall to the front room where the entire wall was covered in panels of mirrors.

Reaching my destination, I slowed to a stop and let my mouth fall open as I gazed at my entire reflection.

“So cool,” I murmured, slowly twisting this way and that to take in the full picture. I let Miguel’s sack of get-wells slip from my fingers and land on the floor next to me as I smiled at the woman gazing back at me. She looked suited for this kind of life. She liked dazzling dresses and white carpets, fresh air, and bright lights.

I blew her a kiss, and then laughed at myself for my ridiculousness.

But I knew I couldn’t stay here with that smiling, carefree girl forever. I had a sick brother at home, and honestly, who knew when the rich bitch would return.

Just as I bent down to retrieve my sack, a beep, followed by a snick of sound, echoed over to me from the front door, telling me loud and clear that someone was currently unlocking it.

Oh, shit. Of course. This would only happen to me. Probably because I was the only idiot alive who’d ever finagle herself into such a crazy situation, but whatever.

I was so busted.

Gasping, I froze like a moron who knew she should run or at the very least dive behind something to hide, but couldn’t quite get the job done. Yeah, petrified-pitiful-me just stood there, stupidly, as guilt, fear, and panic seized all my limbs immobile, rendering them stiff and useless.

“Oh God,” I whimpered.

I gathered the white trash sack to my chest as the door came open. My muscles cramped, allowing blinking as the only movement I could muster. And blink I did, in utter confusion, as a man—not the woman I’d met earlier—slipped inside backward, peering out into the hallway as he came, as if he thought he was being followed and didn’t want to be caught.

Wearing a formal tuxedo, like he might be one of those high rollers I’d seen in the ballroom getting pickpocketed from Diego, he shut the door and blew out a relieved breath before turning toward me, only to jerk to a halt when he realized he wasn’t alone.

Holy cripes, he was gorgeous. With his dark hair slicked up and away from his forehead, his jaw cleanly shaven, and his eyebrows flared up into censorious arches, he looked like a slim, grim James Bond.

He seemed similarly transfixed by me, but in more of a perplexed, what-is-happening-here kind of way. His gaze skimmed up and down my dress with more confusion. I’m sure he must have recognized it as his wife’s—or whatever the evil bitch was to him. But thinking about her snagging a younger man, and one as hot as this guy, made bitterness boil inside me.

I had Diego, the lying thieving braggart, sniffing after me, and she got this?

Life really wasn’t fair sometimes.

His gaze made its way back up to my face, where he blinked and pulled back before say

ing, “What the hell?” as if he recognized me?

And that’s when the thought struck me: why in God’s name was I just standing there, doing nothing?

Run, Gabby, run!

Chapter 5

Hayden

HALF AN HOUR EARLIER

Fin Tin was alive.

Straightening my bow tie, I approached the ballroom of JFI and tried to get my mind to stop buzzing and short-circuiting around that fact.

Arthur’s lawyer wasn’t dead after all.

The private investigator I’d hired to look into him had contacted me not even an hour ago, and he’d found evidence that Randolph Finley was still breathing and very much alive, living the high life in Mexico, a filthy rich man.

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