Viktor

By the time the ridiculous dinner is over for the night, my head is pounding, my chest is aching, and I wish I could talk to my father once more.

‘Tis a desire I’ve ignored for the majority of my time in Amoria, as wishing to speak with the dead is wasted energy, but gods, I miss him.

The grief is sneaky. It’s neither logical nor rational, but it still is.

“Quite lovely speech,” Alexander tells me as we enter the grand foyer of the private apartments. “One would never know all this love is a thorn in your side.”

“I have no objections to love. I have objections to the corruption of the word for the purpose of seeking power and fortune at the expense of others.”

Peach spins and gapes at me.

She’s stopped beneath the heart chandelier that my mother insists would have given my grandfather palpitations of the organ it’s designed after, a bowl of gelato in hand, spoon in her mouth, in long sleeve pajamas decorated with peaches that inspire movement below the belt, despite my best intentions.

“Wha dih yu jus ah?” she asks me. She’s stiff, with guarded eyes that seem to be begging me for something, though I’ve no idea what.

Gods above, if Papaya’s caused some kind of mischief in the stables, I’ve no idea what I’m to do with her.

“I said I have no use of men who corrupt the idea love for their own gain,” I reply.

Her chin wobbles and her eyes go shiny.

I freeze, because what the dickens have I done now?

“Guh,” she whispers, and without another word, she dashes for the stairs.

Though I’m quite certain she would deny the dashing part.

I look to Alexander.

“I daresay she’ll be quite good for Amorian fashion,” he says cheerfully.

“Perhaps so, but what the devil was that?”

“I’ve no idea. You should’ve married a man. We’re much simpler to understand.”

With a grin, he saunters toward the voices in the kitchen, where it seems Mum and Samuel are having quite a lovely time debating the best course of dinner.

Whilst I take myself upstairs.

To my wife.

Or possibly my doom.

‘Tis difficult to predict which I shall find.

Eva’s door is cracked, so I pause and knock softly. She smiles from her chair in front of her fireplace, where she appears to be sketching something. She’s removed her fancy dress, and I feel a pang of jealousy over her sweatshirt and loose cotton pants.

“Did you enjoy the feast?” I inquire.

“I sat between a couple who had been married for sixty-seven years. They sniped at each other the whole evening until the alpacas arrived, and then they quite agreed their daughter would have done far worse in her teenage years. It was lovely, and they’re convinced you shall be a king of the people, as you understand people things, which was evident in your complete inability to deal with a teenage girl.”

As I’m entirely uncertain if she’s meant to compliment me or mock me—siblings are quite special that way—I nod. “Excellent. Sleep well.”

Papaya’s door is closed, and no light sneaks from beneath her door, so I hope she’s sleeping.

I’m not entirely optimistic, but I am tired enough to allow myself a sense of false security.

There’s only my own bedroom left.

Mine.

I turn the handle as noisily as possible, entering through the sitting room rather than the bedroom proper.

Much to my surprise, Peach is curled into one of the two wingback chairs before our fireplace, whose flames provide the only light in the room. Fall comes early in the mountains, and the temperatures have already begun to drop toward freezing in the evenings, though we most likely shan’t see snow at our elevation for another month or so.

She sniffles over her gelato, and my headache is forgotten.

“Peach?” I ask hesitantly.

She pulls her legs tighter to her chest. “When I was fifteen, I had a pregnancy scare,” she whispers. “Meemaw raised me in a trailer. He was from money. And he told me if I didn’t get rid of it, he’d deny it was his and make sure everyone knew I was a whore. I thought he loved me, but he—”

She stops herself with a shake of her head. I cautiously take the seat beside her, torn between the desire to fillet a man alive to avenge her honor and the more rational knowledge that she most likely would prefer I sit and listen.

A man learns a thing or two watching a hockey-playing prince go through his dating years.

“I wasn’t pregnant, but I was old enough to know what it would’ve meant if I had been. And I think I grew up that day.”

“Understandable,” I murmur.

“I hate that he made me who I am today.” Her voice is froggy again.

If I thought she’d allow it, I would pull her into my lap in a heartbeat. “You made yourself.”

She shakes her head. “I didn’t care enough to fight for myself until a boy who claimed he loved me showed me just how much lower my life could go, and how flippantly people toss around the word just to get what they want. The day I graduated high school with a full ride scholarship to a private school, I thought about him. The day I graduated college with three job offers, I thought about him. The day Joey and I opened Weightless, I thought about him.”

“You loved him?” I ask.

She shakes her head. “I loathe him. But it’s his parents I hate more. They raised him to be like that. They taught him he was better than me because he was richer than me. That he could have anything he wanted, including me, because he was better than me. When really, what had any of us earned at fifteen?”

I remember little of being fifteen beyond a driving desire to right the wrongs done to my family in any way I could, and also an obsession with a countdown to being of legal driving age. “Not much,” I hedge.

“But at fifteen, you think you know it all.” She sighs and drops her spoon into the bowl with a clatter.

“And so you worry for Papaya.”

She shakes her head. “I worry for me, Viktor. My whole life has been about making something of myself so that I don’t need to rely on anyone. Because love is a lie men tell to get in your pants.”

“Not all men,” I feel honor-bound to point out.

She lifts haunted eyes to meet my gaze. “No. Not all men.”

Not you, Viktor. Love means something to you.

She doesn’t say it. Of course she doesn’t.

We’ve married as part of a bargain, a bargain growing more complicated by the day.

And love has never been my driving factor.

But I fear it may sneak up on me when I least expect it.

Or perhaps it already has.

“Some days I hate myself for being here,” she whispers.

“For removing your sister from a situation in which she could harm herself and doing what a ridiculous judge insisted was needed to keep her safe?”

She frowns at me, and a smile takes me by surprise.

I’d thought I shouldn’t find anything to smile about tonight. Especially with Ms. Aurora asking for a private meeting to provide marital counseling for us. Which I shan’t be mentioning anytime soon.

Yet Peach frowning at me is quite possibly the most normal part of my day.

“Should you hate yourself less had you married the duck man in Goat’s Tit?” I ask.

Her lips don’t twitch, and her voice goes dryer than the Sahara. “I hate myself for buying into the ridiculous notion that who your parents are makes the man.”

As of course I understand.

She’s made a successful business from scratch, but she’s in demand for a title given by a marriage of convenience in a way that the success she earned by her own blood, sweat, and tears never afforded. “My lady, I promise you, I have never once imagined that you would ever put me on a pedestal for my being named a king.”

“I heard Leonie telling someone King Roland thought it was his right to be king. But to you, it’s a responsibility. You’ll be a very good king, Viktor. This country has no idea yet how lucky they are.”

And once again, this woman has rendered me speechless. I clear my throat and look to the fire. “Thank you, my lady.”

“Don’t thank me yet. I’m inviting half the parents from school over for tea tomorrow.”

I jerk my head back up.

“Like I said, some days I hate myself for being here. But I’m clearing the air with these parents before anything gets started. Like I should’ve done with that little brat’s mother back in Goat’s Tit.”

I’ve an idea as to which brat she’s referring, yet I still feel as though I’m missing half the story. “Shall I clear my calendar?”

“That would be very brave of you.”

“I majored in bravery at university.”

“Oh, bless your heart.”

Ah, the sass is coming back. “You’re quite determined to leave your own unique mark on Amoria, aren’t you, my lady?”

“No, I’m leaving my mark on the whole fucking world.”

She’s leaving her mark somewhere.

I fear it’s my heart.

“I’ve intended to clear my calendar for this weekend anyway. There are two estates to the north belonging to the monarchy that I should like to inspect for myself. Would you be available to accompany me?”

She peers at me, and for a moment, I fear my heart has stopped beating, which of course is impossible.

But a smile shimmers to life on those lips of hers, I remember the sight of them wrapped around my cock, and my world is suddenly more than right.

“I’d love to.”