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Not you?asked a voice inside him. Mocking him.
Reminding him who he really was.
“I will not be returning to any ‘pursuits,’” he gritted out.
Quite apart from having made vows to Melody, he had made a promise to his brother. His King.
Griffin released his grip on the glass, his gaze on his bride. “Idylla has seen more than its share of scandals. There will be no more. Not if I have anything to say about it.”
And his new bride bent her head as if to curtsy before him, small and meek, and why was he having trouble with that? Why was he looking for more?
“Then it is as good as done,” she said softly. As if she was in danger of being carried off by the next breeze. “I am sure of it.”
Griffin told himself he was, too.
CHAPTER THREE
MELODYANDHERbrand-new, confusing stranger of a husband were summoned—invited, she kept reminding herself, though did it count as an invitation when it couldn’t be refused?—to a “cozy” Boxing Day morning with Their Royal Majesties, King Orion and Queen Calista of Idylla.
In the palace proper, which was unlikely to becozyin any way. By definition.
Then again, it wasn’t as if the holiday had ever been filled with anything resembling cheer in her parents’ house, either. Or coziness. Or much in the way of goodwill toward men—or anyone.
“I trust you find everything in your rooms acceptable,” Griffin said when he came to collect her outside said rooms. “You must let the staff know if anything does not suit you.”
Even his voice sounded stiff and gruffly awkward. Melody wasn’t the least surprised to find that when he once again guided her hand to grip his elbow, his entire body could have been confused for a column of granite.
As if he was the one who was out of place here, in this own home, instead of her.
Oddly, this made her feel more comfortable.
“I’m overcome by your generosity, Your Royal Highness,” she said in as decent an impression of his wooden formality as she could muster up.
And then tried to remind herself that she was supposed to be awash in all her fraudulent cringing as he led her back toward the palace.
Half of her attention was on the route Griffin took, different from the night before. He went out the side of his house—theirhouse, she corrected herself—and led her back into the courtyard that separated his residence from the palace. Melody breathed in deep, enjoying the faint, salt sting of the ocean breeze tinged with hints of far-off storms. And reveled in the chill in the air, in case she’d forgotten that it was December. She noticed the blasts of heat again, placed at clever intervals, just when she thought the winter chill might penetrate her skin.
She was keenly aware that Griffin was walking at a deeply sedate pace that was almost certainly for her benefit, as he was far too tall. With, presumably, the long legs to match. He couldn’t possibly consider thisprocessiona reasonable pace. Melody tried to tell herself that it was kind of him to slow down in a misguided attempt to cater to her needs, whether she actually needed him to do it or not. It was something she ought to appreciate, surely.
It wasn’t as if she’d had a lot of kindness, particularly from men. She ought to have been basking in any faint sign of it.
But she couldn’t quite get there. Because the rest of her attention was focused on the deeply pleasurable, if unconventional, wedding night she’d had.
Griffin had delivered her to her rooms and then left her to her own devices. That had included a tray of food from his kitchens that she tore into the moment she finally freed herself from that enormous gown. Only when she’d finally eaten enough to stave off the hollow feeling in her belly after a long day of performing her fragility did she and Fen, her sensei and friend since Melody was small, set about learning each and every contour of her new home.
Fen had been old and wizened when she’d started teaching Melody at the tender age of seven, or so she liked to claim. And as each year passed, she became more and more herself.Earning the right to her bones, she liked to say.
And what her bones liked the most that night was making sure Melody could navigate the house she found herself in with as much silent ease as she had her parents’ home.
They’d started in Melody’s rooms and then, when the household had gone quiet for the night, had fanned out to the rest of Prince Griffin’s domain, taking it room by room, chamber by chamber, until Melody had memorized the layout of her new home as best she could on an initial sweep.
Then she and Fen had returned to their upgraded royal apartments and settled into their new and improved life of luxury.
“I am all right with this Prince,” Fen said happily as she’d gone off to her own private room in Melody’s suite. “So far.”
“As am I,” Melody had murmured as Fen’s footsteps faded away, leaving her to her lovely new bedchamber, stocked with quietly elegant furnishings that warmed beneath her hands and complete with an honest-to-God four-poster bed with a princess canopy.
Nothing Melody had ever wanted or dreamed of, necessarily. But she was happy to have it all the same, and with so little required of her in return.
