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Turns out, we should have returned to the prince’s chambers for dick-sucking because my unoccupied mouth gets me into a heap of drama.
I had thought Torben told me we’d meet with the queen’s advisors about the announcement tomorrow on the plaza. Sable was set to meet with me to decide on an outfit. I’d also been told that we’d begin some preliminary wedding planning. I’d been looking forward to tasting cakes and appetizers cooked by the palace chefs.
But all I get is a tour of the palace and the grounds by Torben, and not the palace historian.
I don’t think anything of it, telling myself that plans change. And Torben is more than capable of delivering an off-the-cuff speech to his people to make a simple announcement. I can wear the same outfit I wore off the plane if necessary. Flora would be horrified that I’m okay with being seen twice in the same dress, but she’s nowhere to be seen on our tour of the palace grounds.
In the hedge maze, I blurt out a question I didn’t know I had.
“Do you and Kala have history?”
Torben picks off a wayward leaf, disrupting the smooth edges of the circular, spiraling maze.
“History? Do you mean dating history? No, absolutely not.”
He seems stiff and agitated, and now I have more questions.
“Huh.”
“What is the ‘huh’ about?” Torben asks.
“Kala seemed surprised to meet me. In fact, she seemed to not realize that we were engaged. We’ve been all over the news here in your country. Social media is bananas about us for some reason. The streets were filled with people celebrating our arrival. And when I checked Pinterest a minute ago, there were about a hundred tutorials on making a copycat jeweled headband by Sable. Why did she act like she had no idea she’d be meeting me or that I existed?”
“I have no idea,” he answers.
That answer is not good enough. So I press. “She seemed really into you,” I say.
“She’s not. Can we drop it?” Torben now strides several paces ahead of me, not making eye contact.
For a moment, I feel bad for prying.
But wait a minute. This is my future husband. There’s obviously some sort of history between them. I’ve told him all about my exes to agonizing degrees. He’s only told me that he’d had chaperoned dates and was a virgin before he met me. What gives?
I don’t run after him, though. I plant my feet in the middle of the row and wait.
After a few more paces, he pauses, turning back to look at me. “Are you coming?”
“As soon as you tell me the deal with Kala.”
“It’s embarrassing.”
“Not nearly as embarrassing as Henry, the identity stealer, though, right?”
“Did your father invoke an obsolete and disgusting law of the monarchy by betrothing you to someone when you were a child?”
Right here and now, I decide to stop acting surprised about the behaviors of monarchs. Internally though, I’m screaming. What the fuck?
“No, he did not,” I say calmly. “Because we are not a royal family, and although we do have a few iffy family trees where I come from, that is gross and illegal.”
Torben loses his cool for the first time in my presence. But I don’t feel the ire directed at me. He’s been bottling this up for a while. “Well, he did!” Torben points vaguely toward the palace. “And I don’t want to talk about it right now.”
“Okay. We don’t have to talk about it now.”
He shifts his weight from one foot to the other.
“Do you want to be alone for a few minutes?”
“I don’t want to run away from you,” he says.
