Page 17 of Royal Darling
The flight attendant rushes over with a handful of napkins. I wipe my beard with a few, and Emma wipes my chest, scrubbing hard enough to make the napkin rip.
I brush her hand away. “I’m good, luv. Stand down with the napkin.”
She looks at the shredded napkin in disgust. “What a poor product.”
The flight attendant quickly takes our rubbish and brings us both fresh bottled waters. Emma smiles at the flight attendant. “Thank you, Peggy.”
“You’re quite welcome, Your Highness.” Peggy gives me a speculative look, like she wants to say more, but then the pilot calls her for the preflight check.
“Please just ignore my brother,” Emma says tightly. “This is going to be wonderful.” She leans close and whispers, “I’m so glad you agreed to join me.”
I whisper back, “Was the sultan a total wanker?” That’s her former groom.
She flushes pink. “He wasn’t a sultan yet, and he was perfectly nice.”
“So why’d you ditch him?”
“It just felt wrong,” she whispers, her gaze downcast. “My gut instinct told me not to go through with it.”
“Did it feel right all the way up to your wedding day?”
She frowns. “No.”
“So what took you so long to dump the guy?”
She folds her hands primly in her lap. “I don’t wish to discuss it.”
A large hand appears in front of me followed by the unsmiling face of her brother. “Hello, I’m Emma’s brother Lucas.”
Emma shoves at him. “Go back to your seat.”
He ignores her and says to me in a tone heavy in disapproval, “I know you.”
“I don’t think we’ve met,” I reply. He knows my rep; he doesn’t know me.
His blue-green eyes narrow into slits of displeasure, all aimed at me. “I’ll be with you the whole time in Italy. Consider me your chaperone.”
“Lucas!” Emma hisses. “Go away!”
I offer Lucas an easy smile. “Nice to meet you, chaperone. Emma and I are just friends.”
He regards me suspiciously before taking the seat directly across the aisle, buckling in, and glaring at me.
And now it’s a party. The three of us plus two guards in a villa for the week. Brilliant. Is it too late to bail out?
Emma turns to me, speaking in a low fierce tone. “He’s letting us into the villa and that’s it.”
I keep my voice low. “Does he know that?”
“Yes,” she whispers. “I told him as much. I don’t buy that he volunteered. Gabriel—that’s my older brother, the new king—sent him to babysit me. I’m twenty-five years old, but Gabriel still sees me as a little girl with pigtails. He has noideawhat I’m capable of.”
I stare at her, intrigued. “What’re you capable of?”
She lifts her chin. “Lots of things.”
“Like philosophy?”
She glares at me. “It’s bad enough my brothers tease me. I don’t need it from you.”
