Page 3 of Bared

“So you can take it public to every man, woman, and child in Arcadia,” Evrest supplied.

“Not necessarily,” Carris cut in.

Jayd spurted out a laugh. “Well, of course not. Because the necessary thing here is…what, I ask? What serves the people…or the Pura?”

“And what would you have them know, then?” Santelle rebutted. “That the princess they have adored for twenty-four years is a sham? A pretender without a drop of actual Cimarron blood in her veins? That she is the product of an affair Queen Xaria was having while King Ardent was fighting with his men on the Mediterranean? That while he was helping to thwart a secret invasion from Muammar Gaddafi’s forces, Xaria was consorting with a commoner? That we have collected physical evidence, including your maimanne’s recorded confession, to confirm all of it?”

“A recording the queen was not aware of,” Evrest countered. “Secured by a woman she considered a trusted friend.” As he snarled the last three words, he rose to his full height. Jayd could not remember her eldest brother ever looking so terrifying but terror-filled in the same moment. “She was confessing the contents of her deepest heart to that friend, who kept the recording because she knew it would fetch a high price one day—a bribe the Pura were apparently willing to pay. For what it is worth to any of you, that woman’s betrayal has sent my mother to her sick bed.”

“She will see no one,” Jayd all but accused. She will not even see me. The daughter who needs her the most right now. The girl who needs so many answers.

“Perhaps she should have considered the consequences when spreading her legs for someone other than—”

Santelle’s own croak was his interruption, as Evrest charged over his desk and into the man’s personal space.

Jayd hissed in satisfaction as her brother wrapped his huge fist around the bonsun’s neatly knotted necktie.

“Shut. Up.” Ev’s order was low and lethal, making the air itself shudder. “I refuse to suffer the muck from your sewer of a mouth, Fortin Santelle.”

For a second, Santelle looked like he’d be smart about heeding that order. But only for that second. Soon enough, he sputtered, “Every word I speak is—”

“The truth?” Evrest twisted his hold tighter. “You dare use that as your justification, when everyone in this palais knows you were one of the cockroaches who helped my father sneak into half of the brothels in the Eve District?” He loomed in closer, narrowing his glower. “Or is that why you have such solid knowledge of how a woman opens her thighs?”

Santelle’s face became a cosmetic vegetable salad. Tomato red. Beetroot magenta. Eggplant purple. His seething mouth was a contrasting line of furious white. “How dare you, sir!”

“I am not your sir,” Evrest seethed. “I am your king, and you will address me as such.”

“Ev!” But Jayd did not move to stop her brother. In truth, a diced vegetable salad sounded delicious.

“Perhaps we should all take a deep breath and a step back.” Despite the placation, Carris moved up and brushed the air with his palms. “We are not here to start a war, Your Majesty.”

“Just a one-sided trial,” Jayd countered.

“No.” The man spiked a frown her way. “We are here in a spirit of…let us call it partnership. To work together on the challenge before us all.”

“Said the viper to the hawk?” Evrest bit out.

“Say the loyal subjects to their king.”

“Bullshit, the sequel.” Again, Jayd submerged it well below her breath—which did not stop Ev from firmly squeezing her shoulder as he spun and stomped back to his chair.

Her cheeks flared from shame. She was not helping anything with her running commentary, even at the sneaky volume level.

Ev proved as much with his visible tension. His shoulders strained at the confines of his shirt. He lowered back into his chair with the jerking doom of a felled tree.

“This matter is simpler than you think, Majesty.” Trystan Carris’s tone was still disturbingly diplomatic. “You have but to render a few defined decisions.”

“Which are?” Ev prompted.

The Pura bastard spreading his hands like a self-appointed messiah. “Well, now that all the facts are on the table…”

“You mean the bribery materials?” Jayd gritted.

“We all have a few choices,” Carris went on as if she had merely sneezed. “After all, the information we have obtained would be vastly interesting for the Arcadian people…”

“Then why are you not just doing it?” Another effort to tamp her temper was wretchedly unsuccessful. “What are you waiting for? Does it feel that good to stand there with your balls in your hand, or are you going to actually put the things to use and follow through here?”

“Highness!” Emme gasped.