Royal Crush

Twenty-Two

CAMILLO

Waking up to Aleric like this was strange. My morning routine had always been private—the healthcare workers my parents hired to take care of me after the accident had been impersonal and under strict orders to keep everything under wraps. I forced myself to think of them like robots in order to cope with the fact that they had to touch me in the most intimate places and see me at my most vulnerable.

And while I eventually got used to it and learned to do almost everything on my own, it didn’t change the fact that I’d made a vow to myself. Even if I did fall in love with someone, I would never let them see me like that. We could be like the couples in medieval times where they kept separate bedrooms, met for sex, and then retired to their own spaces.