My Vampire King Husband Died on Our Wedding Night? novel · Chapter 22 of 24

Chapter 22: Pippa's Last Word

She was sitting on the stone landing of the north stair with her knees drawn up and her pale dress gone gray at the hem.

Her hair was tangled, and her face was swollen from crying.

For the first time since I had known her, she looked like exactly what she was.

She stood up when she saw me, and then she dropped to her knees on the stone.

"Imogen."

"Don't kneel."

"Please let me say it. Please."

"You have one minute," I said. "Hester is on the stair behind me, and she is counting."

"A few seconds now," said Hester, from the dark.

Pippa wiped her face with the heels of her hands.

"I didn't know he'd really kill him," she said. "I swear it on everything. The duke told me the vault had a way out. He told me Edmund would only sleep, and that you would be free in a year, and we'd all be safe."

"Free to marry Bryson."

"Free," said Pippa. "And then I'd be there. I'd be the one who looked after you, who understood the court. I thought, if I waited, he would see me."

"Edmund."

"Yes."

"He never looked at you that way, Pippa. Not once."

"I know that now." Her voice broke. "I know. I stood in that hall and I heard myself telling a room full of vampires that the duke had told me things, and I thought, it's finished, I've finished myself. And you stood there. And you were so calm."

"I wasn't calm."

"You looked it."

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