Lone Prince (Royally Unexpected #7) - Lilian Monroe Page 0,35

bitterness in Rowan’s voice hits me right in the middle of the chest. Yes, I enjoy making her angry. I enjoy seeing her cheeks turn pink when I frustrate her. But this is different. She understands what it means to suffer for a long time. Years. Decades.

Finally, I speak. “How’d she die?”

Rowan swings her eyes to me. “My mom?”

I nod.

“Cancer.” Rowan pinches her lips together. “She was a smoker. Had a lump in her neck. I finally convinced her to go get it checked out after three fucking years. When they opened her up to remove it, she was just…riddled with it. The cancer had spread everywhere. She died within six weeks of the operation.”

I exhale slowly. “I’m sorry.”

“Me too.” Rowan lets out a bitter snort. “I still feel like it’s my fault, you know? She worked to pay for me, for my architecture degree, for everything we had. She ignored her own health to take care of me when no one else would.”

“Scotch and isolation,” I reply.

She swings her eyes to me. “What?”

“That’s how I dealt with grief.” I lift my glass. “Still do. You?”

“Work,” she replies, pinching her lips into a smile. “I was twenty-three when she died. The day after the funeral, I went to work. Threw myself into it as if nothing else existed. Started my own business four years later. I blinked, and five more years had passed. I was sitting in my own office with my name on the door and a wall full of awards behind me, reading the email that awarded me the contract to redesign the Summer Palace. That was a year ago, and it happened to be the anniversary of her death.”

There’s a heaviness in my chest. Rowan stares into the fire, tension rippling through her body. And I get it. I feel her pain the same way I feel my own. I understand the feeling of being in a tailspin, of latching onto anything that will make you feel any kind of normal.

Rowan glances at me, letting out a dry snort. “I’ve never spoken of this to anyone.”

“Not even your boyfriend?”

“Ex-boyfriend,” she corrects. “And no. Our relationship…I don’t think I ever really let him in.”

“You broke up with him when you took on this project,” I say, remembering the file of information on her.

“He gave me an ultimatum, and I chose,” she replies, shrugging.

“Why wouldn’t he want you to come here?”

Rowan chuckles, shaking her head. “He would’ve preferred if I stayed at home and popped out a couple of kids for him.”

My brows twitch. I nod, doing my best to keep my face steady. “Ah. You don’t want kids.”

“I don’t not want kids,” Rowan says. “I just…I want other things, too. I want to come here and see the Summer Palace in person. I want to have my name attached to it. I want to be a leader in my field.”

“You want the glory.”

Rowan sucks in a breath. “I don’t want to die alone in a shitty little apartment with cancer spreading through every organ because I didn’t have the time or opportunity to actually take care of myself. I don’t want someone else to be saddled with the responsibility of feeding me and clothing me and making sure I have what I need.”

“I’m not sure being alone is the best way to accomplish that.” I arch an eyebrow, sipping my drink.

Rowan stares at me and finally huffs out a laugh. “And I’m not sure running away every October is the best way to honor your fiancée’s memory.”

“It’s survival.”

“Exactly,” she replies, staring into my eyes. The air grows thick around us, and on some primal level, we understand each other. Being alone here, with her, as the storm batters the walls of the cottage, I wonder if she’s here for a reason. If she was sent here by some higher power.

“Why did you take this project?” I ask in a low voice.

“How could I refuse it?” She blinks, then lets out a sigh. “Maybe I just wanted to get away.”

“From your ex?”

“From my life.” Rowan’s eyes blaze, and something stirs in my core.

How many times have I wanted to get away from my life? From my grief? From everything that makes me a prince?

Rowan gulps. Her eyes shift back to the fire, and we sit in silence for a while. Nordish blood flows in her veins, but I still don’t feel like she belongs to this place. She says she understands why her design was wrong—but does she truly