Page 27 of Last Comes Fate

“I was fourteen when I started at Eton,” he said before I could protest. “Dad got transferred to London, yeah, but it was always the plan for me to attend Eton College because of my mother’s family. That was the compromise, right? Travel with Dad, then go home to be a proper Englishman. Because at that point, I was still in the running to be the next Duke of Kendal. Mom and Georgina had been arguing about the entail for years since both Frederick and I share a common ancestor with Xavier.”

“Yes, I know about that,” I said. “But last I checked, it goes to the next oldest, doesn’t it? I don’t think your mothers being twins affects that.”

“They’re not the only twins in the Parker family,” Adam said. “Frederick and I both share a great-grandfather who was also a twin—born one minute later than the eleventh Duke of Kendal. Xavier’s great-grandfather. He might have been a jackass who was stripped of his own minor title, but he was still a legitimate Parker. So, you see, with Rupert gone, and Henry on his way, it seemed like I might have as much claim as Frederick. So I was supposed to be ready, just in case.”

I probably should have told him to leave right then, but nothing came out.

After all, I was always a sucker for a good story.

“The thing was, you can’t justbecomean aristocrat when you’re also an American,” Adam continued bitterly while he paced around some of the quads of student desks. “Not when you talk like we do or act like we do. You understand this now, Frankie. You know what they’re all like.”

I opened my mouth to argue but found I couldn’t. I’d known from the moment I landed in Kendal that I could never belong in that world.

Adam approached my teacher’s desk, then leaned across it and grabbed my wrist. I didn’t pull away, sensing his intensity.

“Can you imagine how hard I had to work for one grain of acceptance in that place?” he asked. “You tried for a summer. Me, it was years. I did everything I could to make the sons of dukes, prime ministers, lords and ladies, if notlikeme, then at least accept me a little. I had to work at everything. My manners, my speech, my clothes—it was all a struggle. Everything that came so damn easily tohim.”

Xavier. He couldn’t mean anyone else.

I frowned. “That’s not true. They weren’t nice to him either. He told me. He—he was bullied too—”

“For maybe a second,” Adam said with a snarl. “But you don’t understand—Xavier Parker never knew it, but he was everything those rich prats at Eton wanted to be. Ever heard of street credibility? They called him a bastard to his face, but deep down, every one of them wished they were as cool as the new tall kid from South London.”

By the time he was done, my jaw was practically on the floor. While I could understand how some of it might have seemed this way from Adam’s perspective, I also knew Xavier’s story—that particular period of his life had been marked by a ridiculous amount of cruelty and social alienation. Eton had never been anything but torture for him, particularly since it was well before he had been acknowledged as the heir to Kendal. I was acutely familiar with the scars those years had left. There was just no way it matched Adam’s description.

“They wanted to be like him?” I wondered. “Or was it just you?”

“It waseveryone,” Adam insisted. “He wanted a spot on the polo team? Done. Wanted to shag the hottest girls at Wycombe? All he had to do was give them one stupid, brooding stare. Everything came so fucking easy to him—and heneverappreciated it!”

“I don’t get it. You hate Xavier because, what, he took your place on the polo team and girls liked him fifteen years ago?”

“I hate that prick because he has taken every fucking thing I have ever wanted!” Adam exploded. “My school, my friends, my title. And then the girl of my dreams!”

I stepped back, pulled my wrist out of his grasp, and skittered to the other side of a cluster of child-sized desks. “Adam…”

He moved like he was going to follow me but seemed to realize it would be a mistake.

“I don’t mean to pressure you,” he said carefully. “I know I’ve blown it too many times to count. But I couldn’t just let you push me away without knowing the truth. I’m in love with you, Frankie. I’ve been in love with you for years. Ever since you started at Carroll and I saw what a real, genuine, kind person you are. And itkilledme that just when I got up the nerve to make a move, I found out that asshole was back in your life—”

“Back?” I jerked against a stack of cubbies. “What do you mean ‘back’?”

Adam’s eyes popped open. “I…er—”

“Did youknowwho Sofia’s father was before Xavier came back to New York?” My voice started to tremble—with rage or fear, I wasn’t sure. “Adam, did youknow the whole time?”

“I—yes.” The word expelled from his body like a blast of wind. “Yes, I knew.”

My eyes goggled. “But—what—how?”

For once, he had nothing to say. He just stood there, one thumb hooked into a paint-splattered pocket, thin lips worrying under a short, regrown beard that he couldn’t stop tugging on.

“You’re obsessed,” I whispered. “Not with me, but with him. That’s what this is about, isn’t it? You were stalking him—through me—or, or something.”

“Frankie, please,” Adam said in the same voice every adult in the building used to soothe a hysterical child. “Listen to yourself. I never stalked anyone. That sounds ridiculous.”

“Ridiculous, but you’re not denying either. You are completely obsessed with Xavier.”

“I am not obsessed with Xavier Parker.” Only a slight edge to his voice said any differently. “Curious, maybe. Who wouldn’t be curious about the guy who literally stole his inheritance, huh? Show me a single person who’s never looked up their childhood nemesis on Instagram. It’s totally normal.”

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