“And you’re brave. You’re fierce, and resourceful. And you never complain. I love that about you. Despite becoming a goose girl overnight. And you have an impossible, crazy horse.” He gave a rough chuckle. “Don’t tell me he’s not yours. It’s clear he is, by heart if not law.”
“Oh, Philip!” I cried. “Don’t do this to me.”
He froze, his eyes drinking in every tiny expression on my face.
“So you do care,” he whispered.
“Of course I do! How could I not? But it’s impossible, it’s all impossible.” I drew a shaking breath. “You’re not the only one with secrets.”
For all my desperation to prove myself, it was Damon who had found the evidence we needed to expose Sierra. At the end of the day, I had done little beyond herding geese. I couldn’t fail my family on top of it. Not without at least trying. Not without keeping my promise to give an alliance a chance. No matter what my heart said.
“I don’t care about your secrets, Lark,” he said. “I’m used to secrets.”
“Not these ones,” I said in a small, miserable voice.
“I don’t care,” he said firmly. “I love you.”
I sucked in my breath, looking back up into his eyes. But that was a mistake. As soon as our eyes met, he lowered his face to mine, and I was powerless to resist the overwhelming surge of my emotions.
His arms slid around me, pulling me against him, and his lips pressed down hard on mine. My heart lifted, driving me to slip my own arms around him and lean into his embrace. In this moment it was my heart in control and not the memory of my duty.
He wrapped his arms more tightly around me still, lifting me up off the ground, and lengthening the kiss. I let my hands steal up to feel the softness of his riotous hair just as I had been longing to do for weeks. My soft sigh of joy broke the kiss, and he lowered my feet gently back to the ground, keeping his arms around me.
I nearly raised my lips to his again before my mind reasserted itself. With a pained cry, I pulled free. He let me go, but his hands and eyes reached for me.
“I can’t,” I said. “I can’t.”
“If you think I’m letting you go after that, Lark, you don’t know me very well at all.”
I stared at him, anguished. He had no idea how loving me would completely upend his life. And I couldn’t return to my family a complete failure in every respect. I just couldn’t.
“Please,” I said. “Please. I…need some time. Can you give me some time?”
“Of course I can,” he said promptly. “All the time you need. I want to give you everything, Lark.” His voice dropped. “I’ll wait for you as long as you need.”
I wiped the tears from my eyes and felt the gentle pressure of lips on my forehead. When my vision cleared enough to see, he was gone.
I drew in deep, shuddering breaths. None of this was fair to him. And hurting him, hurt me. But if everything went to plan tonight, at least tomorrow I could talk to him openly and honestly. I could tell him why we couldn’t be together. And then he would feel differently. He had no interest in the restrictions that came with the life of royalty and nobility.
I stood there for a long time, struggling to return to the moment and remember what I needed to be doing. A ball. There was a ball, and I needed to dress for it.
I was still standing there, though, when I heard voices. They were rough voices, and an instant fear response shot through me. On an instinctive level I recognized them, even while my brain was struggling to catch up.
My body urged me to move, urged me to hide, and I looked frantically around the kitchen. The voices moved closer. An iron stove beside me stood cold and empty and, without thinking, I pulled open the door, climbed in and shut it behind me.
The space inside was large enough for me, but only just. I had to curl around in an awkward position, although I didn’t have long to get comfortable before the voices sounded so close that I froze, hardly daring to breathe. Of all the foolish places to hide! Hadn’t there been a pantry somewhere nearby I could have stashed myself in?
The voices stopped.
“I swear this is the only empty place in the whole palace,” growled one.
“It’s strange to be in an empty kitchen,” said another. I recognized him as the one who told me my friends were still alive.
“Never mind that. Is it past midday yet? She said not to go to her suite until after midday.”
“Good thing the guards didn’t search her room on any of the previous occasions,” one of them grunted. “If they’d found us and our injuries, we’d have been in trouble.”
“The royals are finally getting suspicious. That’s why it’s time to move,” said the one who seemed to be the leader. “We stash this vile stuff there for the prince and princess, and then we need to be on the road. We’re going to run out of time if we don’t move soon.”
“I think it’s just gone midday now,” the one who had injured his leg said.
“Well, maybe we give it another five minutes to be sure. Can anyone see any food?”
They spread out, upending the kitchen in their search for food. One of them found the basket of sweet rolls and called the others over, and the talking was replaced with noisy munching and burps of satisfaction.
The aches of my awkward position had disappeared, replaced with a strange sensation of cold that brought my senses jangling into full awareness. None of the confusion of earlier remained, my mind utterly focused.
The vile stuff, they had said. Poison?
And the prince and princess. Now that I heard it, it seemed an obvious choice. What bigger crime against a kingdom could there be than killing their crown prince and princess? What would rouse a king and queen to greater anger? The sort of anger that would lead them to throw away generations of alliance with those who sided with the murderer.
I considered leaping from the stove now and trying to wrest the vial from the men by force, but a moment’s consideration revealed the flaws in that plan. I would have to wait until they’d gone and then go to the ball as planned. I would tell Damon what I had overheard, and we would make sure Alyssa and Max didn’t go anywhere near Sierra—or anyone else, if we couldn’t find that vial.
Impatience filled me as the men ate and ate. Would they never leave? Finally one of them grunted and said it had been long enough. I strained my ears, listening as they clomped their way out of the kitchen, heading for the guest suites upstairs. With so many festivities underway in the palace, they were likely to reach their destination unchallenged.
I debated running after them, in the hope I could find someone along the way who could help me stop them. But the doctors had declared the poison was inhaled. What if it came to a fight, and the vial was crushed? I might end up killing whoever was helping me, and myself along with them.
No, I needed to get to the royals. They were the only ones in danger. I would go straight to Alyssa. She would listen to me.
Half falling out of the stove, I scrambled to my feet. But the sight of my arms made me pause. My short stay in the stove had entirely undone my long soak in the bath. I was covered in dust and soot.
I turned and ran for the bath house, this time planning the fastest possible wash. Once I was clean, I would throw my dress on, leaving my hair in its usual braid down my back. There was no time for anything more fancy now.