Chapter Eleven
SHE COULDN’T SLEEP. The bed was beautiful, and comfortable, and she was exhausted from everything that had happened in the last twelve hours, but she still couldn’t sleep.
She was dressed in a soft gown that had been provided by Andrei, and part of her felt that she should perhaps resist his gifts. Resist wearing the clothing that he had provided for her, resist… The food, everything.
Except she couldn’t. She was pregnant, and she needed to take care of herself. And also she just… The dichotomy of her feelings for him was overwhelming.
Because in many ways, he was still the man who she had loved for more than half of her life, and then suddenly he was a stranger.
The son of a crime lord. And he looked ruthless. Capable of doing everything his father had done and then some.
She lived in a world where blood was everything.
Royal blood meant that you had a duty to the Crown, to the kingdom, to your people.
She had long believed that her blood meant that she was destined to be like her mother.
To do what she had done, did that mean that Andrei was always destined for this?
For a sort of ruthlessness that defied morality?
And then, part of it… She had to take some responsibility for.
She padded out of the bedroom and walked silently down the halls, the carpet soft beneath her bare feet as she went back toward where they had eaten their dinner. Then she walked through that room and into the kitchen. She startled when she saw Rebecca, standing there in front of the oven.
“Oh. Hello,” she said. “I’m just making raisin bread for tomorrow. It’s about to come out of the oven. Would you like a slice?”
Emerald’s stomach growled. “I—I would.”
“Have a seat, dear.”
Emerald did and watched as Rebecca moved efficiently around the kitchen. She took the loaf of bread out of the oven, and turned the loaf pan upside down. Then she busied herself grabbing some butter, putting the kettle on.
“Tea or hot chocolate?”
“I would… I’d like a hot chocolate,” she whispered.
“Wonderful. That will be a nice late-night treat.”
“Have you been working like this at the house even without Andrei here?”
“No. I received a message that the house was being opened up again, and I hoped it was for him. I came the week before to make sure everything was good for him. He was such a lovely boy.”
She couldn’t help herself. She laughed. “He is… A slightly different sort of man.”
Rebecca made a regretful sound. “I was worried about that. I always hated that with the children who would visit. Eventually, they would become so hard. By the time they were fifteen almost all of them had killed someone on behalf of their family. An initiation into that life.”
“Did you always work for families of organized crime?”
She shrugged. “It was often the most secure work here in this part of the world. I always served the Ardelean family. And so, the money that I have always gotten is blood money. Though, all of that changed when Andrei’s father died. But he left us money. His staff was cared for in the end.”
“That seems such a contradiction. That someone could be so ruthless, and yet remember the people who worked for him with so much loyalty.”
“That is the attraction of it. You make for yourself your own kingdom, your own people, your own laws. And you offer fearsome loyalty in return.”
“But it’s all dangerous.”
She shrugged again. “Life is dangerous. As I said, I think the most tragic part is watching the children lose their softness. Because the men in this world, they are so hard. The women too, some of them. Andrei’s mother was a great beauty.
He has the look of his father in his eyes, but, his mother’s features.
They fought bitterly, the two of them. And yet they loved fiercely.
Or at least they were obsessed with one another. ”
Emerald’s stomach turned. “That sounds like a terribly brutal way to love.”
“I suppose it is,” Rebecca said. “But then, I think none of them knew another way to be. I think none of them knew another sort of life. Except this painful, life-and-death allegiance.” She set the cup of hot chocolate in front of Emerald, and then, slipped the loaf from the pan without using an oven mitt, her hands obviously toughened from years of cooking.
“Do you have a family?”
She shook her head. “No. I was devoted to the children who came here. When they left, I lost everything. I helped raise Andrei’s father too.
Andrei was different. He was kinder from the beginning.
When I heard that he had escaped, when I heard the news of him being in your country, I rejoiced.
I had hoped that it might make him less feral. ”
“I thought you said he was lovely?”
“He was. Lovely, and feral.”
“Well, some of this is my fault.”
“I find with passion it is often just messy.” She slid a slice of bread in front of Emerald, who buttered it generously, the butter melting, pooling on the sweet bread, and she picked it up and ate it fiercely.
“Well. It’s complicated.”
“I’m certain. Something is making you sleepless.”
“It could just be the events of the day.”
“There is a library, just to the left of the dining room. You might find something to help you while away your sleepless hours.”
“Oh. That sounds lovely.”
“It is,” Rebecca said cheerfully. What life must it have been, to serve generations of mafiosi, to constantly be around the fringes of so much violence, but to be the one providing softness, food for the children.
It was such a strange thing. Emerald hadn’t had a life free of struggles. She had lost her parents, and it had affected her deeply. But her life was quite limited in its scope.
There were things she never had to consider, like how she would make money and survive without the aid of the Crown.
It made her wonder about the lives of the people who worked in the palace and Basilia. The people who worked in Alabria. She took a sharp breath, and thanked Rebecca for the sustenance before taking herself out of the room and determining that she would explore the library.
She still wasn’t tired. No. In contrast, she was invigorated, her thoughts churning.
She wandered down the hall, past some rooms that were dimly lit, empty. It was interesting how many spaces were in this house that didn’t look like they had ever been used. Or perhaps that was simply the result of the cleaning. And certain spaces hadn’t found their use yet.
Would she give birth to their child here?
Just thinking about spending nearly nine more months cooped up here, with a man who despised her as much as he had ever wanted her, filled her with the improbable twins of dread and hope.
Because on the one hand it was difficult to stand being in the same room as him at the moment.
But on the other hand, for many long years he had been the person she cared for most, next to her brother.
It wasn’t like it had vanished just because things were difficult between them now.
She was surprised to see light flooding out of the library into the hall, and she paused before entering. Then her heart froze.
Andrei was in there, sitting by the fire in a large armchair, holding a book in one hand.
It was as if he sensed her presence. He looked up, his eyes finding hers unerringly.
Like they always did.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
“You’ve interrupted nothing,” he said, intangible emotion burning in his gaze. She could see it even from across the room. But he was, of course, never going to talk about it. Not going to admit it.
“I couldn’t sleep.”
“What a strange phenomenon.”
“It must be strange,” she said. “Being here.” She was going to try to be nonconfrontational. She hadn’t expected to see him again tonight, but she had. So it seemed like it would be best if she didn’t start a row when the two of them were already exhausted.
The simple truth was, putting aside the events of the past few weeks, she had known this man since childhood.
She cared for him. And—again forgetting that he was the architect of the current moment—he was back in his childhood home for the first time since before his parents had died.
Confronting so many things that he’d never had to before.
She could perhaps find it in herself to simply connect with him. To do for him what she would’ve done had they not slept together. Had he not kidnapped her. Had they not eroded the foundation of all the care they had for one another in a single night.
“No stranger than anything else,” he said. “I have been a man outside myself ever since that ship went down. Basilia was not my home either.”
“It was,” she said. “My parents cared for you very much. They chose to bring you in and make you part of the family. If they were still alive…”
“What?”
Longing expanded inside her chest. If they were still alive, things would be so different. If they were still alive she would never have sought the marriage with King Lucian. She wouldn’t have had to. There would’ve been other treaties. Other ways that her father handled things.
Why do you think that? Do you really believe that Onyx isn’t the king that your father was?
No. She did. But Onyx was young. Not even thirty yet, and he didn’t have the time on the throne that her father had. If her father were a king now, fifty and with all that experience behind him, then things would be different.
They would all be different.
She wouldn’t have felt so desperate and driven to do this ultimate thing to honor her mother. Everything would be different.
“But it was not my home,” he said. “It was not my destiny. This was, but I cannot even return here and find my destiny because it is gone.”
“You said that you didn’t want it.”