“Would’ve thought that’d have been the royal choice,” Hud said, a grin on his face that made it clear he was pleased with his joke.
Her icy blue eyes looked down at the plate, then back up at me. I got the impression she was trying her best not to crack.
“Fine.” She took the plate.
“See? Doesn’t matter if you’re living on Skid Row or if you’re the Princess of Candara—no one can say no to a plate of spaghetti and garlic bread.”
“I don’t want to eat with you all,” she said, turning her nose up a bit. “I want to eat in my room.”
Sarcastic whines came from the guys.
“What,” I asked, “we don’t get the pleasure of your company during dinner? What a shame.” I crossed my arms over my chest. “You want to eat alone, fine. But you’re going to spend a little time outside of your room. At least eat somewhere here on the first floor.”
She scoffed. “Fine. But I’m going to eat by myself.”
“Suit yourself, Princess,” Ajax said. “The less, the merrier, in this case.”
Without another word, she hurried over to the fridge and opened it, pulling out a bottle of mineral water. That and the plate in hand, she quickly left the kitchen and made her way to the dining room, sitting alone at the table and starting her meal.
“That counts as a small victory, right?” I asked. “She didn’t throw that plate at any of us, and she agreed to eat down here.”
Hud laughed. “Now, that’s looking on the bright side, lad. By the time this mission’s over, we might have her saying a whole sentence to us without scoffing or rolling her eyes.”
I chuckled, shaking my head as I made another plate. I passed that to Hud, then made one more for Ajax.
“You boys get started without me,” I said as I made a third. “I’m going to bring this to our man outside.”
The guys, never ones to stand around on ceremony, dug in. There was plenty of food, more than enough for leftovers for tomorrow’s lunch. I passed the dining room, glancing in to see Victoria sitting at the end of the table. She was eating like mad, half the food gone. No doubt in my mind that she’d pushed her bratty routine to the point of wild hunger.
“There’s plenty more in there if you want it,” I said, poking my head in. “Feel free to go for seconds.”
She snapped her attention to me, her eyes wide with surprise and her full lips smeared with red sauce.
“What?”
I laughed.
“Help yourself,” I said, nodding back toward the kitchen.
Still looking at me, she quickly wiped her face without saying a word.
I decided to leave her alone. Moments later, I was making my way through the back stretch of the property around the pool and toward the panic room where Kid was stationed. I didn’t like not having anyone on patrol, but he assured me that, once we had the panic room going, we wouldn’t need to. Reaching the door, I knocked on it as I pushed it open.
“Dinner bell,” I said, stepping inside.
The monitors in the space were all lit up with footage from around the property, along with plenty in the house.
“Ah, thanks, P.” Kid eagerly took his feet off the desk and turned around in his chair, taking the plate from my hands and digging in.
As he ate, I looked around at the screens.
“Looks like we’re pretty well set up,” I said.
“Sure as hell are. Got the place wired up. There’s not a single inch of the property up to the tree line that isn’t on camera. Best part is that I got the motion detectors going too. See this big monitor here?”
He nodded to the biggest monitor in the room, the one right in front of the desk.
“If we get movement, it’ll show up here.”