AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She nodded, then pulled the door closed, leaving Alexandra alone with Diamandis. Nerves and concern fluttered in her chest. But she kept her face carefully arranged in an expression of condescending distrust.
“Whatever we have to discuss should likely wait for Lysias.”
“He is not here?”
“He will be,” she said with more certainty than she felt.
“Well, I will need to speak to him as well, but perhaps this is better first between the two of us. About the test.”
There was something different about the man. There was still that icy control, a tightly wound posture that spoke of wrought iron determination.
Yet the usual anger did not seem to flame in his eyes, and he stepped forward and gently took her hands in his. Much as she had to him the other day.
“I have heard from the doctor. The DNA match is inarguable. You are indeed Zandra. It’s hard for me to fathom how that came to be, but I want to assure you that I am grateful it is. Even if you don’t remember me.”
She stood, frozen by the words. Words she knew were false. The results were a fake. She wasn’ttrulythe princess.
Except you don’t know for sure, because Lysias had the results doctored without even finding the truth.
“I suppose it doesn’t make much sense to you that I didn’t believe. Who else would go around poking throats?” he chuckled, but there was a thickness to his voice that spoke of pure devotion. “My baby sister was the only one I’ve ever encountered who has done so.”
Thatwas why he’d reacted so strangely. The princess had done so to him before. But...
Before she could make sense of it or find words, the door flew open, and Lysias strode in looking furious.
“What are you doing in here?” he demanded of Diamandis.
Diamandis’s calm demeanor changed, that flash of temper back in his eyes. But he didn’t tense or drop her hands. “Lysias. The test results have come back.”
Lysias eyed Diamandis’s hands, then Alexandra’s face. She wondered what he saw—what was real reaction and what was an act. She thought she could see through him, but he was nothing but a mask today.
“So, you finally believe me, then?” Lysias said.
The king dropped her hands gently, then fully turned to face Lysias, shoulders back, chin up. He was stiff, formal, but not antagonistic. “I owe you an apology.”
Lysias raised an eyebrow. “Naturally.”
“Not for disbelieving,” the king said, though he was clearly irritated with Lysias’s flippancy. “I think I had every right to be suspicious,” Diamandis said between gritted teeth. “But I was harder than I needed to be. And more... I don’t expect it to matter, to change your opinion of what happened.” Diamandis looked back at Alexandra, and she wanted to not believe the kindness she saw lurking in his expression, but surely there wassomegood in this man.
He turned his attention back to Lysias. “I was not the one who gave the order to have your parents executed with the traitors. I was...not myself in the days after the attack. I wrongly relied on my advisors to make the decisions of how to deal with the coup. They have since been dealt with, but it remains a mistake I have regretted for quite some time.”
“Perhaps you would have ordered the same if youhadmade the decisions,” Lysias replied with absolutely no softening. Even as Alexandra felt herself warm to the man who thought himself her brother.
“Perhaps I would have, you are right,” Diamandis agreed. “And I realize this is unforgivable. I do not seek your forgiveness. But I have seen the way you care for her and she for you. So I will grant you my permission for your marriage.”
Alexandra’s heart twisted. With pain at Diamandis being kind. With guilt over it not being true. And worst of all, longing. That this was all real and true. That she would have a chance to marry Lysias. Maybe even have a family in Diamandis.
But she saw the look on Lysias’s face and knew this was not to be.
“I don’t recall asking you for permission, Diamandis,” Lysias said, wondering if he sounded as casual as he attempted to, or if everything swirling inside of him leaked out through the mask. There was a fury inside of him, and he knew he could not unleash it. His revenge would give him everything he wanted.
But seeing them stand so close... The man who’d once been his best friend, who wasapologizingand trying to excuse away his parents’ murder. The woman...
He’d saved her as a girl. Somehow, some way. He had put her in that tunnel and started some unknown domino of events that had led her here.
Here.
Alive and beautiful. A fierce woman. A fighter, an avenger, and yet there was a softness in her. A great capacity for feeling and passion. There was no one like Alexandra, and on top of all that, she was royalty. The long-lost princess.
