Royal Chase (17 page)

I started shivering. “They form a protective covering,” I said, my teeth chattering together.

He eased me into my bed, pulling my covers over me. He brushed hair off of my damp forehead. “I admit, when I’ve imagined carrying you to bed it never ended with me leaving you there alone.”

Only he would be hitting on me while I was dying. “You have got to be kidding.”

He smiled a too-big smile, and I couldn’t get warm enough. I just kept shivering under my covers. The medic came in to examine me, and said it seemed as if I had the flu. She said to give me lots of fluids and to keep me comfortable, and to get her if my symptoms worsened.

I must have fallen asleep, because I woke up having to retch again. I tried to get out of my bed, and there were arms lifting me up and carrying me into the bathroom. I got to the toilet just in time, and threw up bile. It was like I was trying to exorcise a demon from my mouth.

When I finished, I closed the toilet and leaned my head against the lid. The nice, cool, wonderful lid. I heard Dante’s voice. “Is there anything I can get you?”

“My spleen back? I’m pretty sure it ended up in the toilet.”

“You make it hard to be frustrated with you when you’re sick like this.” He picked me up again and carried me back to my room.

“What are you doing?” I asked. “I look terrible.”

“You do look terrible,” he agreed. But he sounded like that time I told him he couldn’t tell me I looked pretty, and he said I looked awful instead. “Truly horrible.”

“You’re not supposed to agree with me when I say I look bad. You’re the worst nurse ever,” I told him as he put me back in my bed.

“I’ve never taken care of a sick person before.”

“I can tell.” I sighed when he put the covers back over me. He crouched down next to the bed and caressed the side of my face. “When you’re up for it, there’s some water on your nightstand. Let me know if you need anything.”

“Why are you doing this? Why are you in here?” My voice sounded croaky.

“I want to be with you,” he said simply.

“Even when I’m sicker than a white-mouthed mule?”

“Even then.”

I reached out to take his hand. “I’m glad you’re here. I don’t want you to leave.” It wasn’t until after the words came out of my mouth that I realized what I’d said. His grin didn’t help things.

I pulled my hand back. “I’m obviously delirious. Anything I say can’t be held against me.”

“Whatever you say,
Limone
.”

I wanted to argue with him more, but I fell asleep instead.

Chapter 17

Flirting with you? I think politeness has become so rare that people mistake it for flirting. I just happen to be very, very good at being polite.

I woke up and stretched. I felt a hundred percent better. It was like I hadn’t even been sick. I reached for one of the water bottles Dante had left on my nightstand. Yesterday, every time I so much as looked at water, I would throw it up. I took a tentative sip and waited.

It stayed put.

I heard a masculine snoring sound. I sat up. Dante was sleeping in Genesis’s bed. He looked sweet. And hot. And cute.

And very alone with me.

I held my blanket up to my chest, which was ridiculous because I had my pajamas on and he was passed out.

Then a worse thought occurred to me. Had he and Genesis stayed there together? I put a hand to my forehead, ordering myself to not freak out. If he and Genesis had . . . done stuff . . . it was none of my business. It was gross and made me want to smack people, but it was still none of my business.

“Good morning.”

Ack!
My heart slammed into my chest. “Don’t scare me like that.”

“You wouldn’t have been surprised if you weren’t busy ogling me.”

“I wasn’t ogling you!” I insisted. “I was only trying to figure out where that snoring sound was coming from.”

“I don’t snore.” He turned to face me, and I was grateful to see that he had a shirt on.

“You most definitely do. You sound like a Mack truck.”

“You’d be the first to complain about it.”

My skin flushed in response, and I didn’t need to think about the implications of that statement. Speaking of which . . . “Where’s Genesis?”

“I don’t know. The producers wanted all of you in separate rooms.”

I didn’t examine the relief that sang through me too closely. “Why?”

He propped himself up on one elbow. “Genesis and Michelle started throwing up right after you did. They didn’t want you to make each other sicker.”

That was not sickness. We wouldn’t simultaneously get the flu within a few minutes of each other. Something had happened.

Something named Abigail.

“Is Abigail sick?”

“Not that I know of.” If he knew something, I didn’t see it on his face or hear it in his voice.

I thought back to our girls’ night, and how she drank the milkshakes with us and how much it had surprised me. Abigail was always careful with what she little she did eat. Always organic, always proteins and vegetables. I thought she was just excited and decided to have a cheat night. And she drank and drank, up until the last batch that we had right before we all fell asleep.

Was she capable of something like that? Would she have seriously poisoned us? Was she willing to kill us all in order to win Dante?

I had a feeling she was. I would have to prove it somehow. And much as I would have loved to inflict a slow, excruciating revenge, it would be enough just to get her kicked off the show and out of our lives.

“How are you feeling?” Dante interrupted my Inigo Montoya-esque plans for vengeance.

“Totally better. I don’t think I had the flu.”

He pulled back the covers and sat up in the bed. “Food poisoning, maybe? That would explain why all three of you got sick.”

It certainly would.

“Did you take Abigail on the last-chance date yesterday?”

“No. I was in here with you all day.”

My heart stopped and melted all at the same time. The physical attraction was one thing, but the emotions threatened to drag me under. “Doing what?” My voice sounded strangled.

“Taking care of you. Watching that zombie show you like so much when you were sleeping.”

It affected me more deeply than I would have cared to admit that he had spent an entire day looking after me. He didn’t have to, I didn’t expect it, and he did it anyway.

Maybe, just maybe, his feelings weren’t as shallow as I thought they were.

I couldn’t imagine Sterling doing the same thing.

What was wrong with me? It was like I was looking for reasons to be with Dante and cancel my wedding. “You mean
The Walking Dead
?”

“And I don’t understand why when people fall down when running from a zombie, they scoot backward along the ground instead of getting back up and running away. They’re obviously faster on their feet. Or why sometimes the zombies are loud and other times they’re like ninja zombies.”

Sterling also refused to watch
The Walking Dead
, even though it was my favorite TV show.

I sighed. I was doing it again.

“It does make you wonder how you’d react in an apocalypse.”

That was one of the reasons I loved the show so much. I liked to imagine myself in that scenario, how I would do it better than the characters and how I would survive. I liked that he had asked the question. “I would kick butt in an apocalypse. I’m an excellent shot.”

“Also useful in a revolution.”

“Are you expecting a revolution?” I couldn’t help but smile. The last people anyone would try to overthrow were Dante’s parents.

“No one ever expects a revolution. It would be nice to know that at least one member of the royal household could shoot her way out.”

“I’m not going to be . . .” I stopped talking and sucked in a breath as he stretched his arms above his head, flexing his arms and showing an expanse of his stomach that my great-grandmother could have done her laundry on.

He caught me looking and winked at me.

I could feel the blood rushing to my face, and then, to add insult to injury, my stomach rumbled so loudly I half expected it to rock the bed.

“Hungry?” he asked with a smirk.

“I know it seems weird considering what I just ate, but I would kill for some Graeter’s ice cream.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s a brand of ice cream from a company in Cincinnati, Ohio. I had a sorority sister from there and she introduced me to it. She would have it delivered for breakups.”

He stood up. “Your wish is my command.”

“I didn’t mean for you to . . .” I said, but he was already halfway out the door.

Then he stopped and his mischievous eyes twinkled at me. “You said it would never happen, but we just slept together.”

“We did not!” I grabbed one of my pillows and threw it at him, but he was already gone.

I took a shower, and it was nice to feel human again. I wondered how much of the previous day the cameras had captured. If they showed the audience that Dante had spent all day with me, it might look like he favored me over the others. Although, given the way editing worked, I could come out looking like a horrible person while Abigail seemed like the lovable heroine.

After I got dressed and dried my hair, I checked in on Genesis and Michelle. Michelle seemed fully recovered and was busy packing for her hometown date with Dante. Genesis, unfortunately, was still throwing up. She looked so miserable. “Every time I drink water, I get sick again.”

“Stop drinking for a while,” I told her. “Just sleep.” She nodded and closed her eyes. I pulled her blanket up to her shoulder and patted her. I wished I could do more.

On my way downstairs I passed by Abigail’s room. It was empty. “Abigail?” I called out. I knocked on her open door. “Hello?” No answer. I didn’t know where she was or how much time I had, but I was ready to play spy again.

Her room was immaculate. Like a maid had been in to clean it. Another thing to dislike about her.

I opened dresser drawers, rummaging through them. I didn’t know what I was looking for, but I hoped I’d know it when I saw it. I looked under her bed, under the pillows, and in the nightstand drawers. Nothing.

Turning on the closet light, I rifled through her dresses, checked pockets, and looked inside her shoes. I might not find anything. If she were smart, she would have gotten rid of the evidence.

Fortunately, Abigail was not smart.

I stood up and looked at the closet shelves and saw a bag of potato
chips. That woman had never willingly eaten a trans-fat, sodium-infested, greasy carb in her entire life. I grabbed the bag, and saw that it had already
been opened. I fished around inside it, and felt a glass bottle.

I pulled it out triumphantly and read the label. Ipecac syrup.

A former sorority sister of mine, Charlotte, had been anorexic and bulimic. After she came back from rehab for her eating disorders, she asked me to come to her room and get rid of her stash of ipecac syrup. She didn’t have much of a gag reflex anymore, so the only way she could throw up was from the syrup. And it helped her to keep her eating and drinking in check, because once you’d ingested it, any other food or water would keep you throwing up.

No wonder Genesis hadn’t gotten over it yet.

I ran back into her room and woke her up. “Genesis, do not eat or drink anything else. You will get better.”

Groggily she said, “Okay.”

“I’ll come back and check on you later. It may take me a while because I have to finish killing Abigail first.”

She was already back to sleep. I took the water bottles near her bed and carried them down to the kitchen in case she didn’t remember our conversation.

I couldn’t believe Abigail had done this. She must have grabbed the ipecac when we went upstairs to change, and had kept it on her all night, pretending to be our friend and making us shakes. She had been waiting and planning, wanting that last-chance date with Prince Dante, and was willing to make us all suffer so she could get it.

What kind of evil, sadistic person would do that?

I might actually inflict bodily harm on that woman. I was madder than a pack mule with a mouthful of bees. The vein in my forehead started throbbing, and my nails bit into my palms. I was shaking from the anger.

Stomping over to the Bat Cave, I threw open the door. “Where is Burdette?” I demanded.

Taylor looked both horrified and stunned. “What are you doing?” she hissed at me.

Before I could answer, Burdette emerged from a back room. “What is it now?”

I held out the bottle of ipecac syrup. “Abigail put this in our milkshakes during our slumber party. It’s why we all got sick and she didn’t. She wanted the last-chance date and got all of us out of her way.”

He looked at the label and then back at me. “Go get Abigail.” Some assistant scurried off to do his bidding.

Within a few minutes she arrived in high heels and the skimpiest bikini I had ever seen, followed by her camera crew. Another crew had snuck in to shoot from different viewpoints. The overhead lights were turned on and the whole room lit up.

When she came into the room, I went after her. Somebody had anticipated that, because I didn’t take even one step before two men were holding me back and keeping me from her. “Of all the horrible, evil, psychotic things to do . . .”

“Shut up!” Burdette barked at me. It surprised me enough to go still. He handed her the bottle. “Abigail, Lemon has accused you of using this to make all the other girls sick so that you could have Dante to yourself.”

She looked totally and utterly confused. “I’ve never seen that before.”

Of course she would lie. I reached for her, but I was kept firmly in place. “I found it in your room!”

She turned to me, all wide-eyed innocence. I had decided early on she couldn’t be much of an actress if the only role she could get was on a soap opera, but she was proving me wrong. “If you found it in my room, then you must have put it there. I don’t even know what that is.”

What proof did I have? There weren’t cameras in the bedrooms.

But there were cameras in the kitchen. “Check the kitchen footage from that night. There has to be evidence of her adding it to the blender.” I knew there had been a reason for her acting so nice that night. It was to lull us into a false sense of security.

“Pull it up,” Burdette said to one of the techs.

“It had to be in the last batch she made us in the early morning.” Charlotte had told me that it took anywhere from fifteen minutes to two hours to start working, depending on the person.

I glared at Abigail triumphantly, sure that her time was now done. “Got it,” the tech said.