The Queen's New Year Secret(11)
His body responded with a hunger that was becoming predictable.
“I’m glad you decided to join me.”
“Well, now you won’t need to put a lock on the pantry.”
She began her descent, her delicate hand resting on the banister. His eyes were drawn to her fingers, to her long, elegant fingernails, painted a delicate coral that matched her dress.
“I’m pleased to hear that, agape.”
“Don’t call me that,” she said, her tone sharp.
“What?”
“Love. It’s always been a little bit of a farcical endearment, but it just stings all the more at the moment.”
She breezed past him, heading outside to where the table was set for them. He followed after her, trying not to allow that helpless sensation to overtake him again. How did she do this to him? He ruled an entire nation. He was the master of his, and every domain, within its borders. Somehow she made him feel as inept as a schoolboy who didn’t even have dominion over his own bedtime.
“I am sorry, I shall try to endeavor not to call you nice things,” he said through clenched teeth.
She paused, looking over her shoulder, one pale eyebrow raised. “Just don’t call me things you don’t mean.”
It was hard to think of a political response to that. Of course he didn’t love her.
He cared for her, certainly. There was nothing duplicitous about his lack of emotion. He had made that clear when he proposed to her that afternoon in his office after his engagement to Francesca had blown all to hell. He had outlined exactly what the relationship between Tabitha and himself would be. Had told her he intended to base it upon the mutual respect they had for each other.
That thought, of just how honest he’d been, of how she had known fully, and agreed to this, reignited his anger.
And he forgot to search for the political response.
“Actually, my queen,” he said, “I could instead call you exactly what you are. Not a queen. Simply a woman that I elevated far beyond her station. Far beyond what she was equipped to handle.”
“Are you going to malign my blood now you’ve mixed your royal lineage with it? Perhaps you should have thought of that before you used my body as the vessel for your sacred heir.”
She continued to walk ahead of him, her shoulders stiff. She took her place at the table, without waiting for him to come and hold her chair out for her. For some reason, the lack of ceremony annoyed him. Perhaps because it was yet more evidence of this transformation from his perfect, biddable wife, into this creature.
It wasn’t perfect. And you know it.
He didn’t like that thought. It only damaged the narrative he was constructing in his mind about the truth of his marriage. The one that absolved him from any wrongdoing.
The one that said he had told her how their marriage would work, and now she had an issue with it. That, the fact she had been warned, meant that now the fault rested on her alone.
It allowed him to open up all sorts of boxes inside of him, boxes he normally kept closed, locked tight, and pull out all the hurt and anger kept there, examining it, turning it over, holding it close to his chest.
He took his seat across from her, lifting his water to his lips. For a moment, he regretted not serving alcohol out of deference to her condition. She didn’t deserve his deference.
“How is it you expected we might discuss things with more success cut off from civilization?”
“For a start,” he said, leaning back in his chair, “I very much appreciate having you somewhat captive.”
“I’m not sure how I’m supposed to feel about that.”
“Oh, don’t concern yourself. I’m not worried about how you feel.”
“No, of course you aren’t. Why start now?”
He set his water glass down hard enough that some of the clear liquid sloshed over the side. “I’m sorry, have I done something recently that conflicted with our initial marriage agreement?”
“You are...” She looked up, as though the clear Mediterranean sky might have some answers. “You’re distant. You’re cold.”
“A great many people might say that about you, agape.”
“Don’t call me that,” she said, blue eyes flashing.
“I don’t recall agreeing to your edict, Tabitha.”
“You want a list? I’m working on a list,” she said, ignoring his words. “The only time in five years you ever bothered to get angry with me was when I told you I was going to leave you.”
“You want me to get angry with you?”
“I want you to feel something. Anger would be a start.”
“You have your wish. I am exceedingly angry with you.”
“You barely speak to me. You only touch me when attempting to conceive. I am essentially part of the furniture to you. If you could have had an heir with a bureau in possession of childbearing hips, I’ve no doubt you would have done so.”
“The same can be said of the way you treat me. Moreover, I never promised you anything different. What vow have I broken?”
A slash of color bled out over her pale cheekbones. “A woman expects her husband to treat her a certain way.”
“Does she? Even when the husband told her exactly how things would be? If your expectations differ from the reality I lined out for you early on, I fail to see how that’s my fault.”
“Nobody imagines their marriage is going to be a frozen wasteland.”
“A frozen wasteland is exactly what I promised you,” he said, his tone biting. “If I had promised to love and cherish you, then I suppose you would have every right to feel cheated. To feel lied to. But I promised you respect, and I promised you fidelity, I promised that I would treat you as an equal. If I have failed on that score then it has only been in the days since you violated the promises you made to me.”
“I know what you said. What we said, but... Five years on things feel different. Or they feel like they should be.”
“I see. Were you ever going to tell me that? Or were you simply going to freeze me out until I was the one who asked for an end to the marriage?”
She curled her fingers into fists, and looked away from him. “That isn’t...”
“Do you not enjoy being held accountable for the breakdown of our union , Tabitha? Because if I recall, you spent the past five years doing much the same thing you accuse me of. If an honest word has ever passed between us, I would be surprised. Did you think I didn’t notice that you have grown increasingly distant? Did you think it didn’t bother me?”
“Yes, Kairos, I imagined that it didn’t bother you. Why would I ever assume that you cared about there being any closeness between us?”
“Because there was a time when I at least called you a friend.”
Her golden brows shot upward. “Did you? Do you consider me a friend?”
“You know that I did. I assume you remember the day that I proposed to you.”
“Oh, you mean the day that you watched a video of the woman you had chosen to marry having dirtier sex with your brother than I imagine you ever had with her? The day that you—drunkenly—told me you thought I would be a better choice to be your queen? I find it difficult to put much stock into anything you said that day.”
“Then that’s your mistake. Because I was sincere. I told you that we could build a stronger foundation than Francesca and I ever could. I told you that I had been having doubts about her even before her betrayal.”
“Yes, that’s right, you did. And why were you having doubts, exactly?”
“The way you behaved...it was such a stark contrast to Francesca, even on her best of days. I found myself wishing that it was you. When we traveled together, when I went to you to discuss affairs of the state...I found myself wishing that you were the one I was going to marry. I respected your opinion. And I felt like I could ask you questions, when with everyone else I had to simply know the answers.”
He felt stripped bare saying these things now, without the buffer of alcohol, five years older and a lot more jaded than he had been then. But she needed to hear them. She needed to hear them again, clearly.
“And while it is a very nice sentiment, it isn’t exactly the proposal every girl dreams of,” she said, her tone brittle.
“It seems very much that you are angry with yourself for accepting a proposal you now deem beneath you. How high you have risen. That the proposal of a king is no longer good enough for you.”
“Maybe I am the one who changed. But people do change.”
“Only because they forget. You forget that you are going to have to leave my palace, leave Petras, search for a job. Struggle financially. Perhaps even face the life that you were so eager to leave behind. Marriage to me offered you instant elevation. The kind of status that you craved.”
“Don’t,” she said, “you make me sound like I was nothing more than a gold digger.”
“Oh, you would have done all right finding gold on your own. But validation? Status? For a piece of white trash from Nowhere, USA, that is a great deal more difficult to come by.”
She stood, shoving her plate toward the center of the table. “I don’t have to listen to you insulting me.”
“You want me to call you something honest. Though, I hasten to remind you that I learned these words from you. This is what you think of yourself. You told me.”