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“I adopted the dog. You held that Pomeranian in your lap long enough to get your portrait painted, and then never gave the poor wretch another glance.”
Zurri’s stunt had generated the desired effect: young ladies all over the Parmenza region of Italy purchased penny copies of that portrait, and acquired Pomeranians of their own out of solidarity with the prince.
“It was furry,” her brother protested. “I don’t like things with fur. I might not mind—”
“No,” Ammalia said firmly. “That woman is a person, not a Pomeranian. She’s not to become your pet, even for a moment.”
Zurri was not listening to her. His head was cocked to one side, his eyes narrowing with calculation. “She does have good bones, does she not? Perhaps with a bath and a better dress, she might become the English rose I’ve been looking for.”
“No,” Ammalia said again, the word coming out strangled.
Her relationship with Zurri was like this. Though they loved each other, he and Ammalia had sniped and fought with each other for so long, they didn’t know any other way to interact. If Zurri saw something his sister wanted, he took it from her. Ammalia didn’t even have this woman, and already her brother was plotting how to take possession.
Interest from her brother could only spell disaster. For the poor young woman, who would either be leg-shackled to a spoilt brat—or publicly discarded by him in front of all her peers, with no more thought than he’d given the Pomeranian.
Ammalia wouldn’t be able to gather the gorgeous woman up and take her home. Not after a public rejection by the prince. Instead, Ammalia would be forced to leave her behind…
Or else watch her become Parmenza’s next princess and future queen. Living under the same roof, yet untouchable. For the rest of Ammalia’s life.
Chapter Three
“He’s looking at us!” Stasia squealed. “The prince is looking right at us!”
Cynthia didn’t even flick a glance in his direction. She couldn’t have moved if she tried. It was as though she and Princess Ammalia stood at opposite ends of a glass tunnel. The rest of the world was still out there, muffled and distorted, but the only object of perfect clarity was off in front of her, tantalizing and out of reach.
Longing shot through Cynthia, sharp enough to steal her breath. She swayed forward toward Princess Ammalia’s piercing blue gaze.
“It’s me.” Dorothea flipped her long brown hair with confidence. “He’s looking at me.”
The crowd surged closer, squeezing around Cynthia and her stepsisters like a human boa constrictor, each vertebra made up of unwed young women, desperate to insert themselves in view of the prince’s gaze.
With a jerk, the carriage moved forward once again. The prince grabbed his sister’s elbow, forcibly turning the princess to face him.
Her attention lost, the spell was broken. The glass tunnel, shattered. Cynthia’s unsteady limbs wobbled adrift without the incessant swell of the crowd to prop her up.
“When is the grand ball?” she gasped, once she could draw breath.
“Tonight,” Dorothea replied absently, still waving her arms at the retreating prince. “Nine o’clock.”
Cynthia could see no more of Princess Ammalia but the back of her glossy black chignon as the eight white horses pulled the gilded carriage out of view.
This could not be Cynthia’s last sight of her. It could not.
She spun toward her stepsisters. “You have invitations to the ball?”
Dorothea rolled her eyes. “Unnecessary. All unmarried young women are invited, at the prince’s bequest. How is he supposed to select the prettiest flower if his garden is incomplete?”
“Where are the festivities to be held? At the assembly rooms down the street?” Excitement bubbled in Cynthia’s veins. “That’s walking distance from our house.”
“Stasia and I won’t be walking,” Dorothea snapped. “Obviously we’ll hire a carriage.”
A carriage! A grand ball! That magnificent princess!
“I’m going with you,” Cynthia whispered.
That got both sisters’ attention.
Dorothea wrinkled her nose as though Cynthia were something rancid found on the bottom of her shoe.
