“I never think it’s right for a parent to force something on a child, even an adult child. If you do elope, divorce laws are not on your side.” It was hard for a woman to seek divorce in Valleria, though laws were slowly changing to give women morerights. “That’s why I think if you do want to elope, you should do it with someone better than Cary.”
“It’s hard for me though. So many men just want to fuck the ‘Asian’, they don’t actually want to be married to one. They don’t want to ‘pollute’ their bloodline—that’s an actual thing someone said to me by the way—so I have to take the handouts. I don’t have other options.”
“You could run away. I could help you. Or we could run away together!”
Sam shook her head with a sad smile. “I would love nothing more than for both of us to leave all this behind, but I can’t access my trust fund for another year at least, and you don’t have a trust fund at all. And as much as I love this diner, I don’t really want to work in one. I have no coordination and would drop food on the customers all the time.”
Gen giggled. “You would! But you’d look sexy doing it.”
“Damn right I would.”
They separated and spent a few minutes eating, Gen worried about Sam, then thinking about Gabriel, then her mother, and her thoughts just kept spinning around in her head.
“The prince isn’t like Cary, you know. He’s a playboy but with how he’s acted towards you, I don’t think he’d keep it up after marriage.”
Gen glanced up. “We haven’t really talked about that, but you never know. Men don’t put their wives and mistresses in the same box so, to many men, having one does not exclude having the other.”
“Don’t give up on something great because you’re afraid, Gen. Whoever the prince is, he’s not like your mother. He wants you, and he won’t leave you. Not just because of the public perception of it all, but because I think he genuinely likes you. I think you’re so used to people being mean to you that you don’t recognize it when someone isn’t doing that. You keep bracingfor the worst because that’s what you’re used to, but that doesn’t have to be your ‘normal’ anymore.”
Gen looked down into her teacup. The words echoed so much what Gabriel had once told her. Could they be right?
“How do you feel about the prince?”
“I…like him. Despite myself, I do. He’s ridiculously gorgeous and that mustache…” She cleared her throat while Sam laughed. “Anyway. He is nice to me, even when I’m not so nice to him. But he’s also bossy and controlling and doesn’t take my feelings or wishes into account. So what if I’d be a princess and a future queen with him? If I’m a miserable one, what’s the point? Power? Fame? Fortune? Those aren’t enough for me. Maybe they would have been if my father had been alive, but they’re not anymore. I do like him, I could maybe even love him, but I need more.”
“Then I think you have your answer.”
Gen nodded, and slowly sipped her tea. So that was it. She was finally done with him.
Yet…it didn’t feel final. It felt unfinished.
GABRIEL
Gabriel enteredthe sitting room and glanced around. Gaston brooding with a drink by the fire, Leticia chatting with Ferdi and his parents, Agnes chatting with Clotilde and Lucien on the sofa. He went to make himself a drink and Gaston came up next to him, requesting a refill of his own.
“Where’s your darling Genevieve? Did you not return to the palace with her?”
“Only briefly. She had an engagement at the Kaur’s so I arranged a car to take her back there.”
Gaston clamped a hand on his shoulder. “If I were anyone else, I would probably believe you.”
Gabriel nodded to the rest of the room while he handed Gaston his drink. “Think they’ll buy it?”
“Maybe.” Gaston took a sip of his refilled drink. “Our brothers are distracted, but our mother and sister not as much. Father will notice everything of course, and say very little until he gets you alone.”
He sighed, then turned to face the room, his own glass of wine in hand. “Shame. I was hoping to evade an inquisition tonight.”
“No such luck, eldest brother. So, why isn’t she here?”
“She doesn’t want me.”
“I don’t think that’s true.”
“It’s what she told me.”
“Is it? Or did she say she didn’t want this life?”
Gabriel looked down into his drink. “Truthfully, I wasn’t the best partner for her. She told me what she wanted, what she needed, time and again, and I ignored her requests. It makes sense she doesn’t want me. I fucked it up.”
