“Speaking of relationships, what’s this I hear about you staying at some girl’s house the other night?” she said.
Sebastian shook his head. “I forgot what a rumor mill this place was. Besides, it’s not what you think, so get those ideas out of your head,” he said. “I got dragged to dinner at Lady Charlotte’s, who was married to Lord Weltenham, who died several months ago. Their daughter was there and I got paired up with her at dinner. Her horse got sick so I offered to help out.”
“Too bad,” Mallory said as Spencer took a sip of his espresso. “I was hoping there might be more wedding bells in the future.”
Her brother nearly spit his drink across the room. “Malls,” Spencer said. “The day Sebastian settles down is the day hell freezes over.”
Sebastian nodded, even though it might have sounded a bit harsh.
“I’m afraid that is not in the cards for moi,” he said. “You’ll just have to focus your matchmaking skills on your twin brother.”
“Spencer’s too in love with himself to bother with someone else,” she said, wrinkling her nose at him. “But enough of this love talk. We’ve got to get you fed and to the airport.”
~*~
Sebastian was anxious to return to his simple life: his boat, the ocean, and a pair of swim trunks. Yet he couldn’t quite shake thoughts of Clementine as his plane was approaching the tiny Road Town airport in Tortola. He really liked her. She seemed pretty chill, and even though she was chill, damn, she was hot. Thinking about where they left things off got his blood boiling, in a good—albeit frustratingly unrequited—way.
But he knew he’d made the right decision. He didn’t want to set her up for regrets. She’d had enough heartbreak in her life right now; she didn’t need to deal with the inevitable end-run on whatever would have happened to them anyhow.
Yep. No doubt about it, she was far better off without him in her life. The question was: was he really better off without her?
Chapter Twenty-Three
Clementine was summoned against her wishes to Princess Elisabetta’s a few days later. She’d tried to enlist her mother to beg off of the job for her, but she’d have nothing to do with it.
“It’ll do you a world of good,” she said.
Thanks, Mum, for that vote of confidence.
Elisabetta immediately opened the door to greet her as she pulled up the pebbled driveway and parked her car. She was accompanied by a tall, young woman with girl-next-door good looks: long chestnut curls and large, warm brown eyes.
“Clementine, darling! I’m so thrilled you could make it on such short notice. We’ve got much to do. Pierre and I have decided we want this to be a Christmas wedding, so time is of the essence,” she said. “I’ve got someone for you to meet. This is my lovely daughter Mallory.”
Sebastian’s little sister, Mallory. Of course—how could she not see the resemblance?
Mallory hurried over and gave Clem a two-cheek kiss right after her mother did.
“So you’re the one my brother spent the night with, are you?”
Clem blanched.
“Ignore Mallory,” her mother said. “She loves to test her theories by putting people on the spot.”
Clementine gave her a wan smile. This promised to be even more fun than she’d feared.
“Sorry,” she said. “No sparks flying there. We were watching over a colicky horse. Nothing more.”
Mallory snapped her fingers in disappointment.
“And here I’d hoped you’d be the one to trap him,” she said. “It’s only a matter of time before someone breaks through to him.”
Clementine didn’t dare say that he was plenty easy to break through to. It was the keeping him that would prove to be the challenge. Not one she wanted to undergo, either.
“I’ve got lots of pictures I want to go over with you and we can sit down and talk over lunch about details. Mallory’s so excited to help out too, though she’ll be busy with exams so she won’t be able to do too much.”
“Great,” Clementine said, a smile barely breaking the surface of her face as she lifted her forehead dubiously. “Just perfect.”
Before she knew it, Clementine was seated at a table set with crisp, white linens in an orangery, surrounded by lemon, lime, and orange trees, and she was overcome by the intoxicating perfume of citrus. The all-glass walls let the sunshine in while the climate was controlled to keep them all comfortably warm. A gloved wait staff served the three of them while they discussed details of the wedding.
“What do you think if Pierre and I came in on elephants,” Elisabetta asked with a completely straight face.
“Elephants...” Clem said, scrunching her brow. “Elephants.”
“Mum! Are you mad? Elephants? What are you, the Raj?”
Her mother waved her hand. “Just joking! Wanted to see if you were paying attention!”
Clementine felt a sense of relief wash over her.
“Thank God,” she said. “ I was thinking up ways to slip out of here by way of a stop at the loo.”
They laughed.
“Little known fact: my mum has a wicked sense of humor,” Mallory said. “She once slipped a mouse onto Spencer’s dinner plate then covered it with a rounded plate cover.”
“A dead mouse?” Clem said.
“Heavens no!” Mallory said. “She wouldn’t kill something for sport like that. She just wanted to watch Spencer squeal.”
“And then he got to keep it as a pet, remember?” her mother said.
“Which worked out fine until he was holding it outside and a hawk swooped down and grabbed it from his hands.”
Her mother clucked her tongue. “Poor child was traumatized.”
“What about the mouse?” Clem said.
“He never had another rodent as a pet again.”
“You act as if that’s a bad thing,” Clementine said. “If I ever have children I’m going to have a no-rodent policy from the start.”
Elisabetta laughed. “Oh, best of luck with that,” she said. “Somehow despite your best wishes, you’ll wake up one day to find a pet snake in someone’s room and maybe even a chimpanzee.”
“A chimp? Really?”
She sighed. “The thing is, when you’re as close to the crown as I am, you tend to get gifts from other countries. Sometimes they’re desirable gifts”— she waggled her right hand and showed off a beautiful sapphire ring—“but sometimes they’re chimpanzees.”
“Which, she fails to mention, ended up an indirect gift to the national zoo,” her daughter said. “Chimpanzees are not meant to be kept as pets.”
“I should say not!” Clem said.
She was surprised that she was actually enjoying this conversation. She’d so hoped to cut and run with these people but instead she found they were quite entertaining.
“So let’s get to the truth about this wedding,” Elisabetta finally said.
Now the truth. Elephants will be the least of her worries, Clem thought. No doubt there would be fortune-tellers and snake charmers and fire breathers and men on stilts.
“We want to be married in the great room,” she said.
The great room was a spectacular room with high ceilings and ample space and stunning artwork on the walls. It was a space that could be shaped and shifted to make it more intimate or more grand, depending on the needs. It would be a lovely place for a small, family wedding.
“It will be Christmastime, so the decorations will practically take care of themselves. Plenty of holly and pine greenery. A large Christmas tree. Maybe a few smaller ones in the entryway, that sort of thing.
“Food will be traditional holiday fare,” she said.
“Are you talking sit-down dinner?” Clementine asked.
Elisabetta got a sheepish look on her face. “Pierre and I discussed that and decided that there will be a sit-down dinner,” she said. “And yes, turkey will be on the menu.” She winked and Clementine about died.
“Um,” Clem said.
“Oh go on,” Mallory said. “It’s the running family joke. Totally fine to discuss. Mum has long been known for her strong pitching arm.”
Clementine could not believe this conversation. They were making light of a situation that only days earlier had sounded so traumatizing and scarring. Maybe it all comes down to perspective and how one deals with a situation.
“So I can’t pretend to not know about the turkey episode,” she said. “As long as you promise no command performance, I’ll support you on this.”
“We want this wedding to be light and fun,” Elisabetta said. “Usher away all the old nonsense and bring in a new era. Things are different now.”
“I’m really impressed that you two were able to change your ways,” Clem said. “That can’t have been easy after all that has happened.”
“It wasn’t without a lot of work. And a hell of a lot of therapy,” the princess said. “But the more we talked about things, the more we realized it needed to be this way.”
“Love prevails?” Clem said.
“No matter what awful thing transpires,” Elisabetta said, “I believe now more than ever that love, indeed, can prevail. We’re living proof!”
Clementine kept her mouth shut because she couldn’t even believe at this point that lust would ever prevail, let alone love. And she wasn’t about to try to figure it out.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Sebastian returned to find out that Topher had a great surprise for him: they were headed to Australia so that Topher could finish his studies on a research project that would involve sailing around the spectacular Whitsunday Islands. While this was just about the last place Sebastian had expected to visit in the near future, he was more than happy for the diversion. Not only would it distract his mind from thoughts of Clementine, he’d already spent plenty of time sailing Australia’s east coast, and he was captivated by the beauty of the place and the completely chill nature of the Australian people.
Besides, it was as if they were going to take a vacation from their perpetual vacation, and Sebastian was totally down with that.
It took very little time for him to lease a sailboat and arrange flights for the two of them. Before they knew it they’d landed in Mackay, Queensland and made their way to Shute Harbor, where they picked up the thirty-eight-foot catamaran Sebastian had on hold. It was more boat than the two of them would ever need for this project, but plenty to enjoy their own space.
They stayed in the marina for a couple of days to rest and recover from jet lag and get provisions for the boat and for Topher to be briefed on his assignment before they set sail.
On the night before they departed, the two of them kicked back to watch the sunset from the harbor, while grilling fresh fish and enjoying a local brew.
“Doesn’t get much better than this,” Sebastian said, resting his feet on the lifeline. “A cold beer, a good meal, and an amazing view.”
“Might help if there were women involved.”
Sebastian thought about that for a minute. “Nah. Only complicates things.”
Topher started to laugh. “Do my ears deceive me? You’re saying that? The one who doesn’t want a relationship with Clementine but then does want one but doesn’t want one all at the same time? If that’s not complicated, what is?”
“Shit,” Sebastian said. “You make me sound like an emotional girl or something.”
“If the shoe fits...”
Topher’s text message dinged at the same time that Sebastian’s did. Sebastian grabbed his phone from the cockpit and clicked on the message.
“It’s from your brother Zander,” he said to Topher, squinting at the screen. “Some sort of video.”
He looked at his phone and pressed play, and there in unmistakable vivid color was a topless Clementine, her hair failing to really cover her breasts, and Sebastian, pulling at the ties to her bikini bottoms with his teeth. The noise from the audio was deafening, with the audience screaming wildly, egging Sebastian on, as his tongue navigated along Clementine’s gorgeous body. Sebastian could only stare at it, transfixed, remembering how horny the whole episode had made him and wishing like mad that he was still back in Monaforte, where he could maybe do something about how stirred up he was all over again.
It took him a minute to realize that the sounds coming from his phone were echoing from Topher’s as well.
“What are you looking at?” he said to his friend.
“I’m pretty sure I’m looking at the same damned thing you’re looking at,” he said. “So this is what you and Clementine were up to that night? Crap, brother, looks like you had a wilder time of it than I did.”
Sebastian grabbed his phone and swiped to delete the text.
“That’s not for your eyes!” he said. “What the hell is Zander up to?”
He shot Z a quick text:
“WTF, Zander? I told you to delete that from your phone, dude! What is up with you sending that to me and Toph?”
It didn’t take long for Zander to call.
“Crap, Bass,” he said. “I’m really sorry, man.”
“At least you only sent it to us,” Sebastian said. “Now go delete that before it falls into the wrong hands. Poor Clementine would be mortified.”
“Too late. My phone’s been hacked or something. I don’t know what happened, but I think this was sent out to everyone in my address book.”
“Ha, ha. Funny,” Sebastian said. “Now stop fucking with me and delete it.”
“I’m serious,” he said. “Nothing I can do now. It’s been sent, apparently.”
“What?”
“This has gone out to everyone in my address book. I think it took longest to reach you because I’ve already been fielding text messages from everyone and their mother asking me what the hell I sent them.”
“How could you let this happen?” Sebastian shouted into the phone.
“I didn’t mean for it to happen. It just did!”
“If you had deleted it when I told you to—”
“Shoulda coulda woulda. Look, I’ve got a lot of cleanup to do on my end with this mess.”
“I need to know who’s gotten this,” Sebastian said.
“Like, pretty much everyone I know,” Zander said.
“Including Clementine’s family?”
“Her brothers, yeah. Not her mum.”
Thank God.
“You are so dead, Zander,” Sebastian said. “If I don’t get to you, Eduoardo is sure to. And if he doesn’t, trust me, I’m next in line.”
Sebastian ended the call then took his phone and threw it hard against the deck.
“Sonofabitch,” he shouted out, then grabbed Topher’s phone. “Gimme that thing. You’ve got her number in here, don’t you? I need to talk to Clementine.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Clementine’s phone dinged and before she even had a chance to see what text had come through, it was ringing. She looked down to see it was Pippa.
“Hey!” she said to her friend. “You back from Africa?”
“Oh, my God,” Pippa said. “Have you seen Zander’s text?”
“What are you talking about?”
“You. Sebastian. Body shots.”
“Stop speaking in haiku. What are you trying to say to me?”
“Check your phone. Do not cry. Then call me back,” Pippa said. “And I’m getting in my car right now. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”
A bad feeling settled over Clementine as she saw a text message from Zander. She opened it, and there, before her eyes, was sexy Sebastian, licking rum off of her nearly naked body.
Ohmigod. Ohmigod. Ohmigod.
She dialed Pippa back, but then couldn’t muster up the words to speak.
“It’s okay, Clem,” her friend said. “We’ll make this be okay. K? Just take deep breaths so you don’t pass out. Breathe.”
Clementine started breathing loudly. And quickly.
“Honey, don’t hyperventilate. Long, slow breaths. I’m on my way.”
“What? How? Why?”
“I talked to Zander briefly. His phone was hacked or something. This got sent out to everyone in his address book.”
“EVERYONE IN HIS ADDRESS BOOK???”
“I’m afraid so.”
“Do you know how many people Zander knows? He probably has about ten thousand women he’s hooked up with alone who are in there. But at least I don’t know them, thank goodness. But still, I don’t want them to see me like that. But at least they don’t know me. Ohmigod, let me think. Think think think think think. Okay, who do I know who would be in his address book?”
She heard a loud pounding on her door.
“Clementine Squires-Thornton!”
“Gotta go. Get here. Fast!”
Clementine opened her door to see her brothers standing in front of her, arms crossed, with Darcy’s fiancée Caroline standing off to the side.
Eduoardo stormed into her room, waving his phone in the air.
“What the hell is this all about?”
“Eduoardo, we agreed you would keep your cool,” Darcy said.
Caroline raced into the room and gave her future sister-in-law a hug. “Are you okay?”
Clementine started to bawl.
“What’s happened here?” Caroline asked with a calm voice.
“That’s what I want to know!” Eduoardo shouted, his loud voice resonating and making Clementine wince.
“Calm the hell down,” Darcy said pointing at his brother. “Let her talk.”
But Clementine was in no mood to talk, sobbing as she was, interrupted only by loud gasps.
Caroline escorted her to her bed and sat down next to her, rubbing her back to soothe her.
“Do you realize the shame you’ve cast on this family?” Eduoardo said, his voice barely lowering in decibel.
“I’m telling you to stop shouting or I’ll make you leave,” Darcy said.
“You don’t want your mother to come in here,” Caroline said.
“She’s not even home,” Eduoardo said. “Went into town with Alastair. Won’t be back for hours.”
“Listen, Clem, talk to us,” Darcy said. “What is this all about? All of a sudden everyone’s phones dinged and then your uh, thing showed up on the screen.”
Shame of Thrones Page 9