Page 54 of Prince of Masks
Dray’s steps are quiet. I hear the gentle movement behind me, back at the elevator. He isn’t following me.
But I do sense that he watches me go.
11
Dinner at the hotel is tradition on our first night.
Amelia’s favourite dish on the menu is never allowed to be changed. If a chef even suggested such a crime, they wouldn’t be fired. She would probably hang them.
Her favourite dish is pizza.
I know.
But this pizza…
Well, the dough alone takes a week to rise and settle. The darling size of it, I could fit in my hands joined at the thumbs and fingertips. As for the flavour, three types of caviar darken the white truffle brie and the imported Norwegian lobster.
It’s ok.
It’s not my favourite.
And though the menu does not have the prices printed, I am certain it cost more than £10,000. That is a lot of money to spend on a seafood pizza that tries too hard.
I have always been more partial to the meals like burgers and fries; buttered, salty lobster; deep-fried and battered chicken. Wedged, seasoned potatoes drenched in sauces and topping. Starchy, you know?
I force myself to go for the second best, the one that makes me feel better, the salads, the fruits, the smoothies. The stuff that keeps my mother and Amelia off my back.
But there was no point in wasting my energy considering the menu, since Father takes no requests before he orders for us, me and Mother—and for me he chooses a fucking punishment.
Lobster salad with a side of escargot, peppered with gold flakes.
I am so over the edible gold thing. Such a gimmick.
And I don’t want to know how long thatmetal—because that is what it is—sits in my stomach. The only time it’s acceptable is when it’s with dessert,chocolate, because only then is it so incredibly pretty.
But Father orders a salad, and I suspect Mother has been in his ear. So much for my drooling plan to order the gold-coated mud-chocolate pudding for dessert.
The meals are quick to come out.
I am unenthused about the bowl set down in front of me. I stab at the salad with my fork but swing my gaze around all the other dinners.
Beside me, Dray’s plate is drizzled delicately with a beige sauce over two slender strips of duck breast.
On the other side of me, Oliver cuts his kobe beef.
Both Amelia and Harold ordered the gross seafood pizza, while Mother and Father have the salmon.
A waiter inches around to Mother to refill her dom.
“Will you be seeing Asta often over the holidays?” Mother asks, looking at Dray beside me.
I turn a frown on him.
If he thinks anything peculiar of the question, he doesn’t show it. He’s slightly reclined in his chair, mostly abandoned his duck, and taps his finger on the rim of his glass to order a refill.
“The Ströms are invited to Thornbury Park for Rugby Sunday,” he says, but that isn’t for another few days. “The veils keep a distance.”
True. It would take a veil to reach Nice, then hours in the car to arrive in Monte Carlo. It’s exhausting travel, and the jet makes it easier, but the jet can’t be used on a whim to visit a fiancé across the pond.
