His Choice (The Selection)

Chapter Forty

Wrote by firerose11

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When Lily showed up at the door with a giant grin and a bag of sweets, I knew something was going on.

"You have two minutes to explain," I said, opening the door. "After that, I steal that bag and retreat to my bedroom, leaving you standing out here."

"Today's the day!" She said simply before shoving past me and plopping down on the couch.  "You can choose to watch with me, or you can go mope around your room."

I started to understand what she was saying.  "Lily, you know what I told you..."

"Pfft, forget what you told me.  Think of watching the wedding as your way of telling him that you have moved on from the rejection.  After all, you have Tanner now."

I settled next to my friend, stealing a piece of licorice from the bag she had opened.  "You have a point, but you do understand that the prince won't know whether I'm watching or not."

Lily shrugged.  "Technicalities.  Maybe he'll feel your eyes through the cameras."

"That's not how television works," I retorted, prying the whole package of licorice from her grasp.

She gave a weak sound of protest before reaching in to find something else.  "Though, aren't they hurrying on this wedding awful fast?  "

"Not my problem. It's about us the same it took Flynn and Celia," I told her.  "Now, will you be quiet so I can understand what's going on?"

Maybe I say that a little harsher than I meant to, but I knew the only reason that this wedding had taken so little time to put together (a month and a half) was because most of the palace staff had been preparing...for my wedding to the prince.

Despite that I had told myself that I wasn't going to cry or rage or go all moody, the first glimpse of the wedding venue made me want to do all three.

The sea of guests and Charles in a freshly-pressed suit reminded me of all I had lost and those final cutting words between the two of us.  In an attempt to keep both the tears and the words on the tip of my tongue at bay, I shoved several pieces of licorice into my mouth.

Lily shot me a look that told me that she knew exactly why I had abandoned all manner and now looked like a cow trying to chew more grass than could fit in its mouth.

After several more moments, I couldn't just sit there, waiting for Bexley to appear in a white dress and Charles to pledge himself to her for the rest of his life.

"We have popcorn somewhere in the kitchen.  I think I'll go hunt some down.  Would you like some, Lily?" I asked, scrunching up the licorice package and shoving it into my pocket as far as it would go.

"Sure," my friend said calmly.  "After all, we need something to counteract the sweets I brought.  Popcorn sounds perfect."

Honestly, I didn't really remember where the popcorn was.  My family was constantly moving items around in the kitchen, even though my mother didn't cook and the males were only out for snacks when they ventured in.

For a few minutes, I banged around in the cupboards, feeling extremely satisfied when I imagined I was smashing Bexley's face each time I closed another door.

Unfortunately, the popcorn had been relocated to the freezer, something I remembered Anson spouting at the dinner table.  It was something about the cold increasing the shelf life of the kernels or some other such nonsense.

I ripped open a package and shoved it into the microwave, jabbing at the buttons.  The machine whirred to life, and I paced the tile floor, waiting for the first pops.

Instead, I heard Lily.

"Ember!  Get in here right now!" She screamed from the other room, and I forgot all about the popcorn, wondering what had set her off.

I skidded around the corner to find her staring shell-shocked at the blackened television.

"For pity's sake, Lily, what is going on?" I asked.  "What happened to the wedding?"

It seemed like an eternity before she managed to turn her head, revealing her widened eyes.

"I think that you may have been right about Bexley," Lily whispered.

By the evening, it was officially announced that the wedding was postponed until further notice and that the palace was looking into suspicious events that had lead to the previous announcement.

By the end of the week, the whole of Illéa tuned in to watch the Report that promised to explain what had happened.

"As we are all aware of by now, the royal wedding was interrupted earlier this week under much speculation.  Despite what some of the rumors suspect, the entirety of the royal family is unharmed in any way," Miller said.  "The problem lies with a young woman that the country knew as Bexley Neals.  As of today, the truth about her will be public information.

"Miss Neals' real name was Tori Stormley.  Months before the Selection even begun, Governor Neals took this young woman in as his late daughter Bexley, whose death had not been reported to anyone.

"Neals and Stormley were both part of a rebellion, set upon overthrowing the royal family and reestablishing the caste system.  After she was accepted into the Selection, the two used this to their advantage, communicating through letters.

"Their deception was not found out until right before the wedding when one of the palace staff noticed something strange about the dress Stormley was wearing.  Realizing that her plan had been ruined, she attempted to rush into the midst of the wedding guests, but several guards apprehended her and discovered that she was indeed carrying a bomb."

Miller continued to spout out more information about Bexley's, no, Tori's plan to assassinate at least part of the Schreave family.

Once I had most of the details, my mind turned down a darker path.  If any of Carmen's accusations were true, had Giselle been murdered because she was too close to the truth?

It really wasn't my problem, just like it wasn't my problem that the prince no longer had a bride.  I just knew he better not coming to me, asking for my hand, because I was tempted to say every ugly word I bottled up inside.

After all, he had been the one to accuse me, the one to not allow me to explain, the one to kick me out, and the one who had chosen to marry the traitor instead of me.

If the prince came expecting a happy ending, I was going to show him exactly how it felt to be rejected, even if it broke my own heart all over again.