“Whenever anything else was going wrong in my life, numbers always made sense. They’re irrefutable. Math is a universal language. Even though people say money is cold, hard and unfeeling, it’s not. It’s a tool. The stock market is attuned to feelings. When people don’t feel safe, the numbers drop. When they do, they rise.” He shrugged.
She liked that view of things. It made sense to her.
“I wish you could come with me after we’re stateside. I don’t know Renner. I know you.” It was the closest she could come to asking him without actually saying she wanted him.
“You don’t. Not really. I’m not a good guy, Princess. It’s nice that you see me that way now. But it’s like I said, I’m not really good at this protection gig. Killing is more my speed.”
“Then why do I feel so safe?” She was still tucked against his body, shielded by his heat and his strength.
“Because you haven’t learned any better.” His tone wasn’t quite condescension, but it was close.
“I’ve learned what you’ve taught me.” She looked up at his hard profile. “And what you’ve taught me is that I’m safe with you. That you’ll protect me. Even at the cost of your own life.”
“I work for the good guys, but don’t let that fool you into thinking I’m a good guy.” He turned away from the controls and stared down at her, his gaze focusing on her mouth.
For one second, she hoped he’d be what he thought was a bad guy and kiss her. He probably thought she was some sheltered girl with no experience. She supposed that was true, but it didn’t mean that she didn’t know what she wanted or wasn’t capable of making her own choices. She trembled and wanted to ask him if he was going to kiss her, but she knew that would shatter the moment. She wanted him to slam his mouth into hers and kiss her with no thought of where they were, who she was or what it meant.
His eyes were even more intense, his pupils dilated and his breathing was rough and hard, as if he exerted some superhuman effort just standing there. Maybe he wanted to kiss her, too. Her eyes fluttered closed, and she tilted her head up slowly.
“This can’t happen,” he said, his voice as low and guttural as Grisha’s had been when he’d demanded to know why she didn’t want him.
It occurred to her then that she wanted Byron Hawkins with the same intensity with which she’d despised Grisha.
SOME PEOPLE WOULD think that because Damara was a princess, she didn’t understand the word no. She understood it plenty. She heard it so often that yes was more of a surprise. So rather than be upset, she asked, “Why not? Am I not pretty?”
“You know you’re beautiful.”
“Am I?” She lifted her chin, wondering if that’s actually what he thought of her or if he was just being polite.
“Now you’re fishing for compliments and you’re not going to get them. You know how you look.”
“I don’t. Not really. My suitors all tell me I’m beautiful, but all they want is the power that comes with being married to me. I have maids. I have servants. They all tell me I’m beautiful, but they all must. What is it you don’t like?”
She dared to ask the question, but she was actually afraid of the answer. She didn’t want to be told that she wasn’t enough—that she had nothing to offer him since he didn’t want a crown.
“Your innocence.”
“I see.” Damara didn’t. Not really. “Because you’re a bad man?” She turned the conversation back to familiar territory.
“A very bad man.”
“A bad man wouldn’t care. Had I offered myself to Grisha, he wouldn’t have waited.” She shivered, both with fear and anticipation.
“You deserve better than a man like Grisha.”
“I know that. That’s why I picked you. But you’re not cooperating.”
Damara Petrakis wasn’t sure who was more surprised by what came out of her mouth. The expression on his face looked like she’d kicked him somewhere unforgivable. She wasn’t sure what strange maggot had burrowed into her brain, but she suddenly realized that this was the answer to half of her problems. Not only would it eliminate many of Abele’s contenders for her hand; on a more selfish note, it was something she wanted to experience. She wanted to know what it was like to be wanted for herself, not her position. She had a feeling that Hawkins didn’t care if she was a princess or a beggar.
His eyes widened. “You have lost your mind.”
She scowled. “That’s not what a lady expects to hear from her chosen beau.”
“This ain’t a cotillion, Princess.” He sneered.
This wasn’t the reaction she’d expected. “No, it certainly isn’t.” She pursed her lips and decided to appeal to his logic. “But my brother is going to have a hard time marrying me off if I’m not a virgin, isn’t he?”
“That’s still a thing?” He wrinkled his nose.
Still a thing. Damara closed her eyes for a second as the emotion threatened to overwhelm her. The whole of her self-worth had been wrapped up in the slight veil of flesh. It had been drilled into her head that it belonged to her country and she owed it to her people to keep herself chaste until she was married. But now, getting rid of it seemed like only way to give them and herself some measure of protection until Abele was captured and tried for treason.
Of course, this soldier wouldn’t understand. She knew that. It was part of why she’d chosen him. So she couldn’t be angry at him or hurt that he didn’t understand. His culture was different.
She took a deep breath. “It’s very much still a thing in Castallegna and in many parts of the world. I was under armed guard for most of my life. If I’m worthless to him, maybe he’ll stop killing people to get to me.”
“Sweetheart, I don’t know if anyone told you, but he could lie.”
She swallowed. “He could, but the kind of men he wants an alliance with would demand an examination before we were married.”
“How about I just kill him for you?” Hawkins said as if he were asking her permission to do something as mundane as trimming the hedges below her window. Hope surged in her chest for all of a single millisecond. Life would be so much easier. So many people would be saved. One life for many—one of the founding principles on which she was raised. His death would mean she’d be free to dissolve the monarchy, to bring true democracy to Castallegna, just as her father had always dreamed.
But she couldn’t do it on the back of an assassination.
“I can’t ask you to do that.” She swallowed the hope that had turned to bile in her throat.
“You’re not asking. I offered. See, like I said, killing is what I’m good at.”
She wet her lips, as if that would help ease her next words into the world. Damara may not have been experienced in the ways of the flesh, but she did know people. Politics and manipulation had been part of her extensive education, as well. “So are you saying that you’re not good at making love?”
“Fucking, little girl. It’s called fucking,” he snarled.
Damara found it so telling that he could speak of killing—of death—without blinking an eye, but when the discussion turned toward softer things, it made him angry and defensive. At first she’d thought intimacy was the problem, but it didn’t