Page 71 of Tall, Royal Hater
“While we’re on the topic of Mariyah, by the way,” Pierre snuck in, setting a mischievous, lopsided grin on me. “Guess who I saw pinning her to the wall during the party yesterday?”
Shock solidified my muscles as I blinked at him.Did he just…
For a single breath, silence echoed off the walls, then six pairs of wide eyes landed on me.
A flush painted across my face as my shock turned into embarrassment and irritation.
Fuck, I was going to kill Pierre. And I was going to make it slow and painful.
“Is that so, Shehryar?” Prince Arsh asked with a playful gleam in his hazel eyes.
“No,” I growled through my teeth, glaring at Pierre. “That isn’t what happened.”
“Oh, yes, sorry,” Pierre said sarcastically and lifted both hands to make quotation marks with his fingers. “They were just ‘talking,’apparently. Though it looked more like they were about to kiss if you ask me.”
I ground my teeth together harder as Prince Fay threw his head back and laughed. Prince Kai was eyeing me curiously like he knew something the others didn’t. And King Rami and Prince Adam wore identical grinning expressions, the only difference being the colour of their eyes. Candy was the only one whose lipscurled up in disgust, and damn if I didn’t find it the slightest bit satisfying.
“Do you like Mariyah?” Prince Arsh asked, his gaze amused but somehow cryptic too.
“No,” I bit out instantly. “It’s not like that between us.”
“Then what is it like between you two?”
The pressure of his question had me fumbling over frustrated words. “It’s not—we don’t…” I paused for a long second. “We’re dealing with each other for the sake of planning the wedding.”
“According to Mariyah, they hate each other’s guts,” Pierre clarified, but the mirth in his ruby-red eyes made it very clear what he thought of that.
“Ah,” King Rami said with a low regal chuckle. “I see now.”
He adjusted his grip on the lion’s head of his cane as he leaned forward on the sofa. “Hate can be a funny emotion that your mind will use as a defence mechanism in certain situations. Sometimes when you find yourself so drawn to someone for reasons you cannot explain, your mind will trick you into believing you hate the person to rationalise the feeling. It doesn’t actually mean you hate them, just that you hate the way they make you feel so intensely and so out of your comfort zone.”
Prince Arsh nodded to his older brother. “He’s speaking from experience.”
“I am.” The king smiled widely underneath his salt-and-pepper beard, and a reminiscent glaze coasted over his hazel eyes. “Leila and I hated each other while we studied together in university.”
“Wait, what?” Prince Fay said, lurching upright. “You and Mother hated each other? Since when? Why has no one ever mentioned this before?”
Prince Arsh chuckled but followed Fitz’s instructions as the short man returned with the semi-stitched blazer. The king’sthree children, Candy, and Pierre looked at the older man for answers.
“Leila was confident and intelligent, though kept to herself,” the king explained, “and I suppose I was intrigued by her. But that intrigue presented itself in the form of irritation.” The king shrugged impishly. “So, I irritated her back, and teased her, and got on her nerves in order to sate my irritation, but it never worked. We ended up butting heads a lot until our third year when I saw another man try to win her over. I realised soon after that my irritation might’ve been misplaced.”
“That’s when he came to me with the confused ‘I think I’m in love with her’monologue,” Prince Arsh inserted.
The two brothers chuckled. “It was, and I told her too,” King Rami said. “She obviously didn’t believe me. So, I started courting her. I did better. I tried to prove myself to her, and I showed her how I really felt. Of course, her little trust in me meant half of what I did led to a huge number of arguments, but eventually, I got through to her. And now we’ve been married for thirty-two years.”
“Wow,” Prince Fay murmured.
“Someone needs to turn your story into a romance book,” Pierre said. “I’d read it.”
King Rami chuckled, and Candy raised a brow. “You still read romance books?”
Pierre reeled back like he was offended. “Of course I do. Why would I stop reading them?”
Candy rolled his eyes. “Xiomara threw you down a rabbit hole with those books she gave you.”
I didn’t know who Xiomara was, but when no one else asked, it was obvious they all knew her. It wasn’t until I looked up from the pedestal under my shoes that I realised the room was quiet because all seven men were looking at me expectantly again.Even Fitz remained still until he caught my gaze and quickly busied himself with Prince Arsh’s suit.
I bristled defensively. “What?”
