by Ember Casey
His eyes darken, probably in response to mine. “Mm. I do love making you blush, Elle. Nothing gives me greater pleasure. Well, almost nothing…” He closes his eyes and turns back to the door. “I will come to see you after dinner if you’d like.”
“I would like.”
He grabs the frame of the door so hard I can see his knuckles turn white. He stands there for a moment before he speaks. “I can’t stay. Even if there was time, I don’t trust myself to…”
Pull out. It’s like we’re teenagers, for Christ’s sake. Horny, stupid, reckless teenagers.
I begin to button my blouse, almost glad I had the flash of sense not to call him back to the bed. I have no doubt he would have returned to me—and that I could have convinced him to skip dinner with his family after all. But then someone would have come looking for him, and the likelihood of someone walking in on us… It’s not something I want to deal with tonight.
He lets out a long breath, almost as though he’s had the same thought. That even if it is what we both want—even if we can’t keep our hands off each other—the timing, at least for the moment, is not right.
He turns back to face me, and his eyes are still dark with passion. “I will see you later this evening, Elle.” He pauses. “Only if I am invited, of course.”
I narrow my gaze, staring at him for a long moment. “Consider this your invitation, Your Highness. And you’d better figure out a way to sneak in here without anyone seeing you. I don’t want to have to face the wrath of King Edmund tomorrow for defiling his little boy.”
He squeezes his eyes shut and he speaks through his tightly clenched jaw. “I will be back after dinner, Elle. I will find a way to come to your room undetected.” He pauses for a moment. “And you have no idea how much it is killing me to leave now.”
His hands close into fists and he turns on his heel, walking out of the bedroom.
He doesn’t say another word to me—I only hear the click of the door on his way out.
Something about his tone tells me our conversation isn’t quite over—that maybe he’ll come back in the room. But he doesn’t.
After minute or so, I rise from the bed, finally ready to check out my fancy suite. I pull open the door that Leo had mentioned was the closet—and I nearly faint when I glance inside.
The closet—if you can call it that—is bigger than my bedroom at home. It’s mostly empty, of course, but the gowns Leo had made for me are hanging near the entrance, along with several other casual dresses and outfits I haven’t seen before. The space for hanging clothes extends the length of the room and across the back. On the other side, several pairs of shoes—I recognize the ones I wore last night along with the others I hadn’t chosen—are lined up on the top of several rows of angled shelves. There is enough space here to house a shoe store—it could probably hold more shoes than I and everyone I’ve ever known have owned in our lives.
But this isn’t my life. It isn’t even a life I’ve ever imagined wanting.
I stand in the doorway of the closet, staring silently at the empty space—unable to imagine what it would look like full of clothes—when I hear a knock on my door.
My stomach does the weird fluttering thing it always does and my chest tightens. I can’t help but grin—he came back.
I ignore the part of me that hates myself for getting so excited thinking about it—that he did what he said he would do. That he went to his room for a few minutes to get the condoms. That maybe he decided to blow off dinner with his family to spend the entire evening with me. That he chose me.
He chose me.
I smile again and try not to skip to the door. My cheeks almost hurt from how wide my grin is.
I’m ready to pretend to torture the living hell out of him for leaving me in the first place. But my smile falls as soon as I crack open the door.
It isn’t Leo standing there. It’s Stephan.
He doesn’t even wait for me to acknowledge him—he pushes through the door, stepping around me and into the room.
I’m still staring out into the hallway—I have to blink a few times before I realize what’s happening. I close the door and turn to face the pudgy man. I don’t say anything—I only lift an expectant eyebrow.
He sniffs, lifting his nose in an obvious display of condescension. “Yes, right. I suppose you’re wondering—”
I interrupt. “I know I’m not from Montovia or anything, but even in America, it’s impolite for a stranger to barge into a room—”
He interrupts me this time with what almost sounds like a snort. “Ha! Impolite? You, Miss—”
“Doctor. You may call me Doctor. I’m hardly—”
“Miss.” He almost hisses the interruption this time and glares at me, almost daring me to say anything else. “As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted…” He pauses, lifting a bushy eyebrow. “Right. As I was saying, you seem to have cornered the market on rudeness, at least as far as anything I’ve ever been witness to in this palace. And I dare say I’ve served here longer than you’ve been alive.”
Served. It’s still difficult for me to believe that Matthias and Stephan—and probably countless others working in the palace—have given up their lives in devotion to Leo’s family. I guess I have nothing to compare it to—people don’t do that where I come from. I feel devoted to serving children—to helping keep them healthy—but certainly not to one job. I guess I can’t imagine committing my life to only working in one place. I can’t relate, no matter what I do to try to see things from his perspective.
“It goes without saying that this…” He makes a sweeping motion with his arm. “This is not how things are done here. Regardless of what His Highness, Prince Leopold may desire.”
I stare at him, expressionless. What the hell am I supposed to say to that?
He stares back at me in silence for a long moment. “We don’t tolerate your kind here.”
“My kind?” I blink a few times for effect. “What exactly do you mean by my kind?”
He narrows his gaze and folds his arms over his square chest. “I believe you know exactly what I mean.”
I nod, but not because I agree. Leo should be here—to stop me from killing this man at the very least. I can feel my heart starting to thud in my chest, my stomach tightening. I’m going to unleash on this poor bastard, and he’s not going to know what hit him.
But I’m only barely able to open my mouth before he continues. “I’ll not stand for it. You’ll retrieve your things now and you’ll be gone before His Highness returns from dinner. And you’ll not return to Montovia again for as long as you live.”
I press my lips into a line and lift a brow. I stare at him for another moment, trying to contain my rage before I allow myself to speak. “Look…” I suppress the urge to use the word asshole. “Leo, Andrew, and their father all came to an agreement. I guess you might not be privy to the details just yet, but—”
“I’ve heard every detail of the arrangement His Royal Majesty has made with Prince Leopold. That is not why I am here this evening.”
I nod. “I see. Well, then I suppose you should take that up with Leo and leave me the fuck alone.”
His eyes widen at my use of the word fuck. “Your language alone makes you entirely unsuitable to even enter the palace, let alone sleep here. I’ll not have anyone here who—”
“But it isn’t really your choice, is it? I mean, you might think you run this palace—”
“Miss, I do run this palace.”
I glare at him again. “Doctor. You may call me Doctor. I worked pretty goddamned hard to get through medical school, and I fucking well earned that title.” My heart pounds again—mostly because I hate doing that. I never make anyone call me Doctor, and I’ve always sort of hated people who insist on hiding behind their title. But it seems my medical degree is the only thing I have to hold up as some sort of evidence that I’m worth anything at the moment—because Stephan certainly doesn’t seem to think I’m even worth the time he’s taken
to come here.
The sneer he gives me does nothing to make me think otherwise. “The only titles that matter in Montovia are those of the Royal Family.” He glares at me again. “Considering you’re little more than a courtesan, you’re very lucky I haven’t had you arrested and thrown into the local jail.”
The little fucker just called me a whore. And my mind begins to race, the same old song playing through my head again. Undeserving. Unlovable.
Worthless.
My stomach drops to my toes. He’s right. I mean, maybe he isn’t right, but it doesn’t matter. I definitely don’t deserve to be here. There’s nothing even remotely redeeming about me. There’s no way Leo is going to be able to turn me into some quasi-princess, fit to accompany him or anyone else to some fancy thing where he can rehabilitate his reputation. The only thing I’m going to do is drag him down.
“You’ll collect your things at once. A driver will be waiting at the servant’s entrance in one hour. I’ll not have you seen at one of the family’s entrances…”
I nod, but I’m not even listening to him. I’m already planning my next move.
Leaving Leo. Again.
And this time, it will be for good.
Leo
It’s torture leaving Elle, now that we’ve finally come together again and knowing she wants me to return to her tonight.
If it were any other commitment pulling me away, I’d have no qualms about breaking it and spending the rest of the evening with Elle in my arms. But it’s for her sake that I need to do this. I won’t put a foot out of line while I’m under this roof—except for visiting her room tonight, of course. I don’t think I could stay away from her if my very life depended on it.
I slip back to my suite to prepare for supper. After a quick—and very cold—shower, I slip into a suit with the royal shield and scepter embroidered in gold thread on the pocket. Supper with my father is always a formal occasion—an old tradition he should have dispensed with long ago. Sometimes I think my father still believes this to be the nineteenth century—while he has the latest technology at his fingertips, he rarely handles any of it himself. It’s a small miracle that Andrew convinced him to upgrade from horses to cars and solar-powered carts. I wonder if perhaps my father believes that formal, outdated traditions are the only thing separating our family from the masses.
I’ll have to give Elle a few lessons in Montovian table etiquette, I think as I pull on my gloves. She’ll be eating with us soon enough—if I have anything to say about it, at least—and it’s important that she impresses my father. I might love her passion and the way she isn’t afraid to speak her mind, but my father is a different story. Until our three months are up, she and I need to do everything in our power to win his approval. Even if it kills us.
I continue this train of thought as I head out of my suite and down the corridor. Besides table manners, Elle will probably need to learn some general etiquette—and dancing, of course—to prepare for the state dinner. I should also probably give her a few lessons in the history of Montovia and a general overview of our customs and culture, as well as the role my family plays in governing our small but great nation. It will be a daunting task, I suspect—three months isn’t so very long when I think of what she’ll have to learn—but I find I’m excited by the prospect of showing Elle more of my life.
Now if only I can get the rest of my family to behave.
Fortunately, when I reach the eastern dining room—the smallest of the six dining rooms in the palace and the one we use for private family dining—my father has yet to arrive. My mother, however, is already seated at the table. She rises with a smile as soon as she sees me.
“Leopold,” she says, extending her arms toward me.
If my father were here, I’d merely kiss her hand, but since he isn’t, I let her pull me into a hug. The lace on her gown rustles as she pulls me close. She’s nearly my height—the international media loves to call her statuesque—and she plants a kiss on my cheek before pulling away.
“I was wondering if you’d ever return to us,” she says with a smile.
I grin. “I was only gone for a few nights.”
“Yes, well, I know how you get about women sometimes,” she says, her dark blue eyes shining. “And it’s clear this one is particularly important. I half expected to hear you’d lost your head and run off to Bora Bora or something.”
“Lost my head?” I say with a laugh. “What did you think would happen between Elle and me?”
“Truly, I couldn’t tell you,” she says. “I’ve never seen you like this before.”
Unlike my father, my mother actually seems excited—or at least curious—about this development. She places a gloved hand on my cheek.
“I’m looking forward to meeting this woman,” she says. “She is here, isn’t she?”
“Yes,” I say. “Though I didn’t think it would be appropriate to bring her to supper.”
Her smile drops. “I suppose you’ve spoken with your father?”
“However did you guess?” I take her hand in mine. “Don’t fret, Mother. We’ve come to an arrangement.”
She raises a silver eyebrow. “Dare I ask?”
“It was actually my idea,” comes Andrew’s voice from the door.
I straighten and turn. My brother strides into the room and takes our mother’s hand. He brushes a kiss against her gloved fingers. “Good evening, Mother.”
“Andrew.” She smiles. “So tell me about this arrangement of yours.”
But before either my brother or I can answer, my father appears at the door with Stephan at his heels. His eyes are hard as he looks us over.
“Let’s not spoil our supper with such discussions,” he says. He glances around the room. “Where is Sophia? Is she late again?”
“It’s still five minutes to seven, darling,” my mother says, moving toward him. “She’ll be here.”
“She had better,” my father says. “Her behavior recently has been unacceptable.”
What has my sister been getting into? I think. I glance over at Andrew, but his expression gives nothing away. Part of me is a bit relieved I’m not the only one causing trouble around here—better to not be the sole object of our father’s disdain—but the other part of me worries for our youngest sibling. Sophia has always been a bit of a wild spirit, but she’s been a lot more rebellious recently—or at least distracted. She hasn’t quite resorted to running off to other countries the way I have.
My mother is doing her best to calm my father. She runs her hands across the shoulders of his embroidered jacket and looks up at him with the expression she gives him when she’s not particularly pleased with his behavior.
“Why don’t we sit down?” she says calmly. “I’m sure Sophia will be here very soon.”
Andrew and I take our cue and go to our seats, and after a moment our father lets out a sigh and seats himself as well. He and our mother sit at opposite heads of the table, while we children have places in between. Neither of our other brothers are here—William is fulfilling his service with the Royal Military, while Nicholas won’t finish his university courses for another few months—so their seats will remain empty tonight. Frankly, I can’t remember the last time the entire family dined together. The older we get, the more our lives stray in different directions.
I glance down the table at our father. Perhaps that’s why he’s clinging so desperately to traditions and these outdated ideas about serving the family—but that’s still no excuse for the way he treated Elle.
Three months, I remind myself. Three months of good behavior. Three months to prove ourselves to him. Sure, Elle isn’t a member of the European nobility, but that’s hardly important in my case—Andrew is the one who must carefully consider his companion, since he’s the one responsible for the next heir. I have no such responsibility.
And I pity the woman who ends up with my brother. The poor girl will have to spend the rest of her life dealing with a stodgy bore who’s afraid t
o break the rules or have any fun. Though I suppose I can’t blame the fellow—look at what happened that one night in Prague when I convinced him to let loose. If anything, that night probably convinced him to never set a foot out of line ever again.
The family sits in silence as the minutes tick by. Sophia still has yet to arrive, and while my mother seems unconcerned by this, the wrinkle between my father’s brows grows deeper with every passing moment. Finally, my mother waves over our dining attendant and asks him to begin pouring our wine.
“Where is she?” my father grumbles. “She knows the rules in this household.”
“Honestly, darling, she’s only a few minutes late,” says my mother. “Let’s not let it ruin our supper. I asked the chef to prepare braised rabbit for us. I know that’s your favorite.”
How she can be so patient with our father is beyond me. But I see no judgment or annoyance in her eyes as she looks down the table at my father—only understanding.
Perhaps there’s hope for dear old Andrew after all, I think. If my father can find a woman who loves him, then maybe my brother can as well. Me? I want to make the woman I love laugh and smile, not force her to fight her way through layers of sourness and anger. There’s nothing in this world more valuable to me than one of Elle’s smiles.
God, I wish I were back in her room. I want her in my arms again. I want to hold her close and think only of the joy we can bring each other. Instead, I’m stuck at supper with the most dysfunctional of families.
As soon as my glass of wine is filled, I grab it and take a swig. I’m going to need a lot of alcohol to make it through this meal.
At seven fifteen—after another eleven minutes of uncomfortable silence—my mother calls for the food. Sophia still hasn’t arrived, and my father’s lips are a hard line as his plate is laid in front of him.
Maybe it would be better not to bring Elle to these meals after all, I think. I can’t imagine forcing her to sit through this torture. She’ll still need to practice her table etiquette before the state dinner, of course, but there are other ways to do that—other private ways, which sound infinitely more enjoyable.