Page 6 of Marry a King (Five Kings 5)

“Then you’ve got it wrong. Victor’s my friend and always has been. He has never even looked at me that way and if he had, why would it bother you, anyway? We’ve never even spoken and surely if I was to marry either of you, it would be him. No, I’m sorry, you will have to do better than that.”

She looks as if she’s locked in hell with a lunatic as she licks her lips and throws nervous glances toward the door and part of me agrees with her. She’s right to be nervous; to be afraid of what’s happening because I’m guessing Cassie hasn’t really understood the repercussions of what just happened.

“You were always going to be unmasked tonight, Cassie, if not me, by Victor. Why do you think he guided you onto that balcony?”

“Because he knows I had no intention of being around to be claimed by anyone. I have plans and they don’t include staying here.”

Her eyes flash, which makes me smile because I’m counting on her strength in more ways than one and I shrug. “Victor knew that, I knew that, and your parents knew that. In fact, you’ve made no secret of you desire to start a new life in America and the whole of Andromeda knows that you want to be a doctor, admirable really.”

“Why is that such an interesting topic of conversation? Surely nobody cares what I do. I wouldn’t be the first to move away and doubt I’ll be the last. Not every woman here wakes up every morning with the sole purpose of tying herself to a man and this island for eternity. You see, I’m an educated woman. You got that right and I’ve learned there are more important things in life than dressing in fine clothes and existing in a place that should really drag itself into the modern world. I want more than that and I deserve it.”

“Don’t you think I understand? Share your desire and wish I had a different life mapped out for me.”

She looks surprised, a little shocked and, dare I say it, more interested than she did five minutes ago.

“Do you?”

Her face softens a little as she finds something in common with me, and I nod. “I don’t have that choice. Like you, I’ve been educated abroad. Seen how the other half live and envied their freedom. It would be so easy to walk away and turn my back on my destiny out of a selfish desire to please myself. But I have a duty, we all have a duty and our lives are not ours to decide.”

“I’m sorry, maybe that’s true for you and in some way Victor, but I’m different. I wasn’t born to be a queen, I’m just a girl.”

As I stare at the woman across the table, it strikes me how little she understands. Just a girl. The understatement of the year because if she doesn’t see what I see, what Victor sees and what the whole of Andromeda sees, then it makes me desire her even more. She doesn’t see what is screaming at the world, a queen. Regal, beautiful, good and kind. Educated and compassionate. The perfect template for a life of royal duty and the perfect woman to lie in my bed. There was never anyone but her and that’s why I’ll never let her leave and she will just have to learn to accept her fate.

Hardening my heart, I turn to the business at hand.

“You have a decision to make that you must decide now.”

“I do?”

Her eyes widen and she looks a little relieved because she’s sensing she has more control than she really has and it gives me a delicious thrill to see the resignation dawn in her eyes as she learns she never really had a choice at all.

“Marry me, give up your dream of leaving Andromeda and I’ll set your friends free.”

“Excuse me, what are you talking about?”

“Your three friends who have been removed from the ball for their own protection. Lauren, Natalia and Eloise.”

“What about them?” She looks fearful, which gives me a sick pleasure as I say roughly, “Like you, they have plans that don’t concern Andromeda. Take your friend Lauren. She wants to study film, movies and has high ambitions. Currently, she has a place at Paramount Studios Hollywood on a programme designed to walk her through the business and set her up to succeed. Your friend Natalia, the fashion designer. There is a position waiting for her in the premier couture house in Paris under the watchful eye of the chief designer himself. She will learn from the best and have an opportunity many would kill for, which brings me to Eloise.”

I watch the fear spark in her beautiful eyes as she licks her lips nervously because we both know how much trouble she is in right now.

“The professor she has been having a relationship with is one signature away from jail. Papers have been drawn up to arrest him for illegal sex with a minor. He could be facing many years in prison and will lose his job, his livelihood and his reputation. Marry me and it all goes away. She will take a position in the school as a trainee teacher and there’s a house waiting with their name on it. A new life with the person she loves, instead of the humiliation of seeing her lover dragged through the courts and the press plastering her name all over it.”

She looks as if I’ve just killed her puppy and, for some reason, I love the power it gives me. Seeing Cassie with no choice but to agree gives me a certain power that turns me on way more than it should.

Leaning forward, I go in for the kill and say firmly, “If you choose your own path, try to leave, you will find there is no position waiting for you at the Grosvenor Institute of Medicine. There will never be a position waiting for you in any area of medicine, and any choice you make will be blocked at every turn. Your friends won’t leave this ball with their masks intact because I have three potential suitors on standby to claim them. Eloise will be shamed in our society and will never catch the break the rest of you have because her fate lies with one of my older servants who has just lost his wife. So, you can see it’s not looking good for any of you right now, but that could all change if you accept your fate and walk away from your dream into mine.”

Leaning back, I fix her with a dark promise in my eyes because Cassie is fucked whatever she decides and she knows it.

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