Page 57 of Crown of Thorns
“Your daughter is the dowager queen—at my discretion—since the king is dead and I am the blood heir and king.”
“That could change in a heartbeat,” the earl says.
I wonder at whether he’s threatening Rhys and why that has anything to do with whose bed I’m in. This isn’t a nation, it’s bizarroAlice in Wonderland, and I want out.
“Shall we head into the dining room now?” Saoirse says to the room.
If anyone has noticed the tensions rising, they have the good manners to pretend that they didn’t.
Rhys loops my arm through his and leads me into the dining room where he ignores the place cards and seats me next to his spot at the head of the table.
“Really, Rhys?” Saoirse says with faux tenderness. She acts like a loving stepmother but my experiences with her say otherwise.
“Let me enjoy my wedding week,” he says, making my heart stutter. “Let me be madly in love with my bride before we have to get back to work.”
“Surely, you’ll take a honeymoon,” Suzanne chimes in.
“When we can fit it in,” he replies. “Running a country takes quite a bit of time. Perhaps after the coronation we’ll fit in a tour and find some time to spend together before silly season when parliament breaks.”
“Hmm…” the earl says with mock sadness in his voice. “How romantic.”
“Don’t worry,” Rhys replies silkily. “We find plenty of time for romance. Half of the household has walked in on us.”
“Rhys—” I feel my cheeks burn with embarrassment as I look across the table to my uncle whose face is filled with thunder. “Don’t share things like that.”
“Surely, they know what all we’ve got going on,” he replies. “They were all married at one time.”
“But you are not married yet,” my uncle warns. “And you disgrace my niece.”
“No disgrace,” Rhys answers. “I worship every inch of her, and I plan to for the rest of my life.”
“Please stop,” I whisper.
He’s only making things worse. Is this another punishment? I don’t think I’ve done anything wrong but the rules in Rhys’s playbook keep changing and my world keeps tilting. It’s like the fair ride where you lean against a board on a wall while the whole thing spins as fast as it can and eventually, your board flies up into the air with you on it. I feel like I’m flying and not in a good way.
“I think it’s adorable that they’re so taken with each other,” Grace, the First Lady of the United States, chimes in.
“I’m sure the press is eating up a love match,” President Chancellor agrees with his beautiful wife.
Saoirse snorts unkindly and I want to sink so far back into my chair that it swallows me whole. Instead,I just push my dinner around my plate with my fork.
The president continues, “It would be unique, would it not? It’s not like there’s been one here in decades.”
I feel my eyes go wide as President Chancellor puts Saoirse in her place for her slight. Rhys gently places his palm on my thigh, warning me to wait to see how it all plays out.
Saoirse loudly clanks her knife and fork across her plate, signaling that the dinner is over even though it’s nowhere near done. This would have been the case when the elder king was still alive as she was the reigning queen then, even when he was bedridden, and Rhys was acting in his stead. When Saoirse was exploiting her power, but not now. Now, Rhys is the true king, and this is nothing more than a weird game of thrones they’re playing.
I want no part in it.
Everyone is waiting to see if Rhys will cave to her for the sake of politeness, as if she’s the doting stepmother he adores, or even just to keep the peace. I’ve come to know none of those things hold true, and I’m waiting with everyone else to see which way the explosion will blast.
Fortunately, we don’t have to wait long for the lion and the tiger to stop eyeing each other and attack. It comes in the form of Rhys delicately cutting into the fish on his plate and scooping up a bite onto the tines of his fork. He raises a brow as he slowly parts his supplelips and takes a bite.
Saoirse’s eye twitches as she fights a scowl. She knows she cannot outright defy him in front of family and world leaders like the President and First Lady of the United States.
He is the king, and she is merely the dowager. The crown has shifted whether or not a coronation has taken place. The reminder of the power at stake, and the earlier conversation I overheard, is sobering. This is a dangerous tightrope we’re walking and I’m terrified that I’m going to slip—that we’re going to slip—and the consequences will be catastrophic.
“Hmpf,” is all she says to acknowledge Rhys’s act of aggression toward her before she turns to the First Lady and says, “So, how is America? I hear your own wedding was quite scandalous.”
