Page 26 of King's Heir of Hate

“Our presence is requested at the wedding of King Gervais,” he told her one afternoon, as they sat in his office discussing their schedules—one of the anodyne diary meetings he insisted upon. Not because he could not have had access to her schedule either way, but because he liked to test himself in her presence.

“King Gervais has been married two times before,” Esme pointed out.

“And the heads of all the houses of Europe have been invited every time,” Tadeo replied. “This is no different. We will, of course, make our appearance.”

Esme studied him. The rules of their arrangement had evolved over the past weeks. If the discussion was purely related to the business of their responsibilities, that did not count against her. It did not mean she lost her chance to find him in the night.

If, however, she got emotional about anything—by his reckoning, not hers—it did.

She kept studying him now and Tadeo felt his pulse pick up, because he knew that look in her dark eyes. It was Esme’s version ofdevil-may-care. The point at which he could almost see her throw up her hands and say,what the hell, though she would never bequiteso vulgar.

Or not in front of him, anyway.

“Have you met King Gervais’s intended?” Esme asked. Calmly.

Too calmly, by his reckoning. The kind of calm that typically foretold an explosion, if he was not mistaken.

“I have.”

“I haven’t,” Esme murmured, toying with the hem of the sweater she wore over a dress that made her look entirely too pretty and also—through the magic of fashion he could not begin to parse—not particularly pregnant. “But I am certain I can list the accomplishments that allowed her to rise to King Gervais’s notice.” If she saw the reproving look on Tadeo’s face, she ignored it. “Let me guess, she is significantly younger than him,spectacularlymore beautiful than him, and, most importantly, sheltered and naive in every possible way.”

“She is an heiress of no small means from Brazil,” Tadeo said. Carefully. “I believe she was selected because she meets all of the King’s needs.”

Those needs, in Gervais’s case, did not involve dynastic aspirations as his first wife had already provided the throne with its next in line and two spares—along with scathing critiquesin the press. Those needs did not involve the old king’s much-discussed heart, as he had already made a fool of himself over his second wife, a wholly unsuitable actress, who had left him for her personal trainer.

Gervais had cannily selected a new queen who would give him no trouble at all.

Tadeo dreamed of such a queen.

As if she could read his mind, Esme smiled. Tadeo knew immediately, before she said a word, that he’d won today. Though was it really winning when it meant he would not have access to her tonight? Who was he punishing?

But that was a question for another time.

“You kings and your perfect little heiresses,” Esme said, in a perfectly pleasant tone that was at complete odds with that sharp look in her eyes. “It’s like a sweet shop, is it not? Shiny, brightly colored, consumable objects for you to eat up and throw away. How lovely for them.”

He should have ignored this entire line of conversation. And he should not have felt the least bit as if she’d landed a blow. “What you seem to forget, Esme, is that you were raised to be the same sort of bit of candy.”

“Incorrect,” she retorted, and he thought she sat a little straighter. More, there seemed to be something almostcondemningin the way she looked at him. Or maybe it was worse than that. Maybe she lookeddisappointed. “I am my father’s heir, as you know perfectly well. It was his dearest wish that I married you so that our neighboring nations could once again unite the way they did long ago in antiquity. If not as one nation, then as the closest of friends and allies. Our first child is meant to rule Bellaza, our second, Clarebonne.” Esme tilted her head to one side. “Surely you have not forgotten this.”

He had not forgotten it so much as he had never imagined that it would matter, as he’d never intended to touch her again. But something kept him from saying that.

She continued. “I was never intended to be an object on a shelf, sat there to be admired from afar. I am expected to instruct the heir to Clarebonne in the ways of the kingdom in the same manner that I was instructed myself. You know that.”

He shifted uncomfortably in his chair and blamed her for it. “I remember your father mentioning that, yes.”

In truth, he remembered that her father had spoken for some time about his dreams for grandchildren and the unification of their kingdoms, but Tadeo had not bothered to pay close attention. So sure had he been that such a future would never materialize.

Esme studied him in that same way, and he could not account for how deeply he disliked it. It seemed as if she could seeintohim. “I can only assume that you’re trying to be provocative, then. Does it make you feel as if you’ve won something?”

He dislikedthateven more.

“It’s not my fault that you can’t either school yourself from your emotional outbursts or simply keep them to yourself,” he said, proud that he sounded very nearly disinterested. As if she was a science project he was observing from afar. “Sometimes you can, of course. What that tells me is that you are making a choice. You could choose something else, Esme.” He could see it so clearly. They could be models of cool propriety and exquisite protocol by day and keep the rest of it purely in the bedroom. Expressed only and ever that one way. “Everything could change for the better, and for good, if you would only obey.”

She leaned in, and he was struck by how much rounder she was now and how well her dress hid it. He found he hated that it was hidden. It continued to surprise him, how beautifully her pregnancy suited her. As if she was made to bear children.

He didn’t know what it was about that notion—about her ripeness and her round sweetness—that made him feel as if he was breaking his own rules. As if that was an emotional thing he was feeling rather than a simple observation.

“You would hate it if I obeyed,” Esme told him, with a laugh. “You would be bored out of your mind.”