“Why don’t you come with us and stop them from heisting a new pet from the grounds?” Bellamy suggests.
Sebastian grunts. He still hates leaving the palace. He hates his children leaving it even more, but he’s trying.
“Maybe we should all go,” I add, only to be cut off by someone entering the breakfast room.
“My apologies for interrupting.” The woman’s head is cast down, and she does a curtsy toward Sebastian and Bellamy without making eye contact with any of us. She comes over to Althea and whispers something in her ear. Her long, blonde hair is pleated into a neat braid behind her head, stopping at her mid-back. She has no makeup on her face and is wearing a housekeeper’s uniform, which consists of a basic gray dress that goes to her knees.
I can’t see her all that well, but there’s something about her that catches my attention, and I study her a bit closer, even as she speaks in hushed tones with my aunt.
“Mon Dieu!” Althea exclaims, covering her lips with her hand. “Emily has fallen.”
The three of us shoot up from our seats, and the children stop moving as if they’ve been simultaneously frozen.
“Where is she? Call nine-one-one.”
Sebastian places his hand on Bellamy’s shoulder. “It’s not none-one-one here.”
“Like I care. Call your Messalinian equivalent,” Bellamy bites out.
“She’s doing okay, Your Majesty,” the mysterious woman states, still skirting our eyes. “She’s in a parlor on the second level. She was giving me a tour of the family quarters when she tripped and fell on her bad hip. I moved her to the sofa and rang Javier, but she’s in a good amount of pain. I felt I should notify you at once despite her protests.”
Sebastian is wrought with worry and displeasure. “Of course she protested. It’s why we’re learning of her hip replacement only now,” Sebastian growls out. “Stubborn woman.”
“Yes,” Althea agrees. “That was smart thinking. This is Marcella. She’s one of Emily’s candidates who has been working over in the guest quarters.”
Marcella gives a deep curtsy, but when she lifts her head, and I get a shot of her green eyes, something strange tickles the back of my mind. She’s beautiful. I mean, that’s an understatement. She’s fucking gorgeous. But there’s something about her that’s almost…familiar.
Likely that I’ve seen her around the palace and never registered her. But damn, looking at her now, that feels impossible. She’s the sort of woman you can’t help but notice and remember.
“Marcella.” Bellamy goes over to her and extends her hand to shake. “It’s lovely to meet you. Thank you for all the care you’ve given our home.”
Marcella reluctantly takes her hand and shakes it before she gives her another curtsy and murmurs out, “Your Majesty,” but that’s not how Bellamy works.
“Call me Bellamy. As you’ll soon see, I’m not that formal. Please, take us to Emily.”
I move closer to her, anxious for another glance at her face. Strange visions hit me, but they’re wrong. Off. She’s blonde. Green-eyed. Not dark-haired and dark-eyed. It pisses me off that once again I’m thinking about the woman who ran out on me in the middle of the night after the best fucking sex of my life.
Six months, and I haven’t been able to get her out of my head or let her go.
One night has completely corrupted my mind.
I looked for her, but she didn’t exist. How do you search for a woman who gives a fake name? Who was she? What was she doing there? And more importantly, how did she get in? We were at a private hotel that has nothing but forest on one side and mountains on the other. Not to mention, we took a million safety precautions.
Was this simply a thrill break-in, or were her intentions more sinister? After all these months without anything else from her, it’s difficult to imagine the latter, but not impossible. She was skilled and trained. No doubt about that.
I have more questions than answers.
The one good thing to come from Charlotte and my mystery Ella is that the pressure to find a woman and settle down has eased. Our trust in anyone is nil.
And yet, that’s not the only reason I’m anxious to find her. Sebastian teases me. He says it’s the excitement of the chase.That a woman has never rejected me, and it’s my pride that’s wounded.
Perhaps that’s all it is. I was pretty drunk, so it’s possible she wasn’t everything my mind conjured for her. But she seemed...different. Fun. Special.
Not that it matters. I’ll never find her. Not unless she wants to be found.
7
MARCELLA
