Page 11 of Vows to a King
Was their displeasure simply because the Devil Prince dared summon them, first thing in the morning, for a meeting, like mere children? Or because they were realizing that he could ruin their greedy plans for ruling Thalassos?
Even having attended these meetings for nearly three years, Jemima didn’t dare do anything but stand at the back of the room like another ornamental decoration. Adamos had neither invited her nor discouraged her from being present for the meetings. It was because of the Queen’s command that Jemima learn everything about how Thalassos was run that Jemima had been included at all.
Now, she settled into the seat at the back and waited with bated breath. Her quick conversation with the Queen settled inside her like the gnarled roots of a majestic tree sinking deep into the ground, making her lightheaded with relief.
A large part of her had worried that the Prince had been mocking her, or that he would think better of the whole plan in the light of the morning. But he had already shared it with the Queen.
Which meant she was about to marry the Devil Prince.
All that one impending arrangement constituted ran through her mind like a torrent drowning a bank.
What would he be like as a partner, a lover? Christos, what if he laughed at her inexperience? How long before he got bored with her? What could she do to hold the attention of a man who looked like some mythical warrior from one of her art history texts and behaved with the wild abandon of the very devil?
She was pulled out of her reverie by the hard scrape of a chair. A restless anger began to fill the room as the old men of crown council shifted in their seats. Some of them, like her father, dared cast doubtful glances at the Queen, both in pity and bloated arrogance.
Anger on Queen Isadora’s behalf flushed through Jemima. Just as she was about to get to her feet to request the Queen to leave,hestrode in.
Looking as casual and devilish as he had done yesterday, in a white linen shirt that spanned his broad chest, open to below his chest to reveal taut olive-toned skin and delineated pecs. For a second, she wondered if he’d even gone to bed and that led to wondering whose bed he’d tumbled into eventually.
There were any number of his exes that would have waited at the doorstep of his palace wing, willing to restart their wild associations.
Hadn’t the Queen’s aide whispered that Prince Adonis had had an inordinate number of guests waiting for him last night when she’d inquired of his whereabouts this morning?
Had one of those beautiful exes given him an escape from his grief and the tightening shackles of the palace? Hadn’t she sensed the restlessness in him even as he’d agreed to her proposal last night?
She sighed. They weren’t even officially engaged and she was already tying herself in petty knots. The reminder that she had no real claim on the man, even if their agreement last night stood, didn’t help though.
There was something so primal about Prince Adonis that his presence had always been like a hook under her belly button, tugging her. Her gratitude at his continued absence in the kingdom—even as his mother and brother bitterly missed him, had filled her with constant shame.
Now, she gripped her seat with one hand, trying to resist the crazy impulse of running toward him.
His dark blond curls lay stylishly haphazard at the top of his head, making him look like he had just rolled out of bed after a night of debauchery. Thick bristles dotted across his sculpted cheeks. She wondered if he meant to make a statement with his disheveled, disrespectful appearance, or if he had simply treated this meeting as another boring, mundane task he had to deal with.
If not for his bright, penetrating blue gaze, Jemima would have thought him hungover. Those eyes now roamed the expansive room without landing on anyone, even his mother.
Until they found her and stayed.
Warmth bloomed under her skin as he skimmed her from head to toe. Something like displeasure flashed across that gaze before he shut it down.
Jemima couldn’t help rubbing a hand over her belly in self-consciousness. Clearly, something about her appearance had already disgruntled him.
He sauntered past the watching crown council toward her with all the grace and power of an untamed lion. And she, despite her best effort to control her raging heartbeat, felt like wanton prey, foolishly excited to be devoured whole.
His large hand, with its long, elegant fingers, landed in front of her face, upturned. Calluses and raised rope burns danced on his palm, reminding her that despite his appearance of dissipation and life of excess, the truth was something else.
This was a man whose physicality was the stuff of legends. The same physicality that seemed to press up against her like a warm blanket on a chilly night.
She stared at his hand, stunned beyond belief that he was seeking her out while dismissing the waiting council in the same breath. Beneath the sudden sticky tension that swamped her at his nearness, she was aware that he was creating a spectacle, making a statement from the get-go that they would not control him but still…fear and excitement twin punched her.
She hadn’t even informed her father of their discussion last night, worried that it had all been a fantastical dream. Surely, he would punish her in some way after this public statement the Prince was making, would only see it as blatant disloyalty.
“Princess?”
Her gaze trailed up his arm to collide with his.
Blue eyes danced with devilish amusement before they sobered at her expression. Could he see the fear and trepidation that kept her rooted to the seat?
In another move that sent shock waves rippling through the room, he went to his knees in front of her. His stunningly beautiful face swam into view and she got lost in the pure, poetic symmetry of his features, in the lush sweep of his lips and the sharp up-tilt of his cheekbones. A soft, slow heat drizzled down her spine as his blue gaze swept over her features with leisurely scrutiny. Pausing at her lips for way too long.
