by Romy Sommer
instantly tighten with desire again.
“That’s a vast improvement over that hideous dress you had on,” I say. “Let’s go.”
“But I haven’t even done my make-up or hair yet,” she protests.
“You don’t need to. I arranged a stylist, since I don’t trust Phoenix’s stylist not to dress you like a sister wife.” I hold the door open for her. She opens her mouth, then closes it again, lost for words, and I smile. Making Khara speechless could be my new favourite hobby.
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Chapter Nine
Khara
“I haven’t agreed to anything yet!” I protest when Adam pitches his idea to Phoenix.
I give him the side-eye while a make-up artiste paints my lips. I’m seated in a chair in the
center of Phoenix and Max’s spacious living room, which might look like a regular living room
except for the ancient tapestry hanging on one wall, and the blue and gold rug on the floor.
Aubusson, Phoenix called the rug the first time I admired it. I had to Google what that meant. Turns out they’re made at this little village in France - by hand.
“It’s a great idea,” Phoenix says. Then she glances at me, noting my clenched jaw and
narrowed eyes. “I’m not suggesting you’re not good enough as you are, but when I first came to live here in the palace, I was clueless about so many things and embarrassed myself on more than one occasion.”
I can’t imagine Phoenix ever being embarrassed. She’s always so poised and confident.
She shakes her head. “But I had Max to help me, and the palace protocol secretary.”
The make-up artiste stands back to admire her handiwork.
“Great, then the protocol secretary can give me lessons.” I’d rather spend my time with him
than with Adam.
Phoenix pulls a rueful face. “Unfortunately he’s all tied up with wedding stuff.”
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“I could just hide out here in the palace and keep out of sight,” I say hopefully. After all,
there’s that lovely big library I could lose myself in. The only Disney princess I ever wanted to be was Belle, and the Beast’s library was the reason why.
“Nonsense!” Phoenix laughs. “Just think how useful your new social skills will be when you
graduate and start going for job interviews.”
Ugh. Of course, she’s right. I’m a realist; I know how competitive the job market is, and if I don’t want to be a waitress forever, I need every advantage I can get. I throw up my hands in
surrender. “Fine, I’ll do it.” I pin Adam with an icy stare. “But I’m agreeing to lessons only. You keep your hands to yourself.”
The make-up artiste makes a spluttering noise. I can’t work out if she’s laughing, or in
shock.
“Yes, ma’am.” Adam keeps a straight face, but amusement lights up his eyes.
Next it’s the turn of the stylist. She’s a local woman, with a Germanic accent that I’m
learning is the local Westerwald accent. The puppy dog look in her eyes every time she looks at Adam leaves no doubt how well he knows her. I’m going with ‘in the biblical sense’. I feel sorry for her when I remember Adam’s disdain as he told Elena he never comes back for seconds.
She wheels in a rail of clothes, and Adam flicks through the hangers while Phoenix and I
look on bemused. Neither of us has ever been big into fashion. Since there’s nothing on that rail resembling my usual uniform of jeans or hot pants, I feel lost just looking at them.
“No, no, no.” Adam discards one outfit after another, then he takes one hanger off the rail
and holds it up. It’s a baby-blue suit with a knee-length skirt and looks very chic. I can imagine myself wearing it to a job interview. If I were interviewing for a job as a school principal.
I glance at Phoenix, and she stifles a chuckle.
For a laugh, I try the outfit on. It makes me look like a politician’s wife. “I’d rather be
photographed in my pyjamas,” I tell Adam. Fortunately, he realizes I’m serious.
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By the time I try on the fourth outfit, I remember why I hate clothes shopping. The gray
jersey dress makes my figure look stunning, but “too funereal” Adam says. The pretty, dusky-pink, feminine floral dress is discarded too.
“But I like that one!” I object.
“We’ll save it for Saturday’s polo match,” he says. “That’s going to be your first public
outing when everyone knows who you are.”
I try to ignore the sudden anxious flutter in my stomach.
He and the stylist finally settle on a plum-colored pencil dress with a wide collar. I
scrutinize the stranger’s reflection in the portable mirror. I don’t feel like myself at all, but I suppose that’s the point. The make-up is so subtle it’s barely there, my hair has been tamed and pulled back into a neat French twist, and the dress makes me look taller, more sophisticated.
“There,” Adam says, giving me a critical head-to-toe evaluation. “Now you’re ready.”
The photographer is waiting for us in the Yellow Drawing Room, which has been cleared of
all evidence that it hosted a party last night. I walk there in bare feet, trailing the high-heeled, strappy sandals the stylist gave me by my fingers.
For half an hour, the photographer makes me pose in at least a dozen different positions,
while her assistant runs around tweaking the lights. I’m exhausted by the end of it, even though I’ve done nothing but sit and smile or stand and smile. All this for just one photo?
When I see the pictures, though, I agree the fuss was worth it. The woman on the laptop
screen looks like a supermodel. My own mother wouldn’t recognize me. “Can I get one of these to send home?” I ask.
“You have someone special back home you want to send it to?” the photographer asks with
a knowing wink.
Is it my imagination, or does Adam tense, like a dog sniffing the air?
“My brother Calvin. He’ll get such a hoot out of this.”
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Adam relaxes, and I know it’s not my imagination. I’m flattered at his interest in me. Then I
remember the way the stylist looked at him, and it’s as good as any cold shower.
When we’re finally done, I sag back on the antique sofa. “I could murder a coffee.” I’d also
love to get back into my jeans and pumps. Just standing in these heels has killed my calves.
Phoenix looks apologetic. “I have to meet with the press secretary to go through the press
releases for tomorrow, but I’ll see you later. We’ll have a nice quiet dinner en famille in our apartment, so I’ll see you then.”
She leaves, followed closely by the photographer and her assistant, and Adam uses the
internal house phone to order us tea and coffee. Then he moves to sit in the armchair across from me. “What are you studying?” he asks, casually crossing an ankle over his knee.
“Finance.”
His eyebrow rises. “An unusual choice for someone with a passion for history.”
“There’s not a lot you can do with a degree in history.”
“How close to graduating are you?”
“One more semester.”
“Your brother - is he older or younger?”
“Older.”
“Any other siblings?”
“No.” Where is this game of twenty questions going?
“The weather has been warm and clear this week.”
And what is it with this obsession everyone in Europe has with the weather? I’m saved from
having to respond by the arrival of a maid with a tray filled with cups and saucers, two tea pots, milk and sugar, all in the same dainty floral-pa
tterned porcelain. She sets the tray on the coffee table between us.
I lean forward. “Thank you, but I asked for coffee?”
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Adam uncrosses his long legs. “The coffee pot is the taller, thinner one. Tea is the shorter,
rounder pot.”
Yet another thing I’m clueless about. The maid sends me a sympathetic look, then leaves,
and I hide my embarrassment by shifting forward to pour. “Tea or coffee?”
“I’ll have tea.”
I pour tea into one of the dainty cups, and pass it to him, before pouring my own coffee. “So
when do we start my first lesson?”
“Twenty minutes ago.”
“But all we’ve done is chat.”
“Exactly. Your first lesson is how to make small talk. Conversation is like a game of tennis.
I lob a ball at you, and I expect you to pass it back. When I ask if you have a brother, I’m not just looking for an answer, I’m giving you an opening to ask me back. Each question is an invitation.
Try to avoid dead-end answers. Expand your answers, or ask a question in return.”
“How is talking about the weather supposed to start a conversation?”
“It’s an icebreaker, a neutral topic, something that affects everyone. So your response could
have been ‘Yes, it has been lovely weather for sightseeing.’ That gives the person you’re talking to the opportunity to respond with ‘Oh, are you new to Westerwald? What sights have you seen? What did you think of the cathedral?’ And that opens another whole avenue of conversation.” He sets his tea cup down. “Let’s start again. Pretend I’m the complete stranger sitting next to you at dinner. So you have a brother - is he older or younger?”
I try to imagine Adam as the rather dull young man at dinner who only wanted to talk about
the weather. I can’t. “He’s a few years older. Do you have any siblings?”
“One younger sister, but she acts like she’s the older one. What does your brother do?”
“He’s a lawyer.” I say it with pride. Calvin was the first person in our family to go to college let alone graduate.
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“My little sister’s a lawyer too. She heads up the legal affairs and HR departments in our
family firm.”
I imagine his sister’s job is a whole lot more glamorous than Calvin’s. He works for a small
non-profit that mostly handles divorces and maintenance battles for women who can’t afford legal help. He’s over-worked and under-paid. I’m going to guess those are both completely foreign
concepts in the Hatton family.
Adam grins. “See, that’s not so difficult, is it?”
Actually, it is. Making small talk requires a great deal of concentration, as I try to think of ways to keep the conversation flowing, without digressing into the forbidden topics of politics and religion (and money), all the while trying hard not to divulge more about myself than I need to. I’m not ashamed of where I grew up, or my family, but remembering Adam’s Lesson Number Two, I
don’t want to give him any information that can be used against me. And it turns out direct
questions along the lines of “what do you do?” are also considered gauche and American - who
knew? There are more things we can’t talk about than we can.
An hour later, I’ve not only learned how to make bland conversation with strangers, how to
listen and make eye contact, how to sit right (without crossing my legs, keeping my back rigid as a plank), but also the correct way to pour tea if I’m the hostess (milk first, then tea). And I learn that here cookies are called biscuits.
“What’s so funny?” Adam asks when I laugh.
“I’m imagining myself serving tea and biscuits back home. We don’t get a lot of guests.”
We don’t even own tea cups.
“We?” he asks.
“I still live with my mother.” His eyebrows lift in surprise, sparking my defences. “Rent is
expensive. I could either go to college, or I could get my own apartment, but not both.”
Trust me, if I wasn’t so determined to graduate and make a better life for myself, I would
have moved out long ago, but I didn’t have the benefit of a football scholarship the way Calvin did.
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It’s not that I don’t love my mother, but we’re such different people it’s hard to believe we’re related. She’s a hopeless romantic, always believing that the next job is going to be The One, that the next man she dates is going to be her knight in shining armor. By now you’d think she’d realize there’s no such thing. You want a job to be The One, you have to stick with it. If you find a good man, you don’t let him go, hoping something better will come along. Instead of being satisfied with the good things she had, she’s still chasing dreams, and she’s still alone.
“Where’s your father?” Adam asks, as if sensing the direction of my thoughts.
I shrug nonchalantly. “I have no idea. He took off before I was born.”
He bolted the moment my mother told him she was pregnant. I’m not hurt that he abandoned
us. Many men leave when the going gets tough, and that’s just the way life is. What hurts is the mean voices of the playground bullies telling me I’m not worth sticking around for. I’m a grown up.
I know that’s not really true, but sometimes I still hear those voices.
Adam looks at me thoughtfully, and I feel stripped bare again. “You know, with a little less
Goth Girl eye make-up and a little more polish, it won’t be hard for you to find yourself some rich man so you never have to work another day in your life.”
My anger is swift and blinding. Pretend he’s just another drunk gambler who needs to be
humored or handled. It doesn’t work. “Are you suggesting I sell myself for money?” My voice is deadly calm. Anyone who knows me would start running at that tone.
“It’s not as if I’m suggesting prostitution. People marry for money all the time.”
What is this - the eighteenth century?
With shaking hands, I set down my half empty coffee cup and rise. “I am no gold digger,
and not in a million years will I rely on anyone to support me.” I turn, and with as much dignity as I can muster in these heels, stride from the room. As soon as I’m out of Adam’s sight, I pause to strip off the offending shoes, and hurry down the main staircase to the front door. I hand them to the footman on duty, ignoring his bewildered expression, and head out into the gardens.
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Chapter Ten
Khara
Adam was right about one thing; it is a lovely day. Though the temperature is cooler than I’m used to, the late summer sunshine is warm on my face, and I breathe in the rich scents of wet soil and flowers. The palace gardens are beautiful – all manicured lawns and fountains, an oasis in the heart of the city. Even though it’s late summer, the flowerbeds are full of color, as if it’s still spring.
With the exception of the royal family’s private garden, the grounds are open to the public,
so there are people everywhere. Gardeners, people in suits who seem to be hurrying either toward the palace or away from it, city workers on their lunch breaks, mothers pushing prams on the paths between the fragrant flowerbeds, and the ubiquitous tourists. No one pays me the slightest notice, though one of the gardeners does pause to stare at my bare feet as I dash passed. I find a quiet bench under a massive oak tree and gulp down deep breaths.
How can Adam not realize how insulting his suggestion is? I am so sick of rich men
assuming that just because I work a service job that means I’ll be willing to sell myself. I’m proud of what I’ve achieved, even though it might not look like much to this man with a black credit card, fancy shoes and air of entitlemen
t.
I can pay. I still remember every word of that conversation a year ago as if it was yesterday.
My hands bunch into fists. I want nothing more than to behave like a stereotypic trailer park tart and wipe that smirk off his face.
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Then I hear my stepdad’s calm voice in my head. Violence is only a temporary solution; the evil it does is permanent. Just thinking of Isaiah soothes the edges of my temper.
Not that he’s actually my stepfather. Isaiah’s just the man who knocked up my mother the
first time round; he’s Calvin’s father. Unlike my own father, Isaiah has always stuck around. He’s the closest thing I had to a dad, and he’s also the most decent, hard-working, honorable man I ever met. I have no clue why my mother never married him. She says it’s because they didn’t have any chemistry, but she had a shit ton of chemistry with my biological father, and look where that got her: a single mom working for minimum wage, growing old alone. If a man like Isaiah asks me to marry him, I’d be saying “I do” quicker even than Max and Phoenix said the words.
I really hoped Raúl would be the one. I was so sure he was going to propose. Instead, he
broke up with me because he said we had no ‘spark’. Who wants sparks? Sparks start fires.
I’ve just calmed to the point where I no longer want to smack Adam, when I see him. I stay
where I am, my feet curled up under me on the bench. He approaches like a bomb disposal expert approaching a bomb, and comes to a stop just outside my reach. He’s carrying the shoes I left with the footman.
“I’m sorry I offended you.” He looks genuinely contrite. “So you’re not interested in a rich
husband. Good to know.”
“Do you really think that’s all a woman like me is good for?” I bite out.
“No, of course not! I guess I’m just so used to women weighing every man they meet by
what he can give her, that I assume every woman is like that.”