Page 69 of The Royal's Pet: A MMF Ménage Royal Romance

He looks gutted. “A prayer.”

My eyes flicker over him. I’m a python, venom swollen and ready to strike. “Then you should probably get on your knees next time you want something from me.” With that, I push through the door and into Rory’s room.

There’s a blast of cold from her room. Machines beep and whir around Rory’s bed. She looks very, very small in the billowing blankets and pillows. Or maybe it’s that she’s been crying that makes her look small. When I step in, she wipes her face and sniffles. She tries to smile, even though there’s no hiding the red blotches around her eyes. “Hey.”

“How are you?” I ask.

She shrugs meekly. “I’ve had better days.”

I step around her bed and take a seat in a circular chair beside her. “Roland told me that he broke up with you.”

“He’s trying to protect me,” she sniffs. “I get it, but—”

“He’s a bloody idiot.”

She chuckles politely.

“He broke it off with me, too,” I inform her. “Fired me, actually.”

Rory’s big eyes widen at that. “Oh no… Ben. I’m so sorry.”

Leave it to Rory to feel bad for me when she’s the one in the hospital bed. She reaches out and catches my hand in her own. I shiver. She’s made a crack in my hardened composure.

“Now I’m out a boyfriend,” I say. “Out a job. And out a place to live.” I look at her and add, “I hope I’m not out you, too.”

A tear goes unchecked and slips down the slide of her face as she nearly loses it again. “No,” she says, her voice shaky. “You’re never out me.”

I reach over and brush her tear from her cheek. “You’re never out me, either. I promise.”

That draws a single, relieved sob from deep in her chest. “Thank you,” she sniffs and clutches my hand. “I really needed to hear that.”

“It’s what I’m here for.”

I hand her a tissue, and she blows her nose. “I have an idea about a place we can stay,” she says as she dabs her eyes. “Local. Under the radar. But you’re not going to like it.”

37

Roland

They hate me.

Good.

Hate me. Loathe me. Make me the villain. The devil. The spoiled boy prince in his castle.

Hate me, but stay alive.

They think I’m selfish. Proud. They’re wrong. Selfish would have been keeping them to me. Selfish would have been taking them to bed, night after night, and forcing them to give up their lives to live in mine. Selfish would have been putting them in danger every day simply because my heart ran away with me.

This is the least selfish thing I’ve done in my whole life. I want them with me so badly I can taste it. But my life isn’t normal. I’m the prince of England. Even the prince of England, it turns out, can’t always get what he wants.

I leave the hospital in a numb daze. There’s a long black car waiting for me right outside. The driver nods to me. I step into it and close the door behind me. My mother barely gives me a glance.

“Are we waiting on anyone else?” she asks.

I stare out the window. “No.”

“James, take us home,” she says. The car coughs as it starts up and pulls out into the street. “I know that was hard for you, darling.” My mum turns her attention to me now. “But you did the right thing.”

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