From Blood & Ash by Jennifer L. Armentrout Page 0,63

he’s planning to lord it over my head or something.”

Her brows slammed down. “You’re an incredibly suspicious person.”

I started to deny that but realized I couldn’t. I wisely moved along. “He probably just didn’t recognize me.” A weird mixture of relief and disappointment mingled with a thrill of anticipation. “You know what?”

“What?”

“I don’t know if I’m relieved or disappointed that he didn’t recognize me. Or if I’m excited that he might have.” Shaking my head, I laughed. “I just don’t know, but it doesn’t matter. What…what happened between us was one time only. It was just this…thing. It can’t happen again.”

“Sure,” she murmured.

“Not that I’m even thinking he’d want to do any of that again, especially now that he knows it was me. If he does.”

“Uh-huh.”

“But what I’m trying to say is that it’s not a thing to even consider. What he does with the knowledge is the only thing that matters,” I finished with a nod.

Tawny looked as if she were seconds away from clapping. “You know what I think?”

“I’m half afraid to hear it.”

Her brown eyes glimmered. “Things are about to get so much more exciting around here.”

Chapter 12

Early afternoon, the following day, I sat in the airy, sun-drenched atrium with Tawny and not one but two Ladies in Wait, wondering how I’d ended up in this situation.

My trips outside my chambers were always well timed, especially when I came to the atrium, so no one but me would be in the room. When I arrived some thirty minutes ago, it was empty as usual.

That had changed within minutes of sitting down and picking at the tiny sandwiches Tawny had confiscated from another room. Loren and Dafina had arrived, and while I sat as I’d been groomed to do—hands clasped lightly in my lap, ankles crossed, and feet tucked behind the ivory hem of my gown—I shouldn’t be in the room.

Not while the Ladies in Wait were present since they’d cozied up to the table Tawny and I had sat at. The situation could easily be construed as me interacting with them, which was one of the many things expressly forbidden by the Priests and Priestesses. Interaction was, in their words, too familiar.

I wasn’t interacting, though. I imagined I was the picture of well-bred serenity. Or I could easily be mistaken for one of the statues of the veiled Maidens. I may appear calm on the outside, but internally, I was nothing more than an exhausted, frazzled ball of nerves. Some of it had to do with the lack of any restful sleep the night prior—well, to be honest, for the last several days. It was also partly due to the fact that I knew I was going to be blamed for Dafina’s and Loren’s presence. I didn’t even know if I was allowed to be in the atrium. It had never been an issue before, and no one had ever spoken to me about it. However, no one other than a stray servant or guard had ever shown up in the atrium while I’d been here before. They weren’t the only reasons I was a mess of anxious, restless energy, though.

The primary cause stood catty-corner from where I sat, hand braced on the hilt of his sword, amber-colored eyes constantly alert.

Hawke.

It was strange to glance over and see him standing there. And it wasn’t just because it was usually Rylan who watched over these afternoon brunches Tawny and I sometimes took in the atrium. It was how different it was with Hawke being here. Normally, Rylan had stared out into the garden or spent the majority of the time speaking with one of the other Royal Guards who were nearby as he lingered just inside the entrance. Not Hawke. He found the one area in the room where he had a view of the entire brightly lit space and the gardens outside the atrium.

Luckily, the windows didn’t face the roses.

Unluckily, I often found myself staring at the fountain of the veiled Maiden.

In just one day, it had become almost painfully evident how lax Rylan had gotten in terms of security. Granted, there hadn’t been an attempt before, but he had softened. I hated even acknowledging that. It felt like a betrayal to do so, but that wasn’t the only thing that made this brunch so very different from the ones before.

Another thing that made it so different was the appearance of the two Ladies in Wait. I suspected that this was the first time they’d even been