Page 7 of The Wicked Prince

“Stars above—eat, woman. You feeling guilty about it isn’t going to change anything. Either eat or itdoesgo to waste and then you’ll feel even worse about that.”

Robin didn’t move to keep eating. “What are you up to? Why am I here? Why are you feeding me or any of my men?”

Prince John rolled his eyes again before lowering his fork and leaning forward. He clasped his hands under his chin as he stared at her. “You’re not stupid. You know why you’re here and why I haven’t had a hair on your precious men’s heads harmed.”

Cold dread ran down her spine, and she swallowed. “You’ve had your fun. I’m not falling for whatever scheme you’ve got up your sleeve.”

John held up his bandaged hand. “You think this is fun for me?”

There was a light in his eyes that still said yes.

“You’re just trying to mess with my head with that proposal.” He had to be. “What do you really want?”

“I’m not messing with you. I meant what I said.” John rose from his seat and moved to the side of the desk, pushing himself up and sitting on the edge. He left enough distance between them so Robin couldn’t get him, but it was far more casual and almost intimate. He stared down at her, his gaze holding her down far more effectively than her chains.

“I want to marry you.”

She couldn’t find any hint of a lie. Her breath caught in her throat. She couldn’t deny it. He was entirely serious.

“Why?” Robin narrowed her eyes. “You might be the most hated man in the country, but you’re a prince. Surely you’re not so desperate that the only woman you think you can convince to marry you is a criminal?”

John picked up a letter from the desk and turned it to her. Robin leaned forward, and she made out King Richard’s signature and seal on it before John turned it back to face him and started reading. His voice was obnoxiously deeper and pompously stiff as he said, “The reports I’ve been receiving have been quite concerning, more so than anything I’m currently encountering in the Scaldier Desert with the Esmeans and the Faenics. I almost didn’t believe them because they soundedludicrous. Especially after you swore you could handle the responsibility of being regent. But then I started seeing the truth over the last year in the supplies sent to support me and the army. I’ve been patient. You’ve had plenty of chances, but it’s clear you don’t have any control over this situation.”

Ugh. King Richard was risking his life to protect them all, and John was sitting safe in a castle, mocking him?

John looked up from the letter and right at Robin, saying in his regular voice, “You are the situation, by the way.”

“Me?”

John continued reading in his ridiculous impression, “It’s clear that this outlaw has the love of the people, thanks to the fact that you haven’t handled it effectively. While I’ve been gone, they’ve built a hero in their minds against the prince they’ve always despised. This ‘Robin Hood’ must be dealt with. You cannot allow this to go on and continue damaging the war effort. One man will not be the reason we cannot properly defend our borders. You have six months. Deal with this or I will. Then you’ll be the one the Esmeans are trying to shoot at.”

“You’ve been blaming everything on me to King Richard?” Robin gaped at him.

John lowered the letter sharply. “That’s what you took from that? Also, didn’t you ever think of that when you attacked my tax collectors?” John scoffed. “War isn’t cheap, Robin.”

Oh. So this was apparently her fault?

“I didn’t start returning what the people need in order to survive because of thewar. I did it because ofyou. Your ridiculous royal decrees that take away people’s livelihoods on the altar of your benefit. If you stopped swiping money off the top to spend on yourself and actually sent the king what he needed, he wouldn’t be threatening to send you to the front.” Robin’s lip curled up in a sneer. “Don’t blame your actions on me.”

John shook his head and set the letter back on the desk. “I received that five and a half months ago.”

But none of that explained his proposition.

“Congratulations, you’ve narrowly managed to succeed. You’ve got Robin Hood and her Merry Men. If all you need to do is stop me from stealing the taxes in order to prove your worth to King Richard, why haven’t you killed me and been done with it?”

“That was the original plan. The Sheriff assured me he knew you well enough to be able to devise a trap you wouldn’t be able to resist.”

Like the Sheriff had ever been capable of trapping her and keeping her. She grinned. “You’re not still sore about the business with the golden arrow, are you?”

“On the contrary, I was thrilled with how everything turned out. Thanks to the Sheriff’s terrible trap, I discovered the most wantedmanin Astren was actually the most wantedwoman. That’s when the plans changed.” John leaned in, his dark brown eyes piercing hers the same way they had that night five months ago. Only now he was the one looking down at her. He said, “From the moment I first saw you under that hood, I knew I would either kill you or marry you.”

Robin could hardly hear him over the blood thundering in her ears.

“And I don’t like to get my hands dirty, so that really only left one option.”

“That doesn’t make anything clearer.” Robin’s voice was barely a breath.

“Fine, let me put this in the simplest terms for you even though I know you’re smarter than this. Icouldkill you and your men and be done with it. But that’s shortsighted. Richard wants the Robin Hood situation put torest.If you die, it lives on. I’ll be the tyrant who killed the people’s hero, and it just might be enough to push the current dissatisfaction over wholly into violentunrest.Violent unrestmeans Richard comes back and the last thingIwant is Richard to come back.” John placed his uninjured hand on the desk and leaned on it. “But if we get married and the majority of the public believes you’re doing it willingly and in order to help them, the Robin Hood situation is put to rest. The people’s dissatisfaction will ease as their beloved heroine becomes their princess. They’ll believe that you’re still fighting for them, just now on the inside of the castle walls, and they’ll calm down. And Richard stays in the desert defending that worthless stretch of sand. I stay king in all but name.”

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