by Lyla Payne
They ordered drinks and Maggie asked for a cheeseburger, which arrived at the table a minute before the rest of their friends.
“So, fill me in,” Camilla said, slinging her purse on the back of the chair. “And please please please tell me you’ll have time to make me a gown, too. I want to look perfect.”
“Um, hello. We came here to talk about the last twenty-four hours of stakeouts at Matrigna, not so that you could use Maggie’s position to get your grubby hands on a prince.”
“Excuse me, but my hands are not grubby. And someone’s going to marry him—don’t you all want to see me happy?”
Barty snorted. “You think you’d be happy with that womanizer? A hundred bucks says he makes his future bride sign some kind of non-disclosure prenup that allows him to continue being a dirty, dirty boy…”
“Oh my god, you look like you’re about to have an orgasm just thinking about him,” Lorenzo snorted.
“He probably wouldn’t be the first,” Brigida commented.
Maggie held up a hand, tired of the talk about Salvadore. It bothered her—even though he was the things her friends said, even though the prince himself didn’t seem to mind his reputation, he was more than those things. She had never doubted what he could be if he wanted to, and she hated that because he didn’t believe it himself, this was the way his people talked about him around pub tables.
“Cammie, I’ll try and get to a dress for you, but I’m not sure I’ll have time. I’ll come by your place next week if I can squeeze it in.” Maggie squeezed her beer bottle, willing her voice to pitch lower so she didn’t sound so upset. “Now, what have we learned about the person picking up messages for Matrigna? Anything?”
“No one has come and gone except the receptionist, not that we’ve seen,” Brigida said, managing to sound both bored and frustrated at the same time.
“Damn. Well, it’s only been a day.”
“Look, I know this is important, but I don’t have weeks of my life to spend sitting in a car or lurking on a street corner. It’s cold, and I’m too pretty for grunt work.” Camilla studied her manicure. “So is Barty.”
“Ha, ha,” Barty fake laughed. “But she’s not wrong. If it’s really only a receptionist, we could just…let ourselves in and take a look around. Maybe find some files, or a phone number?”
Maggie’s lips tugged down in a frown. “It didn’t seem like there would be much to find in there.”
“Wait a second, you’re supporting this? Perfect, I-Always-Follow-The-Rules Magdalena Rossi?” Lorenzo’s mouth hung open in fake shock.
Or maybe it was real, she didn’t care. She needed to get back to work.
Magdalena shrugged. “I mean, I’m busy, too. Why waste a bunch of time to potentially come up with nothing when we could come up with nothing in one night?”
“It’s settled,” Camilla said. “When are we doing this?”
“How about tomorrow night?” Barty suggested, waiting for the rest of them to either shrug or nod. Lorenzo and Brigida both looked less than enthusiastic about breaking the law, but in the end, they both consented.
Which was important, because Brigida’s father owned a hardware store, which meant she could bring the ring of skeleton keys that would get them inside.
“Can you get away, Maggie? I mean, I’d hate to jeopardize my chance at getting a dress.”
She shook her head at Camilla, wondering again how on earth they’d managed to fall in with the same group of friends.
“I can, but I think a couple of us should go alone. Five is too many to stay inconspicuous.” She drew a deep breath, knowing that she’d started this whole thing and one of the three should be her. “I’ll go, and Brigida so she can bring the keys. Barty, you come as the lookout. We’ll update the two of you afterward.”
They all agreed. Maggie drained her beer, finished her burger, and headed back to the castle to finish up her designs for Elisa’s outfit. She couldn’t shake the feeling that now, when she was trying to convince the crown that they could trust her the way they trusted her father, wasn’t the time to start stepping out of line.
Chapter Nine
Salvadore
Val answered the door in a silk robe that left none of her naked body underneath to the imagination, but somehow, they ended up at her kitchen table with glasses of wine instead of tumbled in the sheets. They had a few hours before her husband would be home from his latest hunting trip, though, and Salvadore couldn’t stop thinking about the mistake he’d made with this idiotic ball.
When he and Nico were boys, they used to tease Magdalena about her penchant for following the rules, and her “judgy eyebrow,” which she used liberally with them both, but most often with Salvy.
But for some reason, the disappointment on her face when she’d learned about the ball, and about his intentions for choosing a bride from the attendees, refused to vacate his mind.
To him, it was disappointment over all of his choices, starting with the day he’d let her down all those years ago.
“You’re freaking out about nothing,” Val informed him, peering into his face over her glass of Chianti. “It’s marriage, and even if you see it as some kind of medieval prison, you’ll fare much better there than in the ranks of priests.”
“I know. And it’s not that, I just…” What? What had changed? A few days ago, he’d been fine with the idea of just picking someone he could live with and not letting it cramp his style.
“You just what?”
“I don’t know. It seems like a big leap.”
“Salvy, look.” She leaned forward, letting her long hair sweep the swell of her breasts, peeking out the top of her robe. He glanced down, as though her word had been a command, but only frowned. Her expression turned curious. “It’s simple. You want to make the King happy enough that he doesn’t send you away. Getting married and knocking up some titled bitch is the easiest way to accomplish that and still keep your life the way you like it. Choose the right woman, and she won’t care what you do as long as she gets to be a princess.”
“It’s not all it’s cracked up to be, you know. Not everyone is cut out for a life of charity work and hand-waving.”
“You’re jaded, my friend. A thousand girls are going to show up in a few weeks, ready to scratch one another’s eyes out for a chance to spend their lives doing just that.”
He didn’t answer. Valla was right. There would be women more than happy to agree to his terms, but…maybe, even with all of his running around and collecting women, he’d always thought that some day he would have a partner like his mother had been to the King. That he would find a love like Niccolo had with Genie, the kind that his brother treasured even after it had ripped out his heart.
Maybe not. It was as likely that men like Salvadore didn’t get chances with women like that. If he was honest with himself, he would admit that was the reason he hadn’t gone after Magdalena all those years ago.
Maggie wasn’t the kind of girl you slept with and walked away from in the morning. She was the kind of girl who made men want to do things like change, provide, settle down, take care of. Marry. She might think that she wasn’t good enough for him, but the opposite had always been true. Maggie was so blindingly better that it had never even entered his mind to think of her that way.
Until he’d read her diary. And then, even at sixteen, Salvy had recognized that truth.
And it had scared the shit out of him.
Which was why he needed to leave her be, now. He couldn’t be the man she deserved, not even if he wanted to be—the daughter of a tailor surely didn’t fit the King’s desire for an acceptable daughter-in-law.
“What’s up with you?”
He startled at the sound of Val’s voice. He’d been so lost in his own thoughts that he’d forgotten she sat across from him. Mostly naked.
He told himself to get a fucking grip.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, you haven’t fucked me on this table yet, for o
ne thing.” She drained her wine. “For another, you’re having trouble articulating your issue with this entire arrangement. You get what you want. The King gets what he wants. What’s the problem? Are you going soft on me?”
She got up, leaving the glass behind and moving to his back, where she leaned her tits against his shoulders and reached around to grip his dick. “Mmm, maybe a little, but we can take care of that.”
Salvy tried to relax as she kissed and bit at his neck, then his ear, her palm rubbing him rock hard with years of practice and expertise. It was difficult with so much on his mind. He almost got up, more than once, but forced himself to stay.
Until he couldn’t.
“Listen, I’m going have to take a rain check,” he told her, standing up and sidling out of her grasp.
The stunned look on her face made him look away.
“It’s okay. We can get you there.”
He shook his head, laughing a little. Val was steady, and she’d always been there for him. “It’s not about you, Valla. You’re perfect, as usual, but my head’s just not right at the moment.”
“Okay,” Val said, tugging her robe tighter around her. She didn’t look angry or hurt; it was curiosity lighting her dark eyes. “See you in a few days?”
“Sure,” he replied, even though he wasn’t sure there would be time. Or that he wanted to make time, not with his head the way it was. Sex with Val was too fun, and usually too good, to be wasted with any amount of disinterest. “You’re coming to the ball, right?”
“Wouldn’t miss it. Maybe we could talk your future bride into a threesome.” Her tone was teasing, sly, but she would go through with it if he wanted.
Val was nothing if not adventurous, and Salvy loved that about her.
He chuckled. “If anyone could talk a woman into that, it would be you. I think you’ve turned half your staff into bisexuals, the way you walk around here with that body hanging out.”
“You flatter me, Salvadore. But I promise, whoever you choose will be more than willing to ask how high when you tell her to jump. Wait and see. This might be more fun than you think.”
Perhaps, he thought as he stepped out into the cold night air and ducked into his waiting car. The driver and security made no comment on his choice of a companion for the evening. His visits to Valla were regular whenever he was in Cielo for even a day or two, and they had grown used to his requests to sneak him in and out over the years.
Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad, to have a second woman at his beck and call. To have children to help him pass the time.
He didn’t know why, but the more he tried to convince himself it didn’t matter who he did that with, the more he failed to believe it.
Salvy had to pass the castle on his way up the drive. Once he noticed the lights were on in Magdalena’s workroom—it was at the back of the house on the ground floor—he couldn’t get the idea of apologizing to her out of his head.
It hadn’t been fair of him, to press her into a corner and demand she talk to him about what she’d written sixteen years ago. They’d been children, and even if she did react to him now in a way that drove him crazy, the last thing he wanted was to make her feel stupid.
He let the car drop him off at home, and waited while security checked out the premises before sneaking out the back. Two guards raised their eyebrows, and followed at a discreet distance. He sent them off before he entered the palace. They didn’t argue. Their domain was his residence and his person; the castle had its own security.
Salvy stood in the doorway to the cavernous workroom until he spotted Maggie. She sat at a workstation that faced out the windows, hunched over her work as she exchanged one colored pencil for another. The lights made the golden highlights in her hair shine, and the closer he got, the more he could smell her. The heady scent of her shampoo mingled with her skin and tugged on his stomach.
She sighed, crumpled the paper in front of her, and chucked it toward the trash can. It landed amidst a dozen others just like it.
“Fuck a duck,” she grumbled, lifting her arms to run her fingers through her hair.
Salvy flexed his own fingers in response, fighting the urge to reach out and touch her. He marveled at how irresistible she’d grown over the years. He’d always liked her—they’d been inseparable as small children, and once they’d gone through puberty, she was still the only person he wanted to talk to about his life, about things that went wrong and right and everything in between.
“Tough night?” he asked from a couple of feet behind her, grinning like a mischievous teenage boy when she yelped and nearly fell out of her chair whipping around to face him.
She glowered at his shit-eating grin, but the twitch at the corner of her lips said she was trying not to smile. “I hate when people sneak up on me.”
“I know. I remember.”
That seemed to take her aback, and she fumbled for a moment while avoiding his gaze. He loved the way she bit her lower lip when he made her nervous, and how her cheeks went pink when she was flustered.
Stop. She’s your old friend, your father’s seamstress. Nothing more.
“I was on my way home and saw your light on. I don’t want to bother you, I just wanted to stop and apologize.”
Her gorgeous eyes went wide. “What? I don’t believe it.”
“Seriously.” Salvy pulled a chair over from the nearest workstation and straddled it, feeling safer with the chair back between their bodies. “I’ve gotten into the habit of treating women a certain way, but that’s no excuse. You’re not any woman, Magdalena. You’re my friend and I’m sorry. I should have remembered that sooner, but it’s been a long time.”
“Wow.” She paused and licked her lips, her eyes darting to his and away.
He bit back a groan. She had no idea how she affected him with those little movements. To be perfectly honest, he had no idea why she affected him so strongly. It was a new experience, one as disconcerting as it was lovely.
“I…I don’t know what to say.”
“Just say you forgive me, like always, and we can get back to normal.” He frowned. “Or, at least figure out what normal is going to look like now that we’re both adults.”
“One of us, anyway,” she teased, her eyes sparkling.
“A fair point.” Salvy smiled, too, happy to be sitting in the light of her happiness once again. He glanced toward the waste basket and tipped his head. “So, what’s got you all in a tizzy tonight?”
I wish it was me.
He swiped away the impulsive thought. He’d only just apologized, dammit. He needed to get hold of himself, and fast.
She sighed, running her fingers through her hair again. “Oh, it’s your niece.”
That startled a laugh from Salvy’s chest. “Oh, you saw Ellie? She’s a piece of work, for sure. Nico’s asked me more than once whether she’s mine and not his.”
“He’s teasing.” Maggie looked stricken by the thought.
Irritation spiked his blood, cooled immediately by shame. The way he’d carried on over the past decade, he supposed he couldn’t blame people for wondering if he had any boundaries at all.
People, no. But Magdalena knew him better than to think he would take his brother’s wife to bed. Or at least, he thought she should, though maybe he couldn’t blame her after how they had parted ways.
“Yes, he’s teasing. Eugenie and my brother were so deeply in love I don’t think they had the ability to even see other people, to be honest. It was ridiculous.”
She raised her eyes to him through her lashes, curiosity warming her gaze. “I wouldn’t have expected you to believe in something like that. Real love.”
“That’s silly. Of course I do—my parents were in love like that. Nico and Genie…they were inseparable. Best friends. It exists. I just don’t think that most people find it.”
Magdalena seemed to think for a moment before she nodded. “I think you’re right. People get impatient. They convince themselves that the person, the
feelings, they have at the right time in their life makes it the right person.”
“Is that why you’re still single, Moo Moo?” He glanced down at her naked ring finger. “At least, you’re not married.”
“I’m single,” she said softly. “I guess no one has convinced me they’re the right person even though some might say the right time has about passed me by.”
The way her cheeks bloomed a brighter red caught his breath—it made him think that the reason behind her lack of a man had something to do with him.
It couldn’t. She was a beautiful woman, and a long time had passed since she’d scribbled down nonsense about an impossible crush in her diary. Teenage friendships turned crushes didn’t last a lifetime. They didn’t even last a decade.
He cleared his throat, wishing it would be as easy to dispel the fog her words had created in his head. “So, what did Ellie do?”
“Who?” she asked, her own voice dreamy as her gaze held his.
“My niece,” Salvy reminded her, needing desperately to get the conversation back to mundane things if he hoped to make good on the apology of moments ago. Not to mention his earlier conviction to step away from any attempt to have her the way that he wanted. It wasn’t fair.
“Oh, right. Well, I’m sure it won’t come as a surprise to you, but Elisa would rather not wear a dress to the ball and the…your, um, wedding. I’ve been trying to redesign the gown concept I’d come up with for her into something that will make both you and her happy, but it’s not going so well. Turns out they don’t teach you how to design pantsuits for princesses at design school.”
“Our Elisa isn’t just any princess. She’s going to change the world.”
“I don’t doubt it.” Maggie made a face. “She might get there sooner if you told her to stop fighting your battles in the schoolyard.”
“What?” Nico had said something about a fight, but not that it had been about him.
“Apparently she clocked some kid for talking trash about you. She didn’t seem to care that it was probably true.”