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“Not as ridiculous as a guy who’s obviously got feelings for a girl but is too afraid to tell her.”
“I never said I was afraid.”
“Dude, I’m your twin. You didn’t have to say it.”
“Really? You’re playing the twin card here?”
“I’m just calling it like I see it. You worry so much about what might happen that you totally miss out on what would happen if you just got your head out of your ass. You should fix that.”
“Well, thank you so much for the analysis. I’ll be sure to share it with my therapist. I’m sure it will clear things right up for him. In the meantime, can we get back to the treaty?”
/> “That’s what I’m trying to do. Play your cards right and you’ll be back in the favorite seat in a week. Then you can storm Parliament and do whatever magic you do that gets those cagey bastards to follow your lead.”
“You had one job, Kian.”
“Actually, I used to have one job. Now I have a hundred jobs and that’s just for today. So do what you need to do to get Lola on board, bring her home, and flaunt her—and your ninety-one percent approval rating—in the King’s face. And take back the throne. Please, God. Take back the damn throne.”
“It’s really not normal for anyone to hate being the crown prince as much as you do.” I pause as the rest of his words finally click in. “Ninety-one percent approval rating? Are you fucking with me?”
“No! That’s what I’m telling you. The country loves the two of you together. The women went all googly-eyed at how protective you were of her in the airport shots and the men are overwhelmingly impressed with your fence-hopping ability. ‘No pussy prince for us’ seems to be the general consensus among them.”
“Ninety-one percent?” I say again, because I’m still trying to wrap my head around it. Numbers like that are unheard of. No one in the public eye has a 91 percent approval rating ever, let alone in the middle of a media firestorm.
“Yes!” Kian says with an excited half-laugh. “With an approval rating like that, you can do anything! And get this: since the poll was being authorized by me and not our father, the pollsters had a little more leeway with the questions they asked. Turns out the country is hurting over your abduction, but not the way the King thinks. Eighty-seven percent of people think more highly of you since you were rescued. And eighty-nine percent think you’re the perfect choice to run the country. Eighty-seven percent trust you more. They recognize how much strength it took to go through what you did and come out on the other side of it.”
Again his words echo Michael’s from the other day and as they start to register, really register, I sit down, hard, on the nearest chair. There’s a lot of knowledge and emotion that comes along with those stats and I can barely begin to process any of it.
From the beginning, the King’s been telling me no one likes a prince who’s been abducted. Worse, he’s been saying that the people will never trust me again. After all, how can they trust me to look after them when I can’t even look after myself? How can they trust me to do what’s right for the country when I was too soft-hearted to recognize an abduction attempt for what it was? For months now, his words have crawled around in my head. They’ve plagued me during the day and haunted me in the middle of the night. They’ve kept me from sleeping, from eating. Kept me drowning in guilt over my weakness, over how I’d let my people down.
But these numbers say just the opposite. They say I didn’t let my country down. Just like they say that it’s not the people who don’t trust or like me. It’s just him. Just my father who thinks I’m weak and a coward and a failure.
I run a hand through my hair as I try to figure out what to think about this new understanding. More than that, what to feel about it.
Kian has no such problems, but then he wasn’t the one who sat in that goddamn militia camp for three months being tortured, being ridiculed, waiting for rescue, and then—after a few weeks—just waiting for death.
He wasn’t the one who lived in fear every day that he would betray the people—and the secrets—he’d been charged with protecting.
And he’s sure as hell not the one who lost the throne, who lost everything, after making it through it all without going insane—and without spilling any classified intel at all.
I am.
Rage slams through me, pure, unadulterated, all-encompassing. It starts as a ball in my stomach, then grows until it takes over every part of me. Until it’s all I can do to think, all I can do to breathe, around it.
But rage won’t get me anywhere right now, so I shove it back down where I’ve been keeping it for nearly a year, then slam the lid down over it to keep it from boiling up and escaping.
“Admittedly, these numbers are all cushioned with the rose-colored glasses of your new relationship with Lola—which, I’ve got to say, is polling ten points higher than Savvy’s and my relationship ever has. Guess the country likes the idea of a female entrepreneur as queen more than they do a romantic suspense writer.”
With someone else there might be bitterness there, but Kian’s so overjoyed at just the idea of shedding the crown prince mantle that he’s practically dancing. I don’t blame him—we both are who we are, who we were trained to be. After all, I’m just as thrilled at the thought of getting that title back. Or at least, I think I am.
“One poll is a long way from overruling the King’s prejudices,” I remind him—and myself. No use getting too far into this new reality until we see how our father reacts to the numbers.
“I know, I know,” Kian says. “But it’s a start. So go find your woman and take her out for a night on the town. And make sure you get photographed a lot—the people will love it.”
I don’t even know where my woman is. When I find her—when she comes back—I have plans to do a lot of things, and none of them involve parading her around Paris like a trick pony. We’ve done more than enough of that today as it is.
I don’t tell Kian that, though. Instead, I mouth a few more platitudes and hang up—after giving him some suggestions on how to go back to Parliament and broach the treaty talks again. He grumbles a little under his breath, but he listens and takes notes. Still, beneath the conversation are undercurrents neither of us can ignore, not when they put paid to the idea that soon this nightmare might be over. Soon I could be the one once again browbeating Parliament into doing what’s right.
I can’t fucking wait.
