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She pulled out her giant rollers and shook out her hair, then picked up her ‘meet the family’ dress.
It was beautiful.
Demure.
Elegant.
She pulled her thick curls together to swirl them into a knot and clip it with black pearls, and then looked out to the harbour and stood watching the near full moon rise above the water—a reminder of the one night she had asked for...a night just for her.
When she recalled it later she wanted her full moon night with Dante to be the night she wore silver. It felt cool, and as she tucked her breasts into the little shelf and turned and looked at her almost bare back she decided it might be more modest to wear her hair down.
She slipped on velvet heels and picked up her tiny little evening purse. Taking out her little compact mirror, she tackled her eye make-up.
She drove him crazy.
The way she’d stood watching him shower, the way she’d hurled questions as he shaved. The way, when she had got things so wrong, she was so blindly determined she was right.
He did not want to care in the way that he did.
About any of them.
Yet, as much as he didn’t want her to come to dinner, he knew it would be better to have her there.
He suited up with the same enthusiasm that he would for a funeral, then combed back his hair and splashed cologne.
Tonight was the night he had waited for.
Soon he would be free of the lot of them, and tomorrow he would finally be able to breathe.
The king would be in his castle and very happily alone.
‘Alicia!’ he called.
‘One minute,’ she said as she decided against eyeliner, opted for a quick dash of mascara.
‘No minutes!’ he said.
A slick of lipstick and she popped her compact into her purse and stepped out to the sight of Dante in a suit and a tie—and a scowl.
‘Is it too much?’ she asked.
‘Do you like it?’ he asked.
‘I love it.’
‘That’s good, then, because there isn’t time for you to change. We need to get going.’
He gave her nothing.
Not a compliment, nor his thoughts.
They strolled through magical lanes so ancient, so beautiful, it felt as if they had entered a portal into another world.
As he guided her across an uneven kerb she acknowledged that heels really were an unwise choice.
But she felt unwise tonight.
She felt his hand on her arm, and the entire problem for Alicia was in that moment—that gesture. His reluctant arm was bliss.
