Henna’s discomfort increased and she was self-conscious in the dress that she’d worn because...well, she couldn’t come to a Michelin-starred restaurant to dump a king in her office clothes. But, unfortunately, she was tired, incredibly hungry and didn’t like being ordered around by Aleksander, who—when he was inthismood—was incredibly unpredictable and liable to manipulate small countries. She wanted to tell him that she wasn’t a dog, but instead a polite, ‘No, thank you. I should be getting back,’ slipped from her lips.
‘Henna, sit down.’ It wasn’t a request and even the discreet security team stood up that little bit taller.
‘Yes, sir,’ she said quietly as she sat down in the chair.
‘Don’t, sir me,’ he said under his breath as much as she had.
‘Then don’t behave like an—’ She could have bitten off her own tongue. Had she really been about to call the King of Svardia anarse?
Once again, Aleksander laughed, which seemed to surprise him as much as her and completely changed the mood in the room. Apparently having decided it was safe, the head waiter came over and offered them a menu each. Even though Aleksander studied it intently, she couldn’t shake the feeling thatshewas the object of his considerable attention.
Henna accepted the menu with a smile and waited while the waiter poured them each a glass of water and explained that they were welcome to order from the menu or, if they would like, the chef had prepared a special meal with wine pairings that was, in his humble opinion, excellent.
‘That would be wonderful, Jakob, thank you,’ Aleksander replied, gently snatching the menu from her fingers and handing it back to the waiter.
Reluctantly, she let a smile pull at the corner of her mouth. There was a cheek to his actions and a spark in his eyes she’d not seen for a very long time. This was who she remembered. Not the manipulator, not the brooding power of the throne—him.
‘So, I’m behaving like an—’
‘Only, apparently, on special occasions such as these,’ she fired back, belatedly shocked by her audacity.
‘Special occasions?’ he asked.
‘When you’re left to your own devices you have a tendency to become...’
‘A monster?’
‘Hardly. A beast, perhaps.’
He inclined his head to the side, as if sayingtouché.
‘Great, big, hairy—’
‘That’s quite enough of that, thank you,’ he said as the waiter appeared with a bottle of wine and Henna felt a warmth in her chest, radiating outwards. Really, she should have known better, because Aleksander was like one of the very best predators, lulling his prey into a false sense of security before striking. Because that was precisely what he did the moment the waiter left.
‘Tell me what happened between you and Viveca.’
Aleksander half wished he could take the question back. Beneath the soft lighting in the restaurant, Henna had visibly paled. But something had happened between Henna and her sister and it was something bad. A protective instinct had risen in him watching their interaction and he neither liked it or wanted it in his life and had therefore decided that only by knowing what had happened would he be able to remove it.
‘It is none of your business,’ she said tightly, and he could see how much it cost her to refuse his demand.
She reached for her wine, her fingers plucking the thin stem from the table and bringing the rim of the glass to her lips. It was wrong of him to be so aware of a woman so clearly angry with him. But it was more than anger. He could tell—just as he had done the first time they had met—that she was holding back an avalanche of hurt and he didn’t like it. He’d never liked it.
‘Tell me and I will find a secretary,’ he offered, utterly aware of how much work she had shouldered on his behalf in recent months.
This time it was Henna who laughed. It was half disbelief, half humour, and it was all honest. That was a hard thing to find when you were King and a long-forgotten part of him was delighted.
‘A secretaryanda fiancée. Just make sure you don’t get them confused.’
‘That really would give the press something to talk about,’ he mused.
‘And the palace HR department, I’m sure.’
The gentle humour lay between them, heated in the flame of the table’s candle and evaporated. He could see her thoughts turn back to his question, could read the internal struggle she was having at the thought of telling him. He held his breath until a sigh signalled her defeat.
‘You’re aware I stayed in Svardia when Freya went to Switzerland for her degree?’
Aleksander nodded, remembering. His sister had desperately wanted to stand on her own two feet, be truly independent for the three years of her studies without protection officers or assistants and staff. And although their father had agreed, he’d lied and had secretly sent an undercover bodyguard, Kjell, to keep an eye on her. It had been devastating for his sister when she’d discovered the truth.