Her gaze had dropped during her speech, but then she looked up at me with her bloodshot eyes and said, “I’m not stupid, Rome, despite what you think. I know you don’t love me, but, let’s face it; it’s not about love, is it? It’s who we are, who we were raised to be.”

“Don’t you want more for yourself? Don’t you have dreams? Things you want to achieve away from all the pressure to be something that we’re not? Hell, Shel, I’m not made for that kind of life! I’m football player. That’s what I was born to be, not some miserable suit!”

Her head began to shake back and forth. “No! I don’t have something like football as an alternative. I don’t have a perfect four-point GPA or some other skill to use as a backup. I’m a Blair, and you know what, Rome? I want the life my momma has, and I need you to make that happen.” Her eyes narrowed and, glancing at the open balcony, she stated, “And I will do anything to get it.”

I straightened at her thinly veiled threat, realizing there was no getting through to her in this state. “It ain’t happening, Shel. I’m sorry.”

Whipping back to face me, she once again adopted her usual bitch façade and shouted, “You’re such a selfish prick! Think of me! If it’s about sex, don’t worry. You know I’d f**k you anytime you wanted. It’s all here for you to take! The perfect life on a silver platter!”

“Have some damn pride, woman!”

“I have pride, but I’m starting to wonder if you even have a dick, pu**ying out of your duty and acting like a whining little bitch instead of just doing what you’re told!”

I strode to the end of the bed, Shelly shuffling back at the severe look on my face. “You and me—never happening. You’re pathetic and I hate everything you stand for. I’ll never marry you. Ever. You get me?”

She faltered for a moment before answering. “You will, Rome. I’ve known you my whole life and you’ve always done what your folks told you to do. What’s changed?”

It was rhetorical, but I glared at her for the longest time before smiling victoriously. “Everything.”

I pounded out of Ally’s room, not bothering to evict Shelly, and went searching for Molly to make sure she was okay. Down on the lawn, I spotted her on a bench with Ally, Jimmy-Don, the scary girl I’d seen with Jimmy-Don, and some chick with black lips and jet-black hair.

Molly looked so pissed off, so sad, and, not wanting to cause a scene, I got the hell out of there. I needed to do something while I had the courage, something that was in no way going to be easy but had to be done to finally break free.

I just hoped I didn’t live to regret it.

5

“Mr. Prince will see you now, Rome.”

I rose from the cold, hard leather couch in the vast, sparsely decorated white lobby and, nodding at Jean, my daddy’s assistant, I entered his office, firmly closing the door behind me.

There he sat, king of the whole f**king world, dressed in his black pinstriped power suit, behind his desk, scowling as I approached. “Rome. To what do I owe this pleasure?” I caught the sarcasm in his voice but ignored it and slumped into the free chair at his desk.

“I need to speak to you,” I said firmly, embracing the detached numbness I always felt in his presence.

He sat back, smirking, crossing his arms. I’d never come to him like this before, and it had obviously humored the bastard. “Go ahead. I’m all ears.”

Taking a deep breath, I met his cold eyes and declared, “I’m done.”

That wiped the smirk off his face, and his graying eyebrows pulled together in confusion. “Done with what, boy?”

“All of it. Your controlling shit, Momma being overbearing and ragging on me nonstop for being such a f**king mistake to you both.” I leaned forward to hammer the final nail into the Prince Empire’s coffin, seeing my daddy’s lip curl in annoyance at the bold gesture. “And I’m not marrying Shel, not for anything. There isn’t enough money in the world or any threat you can issue that would make me want to legally bind myself to her for life. Cut me out of your lives if you want, but I can’t and I won’t do it.”

The silence was suffocating in the expansive, antique-decorated room as the two Prince men stared each other down. Finally, my daddy sat forward, calm as the sea, and said, “I don’t know where the hell you got the idea that you had any choice in this.”

Exactly the response I was expecting.

“I do have a choice. And I’m not going through with it. I’m going to enter the draft, and this time you can’t stop me. I’m gonna leave this place once and for all, and live my own goddamn life. God, you should be proud! Why do I get the only father in the whole of Alabama who doesn’t want his son to enter the NFL? I’m good, Daddy, real good, if only you’d realize it. Maybe if you come to one of my games, you’d see I wasn’t right for a life in the business world.”

Daddy stilled, his face burning red. Then he launched to his feet, swiping at his desk. It took me completely by surprise, and I jerked back in my seat. He’d always been physical, domineering, but this reaction seemed kind of extreme, even for him. He was always calm and collected, especially in public, especially at his work.

Slamming his hands on the solid mahogany desktop, he yelled, “You will do it, boy! It’s your duty! Prince Oil needs the Blairs, and I will not allow some nobody from outside the family to weasel his way into my company when Shelly finally marries! The business has been passed down to the next generation for years, but, oh no, I get the punk of a son who decides against it. Jesus Christ!”