“She does.”
When he’s done, I pin the sides of my hair backso that it’ll look pretty under the hat that matches my dress for this afternoon. It’s a fuchsia ring that sits on the back of my head rimmed with felt roses made of the same color that will cover the pins in my hair.
While Rhys wanders into the dressing room to finish getting ready, I redo my makeup in pretty rose tones to go with my dress before securing the hat to my head. When I’m done, I head into the dressing room wearing nothing but my hat and Rhys’s eyes heat as he watches me.
“Don’t get any funny ideas,” I warn him. “I’m still dead. You just can’t tell because I did my makeup pretty.”
“Hen, I’m going to warn you now, that until the day I die, I will always have ideas about you wearing nothing at all.”
“Nuh uh,” I say as I pull on my bra and panties and then stockings. I step into a pair of nude leather heels before reaching for my dress and Rhys stops my hand.
“Let me just take a mental picture,” he says.
“Shush, you.”
“This is even better than nothing at all,” he says. “I stand corrected.”
I roll my eyes and grab the pink shirt dress from the hanger and unbutton it all the way down the front before sliding it up my arms like a blouse and doing up all the buttons. I tie the sash belt and turn to take in my handsome husband in his uniform.
“You look nice,” I tell him.
“Thank you, hen,” he says. “I’m nothing compared to you. Shall we go make you a member of my royal family?”
“I guess.”
“You could act a little more excited,” he teases. “It does come with more jewelry.”
“If you should know anything about me, it’s that I’m not easily distracted by shiny things,” I say as I hook big rose quartz earrings through my ears.
“And still, I plan to spoil you for the rest of our days…”
“You’re pretty old already,” I say, “I’m not sure how many more you have left in you.”
“Cheeky minx,” he laughs as he swats my backside, making me yelp before he opens the door for me.
We walk down the hallway to one of the smaller formal rooms. Craig is waiting next to a lavishly set table with military style ribbons and medals. Dahlia is dressed similarly to me in a shirt dress and hat. Behind her stand her mother, her grandfather, and Taylor, looking like he’d rather be anywhere else but here, with a small crowd trailing them.
“Well, thank you all for coming here today,” Rhys says to the small assembly. “We’re here today so that I can officially name the first two members of my royal family. Obviously, those two would be my beautiful wife, the Queen, and my darling baby sister.”
Saoirse looks like she’s swallowed something bitter when he calls me his queen and murderous at thethought that Dahlia and I now precede her in importance. The look is gone before anyone else can notice and instead, her face is painted with loving look toward her daughter and stepson as if she couldn’t be prouder in this moment.
Next, Craig hands Rhys a huge velvet jewelry box that he opens, plucking the hand painted oval from where it’s nestled. The oval hangs from a pink ribbon and bears his picture, surrounded by fairly large diamonds. He pins it to my dress, over my heart and winks at me before taking the matching sash from Craig and placing it over my head to lay across my body. Once this is done, I curtsey to him as we planned and practiced, and then he repeats the process with Dahlia.
As he places the sash over her head, I see a flash of a light blue skirt and blonde hair, making me gasp. No. Not again. I barely hold it together and smile as big and fake as I can, pretending to watch my sister-in-law receive this new honor alongside me. But inside, I’m falling apart.
Why is she toying with me?
Is this the new plan? To have me sent to an asylum because I wouldn’t go home and be quiet?
I didn’t have a fucking choice, but I do now and I’m not going down without a fight.
Chapter 14
Advisor to the King
“Everything all right, hen?” Rhys asks as I thread a pearl earring through my ear.
“Of course.”