Alaric shifted in his seat. I could sense that my words were making him slightly uncomfortable.
Silence filled the air. I took another sip of my whiskey, eager to hear what the king had to say.
“Ava is going to be presented as the princess in less than a month. If she has any chance of not being a royal embarrassment, she is going to need to start taking her lessons seriously. Starting tomorrow, she will be spending the entire morning with Oscar and Giselle. If I’m not happy with her progress in a week, it will be the whole damn day.”
A tinge of disappointment ran through me. I’d hoped that the king might listen to my words, offer his hand to Ava in a way that might connect her to him, and the kingdom.
“And if she is not where I need her to be a week afterthat, then I will consider scrapping it all, sending her back to the States.”
“You will?”
“I’d rather leave the kingdom to whatever squabbling third and fourth cousins might come out of the woodwork than give it to a daughter who does not take it seriously. At least there’s a chance they might want it. She will renounce her title and go back to her lobster truck or whatever it is.”
“Crab cakes.”
He raised his finger. “Speaking of which, I want you to keep your distance. That means no more cooking parties in the royal kitchen. I don’t care if you gave all the food to the staff like you two did, it’s too much of a distraction. Focus less on my daughter, and more on your duties here in the palace.”
“Alaric, I—”
“That’s my final word on the matter. That will be all.”
Part of me wanted to stay, to try to talk some sense into him. The greater part of me, however, knew that when the king put his foot down, that was it.
“As you wish, Your Majesty.”
He nodded, his eyes still on the fire. I rose, threw back the rest of my whiskey, and left. Minutes later I was on my floor, passing Ava’s room. I could tell by the crack of light underneath the door that she was in there.
I desperately wanted to see her.
I held back. Truth be told, I was lucky that Alaric hadn’t found out about us. I put my desires aside, heading back to my room.
I was to give her distance. King’s orders were king’s orders, no matter what my heart might’ve craved.
Chapter 21
Ava
Oscar and Giselle’s voices rang in my mind as I dragged myself up the palace stairs. I could still feel their eyes on me—two pairs of narrowed peepers burning holes in me as I left the day’s lesson. I was eager for a nap, eager for rest, eager to ignore how with each passing day I felt more and more lost and out of place.
Most of all, I missed Luc. It’d only been two days since our little kitchen tryst, but there was no mistaking how he’d been ignoring me, going out of his way not to see or talk to me. Why? Had he just wanted sex and that was it? I mean, I knew men liked to think with their dick, but I couldn’t help but feel that seducing the princess only to toss her aside was a lot of effort to then ignore her.Especially when a man that looked like him probably had to swat women away like flies.
Either way, I wanted to see him. I didn’t like to dwell on it, but I couldn’t help but wonder why he hadn’t been around. As I made the last steps up the stairs only to spot Kinley, the palace tailor, waiting at my door, I pushed the thoughts out of my head. I might’ve been new to this royal life of mine, but I didn’t need any special training to know that I couldn’t be seen walking around the palace sulking over the king’s right hand.
“Hello!” Kinley said, her eyes wide and her smile warm and genuine. “I mean, greetings, Princess!” Kinley stood next to a wheeled clothes rack, a big black dress bag hanging from it.
“You don’t need to do all that formal stuff,” I said. “I’m pretty much bombing the whole being a princess thing, so it doesn’t make much sense to worry about calling me that.”
“Something wrong?” she asked.
I paused, realizing I was dumping on the poor girl.
“Sorry, it’s just been a particularly rough session with Oscar and Giselle.”
An expression of understanding showed on her face. “Oh, I know exactly what you mean.”
“Really?”
“Really. Anyone who works here at the palace has to take etiquette training lessons, a month of them, in fact. The king loves his tradition and protocol, so we have to spend a little time learning how to properly walk and such for when VIPs are here. I wasterribleat it. I swear, by hour ten of walking about with those books on my head only to have them fall to the ground, I was positive that Oscar was going to lose his mind.”