Glitter (Glitter Duology #1)(13)
“It wasn’t!” I burst out from just behind my mother. “I saw you. You had your hands around her neck while you—you—” My face was hot and red and I could hardly comprehend, much less explain, what I’d seen.
My mother raised both eyebrows, her expression full of judgment.
He seemed to cower beneath her gaze for a moment, and I was reminded sharply that he was less than two years older than me. Young enough to be my mother’s son. Youngest King in Sonoman-Versailles’s admittedly brief history. But with visible effort he reclaimed his composure and set about dismissively straightening the cuffs of his light linen shirt, even though the front hung completely open, revealing his bare chest.
“Please,” he scoffed. “We’re both consenting and of age, and tonight was hardly the first time.” He raised one eyebrow. “Haven’t you ever sampled this variety of bedsport? You ought to, might loosen you up a bit.”
My mother made a startled sound in her throat, but the King spoke over her before she could form actual words.
“If this situation is anyone’s fault, it’s hers,” he added, pointing a finger right at my face. “She dropped that godforsaken plate and made me jerk and squeeze too hard. That’s the moment it all went wrong.”
Rage boiled off my fear and set me quivering. I wanted to speak up; I wanted to tell my mother about that awful sound. But my tongue was dry and I couldn’t move past my fiery indignation at having been accused of being responsible for the dead woman at our feet.
“Do you truly think anyone will believe that when it’s your fingerprints bruised into her skin?” my mother asked, and I saw a smile hover at the corner of her mouth when the King’s face went pale. “Extenuating circumstances notwithstanding, you’ve done something unforgivable here, Justin. You have to make this right.”
“Of course,” he said, with all the meekness of a mouse trapped beneath a lion’s paw.
“You’ll marry Danica.”
“What?” Our voices burst forth in perfect unison.
“I will not,” His Highness said, sounding insultingly horrified.
“You will,” my mother said calmly. “Or you’ll lose your kingdom.”
At that the King stood back, scoffing openly, hands on his hips, a wide expanse of sleek skin showing above his perilously slouching breeches. I remember how my eyes fastened onto that skin and I couldn’t tear them away. We see so little bare skin at court, and this was the most desired boy in the kingdom. And a murderer. It was incredibly jarring. “You think the accidental death of a strumpet who forgot to use her safe word could take my kingdom from me?”
“No, no, I don’t,” my mother said, still in that deadly calm voice. “But we both know the Board of Nobles are on the verge of doing just that, murder notwithstanding.”
His Majesty opened his mouth as though to argue, then had the good sense to swallow his words.
“Since we’re discussing marriage, here’s a proposal. Four years ago my husband inherited his stepbrother’s place in your palace and a surprisingly significant number of voting shares.” She paused, looking him square in the eye. “We have enough votes to preserve your position as CEO and King. I’ve run the numbers, as I’m certain you have. As of the next regular meeting, without my cooperation, the nobles will succeed in their planned coup. We both know it.”
He didn’t counter her words—they must have been true. Horror lanced through me, despite everything else. Could Justin Wyndham’s rule truly be so precarious?
She circled him then, treading silently on bare feet, the lace edge of her dressing gown trailing behind her. “If this scandal comes to light, I guarantee you’ll lose your great-grandfather’s kingdom, Justin.”
He flinched at her use of his given name this time.
“You’ll be nothing but a potentially brilliant nineteen-year-old forced-out CEO, with all your inherited wealth and no power to do anything with it.” She paused before delivering the killing blow. “Besides, the next regular meeting isn’t your only problem. At this rate even my husband’s shares can’t keep you in place for long.”
“You’re talking about the Queen’s shares.” The King sounded wary, and I felt a prickle of unease at the Q word.
“Just so. Those votes were mooted at your mother’s death and will only become active again when you wed. You need a cooperative bride even more than you need my husband’s support.”
That was when I realized how calculated this move was. How calculated her placement of me in the King’s path had always been.
“You want our silence and cooperation? Not to mention access to those final crucial shares?” she asked. “Marriage to Danica is the nonnegotiable price.”
With those words I was reduced to a pawn in a corporate power struggle. The total worth of my entire life was thenceforth measurable as a tiny percentage of ownership in Sonoma Inc. I became a price tag.
“Besides,” my mother continued, in a tone so businesslike it made my skin crawl with hatred, “without the backing of the King I won’t have the influence or resources to do what needs to be done to clean up this unfortunate situation.” She glanced over to where the poor woman’s small body lay: soft features nestled amid a sea of satin and lace. “Who is she?”