The King hesitates, and I can tell he’s deciding whether or not to push the previous subject; I’m grateful when he decides to let it pass. “You stopped by Lord Aaron’s apartments last night.”
A jolt of terror makes my eyelids flutter. I hate every reminder that he spies on me. “I thought a friendly warning was in order,” I say. No need to add that Lord Aaron was asleep and didn’t answer his door.
“Understandable, I suppose. Watching out for your friends.” There’s a steely edge in his tone. “Your friendship with Sir Spencer must be quite close.”
Ah—that’s his game. If I’m friendly with Sir Spencer, he imagines I might have played some hidden role in the Tremain conspiracy; that perhaps my placement now is that of ace in the hole. Strangely enough, I decide honesty is the best policy, just this once.
“I scarcely know Sir Spencer, actually. It’s Lord Aaron who’s my intimate friend. Has been for years, which you’d know if you’d been paying any attention to court instead of chasing tail. Like everyone else, I heard whispers about the duke’s agenda when the wedding between Lady Julianna and Sir Spencer took place, but you might recall that I was as surprised as you when the date of the vote was set.”
He studies me for a long time. “Truly?”
“I have no motivation to lie about this.” Not anymore.
“Not one that I see, but I’m discovering a whole different side of you. I like it, by the way.” He grins and drops into his chair, looking relaxed and pleased with himself. I don’t know this easy, friendly Justin, and he makes me nervous.
“How long had you been planning the divorce?”
I don’t go for honesty this time. “I did inform you that I was inviting both gentlemen to my dinner last night,” I say, reaching for my glass.
“I thought so.”
No reason to correct him.
“Brilliant, though. Sir Spencer was very pleased.” The King lifts his glass and turns it in his fingers, studying it as though looking for a flaw. “Unless he’s the finest actor I’ve ever known, he really hates that family.”
“Can you blame him? They took advantage of him at his most vulnerable moment to further their own selfish goals.” I glare very meaningfully at the King, but he pops a piece of fruit into his mouth, utterly oblivious.
“The divorce will be made by executive order—being supreme head of the government has many perks—and by the time it’s announced, it’ll already be final.”
“When will that be?”
“Two days. Takes forty-eight hours for the divorce to take effect, and I initiated procedures at my meeting with the upstart. I’m planning a palace-wide brunch, scheduled to begin half an hour after everything’s official.” He grins and rubs his hands in excitement, then turns to me seriously. “On the hush until then. I have several surprises to unveil.”
“Such as?”
He fairly beams at me. “You’ll have to wait and see. Oh, one that I won’t announce publicly, but perhaps you’ll find this interesting: I’ve also annulled the prenuptial agreement and will return all assets to their original owners. Sir Spencer reclaims his full inheritance, and Lady Julianna gets nothing at all, since she hasn’t yet inherited from her father. I can’t stop her father from giving her his shares in the future, but now she’ll have no way to gain control of both families’ votes. Back when the match was proposed I argued it was foolish to put so many shares in one basket, so to speak, but it was a losing battle. Not this time,” he says with a grin. “Can’t stop two legal, consenting adults from getting married, but so long as one wants out, I can push a divorce through.”
“So equitable of you.” I can’t help but find a good deal of justice in that, since the duke made the match solely for the voting shares that came with Sir Spencer’s inheritance.
“Well, Sir Spencer took a bit of convincing in that arena. He’s…kindhearted. A difficult virtue. It’s what made him so easy for Duke Tremain to manipulate in the first place. I hope your friend Lord Aaron has more of a spine than his appearance would suggest. That boy’s going to need protecting.”
I sputter and cough on my drink. “Boy? Sir Spencer’s a year older than you. And as for Lord Aaron’s appearance, you, of all people, have no room to—”
“Calm yourself, pussycat,” His Highness says, and I grip my napkin to keep from tossing the contents of my glass in his face. “I get a little”—he pauses and then smirks—“swaggery when I’m feeling victorious. I meant nothing by it.”
I give my attention to my plate until the awkwardness is so stifling I feel as though it might suffocate me. “My lord?”
He jerks to attention, as though he was completely comfortable in the tense silence, and I hate him all the more for it. “Yes, love?”
I squirm at his endearment but save that battle for another day. “You asked for my presence this evening before you knew anything of Sir Spencer’s dissatisfaction. What is the point of this dinner?”
He looks at the formal spread before us, what appears to be genuine bafflement on his face. “Were you not hungry?”
I glare.
He regards me with the barest hint of amusement.
“You traded this dinner for a favor,” I say, emphasizing heavily. “If there’s anything I’ve learned about you since we became betrothed, it’s that you’re too good a businessman to ever give anything without getting something in return. So, Justin”—I practically spit his name—“what is it you’re after?”
He smiles and it’s disconcerting how much it lights up his eyes. This isn’t a cold, public smile, but one that suffuses his entire face. It’s a handsome smile, and the frightening fact is that I notice it’s a handsome smile.
“I wanted time in your company. Is that so hard to believe?” He holds up a hand, stopping my protest. “Six months ago, yes. Even a week ago, perhaps. But last night I saw that something come out to play, and it was ruthless and brutal. It was very attractive.”
I bat my eyes innocently. “Attractive? Surely you can’t have tired of Lady Cyn already? Last I saw her, she was still breathing.”
He rolls his eyes. “Plainly neither of us is in a position to lecture the other on fidelity, and while discretion is not always your strong suit, I think you understand that.”
Baiting aside, he’s right. There’s plenty of mutual cheating going on, and double standards never made anyone more likable.
“Here’s what I think you don’t understand, Danica. I know what I am. I’m not a kind person. I certainly wouldn’t categorize myself as a good person, though I’m not nearly as bad as you’d like to believe. Or perhaps simply not the type of bad that you’d like to believe. I’m selfish, stubborn, ambitious, and utterly ruthless when it comes to getting what I want. And I see no reason to let someone else’s version of morality govern my life.”
I listen with a prickle traveling up my spine as he outlines his vices and calls them virtues.
“Last night,” the King says, leaning forward with his chin propped on his elbows, “I saw a young Queen who was also all of those things.” He reaches out and clasps my fingers before I can pull away. He brushes his lips across the skin, once, twice, then stays there, murmuring words while his mouth tickles my hand. “I find myself wanting to get to know that Queen.”
“Again, you set this dinner before last night’s meeting,” I say, hoping he can’t feel my fingers trembling as he turns my hand over, caressing my palm.
He laughs, relinquishing my hand. “There, you see? Stubborn, just as I said. I’d intended to spend this evening laying out what you would and would not do for the next several months as I roll out the projects I unveiled at the vote. I intended to put the fear of God into you, make you aware of your position and role in my court, and threaten you if necessary.” He rises to refill his glass, then turns and leans a hip casually against the sideboard, grinning seductively. “But I’m beginning to think I’
d like to see where you take things on your own for a while. Perhaps we can be a team.”
“We are not a team,” I retort. “And we never will be.”
“You say that, but your actions tell a different tale. If you think strengthening my rule while profaning my name makes us not a team, I’m not inclined to disabuse you.” The King comes back to the table, taking slow steps that remind me of a tiger stalking prey. “You go right on thinking you have standards and morals and a conscience to keep you on that straight and narrow. But truly, Danica, you’re lying. Not just to me, not just to everyone in this court. You’re lying to yourself.”
“You’re wrong,” I say weakly, the choices I’ve made since that night in the hallway assaulting my conscience from every possible angle.
“Am I? You’re still somewhat new to ruling a kingdom, so consider this tidbit a favor in kind from your new husband: uneasy lies the head that wears a crown. We’re a newly married King and Queen, freshly confirmed by popular vote. Everyone will be scrutinizing us. We’re headed into the refiner’s fire, and all that’s false will be burned away. When that happens, when you can no longer hide from yourself, who will be right? You, or me?”
I leave without eating dessert.
“I HAVE TO SEE HIM, SABER. FACE TO FACE.”
I’m standing in my silken nightgown, my whole body shaking, not with fear, but with anger. A new box filled with Glitter sits at my feet, delivered sometime after I went to sleep and before I padded into my dressing room to pick my clothing for the day. I almost fell over it.
Saber groans his frustration, still trying to chase the sleep from his eyes after having woken to my shouts and surely thinking I was in danger. I should feel bad but I’m too furious at Reginald. “I didn’t see who brought it,” Saber says. “I don’t even know if he brought it personally, and I would be willing to bet he didn’t.”
“But you know how to contact him, and don’t even try to deny it. There’s no way your countdown always ends on a Wednesday, so I know he’s not just sneaking in with the crowds. He’s somewhere and he and I need to talk.”
Saber tosses a balled-up glove at the wall in an uncharacteristic fit of pique. “I don’t like it when you talk to him. I don’t like you anywhere near him. He stabbed you in the back once already—I would think you’d prefer to not have him around.”
“Well, certainly I don’t prefer it,” I mutter. “I’d prefer he was rotting in a jail cell somewhere, or possibly floating facedown in the Seine. But since I’m forced to work with him at present, I need a consultation.” I finger a new pot of Glitter gloss before tossing it back in the box with a clatter. “I ran out of product yesterday, except for the six canisters I always set aside for my lever staff. So I am due for a refill, but I don’t want him to start bringing higher quantities. I have to explain that to him. Firmly. Plus, I need to know what I owe him.”
“Owe him?”
“He hasn’t collected payment for product in two weeks, and I do not want to be in debt to that man. Besides,” I grumble, “I must know up front what kind of price hike he’s going to insist upon for fully assembled product instead of raw materials. The longer we go without an agreement on price, the more clout he has to rip me off.”
“Does that part even matter anymore?”
“It matters because Reginald is the kind of person you can’t say yes to any more often than absolutely necessary, or he’ll assume the answer is always yes. And there are a great number of things I cannot say yes to. Besides,” I add, pointing at a chest in the far corner, “I’m running out of space to hide the money. With bots cleaning these rooms every day, and the Royal Asshole still denying me an unmonitored office, there aren’t very many places I can stash it. Paying Reginald would help.”
What I don’t say is that Lord Aaron slipped me a tiny tracker yesterday—hardly more than a silver sticker the size of a pea, designed to withstand every countermeasure Lord Aaron could think of. I knew he’d come through for me. But so far I’ve only been receiving deliveries. By slipping the tracker in with Reginald’s payment, I can begin gathering information.
But I can’t tell Saber that part.
“He is poison, Danica. He kills everything he comes in contact with and you want me to bring him to you.”
“Bringing me to him would also be acceptable,” I say with a grin, trying to lighten the mood, but my attempt fails dramatically and I wish I hadn’t even tried. “I owe him money, Saber. A lot of money. Seeing him one time, face to face, can’t possibly be worse than being in his debt.”
Saber seems to deflate, his shoulders bending inward. “You have a point,” he says wearily, fingers fluttering at the ribbon atop the box. “I’ll do what I can.”
“Thank you,” I say, my shoulders finally relaxing. Enough that one strap of my nightgown slips right off.
A low purr rumbles in Saber’s throat and he reaches out to stroke my bare shoulder. “Can’t we stay in today?”
His lips touch that sensitive spot where shoulder meets neck and I close my eyes and hum my approval. “I wish,” I say with a groan. “But I can’t relax, much less enjoy myself, with this box full of…cosmetics…sitting here.”
“You torture me.”
“You like it.”
“True.” He straightens and pulls the strap back onto my shoulder. “Oh, what a waste. Can you handle the first hour without me? They’re going to swarm you.”
“You think so?”
“Oh yes. When you weren’t at last night’s soirée, they swarmed me, and I had nothing to give them.” More softly, he adds, “Ever seen an addict up close when they’re denied their fix? That reckless light in their eyes?”
I remember a few weeks ago when my father miscounted his patches and ran out early. Knowing it won’t be quite the same with the courtiers does little to lighten my heart. Saber’s right; it won’t be pretty.
“I can handle it,” I say, as much to myself as to Saber. “Let’s fill my panniers completely. Maybe between the two of us we can get rid of it all today and won’t have to worry about it again until next week.”
“Dispensing the product is only part of worrying about it,” Saber says. “You’re going to have to deal with it on some level every single day from here on out. But yes, being able to simply say ‘it’s all gone’ keeps you from having to make decisions about who gets the last canisters.”
It takes almost half an hour to dress, and because Saber is watching, I can’t ask my bots to pull my laces quite as tight as I’d prefer, but considering how much weight in Glitter I’ll be hauling, perhaps that’s for the best.
By the time the lined cages beneath my skirts are stuffed to capacity, I’m so loaded down with Glitter that my pelvis feels quite compressed. I hope Saber’s right that most of it will be taken off my hands—hips—quickly. This weight, this pressing, doesn’t feel anything like my corset. It doesn’t make me feel safe and held tight; it only makes me heavy and weak.
Before I leave my rooms I pause and run my fingers up Saber’s arm. “Please,” I say gently. “Find him. I need this. I need to talk to him.”
“I don’t like it.” He leans forward and kisses me. A whisper-soft meeting of lips that makes me want more. “I’ll do as you ask, but I want my objection noted. I’ll join you as soon as I can.”
“But—”
“Later,” he says with a laugh. “Go.”
I push out my bottom lip melodramatically, but take a deep breath and head out of my bedchamber. I’m not three steps from the double doors before I’m besieged by a gaggle of young ladies, all waving money so obviously I feel my temper start to rise.
“Ladies,” I command. “Decorum, if you please!”
They fall silent and subdued, gathering around me in a nervous semicircle. “Good morning, ladies,” I prompt, inclining my head graciously.
A few gasps sound as they realize how rude they’ve been.
“Your Highness” echoes around the circle, and they each fall into a low bow, spreading their silken skirts out on the floor around them like pastel flowers.
“Merci. We must never, ever forget that in the palace there is always someone watching you,” I intone very quietly. “Judging.”
The ladies look crestfallen and several murmur quiet apologies before a rough line forms.
“I need two, please,” says a young lady whose parents were in attendance at the secret meeting—Mireille, I think.
“One only,” I say firmly, and then raise my voice and look around the group. “My supplier has reached the limits of his production capabilities. Until such time as he can expand his operation, we shall have to do a bit of rationing among ourselves. I know we’re all capable of such civility.”
Concern shows in their eyes.
“I always use two,” Lady Mireille protests.
I purse my lips and think quickly. “At the assembly tonight I will happily sell a second canister to anyone who wants one, assuming I have any left. But we must allow everyone to receive a first canister.”
Lady Mireille scowls but pays for her single pot, no doubt already planning to ambush me the moment I walk into the Hall of Mirrors tonight.
The next young lady, a Mademoiselle Simone, tries a new ploy. “One for me and one for my sister, Belinda,” she says. And I hear her suck in a breath and hold it.
I raise an eyebrow and, to her credit, she doesn’t so much as blink.
But I’m not stupid. “Mademoiselle Belinda will have to come retrieve her cosmetics herself. I can nearly always be found in some public place, so that should pose no problem at all.”
Simone’s face is a mask of forced control and for a moment I think she’s going to tear up. I did that. There are no right answers in my life anymore.
She maintains her composure and drops a graceful curtsy, then continues on her way.