Page 23 of Royally Wed
CHAPTER
SIX
When Asher woke the next morning, it was without the crushing weight of a corgi on his sternum. As he lay there staring at the cool blue ceiling, he decided to take his solitude as a good omen. Rehearsal yesterday had not gone as well as he’d hoped. As much as he loathed to admit it, Jeremy’s little speech had rattled him. The royal family had chosen Asher, and his maestro had triedto talk them out of it. It wasn’t exactly a vote of confidence.
Whatever. Today was a new day. He just needed to shake it off and play his instrument like he knew he could... like he’d played it the other night at Westminster Abbey. If he’d managed to pull himself together to play for the princess, surely he could do it again.
He took a few deep breaths. Going forward, everything would befine.
Then Asher made the mistake of climbing out of bed.
First, he tripped over the furry lump that had situated itself—intentionally, no doubt—directly in his path to the bathroom. Then he flipped on the light and identified thefurry lump as Willow.
He called her name. She didn’t bat an eye at him, but instead kept on gnawing on the stick in her jaws. Asher turned toward the toilet and wondered,naïvely, where a corgi would get a stick at Buckingham Palace. He stopped, turned back around, and realized it wasn’t a stick at all. It was his cello bow. His very rare, very expensive, Tourte bow, handcrafted in France in 1820.
“What thefuck?”
Willow lifted her head, panting with glee.
“Give me that.” Asher lunged to rescue his bow, but just as his fingertips brushed the smooth surface ofthe stick, the impertinent dog snatched it up and took off with it.
Shit.
Shit, shit, shit.
“Bad dog,” he yelled.
Yes, he was definitely screaming this time. Not in terror, as the princess had accused him of before, but in anger. He was royally pissed off. The bow was irreplaceable. One of a kind. He’d paid nearly $200,000 for it at auction.
Willow bounced into a downward dog–type positionand wiggled her backside. The bow dangled from her mouth. By some miracle, it was still in one piece. But even from three feet away, Asher could see teeth marks all over the narrow shaft.
At best, it would probably need to be smoothed out and recambered, to realign the curve of the bow. There definitely wasn’t time to get all of that done before the wedding. Asher would have to play with a chewed-upbow...ifthe damneddog didn’t snap it in two.
She readjusted her bite, and Asher’s heart nearly stopped when he heard a sickening crunch. He managed to keep breathing as he realized it had a fresh new set of bite marks but wasn’t broken in half. Yet.
He held out his hand. “Give me the bow. Now, you monster.”
He walked slowly toward her. With every step he took, the dog’s stumpy tail gavea little wag. When Asher was about an arm’s length away, he dove again. And missed. Willow scurried under the bed, dragging the bow with her.
“No!” Asher screamed. “This can’t be happening.”
“Oh, it’s happening,” someone behind him said. “I’m just not sure whatitis.”
The princess. Again.
Asher’s eyes closed. Maybe he was having a nightmare. Maybe if he kept his eyes shut, counted to three,and opened them again, he’d be back in New York, miserable and unemployed. Ah, the good old days.
He opened his eyes and once again found himself facedown on the palace’s powder blue carpet.
“Mr. Reed, is there a reason you’re screaming at the floor?” There was no mistaking the amusement in the princess’s tone.
Asher was in no mood for jokes. He rose onto his hands and knees and glared at her.“Yes, as a matter of fact there is. Your beast of a dog is under the bed with my priceless cello bow.And she’s eating it.”
“Oh.” Her face fell. “For the record, she’s not mine.Willow belongs to my mother. Huge difference.Massive. And why does she keep coming in here?”
The princess’s brow furrowed and she bit her plush bottom lip, drawing Asher’s attention directly to her mouth. The subsequentsurge of arousal that shot through him caught him off guard. He shouldn’t be turned on while on his hands and knees screaming at a dog. Nor while he was about to lose a couple hundred grand.
“Because the corgis have the run of the place. It’s the number one rule of Buckingham Palace.” He’d shot her own words right back at her. “Or so I hear.”
