Page 6 of The King's Fake Bride

Once she’s gone, I set my suitcase on the bench in the corner, open it up and pull out the dress I had planned on wearing to the bar.

May as well put the dress to use even if the rest of my life has imploded.

I take a few minutes to shower and change before heading out onto the beach, the white sand soft and warm between my toes.

The sun is shining with beautiful streaks of orange and pink as I sit down, listening to the lapping of the waves against the shore.

Even if everything else in my life feels like it’s tearing apart at the seams, it is a beautiful evening.

I can worry about piecing myself back together tomorrow.

CHAPTER 3

XANDER

“You have to like at leastoneof them,” Atticus says as the last of his potential brides filters out of the room. “You have no idea the amount of paperwork I had to have them sign before they even got here.”

“And you shouldn’t have wasted your time,” I say, brushing by him out of the conference room to the stairs that lead to my chambers. “It would have been better to forget this marriage idea and start searching for another way to win the approval of the public.”

“What about that date you went on with that one woman last night? She was fine.”

I arch an eyebrow. “She told me that she wanted to be queen.”

“She would be if you marry her.”

Rolling my eyes, I take the stairs two at a time, my cousin trailing behind me. “I thought the point of this whole thing was to find a woman that the people are going to like? To show them that I’m a family man? How is that going to work with a woman who only cares about becoming a queen?”

Atticus makes a strangled noise in the back of his throat as we reach the top step. “Well, you might have a point about that, but I think you should reconsider those other women.”

“And I thought we weren’t going to be leading a parade of women through the palace and hoping they keep their mouths shut.” I shove open the heavy door to my room, rummaging around in the closet for a pair of shorts and a fresh shirt. “If the media sees you ushering lines of women in and out of the castle, they’re going to have a field day.”

Atticus pauses, shutting the door behind him before leaning against it. “You might be right about that, but I still think that you should be taking the plan seriously. This could be your chance to prove to the people that you really do care about them, but you’re throwing it away.”

“I’m not throwing it away,” I snap. “I just don’t share the opinion that the best way to win over the people is to lie to them.”

I disappear into one of the other rooms to change, coming back out and dropping down onto the couch by the window.

“I don’t know why the two of you can’t see that this is a bad press day waiting to happen,” I say. “None of those women you brought me are even people I would consider lying to the country about.”

As Atticus huffs and paces the floor, I grab a stack of reports from the coffee table, flipping through the pages. Each one I pass has numbers about my approval ratings should this scenario or that happen, but few have any with actual information on the country.

I stand and head for the gym connected to my quarters. “I’m going to be running and ignoring the fact that you all thinkmarrying me off is the best idea you can come up with. If you need me, find someone else.”

Atticus opens his mouth to protest but snaps it shut as I disappear into the bathroom and through a door on the other side leading into the gym.

Shutting the door, I twist the lock into place.

Music pounds through the speakers as I press the button on the stereo. Pop music fills the room, echoing off the walls.

I turn on the treadmill, setting it to my normal running pace.

Once everything is making plenty of noise, I head to the wall of mirrors behind the weight rack. A thin divot on the side of the last mirror is just big enough to read my fingerprint before a hidden door swings open on the opposite wall.

Grinning, I slip into the secret passage, closing it behind me and heading for the castle’s exit.

For one evening, I want to remember who I was before the crown.

The sand is soft and warm beneath my feet, even as the sun sinks toward the horizon.

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