Page 5 of Wicked Royals
“Trust me, you’re not the problem,” I said, patting him on the shoulder. “How’s your new job going, anyway? My dad told me you’re at the NSAnow.”
He nodded. “It’s good. Makes my parents happy,too.”
“How are theydoing?”
“Same as usual. Always dragging me to awful parties like this in the hope I’ll meet a nice girl and getmarried.”
I giggled and raised one eyebrow. “I doubt you’re going to meet many nice girlshere.”
“Well, you’re not bad,” he said with a shy smile, clinking his glass against mine. “So there’s somehope.”
Other women might’ve assumed he was hitting on them with a statement like that, but I’d known him for long enough to know better. He had no interest in me, and that was exactly why he had no trouble saying nice things to my face. If he was actually attracted to me, he’d be tripping over his words and sweating likecrazy.
I smiled. “Keep sweet-talking girls like that and you’ll find someone in no time.” I took a quick sip of champagne and leaned forward, lowering my voice to a furtive whisper. “God, remember when you had a crush on ChloeThorne?”
Rowan nodded and groaned. Chloe was Logan’s sister. She was the same age as me and breathtakingly beautiful with brilliant green eyes and silky blonde hair. She was also a terrible bully back in the day, and possibly the only person in the world with a soul as ugly as Logan. Rowan used to have a crush on her, but she shot him down in typical Chloe style. In other words, it was a very public and deeply humiliatingrejection.
“We probably shouldn’t say anything about her,” Rowan said, looking into his glass. “Not when she can’t defendherself.”
My smile faded. “Yeah. You’reright.”
As mean and nasty as Chloe was when we were younger, I felt pretty bad for her nowadays. Around four years ago, she was involved in a terrible car accident, leaving her horribly injured, and now she was under permanent care at the Thorne family’s main estate in Kalorama. From what I’d heard, the brain swelling had been so severe after the accident that she might never be able to speak or walkagain.
“Speaking of the Thornes, I see you’re still very popular with Logan,” Rowan said, looking over myshoulder.
“Is he glaring at meagain?”
“Yup. I don’t think he’s listening to a single word his father is saying. Too busy giving you dirtylooks.”
“Of course.” I sighed and briefly turned my head over my shoulder. Rowan was right. Logan was standing with his parents now. His mother was clad in a stunning green satin dress with matching emerald jewelry, air-kissing another woman’s cheeks, and his father was grinning and carrying on with a Congressman. Logan’s attention, however, was entirely on me. His brows were pulled low with disdain, and his lips were pressed into an arrogantsmirk.
I turned back to Rowan. “I still have no idea what I did to piss him off sobadly.”
“It’s just the way he is. Trust me, I went to school with him,” he said, pressing his lips into a thin line. “Anyway, how’sGeorgetown?”
“It’s okay. Kinda sucks having a security detail following me to every class, though,” I said, pinching the bridge of my nose. “I really hope my mother never becomes president, because then it’ll just getworse.”
Rowan’s face clouded, and he leaned his head closer to mine. “That reminds me. There’s something I should tellyou.”
“What?”
He motioned for me to step over to the edge of the room with him, and then he leaned in again, speaking in a hushed voice. “You should know the government isn’t actually being run by thegovernment.”
“Huh?”
“Have you heard of the DeepState?”
“Um… sort of,” I said slowly. I had a feeling I was about to be dropped right in the deep end of one of his latest conspiracytheories.
“Apparently it’s real,” he replied. He paused and looked over my shoulder, presumably to make sure no one was eavesdropping. “The president is just a puppet. The real leader is supposedly alizard.”
I almost spat out my drink. “Did you say alizard?”
Rowan nodded emphatically. “Yes. A thorny green lizard.” He emphasized every word, as if that made it any more believable. “They run a secret society filled with Washington’s true elite, and the society controlseverything.”
“I think you might’ve had a bit too much of that,” I said, nodding toward his champagne glass. I’d heard this theory many times before. According to all of the tinfoil-hat-wearing proponents of the idea, the US (and maybe even the rest of the world) was secretly run by shape-shifting reptilians oraliens.
“I know it sounds crazy, but you need to think about it. Justthink,” Rowan insisted. “Think about it in terms of anallegory.”
