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“It will be a busy day for you.”
Angele didn’t argue, but wondered if busy was a code for challenging, because she knew that was exactly what her day was shaping up to be. Not that Zahir’s would not be equally difficult. He had to come up with a definitive plan to announce what many would say was scandalous news. He would be questioned and criticized.
The media was going to have a field day with the
situation; the perfect prince had fallen from grace.
And it was her fault.
Knowing he had anticipated her being on the pill or some equally effective form of birth control added to her sense of guilt. Not that he couldn’t have at least asked, but she’d known for a fact they weren’t using anything.
“What is that look?” he asked, his brows drawn together in a concerned frown. “Do you wish to postpone these meetings?”
“That’s hardly an option.”
“I will make it an option if that is what you need.”
“How can you be so nice to me right now?”
“How can I not?”
“It’s my fault we’re in this situation.”
“Assigning blame is useless, but if you must do so, then assign me my portion. I was the one who waited too long to act on the intentions in the contract between our two families.”
“I knew we weren’t using birth control.”
“Yes.”
“Aren’t you angry with me? You were furious yesterday.”
“Yesterday is best left in the past.”
And she knew he meant both literally the day before and their ill conceived night together.
“You’re going to be a figure of public speculation and gossip for months because of this.” And she knew how much that had to bother him.
“Highly doubtful. It will be a nine day’s wonder. And I refuse to forget that had Elsa been more vindictive and less greedy, I would already be so.”
The knowledge obviously weighed heavily on him. Angele could see it in the rigid tension of his shoulders and the haunted shadows in his gray eyes.
“That’s in the past too.”
He shrugged, but she knew he was too much of a perfectionist to extend the same acceptance for mistakes to himself that he seemed determined to offer her.
“My own idiocy is not something I will forget anytime soon,” he said, confirming her thoughts.
“So, we’ve both been idiots. It’s time to move forward.”
He laughed, the sound as surprising as it was surprised. “I do not believe anyone has called me an idiot in all my adult years.”
“Not to your face anyway,” she said, tongue in cheek.
His dark brows rose. “Not behind my back, either.”
“Your arrogance is showing again.”
“It is never very far below the surface, I assure you.”
