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“Sure, Mama.”
She shut the door then took a seat in the nook beside my vanity. She crossed her legs and sat with a straight spine, like she had to balance an invisible bowl upon her head. Her hands came together on her knee. “I just wanted to see if everything was alright.”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
“Your father said you didn’t want to train today.”
“Oh…I was just tired.”
“You’ve never been too tired before.” Her stare was intrusive, like she could see behind my mask to the truth underneath. It was one of her supernatural mom abilities, when she could read my mind just with that powerful stare. “And your father said your eyes looked sad.”
I guess my father was observant too.
Instead of interrogating me, she let the tense silence do all the work.
“Um…I was kinda seeing someone, but I’m not anymore.” I didn’t hide things from my mother, but I also didn’t go out of my way to tell her details like this either. It wasn’t ladylike of me to have lovers when I was a princess, so I did my best to keep that as secretive as possible. But my mother never scolded me for it. Once I’d reached a certain age, she’d stopped asking me these kinds of questions and respected my privacy.
“Are you okay?”
“I’ll get over it.”
“It’s the artist, isn’t it?”
Shit. “How—how did you know?”
“His sculpture.”
I was going to kill that motherfucker. “Well—uh—yeah.”
“Don’t worry. Your father didn’t notice. His mind is always somewhere else when he has those events.”
“Thank the gods.”
She gave a chuckle. “Sounds like an intense relationship.”
“It was just physical.” I avoided my mother’s gaze as I said that.
“I hope I’m not making you uncomfortable, Harlow. You don’t have to share any of this with me if you don’t want to.”
I turned back to her. “You aren’t disappointed in me?”
“Why would I be?”
“Well…I mean…I’m not a virgin.”
“You think I was a virgin when I met your father?” she asked with a slight laugh.
My eyebrows nearly popped off my face.
“I’d been with men before your father. I had a thing with one of my father’s guards when I was your age. There’s nothing you’ve done that I haven’t done myself, Harlow. Don’t be ashamed.”
“Have I ever told you how cool you are?”
She smiled. “I’m cool now because you’re an adult. But we butted headsa lotwhen you were little.”
“Well, I was a brat.”
“Not a brat,” she said quickly. “Opinionated and hardheaded is how I would put it.”
