Page 23 of Fake Fae-Ancée

There had been photos on Kalinin’s and my wedding day. It had been part of the chapel's service package. I’d never had the heart to throw the photos away, despite everything.

Me in my green dress, Kalinin in his pseudo-suit. Yuri had smiled into the camera like a dork — as if he had really been happy. We had both looked happy. As if it had been the best idea in the world to elope and get married in secret. Like we had been really real and not a big, fat giant lie.

That drunken, blissful week in Amsterdam that had followed was by now just a hazy memory. Flickering images of how we had thrown ourselves at each other in the hotel room right after the ceremony, drunk and dripping with happiness and the wild sensation of doing something excitingly forbidden.

We didn’t leave the room for one week.

And then, one morning, that damn phone call. Kalinin didn’t tell me much, but it sounded serious. He had to leave for his homeland immediately.

One last kiss, bittersweetly burned into my memory.

Weeks of radio-silence had followed.

Not a word from Kalinin, no call, not even a text, nothing. I had been sick with worry. I’d had long since returned to base camp when I’d eventually found out that the fancy Prince of Bears — my husband! — had gotten himself a brand-new fiancée.

It hadn’t been what it looked like, he had claimed years later, when one fine day he had reappeared, just shown up on my fucking doorstep like he had fallen from the sky and back into my life. This all had just been a terrible misunderstanding.

Yeah right!

I took another angry swig from the champagne bottle and squared my shoulders. Enough with the self-pity. Enough with hiding and getting drunk under a table. I had never been one for running from a problem. Not my style, powers lost or not. And Kalinin better have a damn good explanation for everything.

I crawled back into the outside world.

Time to tell the bastard once and for all that we were thoroughly divorced, and with very good reason

Yuri

"So, let’s talk."

Kai popped up next to me so suddenly I almost choked on whatever little food-thing I was chewing. She tugged me by the sleeve, pulling me away from the table with the snack-buffet.

I gulped down the last bite. "Why the hurry now?"

She shot me a withering look over her bare shoulder, eyes flashing their usual nuclear violet shade. I knew that her irises were actually midnight black, almost blue. But the last time Kai had not been angry at me had been a very, very, very long while ago.

"You wanted to talk so badly, so we talk," she hissed, "But not here. I'm certainly not making a scene on my friends' wedding day."

Fair enough.

She dragged me up a vast staircase and into a side-wing of the mansion. The hallway was deserted, the buzzing of the crowd reduced to a faint mumble. She stopped, opened a door and peered inside, then nodded as if the coast was clear and dragged me across the threshold and into a deserted salon. She pushed the door closed.

"You have one minute."

"Excuse me?"

Kai thrust her arms onto her hips, jutting her chin out.

"One minute. Starting now. Explain!"

Argh! that woman! Headstrong and angry was not a combination that went well with my waning patience right now. Bear bristled his fur.

"What if I don't?" I growled. "Are you going to hide under the table again?"

Her cheeks turned pink.

As if I hadn't noticed her hiding under the table. Like a pouting child that had pinched dessert. Cute, but useless of course. I had kept an eye on her the entire time. As if she’d ever been off my radar for even a minute in the last few years. Keeping her safe was a full time-job.

"Fifty-five seconds," Kai hissed. I looked over my shoulder, following her glare. An old grandfather clock stood on the wall behind me, the third hand ticking down the seconds. "Fifty-four, fifty-three…"

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