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“It is a nonstory!”
“You know that and I know that, but the pictures of that kiss last night say otherwise. If they didn’t, the whole world wouldn’t be up in arms because I went on a date with a beautiful woman. I have been known to do that occasionally.”
“Believe me, I am aware.” The second I mutter the words I want to take them back. I sound jealous, which is absurd considering we just met and there’s nothing between us. The fact that I like the way he touches me—and kisses me—doesn’t change the fact that whatever this thing is, it’s got nowhere to go but the graveyard. I’m not princess material and I am absolutely okay with that.
He doesn’t comment on my lapse, for which I am grateful. But his blue eyes have a laser-focused look in them, as though his brain is riffling through ideas—and discarding them—at an alarming rate.
“What are you thinking?” I ask, when I can no longer stand the silence—or the anticipation.
“Kian had an interesting idea when I spoke to him this morning,” he says as he reaches for his coffee and takes a slow, measured sip.
“Kian?” I ask. “The psychopath who takes his coffee black?”
“The one and only,” he answers cheerfully. “But just because he’s a psychopath doesn’t mean he doesn’t have good ideas. Crazy like a fox, that one is.”
I pick up my own coffee, bracing myself. “So what does Kian think we should do?”
“He thinks we should run with it.”
The words are so unexpected that for a second they don’t compute. “What do you mean, ‘run with it’?”
“I mean, he thinks we should keep up the charade of being a couple. Not forever, just for a while. The press and the public are eating it up, and their approval will go a long way toward my approval rating. And if my approval rating gets high enough…”
“Your father won’t be able to publicly kick you off the throne and give it to Kian.”
He inclines his head. “That is the idea.”
“And Kian’s okay with this? I thought every prince wanted to be king.”
“Not Kian. It takes too much time away from his own playtime activities.”
“I thought he was getting married.”
“He is. To Savvy, whom he is crazy in love with. But ruling’s never really been his thing, and she’s got him involved in a ton of charity projects that he’d rather concentrate on. He’s always been one hell of a philanthropist behind the scenes, but being king is a different skill set entirely.”
“And it’s a skill set he doesn’t have?”
“It’s a skill set he has no intention of learning and one that I’ve spent my whole life doing nothing but developing.”
“And you think having me by your side is going to put pressure on your father to keep the rightful…umm…” I trail off as I try to think of the correct word for what we’re talking about.
“The rightful order of progenitor. Yes, I do.”
“Dude, you don’t even know me.”
“I don’t, no. But my security detail vetted you before we even went out, and when this thing broke wide open in the middle of the night, they vetted you some more. I read the report in the car on the way over here and there’s nothing in there that sends any red flags up.”
“You vetted me?” I can’t keep the outrage from my voice. “Before you came over here last night, you had your team vet me?”
I expect him to apologize, or at least look a little embarrassed. But he doesn’t. He looks me straight in the eye and says, “Yes. Of course. It’s how things work in my world.”
I think of all the things in my past that I don’t want anyone else to know about—nothing criminal or anything l
ike that, but still. My life is mine, and so are all the mistakes I’ve made and all the bad things that have happened to me along the way. Mine to share or mine to keep secret, and the idea that Garrett knows those things now—that his security knows those things too…it’s a lot to wrap my head around. Not as much as the idea that the whole world might soon know them too, but still.
Again, it’s not that I have so much to be ashamed of. I don’t. The shit that’s happened to me through the years is the shit that happened. Nothing more, nothing less. Some of it is my fault, most of it isn’t, and I’m not going to apologize for any of it. But that doesn’t mean I like the idea of Garrett knowing stuff that I don’t tell on the first date, or even the second or fifth or tenth. Especially since he didn’t give me a choice in the matter. He just decided he wanted to see me, had me vetted, and showed up on my doorstep.
“I think you should go now,” I tell him, pointing toward the door I’ve been terrified of opening since I woke up this morning.
