Page 33 of Crowning His Innocent Assistant

“Oh. I see. So, you intend to keep me in the position I’m in even when you have a Queen?”

“All men keep their advisors when they marry.”

“So she’s simply decorative? Not your primary advisor?”

“No. She will not be my primary advisor. She’s just a woman. From America. What does she know about politics? And, indeed, what does she know about Monte Blanco?”

“What’s the point of it?”

“Optics.” He shook his head. “Honestly, Livia, you are the one that taught me about such things. Told me how important it is. Shouldn’t you be pleased?”

“I’m not pleased. I’m not pleased that you’re acting like a marauding medieval barbarian.”

“You are inconsistent.” He stood in front of her expectantly.

“What?” she asked.

“My tie.”

“You know how to tie your own tie.”

“You do it better.”

She looked up at him with furious eyes. She was wearing those big, gold spectacles she was so fond of. A strange choice, he had always thought. Exceedingly obvious, and not at all subtle. An announcement to the world, he supposed, that she was bookish. But she was beautiful, and those glasses couldn’t hide it. Indeed, he found them quite charming, though he would never admit it to her.

He found her quite charming, even when she was furious, something else he would never admit to her.

“You’re an ass,” she repeated, her fingers moving resolutely over the black silk fabric of his tie.

“I’m not concerned about it.”

“But then,” she said, bristling, “you wouldn’t be, would you? You’re a beast.”

“And yet, you remain.”

“So I do. Call it a care for my country. Without me, we would be in true jeopardy.”

“I see. So you see yourself as a rudder for our great nation.”

“I steer the ship. To the best of my ability.”

“And I’m the one who’s arrogant.”

“I never said I wasn’t.”

She disappeared, and emerged a moment later. Her hair was in a simple bun, and she wore very little makeup. She was wearing her typical uniform of black dress, though this one clung a bit more tightly to her curves. It was a dress that swept to the floor, flaring out like an unfurling lily as it fell past her knee.

It was not bright or obvious. She would not be quite so glittery as the other women in attendance.

But Livia always took pains not to set herself apart. He wouldn’t have minded, as the years passed, if she made herself slightly more obviously a key player, rather than just waitstaff, but she never had. Had never shifted from the background to anything more.

She looked beautiful, though, he thought.

Perhaps it was her fury.

Nobody else dared challenge him in the way that she did. Only Javier ever did, and he was a prince.

It was the audacity of Livia that got to him.

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