Four hours later, I’m lying on my front, on the plush faux fur rug, which is in front of the large fireplace at the center of my room.

My Eden textbooks are scattered in the space between where I’m sprawled out and where Raph is sitting, his back leaning on the plush velvet couch at the edge of the rug.

“I hate to say this, but you are pretty smart,” I say, as I close my history textbook, feeling all studied out for the night. I hate to admit it, but I’m certain that Raph’s help tonight has cut down what could have been days of studying, to a few hours.

The introduction to Eden history section was pretty much everything that Magnus had told me on my first day in Eden, but in far greater detail. Eden geography is entirely new to me, though. Eden, it turns out, is indeed a mirror of Earth, even down to the countries and cities. The only differences being the names and of course, the fact that the Dynasties rule everything. The entire goddamn planet. Raph mentioned though, that there are other parts of Eden which do not mirror any place on Earth. The royal city of Arcadia being one of them.

“Why do you sound so surprised?” Raph asks, raising a golden eyebrow.

“Because you’re an ass,” I retort, unable the resist the opening.

He laughs in response, and I have to shift my focus to the open pages of my Eden politics book, in an attempt to distract myself from the way that laugh lights up his whole face, making him look innocent almost. Something he definitely isn’t.

The book is open on the modern politics section and my gaze falls on a diagram of the current Dynasty heads. Magnus’s face looks back at me and the other faces on the page are familiar, too. I’d seen those faces watching me at that first ceremony, the disapproval in their eyes veiled, but there all the same.

The book must be outdated though, because the image at the head of the diagram is the face of the man who was meant to be my father, Arwen Evenstar. The image is small compared to the wall to ceiling portrait that hangs in the Evenstar palace. But those eyes, so like mine, are just as piercing.

I can feel Raph’s eyes on me, trying to read me. But I don’t want him to. I divert his attention to the space where the heir to the throne should be instead. It’s blank, Raph’s destiny yet to be written, although there’s no doubt as to what that is.

“I guess you’re not so important after all, if they neglected to include your picture here,” I say mockingly.

Raph just flashes me that infuriatingly cocky grin.

“Hardly. It’s just because it’s near impossible to capture this image of perfection.”

The gagging gesture that I make is only half pretend. His expression is as arrogant as ever, but I think I glimpse something beneath that is at odds with everything he seems to be trying to portray.

I don’t know what makes me ask him the next question.

“Do you want the throne?”

My question catches him off guard, and for a moment I feel stupid for even asking it. Raph is regal in every sense of the word. He was made for that throne, he exudes it, emanates it. He carries himself with the air of a throne that is his by blood and a crown that is his by birthright. To question whether he wants it is, absurd, yet I can’t help but think otherwise, when I catch a glimpse of something unreadable in those endlessly blue eyes.

“I’m sorry, it’s a stupid question,” I say when he doesn’t respond.

He shakes his head then.

“No … it’s just that I don’t think anyone has ever asked me that before.”

That doesn’t surprise me, as just seconds ago I’d felt stupid for even asking, when the answer is so obvious. But his next words aren’t what I expect to hear.

“I’ve been raised to want the throne, taught since birth to want it above all else. It’s all I’ve ever known.”

There is so much left unspoken in those words, and I have no idea how to respond. But I try anyway.

“I guess you’re lucky then,” I say, although the words don’t feel true.

His eyes darken as he looks away into the fire that he’d started in the fireplace earlier. He looks different just then. It’s not just the glow of the fire warming his already golden features, but something tinges those devastating features—sadness?

“Things aren’t always what they seem,” he says quietly, almost as if he doesn’t want me to hear it.

“Everyone always assumes that my life is perfect—but they have no idea.”

I stare at him in confusion, and I want to ask what he means. But something inside me holds me back. Believing that this impossibly beautiful guy is shallow, conceited and couldn’t possibly understand all the loss and loneliness in my life is easy. It’s safe. I don’t want to believe that there’s anything more to it, that there’s some deeper side of him that maybe understands those painful parts of me only too well. So, I keep my mouth shut as I shift to lie on my side.

Raph seems to sense the unspoken decision, too.

When he turns back to me, that easy charm is back and I’m glad, because that glimpse of what lies beneath it is downright dangerous.

He flops onto his back beside me and we talk about classes and other things which don’t really matter. As much as I hate to admit it, I like having him here. With me. I’m so used to being alone, that the feeling should be alien. But it’s not, it feels strangely right, like some part of me has known him my entire life. It’s difficult to remember that only a few weeks ago, I hated this guy.

My eyes are starting to drift shut when I feel Raph shifting beside me. The fire in the fireplace goes out. Before I can register what he’s doing, I feel his arms around me, lifting me up and carrying me across the room to my bed.

“I can walk, you know,” I protest, but it’s a weak one. I’m half asleep and I find my arms looping themselves around his neck, as if they have a mind of their own.

“I know. But where’s the fun in that.”

He carries me like I weigh nothing. A reminder of the strength contained in that powerfully muscled body. His arms are oddly gentle around me. I must really must be half asleep and I think I might be imagining it, but as he lowers me onto the bed, he lays me down almost tenderly, as if I’m made of glass.

I expect him to leave then, but he flops down next to me on the bed instead, and he looks like he’s settling in for the night.

“What are you doing?” I ask after a moment. I’m now fully awake and painfully aware that Raph is lying next to me. On my bed. The bed is huge, so there’s plenty of space between us, but his presence is still overpowering.

I turn to look at him. The room is dark, the only light coming from the silvery moonlight streaming in through the floor to ceiling windows. Of course, Raph always glows with his own light. God, he’s beautiful, I find myself thinking, and at the same time, trying to stamp the thought out because no good can come of it.

“What does it look like—I’m sleeping in your bed. Duh,” he replies, flashing me that insufferably charming smile.

“No, you’re not,” I reply. “You have your own bed across the hall in your room.”

“I know. But I like your bed.”

He looks back at me all wide-eyed and innocent.

“Best friends have sleep overs all the time.”

“That would be true, but we’re not best friends so …”

I’m fully aware that I’m lying there with my arms crossed over my chest, looking stiff as a board. I’m glad that I changed into a t-shirt and sweats earlier instead of my usual sleeping shorts and vest.

Raph picks up on my extreme discomfort and laughs. He actually laughs.

“Oh, come on, Jaz, I had no idea you were such a prude—don’t tell me you’ve never slept in the same bed as a guy before.”

I clamp my lips together and Raph’s eyes flare in surprise as he interprets my silence.

“No way—”

I cut him off with an indignant look.

“Well, if you must know, I haven’t,” I say, through gritted teeth. I hope that it’s enough to shut him up. But of course, Raph doesn’t drop it.

“You haven’t what?” he prods, his smile growing wider. I want to wipe it off his face, but I say nothing.

His voice is oddly gentle when he speaks again.

“Are you a virgin, Jaz?”

My face is flaming and for a second I consider lying and telling him that I’ve slept with plenty of guys before. But why would I do that? It isn’t true and it would just feed into the rumors that the Dynasty heirs have spread around school about me—that I’m some kind of whore.

The memory of it burns in my mind, and I’m suddenly angry.

“Yes. I’m a virgin.”

His eyes darken and there’s something there that I can’t read, but I’m too angry to care just then.

“Ironic, isn’t it? Those rumors about me being a whore—rumors that you probably orchestrated, couldn’t be further from the truth, because I’ve never even had sex before.”

“But you’ve done other stuff right? I mean, back on Earth you …” He trails off, but I know what he’s referring to.

“I took the job at Rodeo Ricky’s because I didn’t really have a choice. I was one year from being out of the foster system and out on my own. I was saving up for art school and needed to be able to support myself. You wouldn’t understand what it’s like to be in that situation, where you have to do whatever you need to, just to provide for yourself. Sure, I had to wear a skimpy outfit and serve burgers and beers to a room full of perverted old men. But I sure as hell didn’t let any of them touch me and I wasn’t sleeping around.”

The expression on Raph’s face when I turn to him is not one I’ve ever seen before.

“How is that even possible?” he says after a moment, and hurt spikes inside me at the insult.

“How is what even possible? You think that just because I had to bare my body just to provide for myself, that I’m some kind of slut that—”

He cuts me off.

“No, that’s not what I’m saying at all.”

“What I mean is—I mean look at you, you’re gorgeous, Jaz. I …”

He trails off, and I’m stunned into stillness, because I can’t believe my ears. Did he just call me gorgeous? And the way that he’s looking at me just then as if …

I turn away to look at the ceiling, because this is all just too much. We’re straying into dangerous waters, and I feel the tide threatening to pull me under.

He doesn’t finish what he was saying. I let out a long sigh.

“I moved around a lot. Ten different high schools in ten different foster homes and I have some serious trust issues,” I say.

That last part makes him smile.

“Really? I never would’ve guessed that you have trust issues.”

I roll my eyes in response, and I don’t know what makes me say what I say next.

“When I was fifteen, my foster father tried to …” I try to find the words, because other than telling the cops, I’ve never spoken to anyone about this and I have no idea why I’m telling Raph, of all people, now.

“He tried to sexually assault me—”

The waves of palpable anger that I feel rolling off Raph cuts me off. He looks so furious, that he’s almost glowing with anger.

“But it didn’t get that far. I kicked him in the balls and called the police.”

He chuckles then.

“But it meant that for a long while after, I didn’t like to be touched. I guess I still don’t,” I say.

“So, to answer your earlier question, I haven’t done other stuff. I hadn’t even kissed anyone before until that kiss with Baron that night at Twisted.”

Those blue eyes burn like twin flames in the darkness, and he looks almost angry. Why would Baron being my first kiss even matter to him?

“What’s the matter?” I ask.

“Firstly, I’m going to kick Baron’s ass.”

I gape at him in response.

“Secondly, I feel like a total dick. I had no idea. I’m so sorry, Jaz.”

I smile then, despite myself.

“Well, like I said before, you are an asshole.”

He laughs.

We’re silent for a long while and he seems to be thinking something over in his mind.

“I haven’t ever slept with a girl either, by the way.”

Now, it’s my turn to laugh. When I turn to my side to face him, his expression is dead serious.

“Sorry. I don’t buy that. I saw you post-orgy only a few weeks ago, remember?”

He rolls his eyes.

“That’s not what I meant. I’ve fucked girls before—plenty of girls.”

“Gross,” I interject.

“But I don’t ever sleep with them. I usually get them to leave straight after.”

I gape at him in shock and I don’t like the strange warmth spreading in my core at the confession and all that it means.

I’m sure that I don’t want to hear the answers to the next question, but I ask it anyway.

“But what about Layla?”

Raph doesn’t even blink at the mention of her name, although I feel my own extreme discomfort at having mentioned it.

“I have never slept in the same bed as a girl,” he repeats.

Still, I don’t want to believe him.

“Okay, what about that morning when I saw those two girls in your bed—naked girls.”

I have to admire Raph’s cool in the face of these questions that would make most people flush crimson. I sure as hell feel embarrassed at even asking them.

“What you saw that morning, those girls came to my room that morning. They didn’t sleep there.”

The image of what I saw that morning is still burned into my mind, and I remind myself that this guy is a total pig, so I should tell him to get the hell out. But when I open my mouth, something else comes out.

“So, what are you doing here then?” I ask quietly.

“I don’t know,” he replies honestly. The same thing he said to me in the art studio and on that training session on the beach.

“Do you want me to go?” he asks, turning to me.

Yes. Should be the answer. But I can’t seem to make myself say it.

We’re not touching, though there’s something strangely intimate about the way we’re laying across from each other, eyes locked.

“No.”

Something flares in his eyes, something that I don’t recognize. It stirs something inside me which I’m not ready for. So, I close my eyes.

I’m almost asleep when I hear Raph’s words. So gentle, that I think I must be dreaming them.

“Goodnight, Jaz.”

* * *

“You have to come to Friday night’s game—it’s our first one this season.”

Raph has been bugging me to go to his stupid game for the past two weeks and it’s driving me bananas.

“Dani, help me out here.” He really knows how to lay on the charm, because to my annoyance, Dani joins the chorus.

“You have to go, Jazmine. The Regency Gladiators are the best.”

I narrow my eyes at my traitorous friend. But part of me is kind of glad that she and Raph have been getting along so well. I’ve learned pretty quickly that Dani is good at reading people, so I guess I thought that she’d see right through Raph’s charm pretty quickly, and see him for the arrogant asshole that I still like to think he is. But she seems to think that he’s a genuinely good guy. I guess I was wrong about her being able to read people after all. Because I refuse to acknowledge the alternative.

“But I don’t even like soccer. I went to one game before, only because they needed someone to work the concession stands for the night and it was dull,” I say, helping myself to another spoonful of my frozen yogurt.

“Trust me, this is like no other soccer game you’ve ever seen before,” Raph says. “It’s not the same as the kind they play on Earth. Plus, you get to see me in all my glory.”

I choke on my next spoonful of yogurt.

“How could I say no to that,” I reply sarcastically.

Raph leans over to me and I don’t miss Dani’s smirk as Raph’s thumb wipes a drop of yogurt off my bottom lip. The simple touch sears my skin and I jump back as if he’s just held a lighter up to my lip.

I hear Dani stifle a laugh with a cough.

Ever since that first night in my room, Raph has been acting like we’re attached at the hip. In the classes that we have together, he either sits next to me or behind me and of course, it doesn’t stop him, if those desks happen to be occupied. One look from him and the offending person promptly gets up and finds somewhere else to sit. He is also now a permanent fixture at Dani and my lunch table, much to Layla’s annoyance, and to the confusion of the rest of the student body. Everyone, apart from Baron, Keller and Lance, that is. Because whenever they see Raph and me together, they exchange looks which tell me that I desperately need to set the record straight about whatever they think is going on.

Because nothing is going on. I mean, sure Raph has now taken to sleeping in my bed like it’s his own, much to my annoyance. But nothing ever happens, and we both keep to our respective sides of the bed. Although, even I haven’t failed to notice that Raph is always trying to touch me—surprisingly, nothing perverted or sleazy. Just a brush of the hand here, an arm around me there, wiping food off my lip like he just did. I always push him away but I get the feeling he understands why. Especially since I told him about foster father number six a few nights ago. I also get the feeling that he’s doing it to make me at ease with his touch, and the flutters that it causes inside me aren’t entirely unpleasant. Shit, I’d rather gouge my eyes out than admit it, but something tells me that I’m straying into dangerous territory.

“God, Jaz, you really know how to chip away at a guy’s ego,” he says. His tone is light hearted, but I think I see a flash of hurt in those blue eyes, although I’m probably just imagining it.

“Which is perfect for you, because your ego could use some chipping.”

He chuckles at that.

“Anyway, about the game …”

I throw my hands up in frustration.

“Oh god, okay, if you stop bugging me about it, I’ll go.”

His smile lights up his entire face and those perfect dimples pop out, making it impossible for me not to smile back.

He pulls me in for a hug and although I don’t return the hug, I also don’t pull away. I try not to notice the deafening silence that has descended on the tables around us or Dani’s shit-eating grin.