Chapter Two #3
Isandro led the way to his office without a word, and Wren followed him, the way she always did. They’d walked together to his office so many times it was probably a learned response rather than anything she consciously thought about.
The office was large, with big, deep windows that looked out onto his private garden. Again, it was one his mother had designed as a present to his father, but Xavier had ignored it the way he’d generally ignored everything his queen did.
Isandro, though, loved the garden and was meticulous about tending to it.
In fact, tending to the plants and the trees and the flowers was what he loved most to do whenever he had a spare moment.
Which wasn’t often enough for his tastes, but still.
It was enough to keep this particular garden looking beautiful.
He went over to the large, antique oak desk that the long line of Valdoran rulers had used, and sat down behind it.
A comfortable armchair was positioned on the other side, and normally Wren sat there.
But not this time. Instead, she stood in front of his desk, her hands still clasped, her expression tight.
There were memories in this office. Memories that shamed both of them. But he’d worked hard to keep those memories locked up tight whenever he was in here, and most especially when he was in here with her.
Perhaps it would have been better to talk to her somewhere else. Then again, being here to talk about their marriage was somewhat apt.
‘Presumably, since we’re here in your office,’ she said before he could speak, ‘you want me to craft a press release.’
It didn’t help his mood that she already knew what he wanted, which was illogical since it was her ability to know what he was thinking that had made her so valuable as an employee.
And not only as an employee, but a friend.
A friend, yes, he’d tried to put her in that box.
Tried to tell himself that’s what she was, that’s all she was.
Of course, that had been a lie. She’d been more than a friend.
He’d been fascinated by her intelligence and the calm, patient way she’d handled Carlotta’s various scandals.
Her attention to detail, her incisive questions that always made him think, her passion for the country she’d elected to live in that was a mirror for his own.
There was also a quiet strength to her, an unshakeable core of determination that he found incredibly attractive, especially when she disagreed with him.
She’d been an obsession he’d never managed to overcome.
Yet things were different now, weren’t they?
She wouldn’t be his employee any longer.
She would be the obsession he could glut himself on, and his body liked that.
It liked it very much. But it did mean that she couldn’t be the one crafting the press release.
He’d have to find himself a new palace PR manager and it would have to come from them.
He stared at her from across his desk, her figure hidden beneath the voluminous black sweatshirt, her pale face staring out at him from under the hood.
‘No,’ he said. ‘You will not be crafting anything. You’re not my PR manager now, Wren. You’re here so we can both decide on an appropriate narrative to put in the press release.’
Surprise ruffled her delicate features like the wind over a still pond. ‘Oh? I assumed—’
‘My wife will not be the palace spokesperson. Surely you can see that?’
Her expression tightened. ‘Of course.’
Isandro leaned back in his chair, and nodded to the seat on the other side of the desk. ‘Sit down,’ he said.
‘Thank you, I’ll stand.’
Impatience gripped him. There were circles under her eyes and she was pale, and he didn’t like that.
He’d always worried for her when she got that pale, drawn look, and he’d worried even more in the month after their interlude in his office.
She’d looked constantly pale and had had to take time off, which was unusual for her.
A stomach bug, was all she’d said when he’d asked, and he, fool that he was, had thought no more of it.
He leaned forward, his elbows on the desk. ‘Sit, Wren,’ he said in a gentler tone. ‘You look exhausted.’
Another expression flitted across her face that looked like pain, but it was gone before he could be sure. ‘Let’s get whatever this is over and done with,’ she said tightly. ‘I want to go to bed.’
Wren had always hated being told what to do and she could give a mule a run for its money when she was being stubborn, which was most of the time.
He knew better than to argue with her, but this was her cutting off her nose to spite her face.
Also, she was carrying a child, his child, and since the baby’s health was dependent on hers, he was not going to be argued with on this one.
‘Do as I say, and sit,’ he ordered flatly. ‘For the baby’s sake.’
There was a mutinous cast to her chin, but, after a minute, she sat herself on the edge of the chair like the bird she was named for, delicately perching on a twig. ‘There, Your Majesty,’ she said tartly. ‘I’m sitting.’
Your Majesty.
She never called him that, and he’d never wanted her to. He’d always been Isandro to her when they were in private, and in public, he’d been ‘sir’.
‘As I already mentioned,’ he said, ignoring the subtle dig, ‘we need to decide on a story to tell the public.’
Wren stared back, giving him nothing. ‘Weren’t you going to tell the truth? At least, that’s what you said back at the airport.’
‘Yes, but we need to craft it carefully. I don’t want Carlotta’s memory to be tainted by this.’
‘You know she wouldn’t care about yours, if it had been you killed in that car accident.’
Isandro frowned. Wren had been meticulous at covering Carlotta’s mistakes, and she’d never had a bad word to say about her, even when he’d been less than discreet about his own anger towards his wife. Yet he could hear the sharp edge in her tone. This wasn’t about Carlotta, though.