Page 90 of Tall, Royal Hater
“No,” I deadpanned. “I just like joking about the man I don’t like railing me into his bed.”
Pierre threw his head back and cackled so bloody loudly. I sat there with burning cheeks, glaring, and waiting for him to get it out of his system. It took a while for him to stop.
“Are you done?” I said as he wiped the corners of his eyes.
A light chuckle bubbled from him. “I take it you enjoyed yourself then?”
“Do you really want to know?”
He shook his head. “No. I mean…” He tilted his head in thought, but then grimaced. “Actually, no.”
I rolled my eyes. He grinned proudly. I glared, but he eased closer without any fear for his life. “You know when I said, ‘fuck him’…I didn’t actually meanliterally.”
My face dropped, and blood surged to my skin. He fell back into his chair, laughing all over again.
“I hate you right now,” I said.
“No, you don’t,” he said confidently through his settling mirth.
“I don’t know why I thought I could tell you.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
I threw one hand up. “Because Esmeralda isn’t here, and I wanted someone to talk to.”
“That’s not what I’m asking, Mariyah.” He looked intently at me. “I mean,whyare you telling me? What’s the problem if you and Shehryar did the deed?”
My mouth opened and closed wordlessly, struggling to form an answer. I didn’t have one.
“You’re panicking,” Pierre said almost matter-of-factly.
“No, I’m not,” I snapped, but the defensive sharpness in my tone suggested otherwise. I let out a breath and tried again. “I’m not panicking. It doesn’t matter to me that we slept together.”I pointed past Pierre. “Buthewants to make things weird by talking about it as if there’s anything to discuss.”
“Maybe he wants to know when it’ll happen again.”
My core clenched at the thought, but I rolled my eyes. “That wasn’t the kind of talking he meant.”
He shook his head slowly, appearing confused. “Maybe I’m missing the point, but I don’t understand what the problem is. Do you not want to hear what he has to say, or do you think he’s going to do something stupid like tell you to pretend it never happened? Because, in my opinion, Shehryar seems too noble to be the kind of asshole who does a hit-and-run.”
I wanted to scoff at the idea of Shehryar being noble, but there was annoyingly some truth to it.
“Yeah, well, maybe his nobility is the problem,” I said. “I don’t really want to do the whole ‘so, do we tell Esmeralda,’ ‘what are we now,’‘why did you leave the room when I went to get a towel—”
“Wait! Wait, wait, wait.” Pierre put his hand up for me to stop, eyes wide. “You left the room when he went to get you a towel? Why?”
“To save us both fromthe talk, but he wants to dothe talkanyway.”
He half grinned, half grimaced. “Yeah, it sounds like you kind of shot yourself in the foot.”
“Well, he had the chance to talk to me after breakfast, and he didn’t fucking take it. And I’m going to go shopping with him, Prince Arsh, and Katiya after lunch, but I swear if he tries to corner me there, I will rip him a new one.”
Pierre gave a single firm nod, amusement quirking his mouth. “Go for it.” He pointed a finger at me. “But the longer you put offthe talk, the more annoyed he’s going to get, and if yesterday was anything to go on…” He smirked. “Then I think you know what the consequences are gonna be.”
Annoy Shehryar just to get railed again?
It sounded like something Ishoulddo rather than shouldn’t.
But this time, he’d be the one begging.
