Chapter 4
It’s been over an hour, and I haven’t learned anything useful except that Hex is very good at doing exactly what Virek wanted him to do.
Every time I’ve seen him as I’ve moved around Lord Markell’s house planting listening devices, Hex has been at the heart of the party.
From suckups to romantic hopefuls, everyone has fawned over him.
I can’t say that I’m surprised, but for some reason I’m disappointed that he hasn’t given me any attention since I left his side.
Reminding myself that Hex hates me so he obviously won’t want to spend time with me if he doesn’t have to, I make my way to the game room where the bulk of the guests are to seek out the prince and put my plan into motion.
I take my time, hoping I can catch something incriminating in the conversations around me while I place the last of my bugs.
As if an anti-royalist supporter is going to make themselves known in the middle of a party.
This would be so much easier if I hadn’t grown up firmly in the working class.
At least Markell’s guests have given me good reasons to be grateful for my humble upbringing.
Everywhere I look, someone proves why the anti-royalists have been getting stronger every day; the nobility are kind of terrible, treating each other with equal parts familiarity and contempt.
There’s as much camaraderie as there is envy, everyone eager to maintain the social order while at the same time trying to get a step ahead.
As I slip a listening device on the inner lip of a huge decorative vase, I watch a baron smile at the viscount he’s talking to, then immediately turn and wrinkle his nose in disgust as soon as the viscount’s back is turned.
A duchess’s sister flirts with the son of a baronet while her hungry eyes follow an earl across the room.
The night has been nothing but guise and deception and every man for himself, and yet nothing I’ve seen or heard so far has given me even a hint of anti-royalism ideology.
Either we’re looking in the wrong place, or the noble supporting the cause of the antis is too intelligent to reveal himself even among his own kind.
“Check in, Storme,” Virek says in my earbud.
Pausing in a corner of the game room, I lift my gaze and pretend to admire a painting to give myself an excuse to keep my back to the room.
No one has paid much attention to me all night, like I expected, but I still make sure I’m on my own and won’t be overheard.
“I’ve bugged every room on the ground level and most of the first floor. ”
“I am very glad you chose to avoid the toilets,” Callum mutters.
It takes everything in me not to laugh. Callum rarely talks over comms, preferring to keep his focus on listening to what’s coming in while ensuring the devices are working properly, but when he does speak, it’s always worth hearing.
“How’s our prince doing?” Virek asks.
I frown, far less amused by the question than I was by Callum’s comment. “Can’t you hear everything around him?”
“Unfortunately. But does anyone suspect he isn’t here for the fun of it? We can’t afford for him to become a liability.”
I look to my left, where Hex is deep into a game of cards and failing to hide a smirk as he waits for one of his opponents to take her turn.
No doubt he’s winning whatever game he’s playing.
All around him, aristocrats sip glasses of champagne or bourbon and watch the game with amused interest. No one looks suspicious of the prince.
All I can see is admiration, curiosity, and, in some cases, desire.
“He’s living up to expectations,” I mutter and roll my eyes. As I watch, Hex leans close to his female opponent and gives her his dazzling smile, though there’s a crookedness to it that I’ve never noticed before.
Not that he ever smiles at me, but I thought I knew all the prince’s smiles.
I sigh as jealousy floods my body with uncomfortable heat.
At almost the same moment, Hex glances over at me and narrows his eyes, like he can see my discomfort from clear across the room.
Virek and the rest of the team are likely listening to the conversations happening around the prince, but I should make my way over there.
Maybe I’ll catch something the microphones don’t.
Right as I take a step, a man moves into my path and stops me.
“Might I make an observation, Miss Storme?” His smooth voice sends a shiver through me, as much because of the way he’s examining me as it is because this man is fifth in line for the throne.
The only people in Candora higher in standing than him are the royal family and his father, the Duke of Rensvik.
“It is Storme, isn’t it?” he asks, tilting his head as he studies me with his gray eyes.
He steps around me slowly, prompting me to turn to keep him in my sightline.
“Who is that talking to you?” Virek asks.
“Lord Blackmere,” I say and dip my head. I should probably do more than nod at the man, but after working alongside the Queen of Candora and being told quite vehemently that bowing is unnecessary, I’m not in the habit of showing respect in the traditional way. “And yes, I’m Astrid Storme.”
He holds out his hand to me, and I take it, quickly noting anything I can about the future duke.
A half-empty flute of champagne is in his left hand, but his stance and eyes are clear.
Not drunk, maybe not even tipsy. His suit is well-tailored, his posture confident, and there’s a shrewdness to his expression that tells me not to underestimate him.
I’ve never interacted with Alaric Blackmere, but I saw him often when I was Freya’s bodyguard.
He’s intelligent, independently wealthy, and well-known for his charm.
“You said you have an observation,” I say when he neither releases my hand nor says anything else.
He chuckles, his eyes jumping to the other side of the room, where Hex is playing cards.
With one step forward, he gets close enough to me that instinct tells me to step back.
But I hold my ground. “I have to wonder,” he says, his air so casual that he might be about to talk about the weather, “how someone like you ended up at a gathering like this.”
I’ve spent my life being underestimated; his veiled insult won’t bother me. “Someone like me?” I repeat, putting some bite into the words to see how Blackmere reacts.
“Easy, Storme,” Virek says.
Smirking, Blackmere adjusts our hands and brings my knuckles close to his lips without kissing them.
Then his eyes roam from my head to my toes.
Not in a lustful, leering way, but still in a way that makes me feel exposed.
“You’re not from this world. You might have lived in the big fancy castle for a time, but that doesn’t change the station you were born to. ”
I open my mouth to refute his words—and say what, I have no idea—but he keeps talking before I can speak.
“Only you can do that.”
Caught off guard, I furrow my brow. “Do what? Change my station?”
His gray eyes flit over my shoulder to Hex again, his gaze full of amusement.
Full of challenge. He’s taunting the prince, and it’s only now that I remember the secret I threatened to divulge yesterday.
Hex once had a tumultuous fling with Blackmere’s sister.
“You came on the arm of Prince Hendrik, so clearly you’re not opposed to the idea of elevating yourself, but if it’s power you’re after, you could do better than the frivolous prince. ”
“If I don’t belong in a place like this, then I wonder why you thought to give me advice.
” I could ask Blackmere if he’s offering himself as an avenue for power, but that feels too direct.
If I can get a sense of his ambition, it’ll be easier to decide if he’s a suspect or simply an arrogant aristocrat poking a royal bear.
No matter his motives, talking to me won’t get a rise out of Hex when the prince can barely stand me.
Still smiling, Blackmere touches his lips to my hand, then steps back and releases me. “Because you intrigue me, Miss Storme, and I would hate to see you waste your time. An Alverra is never going to get you where you want to go.”
Staring at the lord as he wanders through a door, I can’t decide if that was an insult toward Hex or something more.
Virek decides for me. “Looks like Blackmere just made it to the top of our list of suspects,” he says in my ear, sounding far too happy.
That was barely enough to place any suspicion on Blackmere, but it was…
something. There’s bad blood between Lord Blackmere and Hex—because Hex and Eloise Blackmere had their little fling?
—but something about Blackmere’s words felt too pointed to be a simple insult, one the prince didn’t even hear. He said it for me.
Laughter breaks out behind me, and I turn to see the prince place a card on the table and grin in triumph as a few others in the game groan and toss their cards down in frustration.
Of course he won; Hex always wins. Even when he loses, he finds a way to turn it to his advantage with his puppy-dog eyes and compels everyone around him to make him happy.
Did he even watch my exchange with Blackmere?
Hendrik’s eyes jump to me, his eyebrows dipping down in a way that makes me check my face so he can’t see my disappointment.
For a moment, he looks like he might approach me, but then Lady Vardane says something beside him, pulling his attention to her.
His expression hardens, and instinct pulls me two steps in their direction.
“Storme,” Virek says, bringing me to a stop with the urgency in his tone. “Someone just agreed to a secret meeting in the library.”