Madrigal: So if you see people in the guild that are acting weird or unhappy, you know why.
Madrigal: I can’t believe you didn’t know.
Taylor pressed her hand to her mouth, sick.
He’d gone through with it. He’d really, really tried to kill himself. It wasn’t just talk to make her feel guilty or to force her to log on. Sig had actually tried to end his life over the fact that she’d gotten engaged. She stared down at the ring on her finger, trembling.
How could he do that? Wasn’t she allowed to have happiness, too? She knew he was miserable, but Taylor couldn’t fix him, especially not from afar. She blamed herself for letting things go on as long as they had.
HaveANiceTay: I didn’t know. Thank you for talking to me. Thank you for telling me.
Madrigal: I hope you’re not too upset.
Upset didn’t feel like a big enough word. Hurt. Shocked. Betrayed. Guilty. All of those worked so much better.
HaveANiceTay: I’ll be fine. I’m going to call his mom and see how he’s doing. Thanks, Madrigal.
Madrigal: You’re welcome.
HaveANiceTay: Actually, I might be taking a break from Excelsior for a bit. How do you feel about taking over as guild leader?
Madrigal: !!!
Madrigal: Seriously?
Madrigal: I’d love to, but I don’t want you to step down over this!
HaveANiceTay: It’s a lot of stuff and I haven’t been feeling the game in a while. I’ve only been playing because of Sigmund. I would love to make you guild leader instead. You’re a great guy and I think you’d do right by the guild.
Madrigal: I’d be honored.
She executed the command to pass the guild leader tag over to Madrigal, and a moment later, the screen lit up. MADRIGAL HAS BEEN MADE GUILD LEADER. The guild chat, previously so silent, lit up with questions. She didn’t stick around to answer any of them. She slammed her laptop shut and tossed it aside, then buried her face in her hands.
Taylor knew she wasn’t responsible for Sigmund’s suicide attempt. She knew he was unbalanced and overly needy and depressed. All the signs were there and it had worried her for a long time that it might come to this. She didn’t feel any better knowing that she was right.
Nor did she feel any less guilty.
Taking several deep, steeling breaths, she composed herself. It wouldn’t do any good to call Sig’s phone and be all hysterical if his mother picked up.
Across the room, a phone buzzed with an incoming text.
Distracted and out of it, she headed over to the table where she kept her phone. Loch’s was right next to hers, and she frowned at the sight of it. Didn’t he want to take it jogging with him? She felt naked without hers. When she picked up her phone, though, her text message screen was blank.
Curious, she looked over at Loch’s locked phone.
PM: Just wanted to update you on our situation. HRH is pregnant. I hope you haven’t gone ahead with your ridiculous plan to marry the unsuitable American girl just to thwart the insurgents. Call me back, no matter the hour.
She staggered.
What the hell? She knew she shouldn’t be snooping on his phone, but the text was lit up for anyone to see and he’d left it out in the open. She read it again quickly, her mind whirling. So Loch had a plan to marry an unsuitable American girl to thwart insurgents? What insurgents?
Taylor whirled around and tripped over the end table, taking a header in her haste. She pulled herself up off the floor and crawled over to the couch, and opened her laptop again. A quick Google search of Bellissime insurgents found a few overseas articles, all pointing at the fact that an anti-American league was protesting the princess’s marriage to an actor, and they were eyeing others for the throne. Loch’s name came up several times.
She felt sick.
Closing her laptop slowly, she sat on the floor and stared ahead at nothing.
Well, at least now it all made sense. She’d been wondering how a guy as out of her league as Loch could be interested in her. It had seemed too good to be true. Turned out it was.
She was being used. If they didn’t like the princess marrying a famous actor, they sure wouldn’t like Loch marrying a nobody like her who wore Doctor Who scarves and carried a kitty-cat backpack.
But . . . he’d told her he loved her. She’d thought everything was moving super fast, but he’d said he loved her and they were good together.
And stupid, stupid her, she’d squealed and professed her own love.
She felt like the world’s biggest idiot.
Hot tears spilled down her cheeks and she put her head in her hands and sobbed.
Loch didn’t love her. He was using her. Sigmund had tried to kill himself over a proposal he didn’t even realize was a sham. Hell, she hadn’t realized it, either. She swiped tears off her cheeks and sniffed hard. She had no one left but herself.
All right, then. Time to lick her wounds and fix things.
She got up off the floor, wiped her eyes again, and went to pack her stuff.
***
She debated leaving before he returned from his jog. On one hand, it would have been immensely satisfying to leave without a trace and make him wonder . . . but she was going to be mature about this.
Well, relatively mature. There were probably going to be tears and cusswords, too.
Taylor sat by the door in her THIS PRINCESS SAVES HERSELF T-shirt with her backpack by her feet and her suitcase next to her, and she played Candy Crush while she waited for him to return. Or at least, she tried to play Candy Crush. Most of the time she just stared at the bright-colored little candies and tried not to cry. Stupid candies needing to be crushed. Stupid Loch. Stupid Sig. Stupid everything.