The King of Hearts - Jovee Winters Page 0,26

myself for half a moment.

Gods, when had I become such a good liar?

I’d never deceived my mother before. Ever.

She cocked her head. I knew she didn’t believe me, and yet, she had no proof. She looked around the palace again.

“Debauched, bastard,” she muttered beneath her breath.

I almost, almost muttered hypocrite back, but I swallowed it down. The only reason mother was so bothered was because she saw nude females. Females she wanted me to have no part of. And I was finally beginning to have suspicions why. If those were men in the paintings, she’d be actively encouraging me to enjoy them.

Mother knew something.

About me. About Psyche.

She looked at me. “Take me to see her, Eros. Now.”

I stood off to the side, under heavy cover of my shadows. Watching mother, watch her.

I tried to pretend my palms weren’t sweating. That my heart wasn’t racing. That my stomach wasn’t diving with a nest of razor tipped butterflies, and that at any moment I might become sick from the most astounding case of nerves I’d ever felt.

Psyche was sitting alone in her father’s gardens, head bent, reading a book. The moonlight framed her profile, making her look both alien and yet heart achingly familiar.

I’d been watching her many nights roam her gardens relentlessly. Pacing slowly back and forth, her footsteps meandering and nonsensical, but yet she reminded me of a caged beast desperate to be set loose from its captivity.

Maybe it was that part of her I felt must attuned to.

It wasn’t like I couldn’t recognize her beauty. She had it, in spades. With or without the potion she’d drunk, there was no denying that her doe shaped eyes, her button nose, or her rosebud pout weren’t exceptionally crafted. But I’d been around physical beauty my whole life. It wasn’t as titillating to me anymore.

Still, it was shocking how many had forgotten Psyche’s astonishing good looks, if they’d seen her with their hearts and not simply their eyes, they’d never have forgotten who she truly was.

Her fiancé, Arganon, had broken their betrothal several days past. I counted that a win. And so, had she, judging by the secret smile I’d seen play about her lips when her maid had whispered to her that she’d been set aside in favor of her middle sister.

The castle had been in a tizzy with that bit of tittle tattle. But Psyche had held her head high and pretended not to notice.

Psyche was pleased to be rid of the scoundrel, her parents, however, they had not. And their usual indifference to her was starting to take a turn that was worrisome to me. Her father’s moods were becoming more and more prone to violence. At first, he’d simply seemed aloof to her, but as more time passed and more and more avenues of wealth dried up for him, he seemed to take it personally. More as a slight against him as opposed to his daughter who he’d once pretended to cherish.

Now, the beautiful female paced the gardens with the intensity of a prowler. That or, she exhausted herself from hours of self-flagellation that she simply sat and read. Though how much reading she truly did, I wasn’t sure considering she was always on the same page.

I’d not uttered a single word to her since that day on the beach, and yet I knew her. I knew so well, because she was me.

“Pathetic creature,” my mother turned, eyeing the space where my shadow was thickest before skipping past to a spot just to the right of me. Sometimes I wished I could live inside the shadows and never be seen again.

“Where are you boy, do not pretend you’re not here. I feel your wet breath on my neck.”

My lips curled into a grimace of distaste. I would never do something so vile. And she knew it. She also knew how to wound me with her careless words.

Burying my sigh, I banished my shadows. Revealing myself to her again.

Her eyes instantly lit up and her smile became as radiant as the sun.

“There’s my good boy, not like that waste of air back there.” She jerked her thumb over her shoulder, where Psyche sat. I wanted to look at her again, but I was afraid that if I did with my mother right there, I would not be able to hide my truths any longer.

So, I pretended to agree with my bitch of a mother, hating her just a bit more today than I had yesterday. “Indeed,” I drawled.

Her grin