Chapter 6 No Choice #2
“Let’s see it,” I say when I finally get her to my office. I set aside the wrapped sandwich from Bette’s, and she lifts her hair away from her forehead, allowing me to brush my fingertips over the slight swelling. “Good makeup. Are you having any lingering headaches?”
“Do you count my mother? She marched me down to Doctor Frum’s surgery when she saw it.
I swear, the woman has eyes like a hawk.
Anyway, I got the usual lecture,” she says, spinning her hand in the air, “about how I’m not fifteen anymore and she’s juggling several reign-ending catastrophes at once.
Can’t I just be easy so she can focus on Freja? All of it.”
I hold Ella’s chin in my hand, tilting her face into the light. She’s not made of glass, and her doctor is one of the best in the country. Still, such knowledge doesn’t shorten my inspection.
Finally satisfied, I relax onto the leather sofa, overlooking the city’s historic skyline. Ella kicks off her trainers and tucks herself into the corner.
Why am I worried about her? The question has the rough heft of a brick, and my mind hastily boards up its windows.
The answer is—must be—that I am her friend and protector, I think as I pick up one of the white trainers.
Those rigid roles protect us both. “Was this on Her Majesty’s list of approved wardrobe choices? ” I ask.
Ella reaches for a sandwich, but her face wears the same look it does when she’s left one of the pasture gates open and all the cows have wandered out. Ask me how I know.
“Approved?” She chews her liver paste on rye.
“Mama doesn’t have time to monitor every little thing, and I took a chance.
” She meets my gaze from the corner of her eye.
“No. I already know what you’re going to say.
Don’t. You can’t imagine living every second of your life policed by a loving but tyrannical despot. ”
My lips twitch. “She’s going to be annoyed that you’re not wearing contacts.”
“My eyes were itchy this morning.”
I look deeply into her brilliant green eyes and think traitorous thoughts. Her Majesty is more short-sighted than her own daughter. She doesn’t see that Ella is the kind of person you have to allow to be twenty percent unruly unless you want the whole one hundred.
“I put my glasses on in the car,” she admits. “She’s busy trying to find a loophole in the Marriages and Succession Act.”
“Are you worried?”
Ella arches her back, stretching her arms wide, and my thoughts unravel like a sweater caught on a rusty nail, random facts spilling into my hands.
Ella has a brilliant mind. Ella taught me how to level up on Killer’s Sun.
Ella likes Vestfyn. Vestfyn. I cling to the word, rocket out of my seat, and cross the room to retrieve a bottle from the mini-fridge.
I hand her a bottle and sit, wrists on my knees, tracing the wood grain on the coffee table with my gaze. I am not okay.
“I’m not worried. My sister’s problems are not mine,” she says.
I snort. She probably thinks she means it, but I have the receipts to prove otherwise—a text thread more than six months long detailing an actual wrestling match she engaged in to get Clara to admit her feelings for Max, social media tutorials to help Freja bring more visitors into The Nat, and endless video games played with the crown prince of Vorburg to deal with his frustration over not being able to spirit Alma across an international border and keep her for his own.
“I’ve never met anyone more involved in the lives of the people she loves,” I counter.
“I’m turning over a new leaf,” she says. “The only thing that worries me about Freja is how I’ll ever get out if she doesn’t stay in.”
“You’re throwing off your mother’s concentration with stunts like this.
” I nudge the sneaker with the tip of my shoe.
“And this.” I touch a light finger to the frame of her glasses.
“And this.” I raise my sandwich and feel heat rise up my neck.
“Asking me out during a public engagement, forcing me to feed you... A number of those girls are going home to write fanfic about us.”
Ella’s eyes light up. “Do you really think so?”
Anxiety swims through my blood. “You’re not still writing on that old account?”
She works herself into the couch cushion, bracing her feet on the coffee table.
“I ought to finish Temptation of the Elf Prince. It was some of my best work.” She bumps my shoulder and the air vacates my lungs.
We’re too close and she can’t keep doing that—touching me.
My skin vibrates with the need for more.
“You should stop worrying,” she continues, reaching for a pickle.
“We aren’t exactly the type of people to inspire fanfic.
When was the last time a tabloid put us on the same page?
Honestly, Marc, we could be caught swimming in Handsel harbor in our under-crackers and everyone would be like, ‘Trusty Marc van Heyden, liegeman of Crown Prince Noah, gives an impromptu water safety course to Princess Ella.’ Not one newspaper would waste a drop of precious ink to document how not into each other we are. ”
Ella nibbles on the pickle, her lips pursing at the taste of sour juice. A line runs down her wrist and she kisses it away.
I hook a finger around the knot of my tie.
I should stop wearing these flamen things—become one of those tech CEOs with a closet full of organic cotton t-shirts and flat-front khakis.
In the meantime, I force myself to remember that I am a dutiful son, a respected business leader, and a loyal friend who made promises to his crown prince.
I can’t afford to explore why or how much I hate her construction of our relationship.
“Anyone could mistake friendly banter for flirtation,” I grit out. “Be careful.”
She lifts her eyes to the ceiling. “You could have been giving me mouth-to-mouth and no one would have blinked.”
The mental image kindles a fire that spreads heat along my veins, until Alix bursts through the door, trailing a gust of expensive perfume.
“I cannot believe my luck, finding you together,” she claps, dropping her immense bag on the coffee table.
She ransacks the contents, tossing aside tubes of skincare, a packet of flossers, and a carabiner of scrunchies, finally unearthing two embossed invitations.
“I can choke two sea birds with one herring.”
“What is this?” I ask, taking the card. My heart has not found a steady rhythm.
She swipes the card away, bats me on the top of my head, and hands it back. “I can’t believe you’ve forgotten your only sister’s engagement party.”
“Third engagement party,” I grunt. “There was the intimate dinner at Minty’s, and then Aldo Gardens for everyone you had ever met, and—”
“This is for Tom,” she cuts me off, stuffing her purse again.
I flick a glance to Ella. “Not for Tom,” I mouth. She catches her full bottom lip on a laugh and I want to push Alix out the door or off the roof. Time alone with Ella is precious, and my sister is burning it up.
“Amma is in Seong,” Alix wheedles, “and you’re busy with your company and the estate, but this is important. We have to knit ourselves into a proper family before the wedding.”
“Knit?” Ella laughs. “What do you know about knitting?”
Alix takes Ella’s invite and bops her on the head with it before handing it back. “Remember when I spent a summer in an ashram? There was no internet, and I made you a potholder.”
“I thought it was half a bikini top,” Ella muses, turning the card over. “What’s the theme?”
Alix wiggles between us on the sofa, pushing me away from Ella—from some reckoning. There will be no balance until I pay a price for looking at her the way I do. Pay again for the way my heart can’t calm down, even when we’re not alone.
“It’s a costume party,” my sister says.
Ella doesn’t hesitate. “I’m in.”
Alix turns to me. “And you?”
I don’t have time for this. I’ll have to work late tonight—and every night—to earn my rest. My duties are demanding and clear. But another thought chases this. I promised Noah I would keep an eye on this princess. I tell myself I have no choice.
“I’m in.”