“Don’t do that!” Evangeline hadn’t meant to yell. Although she wasn’t shy with strangers, she generally avoided quarrelling with them. But she couldn’t seem to help it with this crass young man. “You’re being disrespectful.”
“And you’re praying to an immortal who kills every girl he kisses. You really think he deserves any reverence?” The awful young man punctuated his words with another wide bite of his apple.
She tried to ignore him. She really did. But it was like some terrible magic had taken hold of her. Rather than marching off, Evangeline imagined the stranger taking her lips instead of his snack and kissing her with his fruit-sweet mouth until she died in his arms.
No. It couldn’t be …
“You’re staring again,” he purred.
Evangeline immediately looked away, turning back to the marble carving. Minutes ago, its lips alone had made her heart race, but now it just seemed like an ordinary statue, lifeless compared to this vicious young man.
“Personally, I think I’m far more handsome.” Suddenly, the young man stood right beside her.
Butterflies fluttered to life inside Evangeline’s stomach. Scared ones. All frantic wings and too-fast beats, warning her to get out of there, to run, to flee. But she couldn’t look away.
This close, he was undeniably attractive, and taller than she’d realized. He gave her a real smile, revealing a pair of dimples that briefly made him look more angel than devil. But she imagined even angels would need to beware of him. She could picture him flashing those deceptive dimples as he tricked an angel into losing its wings just so he could play with the feathers.
“It’s you,” she whispered. “You’re the Prince of Hearts.”
2
The Prince of Hearts took a final bite of his apple before it dropped to the floor and spattered everything with red. “People who don’t like me call me Jacks.”
Evangeline wanted to say that she didn’t dislike him, that he’d always been her favorite Fate. But this was not the lovesick Prince of Hearts she’d imagined. Jacks didn’t look like heartbreak come to life.
Was this all a nasty joke? The Fates had supposedly disappeared from the world centuries ago. Yet everything Jacks wore—from his untied cravat to his tall leather boots—were of the latest fashion.
Her eyes darted around the white church as if Luc’s friends might jump out at any moment to have a laugh. Luc was the only son of a gentleman, and though he never acted as if that mattered with Evangeline, the young men he kept company with considered her beneath them. Evangeline’s father had owned several shops across Valenda, so she’d never been poor. But she wasn’t from the upper tier of society like Luc.
“If you’re searching for the way out because you’ve come to your senses, I won’t stop you.” Jacks folded his hands behind his golden head, leaned back against the statue of himself, and grinned.
Her stomach dipped in warning, telling her not to be deceived by his dimpled smile or the torn clothes. This was the most dangerous being she’d ever met.
Evangeline didn’t imagine he would kill her—she would never be foolish enough to let the Prince of Hearts kiss her. But she knew that if she stayed and made a deal with Jacks, he would forever destroy some other part of her. And yet, if she left, there would be no saving Luc.
“What will your help cost me?”
“Did I say I would help you?” His eyes went to the cream ribbons trailing up from her shoes to wrap around her ankles until they disappeared under the hem of her eyelet dress. It was one of her mother’s old gowns, covered in a stitched pattern of pale purple thistles, tiny yellow flowers, and little foxes.
The corner of Jacks’s mouth twisted distastefully and stayed that way as his gaze continued up to the ringlets of hair she’d carefully curled with hot tongs that morning.
Evangeline tried not to feel insulted. From the brief experience she had with this Fate, she didn’t imagine most things found his approval.
“What color is that?” He waved vaguely toward her curls.
“It’s rose gold,” she answered brightly. Evangeline never let anyone make her feel bad about her unusual hair. Her stepmother was always trying to get her to color it brown. But Evangeline’s hair, with its waves of soft pink streaked through with pale gold, was the thing she liked best about her appearance.
Jacks cocked his head to the side, still observing her with a scowl. “Were you born in the Meridian Empire or in the North?”