Page 2 of Ruthless Prince
Elizabeth Thorne gave me a sweet smile and air-kissed my cheeks. Then she turned to grab a microphone from the edge of thetable.
“Hello, everyone! I wanted to thank you from the bottom of my heart for joining us this evening. It means so much to me and my family that you’re all here to celebrate Logan and Willow’s commitment,” she said in a gushing tone. She paused to let everyone clap and cheer for amoment.
My face felt like it was going to crack from all the fake smiling, but I soldiered on, keeping my lips stretchedwide.
“As a mother, nothing brings me more joy than the celebration of my child’s love,” Elizabeth went on when the cheers had finally died down. “I’m so happy for Logan, and I can’t imagine a better match for him than Willow, our country’s very own first daughter! So without further ado, please raise your glasses and join me in a toast.” She lifted her crystal champagne flute. “May the love and strength you share endure and grow.Always.”
“Hear, hear!” Chuck’s voice boomed out after his wife’s, and the spacious ballroom echoed with the sound of clinking glasses. I gazed out at the sea of happy faces again, wishing a sinkhole would appear on the floor and swallow me rightup.
Several prominent members of the secret society known as the Order were dotted around the room, holding their glasses high in celebration. All of them were smiling at me as if I was actually one of them. Most of the other guests were oblivious to their true nature, but if they stepped up behind them and parted the hair just above the napes of their necks, they would glimpse the society’s sacred symbol—a small black tattoo made up of a triangle with an eye insideit.
Just likemine.
The Order presence at this party made me want to hurl. They might’ve invited me into their inner sanctum and promised to help me, but they were master manipulators who owned me just as much as the Thornes did. If it wasn’t for them and their shady existence, my father might’ve taken a different path. He might’ve been forced to own up to his mistakes and pay the proper price instead of using the society to cover his ass by selling me to the highestbidder.
“Now, Madam President, I’m sure everyone would love to hear from you!” Elizabeth said, turning her pretty face to mymother.
Another round of raucous cheers echoed throughout the room. My mother looked like she wanted to murder someone, but then she glanced over at the reporters and videographer the Thornes had hired to capture the speeches. The transformation in her expression from irritation to delight happened in a split-second, but I didn’t miss it. I knew her all toowell.
She sashayed up to the table and accepted the mic with a brightsmile.
“Hello, everyone,” she said, waving her free hand in a regal manner. “To begin with, I’d like to thank my wonderful friends in the Thorne family for organizing this magnificent evening. I know it’s traditional for the bride-to-be’s family to arrange the engagement party, but as you can imagine, I’m a little busy being the first female leader of the freeworld!”
Everyone dutifully laughed at her joke. I gritted myteeth.
“Now I want to address Logan,” she continued, swinging her gaze around to my fiancé. “Logan, when you came to me and told me you wanted to marry my daughter, I was so charmed by how nervous you seemed. You’re such a wonderful young man, and I’m thrilled to have you as part of our family. I know you’ll take care of my littlegirl.”
I almost let out a snicker at that.The media loved to use the term ‘fake news’ when it came to politics these days, and this speech was right up there with all ofthat.
“And my dear Willow,” she went on, latching her gaze onto mine. “I love you so much. You will always come first for me, no matter how busy I get, and I truly hope you will be as happy with Logan as I have been with your father all these years. That’s twenty-five years, people! Can you believeit?”
She grinned and paused again, allowing for a few seconds of excited applause. Beside me, Logan let out a barely audible snort. “Jesus, what a load of shit,” he muttered under hisbreath.
For once, I agreed withhim.
My mother’s speech was total bullshit. For one, she hated the Thorne family and viewed them as our sworn enemies. Mustering up the ability to refer to them as her ‘wonderful friends’ had probably given her a stomachulcer.
Secondly, she’d been a casual parent at best, always putting her career above me and my brother, and she hadn’t seemed happy with my father for years. She was just trying to humanize herself in order to make a good impression on the journalists who’d been invited to cover the event. As POTUS, she had to make herself look as great as possible to the public through the media, even if that meant lying through her teeth at every opportunity and making her daughter’s engagement party all aboutherself.
Mom went on. “The more time I’ve spent around these two, the more I see why they are so crazy about each other. Seriously, they fit perfectly!” She turned to face me and Logan. “I love how you support each other, and I want you to know that I’m behind you all the way.Congratulations!”
The room erupted in more applause and whooping cheers. My mother dropped the mic and stepped over to me. Her cloying perfume made my nose tickle as she pulled me into a tight hug. “Your choker doesn’t match your dress,” she muttered against my ear, the fake smile still plastered on her face. “Are you ever going to take that hideous thingoff?”
The choker wasn’t actually hideous, despite its underlying purpose as a tracking and recording device. Mom was simply envious, because my father had never bought her anything even half as expensive during their time together. She had a point, though. The blue alexandrite pendant hanging from the choker went well with my auburn hair, but it didn’t exactly match my deep purplegown.
It wasn’t like I could tell the truth, though. I couldn’t admit that I wasn’t allowed to removeit.
“It was a gift from Logan,” I replied. “He likes to see it onme.”
“How touching,” she replied in a frosty whisper. “Now, make sure you speak to the Keshari Crown Prince at some point this evening. I’ve been trying to broker a deal between Keshar and Syria over their whole oil situation, but the prince can be very stubborn. I think your input would help me smooth things over. He’s been staring at you allnight.”
“Right.”
She pulled away just as Logan grabbed the mic from the table and spoke up. “Sorry to drag this out, everyone, but I’d like to say a few quick wordstoo.”
My heart sank. How was he going to humiliate me thistime?
“I just wanted to tell you all how much I adore Willow,” he began. “Our closest friends know we had a sort of love-hate, will-they-or-won’t-they relationship for a very long time, but in the end, I had to do what I felt was right. What Iknewwas right. The truth is, Willow was simply made forme.”
