I frowned at her. “Max tells me the people like her.”
“They do, but not for the right reason. They’re just happy someone slapped you in the face.”
I clenched my jaw. “That’s not how Max put it.”
“To be frank, Your Majesty, I’d know better than Max. Sir, I believe the girl would do more harm than good at this point.”
“That’s disappointing,” I said.
“I think we should send them off to a resort, let them have a nice time, and forget about all of this. Concentrate on the rebellion. Maybe find you a good Starkish girl.”
I pursed my lips. This was exactly what I had been afraid of. Lynette was forever doing opinion polls and testing. She was obsessed with public opinion, and for good reason: A King couldn’t effectively rule people who hated him.
But there was a line. I could only care what the people thought so much. I couldn’t make every decision based on what was popular. Sometimes I did the unpopular thing because it was the right thing.
“No. The Koch family stays,” I said.
“Sir,” she said gently, “there is a large population of people that still miss your brother.”
“I miss my brother,” I snapped at her.
“I understand. But many people believe you should marry Victoria.”
I stopped walking, forcing Lynette to turn and face me.
Victoria had been my brother’s fiancée. They never actually got married, and truthfully they barely knew each other, but she had been promised to him. She was a beautiful woman and very well liked among the people, but we all thought it would be strange for me to marry her.
And frankly, I was not my brother. Victoria was an uptight aristocrat like every rich, spoiled girl in Starkland. That was fine for my brother, since he knew it would be a good political match, but I wasn’t so practical in my marriage. If I had it my way, I wouldn’t get married at all, let alone to some baron’s daughter.
“No,” I said simply. “That isn’t happening.”
“I urge you to reconsider.”
“She is my dead brother’s girl. Leo is barely buried, and you want me to marry her?”
“King Leopold never married her,” Lynette pointed out. “Some would see it as you honoring your brother’s memory.”
“Enough,” I said, feeling my anger rise. “Here is what’s going to happen: You’re going to forget about me marrying Victoria; the Koch family is going to stay here for the remainder of their trip, as planned; and you aren’t going to interfere.”
“Your Highness—”
“Do you understand me?” I said, glaring at her. “Your king is giving you a command.”
She nodded once. “Very well, sir.”
“Good. I like you, Lynette, but don’t push this.”
“As you command, sir.”
I turned away from her and quickly left. I felt her watching as I walked away, but that didn’t matter.
Maybe that was a bad move politically. My older brother had been a beloved ruler, and when my father died of old age and my brother took the crown, the people rejoiced. When Leo went to the south to fight the rebels, everyone assumed that Great King Leopold would end the conflict and solidify the monarchy’s control over Starkland.
Instead, Leo’s caravan rode over a bomb and he blew himself to little bits and pieces. The people were distraught when their beloved king had died bleeding on the side of the road.
To them, he was a king. They didn’t know Leo. When he died, I didn’t just lose a king. I lost my older brother, the man I was closest to in the world.
We were very different people. Leo was always so sober and serious all the damn time. But he was my foil, the man I could rely on no matter what. Without Leo, I’d felt lost at first.
And the people weren’t happy that the bad boy was suddenly their king.
I never asked for any of this. I was born into this family and only became king because of dumb bad luck. I didn’t choose for Leo to go to war, and I certainly never wanted him to get blown up.
I had very few choices in my life. There weren’t many things I could actually control. The woman I married was one of the few things.
I wasn’t sure I wanted to marry Bryce. I barely knew the girl. But I did know that I wanted to get to know her. I wanted to make her mine. And maybe in the process, I’d teach her that she wanted to be my queen. Maybe that wasn’t a great political move, but fuck politics.
Sometimes I needed to do whatever the fuck I wanted to do. What was the point of being king if I couldn’t make my own choices?
I was choosing to keep Bryce around, because she made my fucking blood ring like a bell. That was good enough for now.