His Majesty's Forbidden Temptat - Maisey Yates Page 0,2

despise him all she wanted. It wouldn’t change the circumstances.

“So that’s it. I marry, I get my inheritance. I don’t marry. I don’t get my inheritance. And not only do I not get the inheritance, my horrible cousin will get it, and he will likely spend the money on liquor and whores.”

“That about sums it up.”

“Well, that’s just excellent. Anything more?”

“Yes. You leave Liri, and the palace withdraws its support.”

The color drained from her face. “You would do that to me?”

“It’s not I who wrote this will out, but your father, and mine.”

“So what? They’re dead, and you’re the King. Surely you can override all of this.”

He could not believe this child was arguing with him. He couldn’t recall a time when anyone had dared. “I cannot. Because it was signed by the previous King. And these things are not that simple. And when it comes to you and your well-being, it is a matter of honor.”

“Certainly not a matter of affection.”

“Affection between you and I is inconsequential to me. But what is not is honoring that which my father has demanded of me. You must be cared for. And this is the way your father demanded you be cared for. I owe my father.”

“Why, because you lost his other sons?”

She threw the challenge down with a resounding echo. She was the first one who had dared to lob such an accusation at him in a very long time. It was notable for that reason alone. And if he’d had a weak spot in that wrought iron chest of his it might have hurt.

But he was beyond hurt now.

Beyond feeling.

He was a man with drive, purpose. A man determined to become that which Liri required he be. He was prepared to do what needed to be done to honor his country and his father.

He too had a marriage time line. Though he was able to wait until thirty-five.

He had a prospective bride selected. A beautiful, frosty socialite who had been trained for just such a position.

The very opposite of the explosion that was Tinley Markham. Tinley had been given every advantage that a socialite would have been, but she had always been... Well, she had always been unruly. The only child of Barabbas and Caroline Markham, she had been practically raised on the grounds of the palace. But her positioning as the future wife of his brother had certainly been more about his father’s feelings regarding her father, than it had been about her particular suitability. The engagement had been cemented before Tinley had hit puberty.

And Tinley had... Well, she had worshipped Dionysus openly. And he had thought nothing of her. And why would he? She was a girl, and his brother Dionysus, four years her senior, was a renowned playboy with a voracious appetite for lush women. Blonde and ceramic or raven haired and brown skinned, he didn’t much care. But he’d favored a particular sort. And in mass quantity. He had also favored drink.

It had been viewed as a lark. By his father, by the country. He was lighthearted. A man who knew how to enjoy a party.

Alexius had seen the darker side of Dionysus, even if no one else had.

It would be easy for Alex to name alcohol as the primary culprit in the death of his brother. Dionysus’s obsession with sex and alcohol.

But then, Alex himself had known of those weaknesses in his brother. Had known what weaknesses they were.

And when, at a party where Tinley was in attendance, foxed out of his mind with a doe-eyed beauty clinging to his arm, Dionysus had claimed that he was going into the woods to face the spirits that had taken their brother, Alex should have known it would end badly.

He had known. On some level. For Lazarus had been lost in those same woods two years before Dionysus’s birth and Alex should have had it in the forefront of his mind.

Instead...

Instead, that night, he’d made a different choice. He’d fallen prey to his own weaknesses. He’d sought to appease his own selfish desires. For the first time in his life, he’d truly thought only of himself. Consciously. Willingly.

And it had ended in tragedy.

His father had often said that his remaining sons were two sides of one coin. Their core was the same. Royal and resilient. They had the same golden eyes as their father that had earned him the name Lion of the Dark Wood. One that had become a title, along with King.

But Alex had always