“And when I asked you about this love interest of yours, several times, you didn’t think it wise to tell me about this game you were playing?”

He’d been ready to forgive her being some type of spy, meddling with his country’s affairs. This? This drained all the relief from him and replaced it with an amorphous hurt.

She rubbed one hand up her biceps. “It seemed kind of awkward to bring up. And it’s just a game.”

“If it was just a game, why didn’t you tell me?” he pressed.

She folded her arms over her chest now. “I did tell you. In this very room. When you asked me who I was getting messages from.”

“Just a game where you were dating some silly version of me. I see.”

“Why are you so upset?” she asked, and it seemed to be a genuine question. “The fact that someone stole a photo from my phone, and who knows what other information, is more pressing right now.”

He didn’t know why he was so upset. It was a game.

But he felt tricked, foolish. Nya had never seemed like she was particularly interested in his playboy persona. But she’d been playing that game, with the frivolous version of him, and she’d kept playing it, even after they’d agreed to the fake engagement. Even after he’d kissed her and thought he was going to burst from his heart being so full.

It seemed that needy part of him wasn’t satisfied with love alone. It needed Nya to love him for himself, and not because she was obsessed with some fake version of him. That was the thing with need—it was multifaceted and once acknowledged, just the tip of an iceberg of unknown size. If anyone had ever told him that he’d actually let himself fall this hard for a woman and then doubt her because of some video game, he would have laughed. And yet there he was, blindsided by a seemingly trifling blow that would leave a hell of a bruise.

“I don’t know.” He got up and began to pace. “I know this is ridiculous. Trust me, it’s the last thing I thought we’d argue about, but it’s not great feeling like all of this was just some game to you.”

His ability to speak so calmly surprised him; inside he was furious, mostly with himself. He thought he could read people so clearly, but he’d created his own fairy tale with Nya, one in which she’d seen behind his masks and somehow intrinsically understood who he was. But she’d clearly liked those masks and facades if she’d devoted so much time to the game version of him. She said she wanted him, Johan, but maybe she was just a Jo-Jo fan in sheep’s clothing.

“It was some game to me,” she said, her voice cool with anger. “I don’t know where this righteousness is coming from. You ignored me for almost two years. You pretended you didn’t know that I existed, or even my name. And I was supposed to just tell you everything? You’re not the only one who gets to protect yourself, Johan.”

He turned toward her, his movements carefully careless.

“And how was pretending that you had some lover desperately texting you protecting yourself?” he asked. His voice was harsh but he was unable to control it. He’d felt pure, undiluted jealousy about those messages. “I think that’s just called lying.”

“I didn’t pretend anything!” She was standing now, wrapping his sheet around those curves that had been under his hands all night. “You assumed. And you know what? I could have told you it was a game, but you were the first person who’d ever even assumed that anyone would take interest in me in that way!” Tears filled her eyes and her anger made her accent clip her words. “I was embarrassed, okay? I didn’t want to be silly, boring Nya, only able to find love in a video game. Especially not to you, who had looked through me for so long and could have anyone he wanted. I do apologize—for trying to save myself one more humiliation.”

Scheisse de merde, he was being an asshole. He was being completely, indisputably ridiculous after everything that had passed between them the night before. But he also couldn’t seem to get past this hurt because of everything that had happened the night before. He’d opened himself to her completely, thought he’d finally found the person who would see him as he was, love him as he was, and maybe all it boiled down to for her was a romp with a celebrity prince.

“If you want to talk about humiliation, imagine having to wonder if your . . . person cares about you or a fake version of you.” He ran a hand through his hair in frustration, leaving his hand tangled in the strands, and exhaled harshly. “This is absurd.”

“You told me you loved me,” she said, her eyes wide with hurt and anger. “I think it was you playing games. Because you went from ignoring me, to being everywhere I was, to charming me, to offering this fake engagement, to taking me into your bed. And now that you’ve gotten what you wanted, and the referendum is tomorrow, you conveniently find some reason to take a small error and turn it into an unforgivable one. I know this playbook. Maybe I was wrong to think you weren’t like my father.”

Johan dropped his head, shaking it. “No. I didn’t use you any more than you did me.”

“But you did use me, at the beginning. Because you wanted me, and you couldn’t admit that, so when you saw the opportunity to have me without actually doing the work of a relationship, you took it.”

He wished she was less perceptive.

“I didn’t think that far ahead,” he said. “It was an impulse.”