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‘Your list—’
She raised a hand, cutting him off midsentence. ‘I know, they’re silly and—’
‘We’re doing them.’ The words cast his promise in stone.
She looked up at him, the sun balancing delicately behind her head, its rays setting her hair on fire, none of which compared to the sparks of golden fire dancing with the slivers of jade in her eyes. She bit her lip as if to prevent just how much it meant to her from escaping, but it failed. He felt her joy, her thanks like a punch to the solar plexus, so powerful he needed a moment to catch his breath.
‘But first,’ he said, forcing himself not to cast his gaze across her body as he wished, ‘clothes.’
She looked momentarily confused, as if she’d forgotten that she’d run from Paris in his shirt and trousers, and then her eyes crinkled with mischief. ‘Okay, but Aleksander pays.’
Marit twisted her body in the mirror, surprised by the fit of the wide-legged cropped trousers the shop assistant had promised her would look ‘dee-vine’. Marit smiled. She wasn’t sure about divine, but the burnt orange heavy cotton did look good. Contrary to the plans she’d had to rack up horrifying bills against her brother’s account, she couldn’t bring herself to be that wasteful.
Marit might have been overlooked by her parents but she’d always had the greatest of respect for the position their family held and the faith and trust of the Svardian people. Their family’s money was the people’s money, which was why she’d taken her university degree seriously, even if it hadn’t been her choice. Which was the same reason Marit couldn’t run up a huge debt just for some clothes.
Something Lykos seemed to be strangely irritated by. She had the sneaking suspicion that it was precisely because he had expected her to, and that made her feel...uncomfortable. Lykos clearly thought she was a spoiled little princess. And while Marit couldn’t deny that she had grown up around money—something she instinctively knew Lykos disliked and distrusted—she had never taken that for granted. In the last eight months, her work with the kids in the city youth orchestra had brought her in touch with children from all levels of household income, some of which broke her heart to witness in her country. Just the thought of it made her feel guilty for running off, first with André, then to Milan. To be here now, it just felt...selfish.
With that feeling a dull echo in her heart, she folded up the bare essentials the shop assistant and she had decided on to get her through the next five days, and was about to leave when she heard a tap on the dressing room wall.
‘I hope you don’t mind, but I was wondering if you might try this on?’ said the assistant, a blush on her cheeks at the odd request. ‘It’s just that my little sister designed the dress. She’s working her way through fashion school and I know that it would look incredible on you.’ The words rushed out of the proud older sister, and Marit was helpless to refuse.
The moment she was handed the oyster-coloured silk she felt tingles buzz along her skin as if in warning of how precious this moment was. She hung the dress on the hook and, refusing to think too hard on it, slipped out of her clothes and into material that felt like cream against her skin. Gently puffed sleeves gathered at her wrists, framing the V-neck sheath that fitted close to her chest and torso, snugly wrapping around her waist to pour down from her hips to the floor like a waterfall. But it was the hundreds of lines of tiny cream-coloured sequins through the whole dress that made it so magical. They were spaced at different intervals, the closer collection of sequin lines gathering at the front, from where they fell around the V and down, drawing the eye, making Marit look taller and more sophisticated than she’d ever felt.
The lines made her think of music, of sound waves, and although she’d intended to politely refuse the dress, Marit knew that she’d never forgive herself if she didn’t take it with her.
The shop assistant gasped when she caught sight of her in the dress—‘so beautiful’—the words for the dress as much as Marit, and Marit could only agree.
‘Do you want to show your handsome man waiting so patiently out there for you?’ she asked.
Something turned in Marit’s chest and, biting her lip, she shook her head.
‘Ah. Yes, so much better for it to be a surprise,’ she whispered conspiratorially.
Marit turned back to look at herself in the mirror without replying, wondering suddenly whether she would ever wear the dress. For some reason she didn’t feel that it would be part of her life in Svardia—instinctively knowing that this dress belonged to the five days of freedom a girl called Marit had been given, rather than the Princess who would soon become second in line to the throne. It would be a crime for this dress never to be seen in public and Marit was about to tell the assistant she’d changed her mind, but the woman had already whisked the dress away to be wrapped up.
When she emerged from the dressing room in the small boutique she almost stopped dead in her tracks. Lykos’s tall frame lounged in a leather armchair, one leg bent lazily over the other. His elbow was pressed into the arm of the chair, his chin propped up by his thumb and his temple speared by his fingers and, despite the fact that his eyes were closed, he exuded such an air of sensuality that the other customer in the shop had stopped to stare.
Marit’s heart stuttered and she pressed her thighs together, trying to quash the pulse of heat that flashed outward across her entire body.
‘Are you done?’ Lykos asked Marit without opening his eyes.
The other customer squeaked and fled the shop in embarrassment.
‘That was cruel,’ Marit chided as she went to the counter to make the call to the Svardian embassy to arrange payment.
‘She was staring,’ he replied, once again with his eyes closed, making Marit wonder if he had a headache.
‘You’re handsome. It’s not her fault.’
There was a pause before his eyes sprang open and their gazes locked. He looked as if he were about to say something when, thankfully, the embassy answered the phone.
CHAPTER FIVE
HISPHONEBUZZEDin his trouser pocket but he ignored it, unable to take his eyes off Marit as she charmed the ice cream vendor into providing ice creams for what looked like an entire school bus of children. This was not out of the kindness of the vendor’s heart. No. Somehow Lykos was footing the bill.
She turned to look at him directly then, the smile full of bright red lipstick that suited the summery outfit she’d bought from the boutique. Rather than heading straight for stores with famous designers, instead she’d found a little privately owned shop with brightly coloured clothes that reminded Lykos of the films he and Theron used to watch at the open-air screen by the beach in Piraeus.
The dress made Marit’s waist look even smaller, cinched by a broad belt, with a skirt that spun out when she turned, the ballet pumps on her feet more comfortable than stylish, but pretty nonetheless. She walked straight to him, perhaps she too was following the invisible thread between them, making his breath catch in his throat in a rather unmanly way, and returned his wallet to the inside pocket of his jacket, the contact shockingly intimate.
