Page 12 of Royally Arranged

What had changed her so much in such a short time?

“Thorne,” a feminine voice said. Twisting, I stared at my mother in her thick swirls of dark lace.

“Mom?” I asked, coming forward and taking her hands. “What are you doing here?”

She embraced me; her cheeks were wet from tears. “I’m weak. I flew out soon after you and your father. Lulabelle offered to stay behind and help, though I’m not sure she’ll eventryto work out any new deals, you know how she is, but ... Screw the business, I couldn’t handle the idea of him facing this without me.” She placed her hand on the middle of my back, guiding me deeper into the church. “I should have stopped by your hotel room, but I arrived after midnight and hated to wake you. I knew I’d see you this morning, here.”

I was barely listening. It took everything I had to stop staring at Nova. I felt her eyes on me as I approached the lower pews. My mind was jammed—I kept playing that meeting on repeat. I’d met Nova before ... Even if I’d forgotten, I doubted she had. Why hadn’t she reminded me about it?

The anxious threads of paranoia were abruptly chopped when I lifted my head to see what was at the front of the church. Sitting on a low platform was a shiny coffin covered in gold filigree. It was so saturated in color that my father was easier to spot than normal.

He, too, was all in black. It made him seem like a shapeless shadow from behind. I watched him as he gazed down on his brother. It hit me then. The last time they’d seen each other, Hester had been alive. He’d been so much more than this emaciated corpse.

Ice traveled the length of my spine. A bomb had been rolling in my chest since I walked into the cathedral; it exploded until I thought it would fill up every crevice in my body.

Two siblings forced apart by greed.

This was a tragedy ... This was beyond cruel.

I felt grateful to my father. Even if he’d fled into exile to save his own skin, he’d prevented his children from enduring the same game of royal chess that he’d grown up with.

On the sidelines I caught motion; Nova was leaning forward from the straight-backed row of her family. Her perceptive eyes were stuck on me—like she was waiting for me to cry. Like she expected me to. My nose burned as I sucked in air. On stiff legs I headed over to my father. My mother grabbed my elbow, pulling me into a seat beside her. “Leave him,” she pleaded.

I didn’t resist her firm grip. But her command broke me out of my stupor. “Why thefuckare the Valentines here?” I hissed into her ear.

She looked straight ahead. “We’ll talk about it after. This isn’t the time.”

I burned with a wild need to confront them. To stalk over there and stare down Kurtis Valentine and his whole brood. To ask them what their connection was to Hester ... to Torino.

To askherwhat she was up to.

Nova,I thought, my hands tightening into fists in my lap.Were you playing with me yesterday? Did you kiss me as part of some trap?I hated not knowing. I prided myself on staying ahead of the game. But I hadn’t just stumbled, I’d fallen flat on my face.

My father approached us. He dropped bonelessly on the opposite side of my mother. The priest approached the casket; Maverick was staring that way, his eyes dry, his skin ashen. I saw my mother take his hand. He clutched it.

As the priest went on about life, death, and the power of heaven, the small crowd made quiet sniffling sounds. A high keening cry soon started from a corner. There was a woman covered head to toe in black silk and a nearly opaque veil. She was sobbing, hugging herself; my eyes narrowed when Kurtis Valentine’s wife, Valencia, hurried over to talk to her.

“Austere Fredricson,” my mother whispered in my ear. “The king’s widow.”

I felt a tickle of suspicion seeing Valencia holding Austere close, talking to her in a soothing way. Their behavior was too familiar. How did they know each other? How did the Valentines knowanyonein this country? They were a Boston Mafia family. Dangerous, powerful, rich like mine ... but clearly that wasn’t all. There was more happening here.

I was determined to understand everything.

- CHAPTER SIX -

HAWTHORNE

“They’re snakes,” my father said. He leveled his glare on me—and even knowing his anger wasn’t for me but the Valentines, I stepped back. “Everything they’ve been up to makes sense now.”

“Tell me.” I bit the words in two, narrowing my eyes in Nova’s direction. She had the grace to turn away.

My father led me and my mother farther into the cathedral. He didn’t want anyone else to hear. “Glen brought me up to speed yesterday. It seems that my brother fell in love with the queen around thirty years ago. She was visiting with her family ... with her sister, Valencia.”

That information made me dizzy. “Austere is Valencia Valentine’s sister?”

Crinkling her lace-gloved hands into a ball, my mother scowled. “They’ve been involved with Torino since the start. That’s how they knew who you were, Maverick,” she said, looking at her husband.

Back in the States, my father had changed his surname from Fredricson to Badd, so our royal blood would remain a secret. Not many knew who we really were—though telling a girl that you’re a prince in hiding is easy-mode for a good time. If you like things easy, anyway.

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