Page 61 of The Dandelion Princess
Ella closes her eyes for a moment, and pain is carved in the gentle lines of her face. Does anyone else see this side of her? She doesn’t cry often. When she’s upset, her emotions take another path to the surface, erupting as caustic humor or aggression. In one fluid motion, I escape the booth and pull her in my arms.
When I promised Noah I would look after his sister, what did we imagine? That she would say something outrageous in public? Her expression promises an apocalypse.
“You’re not going to do anything rash,” I declare.
She looks up, steel in her eyes. “You’re not the boss of me.”
20
Dancing Bear
ELLA
Marc rushes me to the elevator and dials up my security detail. “Thor, I have Ella. We’re coming back to the palace. Side gate. Look for the black Ferrari.” A pause, and he checks his watch. “Ten minutes.”
Heat radiates from our clasped hands, but my mind is as messy as an unlicensed circus. The dancing bear has snapped his leash and charges the stands, the dazzling lady tightrope walker is hanging by her fingertips, and a death-defying motorcyclist is trapped in the metal cage of that kiss, racing in circles at a dizzying speed.
What kind of lesson did Marc want to impart to me this time? And,Dominanstid, how did he get so good?
I twist out of his grasp. “You don’t have to drive,” I say, striding into the tiny elevator, four people deep, one and a half people wide. I hate these things, and the walls seem to closein on me as I try to untangle my emotions. “I’m not your responsibility.”
Marc locks the ornate metal door and presses the button for the underground garage, crowding me into the back. The deathtrap shudders and the lights dim but, before I can climb out of my skin, he reaches for my hand again, lacing our fingers together. My breathing slows, matching his.Stultes es. I’m going to have to begin again to get over him. But not yet. I close my eyes.
“You’re wrong,” he says, brushing the pad of his thumb across my skin. “Didn’t you listen to your mother’s Christmas message? It was all about brotherly love. The whole human family bound together in goodwill and peace. We belong to each other. All of us.”
Marc doesn’t tease my sisters. Not really. His affection for them is as straightforward as a blue sky. He saves this side of himself for me. The elevator emits a death rattle when it reaches its destination, and Marc crashes the door open. I take a deep, clean breath as we exit.
“She didn’t mean a word of it,” I counter. “Freja had just eloped with a Pavian immigrant, and that was my mother’s attempt to head off a national meltdown.”
“Cynic,” he answers, stuffing me into his car, ducking back in to press a leisurely kiss on my lips.
We’re still doing this? I thought the next order of business on his agenda was to give me a talking to about borders and boundaries and neat little boxes. It’s an unusual day, though. Maybe the kiss is meant to calm me.
He closes the door with an expensive thunk, and the caged motorcycle in my mind is deafening, my brain filled with melting rubber and blinding smoke. I move to buckle my seatbelt, halting when I see an ornament swinging from the rearview mirror. I cup the gold chain with the row of tiny raccoons.
“It was a deal. Two for one,” he says, sliding into his seat and clearing his throat. His eyes never shift from the windshield, but a wash of red stains his neck.
Caroline meets us in the Great Hall with a quick curtsey. “You’re the last to arrive, Your Royal Highness,” she says, leading the way to the administration wing. The worst possible news has hit my family, yet I hardly register it as strange that our first impulse isn’t hugs and tea in a cozy tangle—it’s a meeting in a war room.
“It’s going to be okay,” Marc murmurs. Okay or not, I hold onto him with a death grip. When we enter the room, I curtsey. Marc gives my mother a respectful bow.
“Caroline,” Mama says, expecting to be instantly understood. Without fuss, the secretary arranges a chair slightly behind my customary seat. Marc is to stay.
I take my place and fidget with a pen and a notepad, drawing patterns on the page. Across the table, Freja and Oskar carry on a low-voiced conversation, the two of them in a small, self-contained little world.
Mama calls the meeting to order, appearing as the reassuring monarch rather than the anxious mother. “Allow me to misquote Job,” she says, slipping into her seat. She perches her reading glasses on her nose. “‘The thing which we greatly feared has come upon us.’ Caroline.”
Caroline clicks on the projector and strides to the light switch. Noah beats her to it and she bumps into him just as the lights blink off. Peeling out of Noah’s steadying hold, she walks through the shifting, camouflaging light. “We are here, ma’am,” she says, touching the flow chart projected on the wall.
She begins to describe the meandering path of destruction. Freja’s legal matter will begin with a formal investigative committee and debate between parliamentary members on the floor of the Grousehof.
My stomach slides. Open Access broadcasts these exchanges on municipal planning disputes and marginal tax rates, and they usually put people to sleep. The idea of my sister’s private life being served up for public consumption makes me physically ill.
Caroline continues. “From there, this matter lands before a body of judicial lords before being presented for Her Majesty’s royal assent.” She clicks through to another slide. “Once the committee begins an investigation, members of the royal family and royal household will be called to give evidence.”
Mama tips her head. “I am surely exempt from the summons of a minister.”
“That is technically correct, ma’am.”
