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ELLA

I stay in my room longer than I should, staring at the ceiling and letting my chest ache.

Nathaniel Vexley has no right to make me feel this way.

That’s the stupidest part.

He isn’t mine. He was never mine. He’s not some guy from a decent family who promised me forever and then forgot my name.

He’s a Vexley.

My eyes burn.

I hate it.

I hate that I’m in here with tears in my eyes over a man who probably woke up this morning without thinking of me at all.

Then again, he did check on me when I didn’t take the approved transportation home last night.

He then proceeded to fuck me a second time and once again act like it didn’t happen.

I take a deep breath, run my hands up my scalp.

“Enough,” I whisper.

I straighten my uniform as best I can. There’s work to be done.

But my mother invades my mind.

Not the one who used to sing while she folded laundry, who wore her hair in a messy knot and danced barefoot in the kitchen.

The one whose body is too thin beneath the blankets. Her skin too pale.

Cancer eats away at her every day, and the only thing that might stop it is an experimental treatment so unlikely to work that the doctor couldn’t meet my eyes when he told us the odds.

Ten percent.

That’s what we have, but only if I can come up with more money.

And I’m crying over Nathaniel Vexley?

No.

No, I don’t get to do this.

I’m not sick. I’m not trapped in a bed with a body that has betrayed me. I’m healthy. Strong. Capable. I have two hands, two feet, and a job inside the most powerful house in the city.

Maybe my heart is bruised. So what? Bruises fade. They eventually heal.

Report to laundry, Audrey said. Then polish silver in the west dining room. The guest baths. Steam the curtains in the blue living room. Check pantry inventory. Dust the bannisters.

What else?

There was something else.

I sigh as I walk to the laundry room. If I forget something, Audrey will be only too happy to remind me of it.