One day left.
One more day of being alone with Chevalier, far from the palace, distractions, and responsibilities.
And I wanted to do the laundry.
It was the growing pile of dirty sheets in the corner of our bedroom. Chevalier knew better than to let me take it to the laundry, or even show me where the laundry room was, but I’d explored the chateau over the past few days, opening all the closed doors and peeking into the rooms we neither needed nor used, familiarizing myself with the layout for the next time we came to visit. And I’d found it myself. It had taken everything in me not to rush back to our bedroom, scoop up that pile, and take it there for immediate washing. But Chevalier was adamant that I was no longer his maid, and he didn’t want me acting like one, no matter how much I insisted one load of laundry wouldn’t hurt anything. He seemed to think I wouldn’t stop at just one.
He was probably right.
And that was probably why I found him changing the sheets when I left the bathroom that morning.
“Oh, you didn’t have to do that,” I said, surprised. “But thank you.”
He cast a sideways glance and a smirk at me. “It isn’t difficult,” he replied.
If I didn’t know him, I would have taken offense to that statement. But I knew him quite well, and I knew he had to turn everything into an opportunity to tease me.
Not that I minded.
I crossed my arms over my chest and leaned against the doorframe. “Are you insulting my abilities?” I asked, playing along.
“I’m complimenting mine,” he replied.
It really wasn’t fair that he hadn’t put a shirt on yet. Watching the muscles in his back flex and stretch as he made a bed neat enough to put any maid to shame had my heart pounding crazily. I swallowed to work enough saliva into my mouth so I could say, “Then maybe you’d like to make breakfast this morning.”
He straightened up and hit me full on with that smug smirk and an unobstructed view of his chest. “No.”
I’d never understood Theresa’s obsession with the male body until I became intimately acquainted with Chevalier’s. Add to that his one-sided smile, those sparkling crystal blue eyes, and that messy pale blonde hair, and I had an obsession all my own, drawing me like a magnet to his bare skin and the thrill that came with touching him. I was already doing it now without a thought, walking my fingers up his chest and sliding one arm around his waist, the butterflies flitting erratically around my stomach as his arm wrapped around my waist and pulled me closer. My fingers reached his collarbone, and his tilted my chin up so I could drown in my favorite shade of blue and his warm, soft lips.
There was no such thing as a simple good morning kiss.
I rested my head on his chest, sighing contentedly as his arms encircled me. “This is our last day here.”
“Yes, it is.”
“I’m not sure I want to go.”
He chuckled, a deep rumble echoing from his chest through my ear. “You have been getting more restless every day.”
“Only because you won’t let me do anything,” I complained teasingly.
“I won’t let you act like a servant,” he corrected me, stroking my hair. “You’re a queen now. There are other ways to occupy your time.”
I smiled knowingly up at him. “My being a queen has nothing to do with it.”
I really loved his smile.
“No, it doesn’t,” he confessed, and then he scooped me up and headed into the hallway.
“I can walk!” I protested, throwing my arms around his neck. “Or am I not allowed to do that now, either?”
“I’ve changed my mind,” he replied. “I’m making breakfast.”
It took me a moment of stunned silence to process that statement.
“I appreciate that,” I said slowly, “but if you’re revoking my kitchen privileges—”
“I am not revoking any privileges,” he interrupted. “If you want to clean so badly, I will not stop you, but you have spent most of your life serving others in conditions little better than a step above slavery, receiving abuse and insults instead of the appreciation and dignity you deserve.” He deposited me on the kitchen counter, his blue eyes intent on mine. “And I want to spoil you.”
My chest felt warm and tight. “Well, when you put it that way…”
He brushed my hair back behind my ear and pressed a kiss to my forehead. “What would you like for breakfast?”
I shrugged and replied with his answer to that same question a couple of days ago: “Surprise me.”
He left me with the lingering touch of his fingers on my cheek while he rummaged in the cabinets for supplies. “It won’t be much of a surprise if you’re watching me make it,” he said, repeating my words from that same conversation.
I propped my hands up on the countertop behind me and leaned back, swinging my legs back and forth over the edge. “I enjoy watching you.”
He glanced over at me. “There are chairs at the table.”
I smiled. “I’m supposed to say ‘I prefer to sit here’ now, but you put me here,” I remarked, studying the ingredients and utensils he was lining up on the counter next to the stove. “That doesn’t look like anything I’ve made before.”
“It isn’t.”
I tilted my head to the side thoughtfully. “Did you read a book on cooking, then?”
He chuckled. “I cooked all my meals before you became my maid.”
My legs stilled. “And you never thought to tell me that?”
“You never asked.”
“Well, why would I? And why would you do that, anyway? That seems like a waste of your time.”
“Poison,” he replied. “I’ve developed a tolerance for most, and I can usually identify them by smell or taste, but there was a time when it was simpler and more efficient if I made my own meals.”
I fell silent, watching him cook. Whatever he was making looked like the fancy dishes the palace chefs often served for breakfast, because, of course, that would be the kind of food a member of the royal family would learn to cook. A member of the royal family who had been surviving assassination attempts since childhood.
“Chevalier?”
“Yes?”
“You’re not allowed to die in an assassination attempt or some war.”
“I don’t intend to.”
“Good. Because if I have to raise our children alone, I’ll be very angry with you.”
He glanced over at me with that incorrigible smirk. “Is that the only reason?”
“Well, I don’t really like politics, but I won’t let a bunch of wizened court ministers rule Rhodolite when I’m still the queen,” I said airily.
“And?”
“Hm…” I bit my lip and shrugged. “I can’t think of another reason right now.”
“Then I’ll have to remind you later,” he commented, dropping his casual words into the low pitch that always sent shivers up my spine.
There were certain things I’d miss when we left this place. The freedom to make love whenever and wherever we wanted was at the very top of that list, a complete reversal of my mindset when we first came to this chateau. It was almost comical to think how much the mere thought of being alone with Chevalier frightened me that first night. I never had reason to fear him, and every day since then, I’d felt a little more comfortable pushing myself to be a little bolder.
And now, being a little bolder meant hopping down from the counter and teasing him as relentlessly as he did me when I was cooking.
A week ago, I wouldn’t have dared. My face would have been blazing hot just at the thought of it.
But today, my feet hit the floor with no hesitation, and I walked up behind him, starting my targeted attack by rubbing his back as I looked around him at the food cooking on the stove.
“What are you doing?” he asked, his voice laced with amusement.
“Just getting a closer look.”
I let my hands wander, sometimes following his spine up and down, sometimes pressing out from it toward his sides, occasionally using the heels of my palms for extra pressure. No reaction yet, but I hadn’t expected him to break easily. I slid my fingers down to the waistline of his pants and around to his stomach, gripping my right wrist with my left hand in front of him to trap him in my embrace.
He tensed.
“Something wrong?” I asked innocently, resting my cheek against his back.
“Nothing I can’t handle,” he replied. “Merely a foolish little dove, tempting a ravenous beast.”
“Ravenous?” I splayed the fingers of my right hand across his stomach and rubbed a small circle. He flinched. I smiled and said, “He seems pretty well-fed to me.”
“His appetite is insatiable.”
Now, my cheeks were getting warm, and so was his skin when I kissed his back. I pressed my forehead against him, suddenly feeling shy. He would take things further if he was the one teasing me, I knew, but I had reached my limit of bravery, and his chuckle said he recognized that. There was a scraping of metal against metal as the skillet left the stovetop grate, and then he turned smoothly in my arms, taking my chin in his hand and making me look up at his smile.
“If you start something, you should be prepared to finish it, little dove,” he murmured, brushing his thumb across my flushed cheek.
“Well, we have all day, don’t we?” I stood on tiptoe to place a peck on his lips. “So, let’s see how your cooking turned out, and then we’ll see what happens.”
He pulled me back in for a much longer, hungrier, kiss, one that threatened to make me forget all about breakfast and the savory smell of eggs and spices filling the air, air that he stole from my lungs with each movement of his lips and stroke of his tongue. I leaned into him as my knees went weak, and he finally broke the kiss, leaving me gasping for breath.
“I’ll take that as an appetizer,” he said, an arrogant, self-satisfied, gorgeous smirk on his wet lips. “Care for a drink?”
“A…drink?” I asked, struggling to form words when my head was still spinning.
He chuckled and scooped me up again, this time setting me on a chair at the table before leaving without another word. I licked my lips and tucked my hair behind my ear, wondering why he had to leave the room for a drink and, more importantly, if I would survive our last day here to make it back to the palace.
And then he returned with a bottle of wine and two glasses, and I was sure I wouldn’t.
“Wine? For breakfast?” I asked in disbelief.
He set the bottle and the glasses on the table and returned to the stove, dishing out the food he'd prepared on a pair of plates before returning and setting a plate in front of me. “This vintage pairs well with this dish,” he replied, a distinctive popping sound marking him uncorking the bottle.
I feigned a frown as I watched him pour. The scent of grapes and the sharp bite of alcohol mixed with the smell of the eggs. “Are you trying to take advantage of me?”
“It would be better to have a glass now than to have one tonight and wake up with a hangover tomorrow when it’s stronger than you anticipated,” he replied, setting the bottle aside.
“And why do we need to have a glass at all?” I continued, taking the cool, delicate stem of the wineglass between my fingers and sniffing the rich red liquid. There was a hint of roses and something else in the fragrant blend. Vanilla?
“This is the bottle provided by the servants for our first night," he explained. "If I left it in our room untouched, then tonight, when we pack our luggage, you will see it and make a comment about how it would be a shame to not even try it,” he said. “This way, you will have plenty of time to recover from any ill effects.”
“That all sounds reasonable,” I conceded, reluctant to admit that sounded like something I would do, “but I still have a feeling you just want to see what I’m like when I’m really drunk.”
He hid his smirk behind his glass, but that was all the confirmation I needed. I would not be doing laundry today.20Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPHadatPYre
