Page 99 of Royal Affair
She didn't answer, which was answer enough.
"I've been searching for him, you know," I said quietly. "James. Every night for six months, I've been looking for any trace of him online. Hoping for some sign that what we had meant something. Maybe he was lying when he said I was nothing to him."
"Evangeline..."
"But there's nothing. He's vanished completely, as if our entire relationship was just a fever dream I imagined." I stared out at the gardens, remembering moonlit walks and stolen kisses that apparently meant nothing. "Maybe it was. Maybe I was so desperate to feel something real that I convinced myself a man like that could love me."
"You're not desperate?—"
"Aren't I?" I turned back to her, letting her see the full extent of my devastation. "I'm so broken that a man like Dmitri thinkshe can walk in here and claim me like a trophy. And the worst part is, he's probably right."
I stood, smoothing down my skirts with hands that trembled slightly. "Set up another meeting with Prince Dmitri if you must. But don't expect me to pretend he's anything other than what he is—a predator who sees my pain as opportunity."
"And if I do? If I arrange another meeting?"
I looked at her, this woman who'd never understood that duty without love was just another form of slavery. "Then I suppose we'll find out just how thoroughly James Banks destroyed me. Whether there's enough left of the woman I used to be to fight for something better."
I left her sitting there and returned to my bedroom, where I stood once again before the mirror. The woman looking back at me was still perfectly poised, still elegantly dressed, still every inch the princess. But her eyes were hollow now, carved out by loss and betrayal and the crushing realization that even rock bottom had a basement.
Tomorrow, I would probably sit through another meeting with Dmitri. I would listen to his crude innuendos and calculated cruelties, and I would feel my soul die a little more with each word. That's what broken birds do—they let themselves be caged by men who enjoyed their suffering.
The trap was closing around me, and for the first time in my life, I wasn't sure I had the strength to fly away.
Chapter Thirty-Four
James
Iset down the empty whiskey bottle with more force than necessary; the glass clinking against the others lined up on my coffee table like trophies of poor decisions. Six months of nights that blurred together, six months of trying to drown out memories that refused to stay buried.
Takeaway containers, newspapers I'd read but didn't throw away, and clothes draped everywhere made my flat chaotic because I didn't want to think about tomorrow.
My phone buzzed from somewhere in the wreckage. Another potential client, probably. I'd been turning them all down for months now—new contracts, lucrative offers, high-profile assignments. I kept the existing clients satisfied, went through the motions at the office, but anything that required a proper engagement got a polite decline. My assistant had stopped asking why weeks ago.
The blinds stayed drawn most days. Sunlight was optimistic, and I wasn't in an optimistic mood. I'd grown out my beard because shaving every day seemed pointless when no one was looking. The stack of unread mail was on the kitchen counterbecause bills could wait and everything else was probably rubbish, anyway.
The pounding on my door started at exactly noon—sharp, authoritative knocks that suggested the person on the other side had no intention of going away quietly. I knew that rhythm of impatience. Spencer.
“PISS OFF” I called out, without bothering to get up from where I was sprawled on the sofa reading the same page of a military history book for the past hour.
The knocking continued, more insistent now.
"James, open up or I'll get one of my agents to force the door in."
A second voice joined in, lighter, more amused. "Or we could just tell the press the prime minister is conducting wellness checks on his alcoholic brother. That'd make the evening news."
Rupert. Of course, fucking Spencer had to drag him along.
I dragged myself upright, running a hand through hair that was longer than I usually kept it but not unkempt.
I opened the door.
Spencer stood there in his typical government-issue authority, looking like he'd stepped off the cover of GQ Magazine. Perfect suit, perfect hair, perfect expression of disgust as he took in my appearance. Two security officers flanked him at a discrete distance. Beside him, Rupert wore casual but expensive clothing, and his eyes already catalogued the chaos visible behind me with obvious amusement.
"Christ, this place smells like the back of a bar," Rupert said cheerfully, pushing past me into the flat.
"Charming as always." I turned away, leaving the door open. Let him follow or not—I didn't care.
Spencer entered my flat, but his expression, as usual, was unreadable. His eyes swept over the devastation with a frown, cataloguing every empty bottle, every piece of evidence of myspectacular self-destruction. He kicked an empty whiskey bottle, sending it clattering across the hardwood.
