Minutes before noon the dress and accessories were procured in the span of two hours only, and Irene dressed me carefully. She wiped away the red on my lip for a pink shade of lipstick.

"It suits you much better," Irene said, standing back to admire her handiwork. "Now get used to the heels, they were quite expensive."

"I could get used to that, but these lace gloves are impractical," I complained instead.

"Hurry, it's already noon!" She turned away and cleaned up the boxes that held the dress and gloves. Expensive things came in expensive boxes, I learned. Like hat-boxes with ribbons and lining inside.

I rushed out of the room and slowly down the staircase, where Dylan and Vaughn waited. Calvin was not going to be there, as well as Ruby, I heard.

"How is the outfit?" I asked as I descended. Dylan nodded.

"White is a much better color on you. And your face looks better, healthier."

I had secretly patted off the white powder and Irene applied my makeup again, without the black for eyeliner.

"I should hope so, it's my natural look."

Vaughn snickered and Dylan looked away before speaking. "Well, I'll have to escort you out and give your introduction since you have no father."

"The will isn't told to them, right?" I asked.

"Of course not! We aren't begging for suitors," Dylan said quickly. Vaughn shrugged.

"You forget about Scarlett. She's bound to talk, and Austen may even hint towards it with that brain of his."

"Stop looking so worried, smile, Rose." Dylan could take his own advice. Instead, he held out his arm. "Let's go, as the siblings Dylan and Blanche."

I held his arm, making sure I wasn't overbearingly tight, but I was glad to hold him.

"Sometimes you feel familiar," he whispered right before the door to the garden opened. "I feel as though—as though I'd known you before this. Before all of this, which was why I thought you were Blanche. It wasn't your appearance."

"Then what was it?" I asked, but he opened the door, and sunlight was on our faces.

I struggled to stand straight with my heels for a while, pushing Dylan by accident, but I was giddy, especially after hearing what he had said. I tripped over the threshold and Dylan held me tight.

I was aware of how close I was to his face, he was only a half a head taller than me in such high heels, but he only met my eye with a confused look.

"Are you fine?"

"No, but I'll get through with it," I promised in a whisper. "Now let's make our entrance."

Both of us walked out with our chests out and proud, and as expected, people crowded around us.

"How darling!" Scarlett's voice rang out. "White for Blanche, am I right? I remembered suggesting it, I knew it would suit her. Oh, to be young and pretty again!"

Women chorused how pretty she already was, and I recognized them to be the Whitecross sons' mother, the Redmond's two mothers, as they had two heirs, and Leroy's mother.

I had seen the famous people before, in newspapers and tabloids, when I was Rose Blackwood, only no one recognized me as expected.

"Yes, this is Blanche de Winter, twenty-two as of this year. She is my younger sister and will live with us in the de Winter estate from now on," Dylan said, barely smiling.

"You two don't look a thing alike," a boy said with a smile. "I'm Samuel Redmond, and if I could say Miss Blanche looked like anything, it would be a French Bisque doll."

"How amusing," I said, covering my laugh with my lace gloves. They didn't even allow my fingers freedom. The man next to him spoke.

"I'm Ivan Redmond, his cousin. We are both going to take over the Redmond finances and manage it together. Oh, it must bore you to talk of that, anyway," he said.

The two were different too, Samuel calm but charismatic, Ivan nodding like a man used to giving commands. Yes, Ivan had to emphasize that.

"As a working man, it's hard to find topics to talk about with domestic women. Do you happen to drive? Well, I suppose not, as I haven't seen a car here, but it's an exciting activity I suppose only men can relate too."

"I find it boring talking to men, too, oh, I meant uneducated men who think they are above others. It really frustrates me, in fact."

"I know what you mean, my professor at my university, the elite Chicago university, you see—" Ivan continued hopelessly. Samuel sighed in embarrassment and gave me a look of apology. I didn't forgive his earlier comment of Dylan and I looking so different, so I walked away from the two.

As I was drinking tea and picked a pastry from a platter on the table set up outside, with red tablecloth, another man walked to me. Only men were introducing themselves.

He was older, maybe in his thirties, and I smiled to be polite. Maybe he was an uncle? Either way, his face was tanned and healthy, and his smile seemed to have no malice.

"I'm Abraham Whitecross."

I had never heard of him.

"I'm Blanche de Winter," I said with a smile.

"Of course we know. Oh, that dessert looks appetizing. Would you like to take a stroll? The crowd annoys me."

"It does make me self-conscious," I admitted with a light laugh. His expression brightened.

"Let's go to the back of the house. They have rose bushes. It's pretty, I wonder if Dylan had someone tend to it."

We began walking there but I was confused. Rosebushes in the back of the house? For what reason? And while they had three maids, Irene, Julie, and Gwendoline, they never went outside to tend to the rosebushes. Maybe the butler did it—but he hadn't returned for a while.

We were in the back and Abraham inspected the mass of overgrown thickets and even weeds.

"How strange, isn't it?"

"What is?" I asked, feeling ominous from the sudden faraway sound of the party. Even the sky seemed to cloud over and Abraham turned towards me and then walked to me, making me step back.

"This is the house of the curse of Snow-White and Rose-Red. You know Snow-White and Rose-Red? The men are ugly but always manage to marry pretty. The first wife, Claribel, Scarlett, and Olivia." Abraham laughed. "And you're pretty, but I bet you'll marry low!"

He grabbed my wrist.

"Let go of me!" I shouted, alert, and Abraham put his hand over my mouth without delay, and laughed loudly in good-nature to cover up my shout.

This damn—damn pig! Bastard!

I swung my arms at him but he caught it instead. I pushed back and bit at his hand, but he didn't move it at all. He only laughed again, this time at me.

"Come on, I'm also a Whitecross," he said, leaning in. "Not the main branch, but think, Blanche Whitecross. It's meant to be."

"Go—away!" I spat into his hand and with both hands, twisted his wrist, but he pushed my head into the brick wall. My vision shook. I felt both my hands easily clamped in his other hand.

I gasped for breath. "Help me! Help me! Dylan! Ruby! Vaughn!" I screamed their names again and again. I lost count but my feet kicked at his shins as he grew closer.

"You sure fight back a lot. But if I defile you, I'm sure your house would marry you off to me if they want the matter silenced, eh?"

Abraham's face was so normal—you could never tell when a man is sick in the mind like that. Most of the time, they thought themselves clever and women as playing chips. That angered me the most, but only tears came out as his hand grabbed my bosom.

"No, no!" I squirmed and screamed a shrill scream I couldn't forget.

I didn't want to be played by this asshole!

"Abraham!" Dylan ran forward, a tiny dot that grew, and then he gestured and Vaughn and Calvin followed. "Blanche—Blanche!"

"You son of a bitch!" Calvin ran past Dylan and socked Abraham without hesitation. It scared me to think what would've happened as I fell to the ground.

"Carry her to her room!"

"I'll go with her—"

"Damn you, Abraham! Damn you!"

There was only the sounds of Calvin's fists against a jaw before someone was calling for Calvin to stop, and Dylan held me and carried me into the house.

"Blanche needs rest, Abraham tried to assault her. Yes, please, she needs time alone. Vaughn will oversee the party and his punishment, for now just leave us alone," Dylan said. My closed eyes didn't allow me to see their depreciating looks. I held myself to Dylan's chest, the low hum of his voice like a soft harp, each string vibrating with its deep tone.

I smelled the familiar smell of the house on him, the papers from the study, the same smell of the fresh bed I slept in since I became Blanche, and his own smell of men's perfume.

Dylan—why did you save me? Was it as Blanche, or Rosemarie?

Back in my room he put me on my bed.

"You can open your eyes now."

I opened my eyes, and found myself sitting close to the edge. I slowly stood up again.

"I would like to change. I need Irene. The back of my head hurts from being slammed into the wall, I'm dizzy." Then I cried. "I ruined the party, didn't I?"

"It was all Abraham. Vaughn and I will make sure his future gets destroyed. I have no words to apologize to you." Dylan hung his head, and I walked closer, still wobbly in the heels.

"No. No, don't say sorry. You saved me, Dylan." I shook and with my blood rushing to my head, I began to sob, holding my face in my hands. "I'm so scared. I'm scared—I never thought it would be like this!"

"Blanche, no, Rosemarie, you're safe here." He held out a hand before hugging me. "I'll never let you be alone with a stranger, or person if you don't wish for it. God, Rosemarie, I'm here! I brought you into this mess! If anything happens to you, I'll be here to protect you!"

"How? I'll be sold off like this, violated and taken advantage of as a country girl. I can't do anything when they touch me, I freeze and I just can't dare to push them away! I'm weak—"

"No, you're not! I'll stop this foolish charade with such men. I promise, I—I was never able to do it for my mother, but I will, for you."

I felt his hand on my hair and allowed him to hug me, focusing on my own growing heartbeat and the heat rising to my cheeks.

"Your mother. You never talked about her." I clutched the sleeve of his blazer. "Do I remind you of her?" Abraham had mentioned the first wife and her beauty. This white dress—was it all for his mother?

"No, not at all." He laughed, his throat rumbling against me. Relief flooded me. "I suppose I was always envious of Calvin. He had Claribel and Ruby, but I had no one. Nobody at all."

"Did you want to meet Blanche?" I whispered into his ear. He froze and stiffened. I drew back, and his eyes averted mine.

Of course he did. The one other sibling he had who was alone. The one and only child of his that the de Winter bastard liked. Maybe he wanted to meet her out of envy, or to relate to her. I would never know.

"I don't know."

"But what do you want, now?" I asked. "Do you want to continue searching?"

"What?"

"Didn't you feel curious when you heard his will?" I asked. "It sounded less like love than hatred. No, something less than hatred, maybe jealousy on his part. Blanche wasn't his beloved daughter, no, or he would have provided for her and she would've lived in this house she would own. Something prevented it."

"Wouldn't it be our relatives? Maybe he simply wanted to make sure Blanche was safe before writing his final will, which would be unchangeable," Dylan asked.

"I don't think that's it. As a people-watcher, I've always tried my best to hear the underlying messages in people's words, not their tones. I don't think there was something like love at all." I softened my voice. "De Winter did not live Blanche."

"Why were you a people-watcher?" Dylan asked, eyes now on me. I was the one to turn to the side, but his shiny eyes were still there so I faced it.

He had such beautiful eyes, dark and now that his brows were furrowed in his promise to protect me, it felt romantic. How funny, the one person I couldn't marry. 

"I wanted to please people," I thought of my childhood, "so I watched people."