Page 21 of The Prince Falls First
She shook her head.
“Tell me.”
“You cursed.”
He frowned. “So? I often curse.”
“Not in public.”
“I’m not in public right now.”
“Don’t pretend you don’t know what I mean. Everyone sees you as this calm, cool, collected prince, but you’re just the same as other men, aren’t you? Not above begging a woman to like him.”
A warmth spread through him, and he was sure only part of it was embarrassment. “I was not begging.”
She was smiling, then coughing and sneezing in alternate bursts.
When she gestured to the toilet roll, he moved forward, tore some off and handed it to her. When her cough subsided, she looked pale and exhausted.
He brushed some hair away from her face. “Do you often get ill?” he asked softly.
She shook her head, but said, “Sometimes. You go to all these parties and things, it’s bound to happen.”
“I go to twice as many events as you, my dear, but I stay perfectly healthy.”
She snorted, which turned into another cough. “Easy to do with palace health care. Not so easy if you’re a nobody like me.”
“You’re not a ‘nobody’, at least not to me.”
She shook her head and blew her nose. “Why are you here? Why do you keep bothering me?”
She sounded so annoyed but it only came out cute with her congested voice. “I told you. I like you. I want to get to know you.”
She sighed and reached for the water.
He got to it first and handed it to her, then asked while she took a drink, “Did you decorate this room?”
“Nuh-uh,” she said, still drinking. Once she finished, she continued, “My mother. It’s been this way as long as I can remember. When my father died…”
She cleared her throat and kept her eyes on the glass in her hands. “When he died, we didn’t have the money to redecorate our rooms, though mother always keeps the public rooms up to date.” She met his eyes. “So you see the truth of our lives. We’re poor, faking a rich life.”
“Is this why your mother wants you to marry me? Because we’re rich?”
She nodded. “Partly. She also wants power and, as she can’t get it herself, she wants to use her kids to get it instead.”
“Your mother’s not the first, you know. Plenty have tried before, with me or my siblings.”
She shrugged.
“What do you want, Genevieve?”
She seemed taken aback by the question. “What?”
“Every conversation we’ve had so far has been about other people’s expectations for you. I can certainly relate to that, but I’d like to know whatyouwant.”
She stayed quiet for a minute, her eyes focused on the glass in her hands again. “To get out of this house. To leave and never come back.”
It was strange to think about leaving a home. In some senses, he was chained to a home he’d never be able to leave: the palace. He usually didn’t think about it; after all, he’d been born there, he’d rule there, he may even die there. It was simply…home to him. There was a time he didn’t want the responsibility or the royal life, but he didn’t have a choice to walk away as she did.
