Her earlier worries returned in full force.
“Thank you. It’s nice to meet you, too.”
“Clara,” Cass broke in before either woman could say anything else, “would you give Briony a tour of the palace? Just a quick one, twenty minutes or so, and then bring her to Alaric’s study?”
He ignored Clara’s indignant huff and kept his gaze on Briony. His eyes gleamed. Cold tendrils of suspicion sank deeper into her skin.
“Cass, what’s going on?”
He gently cupped her upper arms in a surprisingly intimate gesture.
“I’m speaking with King Daxon and Prince Alaric privately before I introduce you. Is Alaric in his office?” he asked as he released her and turned to Clara.
“PrinceAlaric,” Clara snapped, “and yes—”
“Excellent.” Cass started to walk away.
“After I take you to—” Clara started to say.
“I know the way. Thank you.”
Cass strode confidently down one side hallway without a backward glance. Clara stared daggers at his retreating back. But when her eyes flickered to Briony, she recognized the emotion lurking in the other woman’s gaze.
Pity.
Cass’s blood pounded through his veins as he neared Alaric’s private office. Nineteen years. Nineteen long years of biding his time, of having plan after plan dashed, only to have his archnemesis himself hand him the key he needed to unlock both Linnaea’s salvation and his family’s vengeance.
He’d almost ruined it, too, with that damned slipup with Briony earlier. Kissing her on the plane had been a mistake, one that had shocked him at how quickly he’d succumbed to the surge of lust. Between his anger at her accusations and the unsated passion that had been building between them for a week, he’d acted on instinct. He’d seen the look on her face. She’d been just as affected as him, which was both incredibly sexy and very concerning. He couldn’t let Briony think for even a second that they could have a relationship where their attraction ruled over common sense.
But then she’d walked out and she’d looked absolutely stunning, every inch a future princess. She had picked the lavender dress, a gown that had looked almost plain to him when he’d seen them laid out across the bed. But on Briony, with her vivid red curls and bare shoulders thrown back as if she owned the palace, she was mesmerizing. Who knew elegant could be so subtly sexy?
As the limo had drawn closer to the palace, the silence between them had filled the interior, thick and oppressive. For the first time since he’d begun his quest, he knew a moment of true doubt, not just the vague morality questions that he’d brushed aside. Linnaea was in trouble. He was ensuring a steady flow of money into the country, money he could oversee and ensure went to good use instead of a worthless real estate project or kickbacks to political cronies; it was the right thing to do.
And his aunt deserved to have her revenge against the man who had driven her and her family to the point of ruin.
But as he’d looked between the approaching palace and Briony, looking so strong and lovely and yet also lost among the cavernous backdrop of the grand hall he’d guided her to, he wondered if the cost of his success was too much.
He turned down another richly carpeted hallway, this one less cluttered with marble statues and priceless paintings than the others. While Daxon insisted on featuring his most costly purchases throughout the main wing seen most by the public, Alaric had managed to slowly but surely clear the hall that housed his office.
As a child, he’d never been in this part of the palace. When he’d first stepped foot in here a month ago, he’d been escorted between two armed guards. He could still see the smug, arrogant smile on Daxon’s face when the tall wooden door had swung in and revealed the nephew of his former lover-turned-enemy.
How satisfying it had been to see conceit drain from the old mongrel’s face when Cass had plonked not only copies of Aunt Alecine’s documentation on the table, but a file on the long-lost princess of Linnaea.
He approached the same door and knocked once. For a moment, there was silence. Then the door swung open.
“Cassius.”
Cass was tall, exceptionally so, but even Alaric stood above him by an inch or two. The heir to the Linnaean throne was a larger, more masculine version of his sire. Where Daxon’s face had an almost delicate quality, Alaric’s was made up of hard lines and a sharpness that had enhanced his reputation as a notoriously private yet fierce leader. Daxon had tied his son’s hands on many matters. But the few things he did allow his son control over, Alaric took and ran with a leadership that even Cass grudgingly admired. If there was one thing Cass was certain of, it was that Alaric hated Daxon almost as much as, if not more than, he did.
“Alaric.”
Alaric’s eyes, a similar emerald to that of his sister’s, narrowed at the lack of formal address. Few people dared to push the buttons of a man who was rumored to be even colder than his father.
“Is she here?”
Cass nodded.
“Did she sign?”