to do what he wanted. Cooperation was his goal. In order to achieve that he had to find out what had motivated her into coming to find him this way.
He grimaced. Being sensitive to the needs of others wasn’t usually uppermost in his mind. He was used to being catered to. Time for him to learn to stretch himself a little.
“Okay, Julienne,” he began slowly, feeling his way. “Explain to me just exactly what you’re doing here.”
His voice was low, but with enough command to let her know he expected a complete and coherent answer.
She took a sip, nodded approvingly, and smiled up at him again, waving one hand with a flourish.
“This is merely a courtesy call,” she told him cheekily. “I thought, as my guardian, you might like to know what I plan to do with my life.”
He frowned, wary, but still in control of his reactions. “As your guardian, I already know what you’re going to do with your life. In fact, I planned it myself. No need for you to bother.”
“Ah, but that’s where you’ve gone wrong.” She took another sip, just for bravery, and set the drink down on the glass coffee table. “You see, I’m no longer a minor, no longer in a position to be your ward.” She took a deep breath and faced him squarely, her gaze simple and direct. “In fact, I quit. I’m old enough to be on my own. And that is what I choose to do.”
He looked pained. “Julienne, you know very well your life was mapped out seven years ago as part of the Treaty of Salvais.”
She glanced down at the drink, began to reach for it, then drew her hand back and nodded quickly. “I know. I know. But, you see, that was done without my consent, and—”
“Your consent!” He shook his head, losing control of his patience a bit. “Julienne, your wedding is in less than a week. You can’t back out now. The invitations are out. The gifts are streaming in. It’s too late to stop the momentum. It’s going to happen, whether you like it or not.”
She didn’t look convinced. In fact, she looked downright resentful.
“And are you planning to show up this time?” she asked, challenging him with her dark, honest gaze. “Or do you have your usual ‘business to attend to’ instead?”
His head went back in reaction. She’d pushed exactly the button that was guaranteed to open the floodgates to the guilt he felt about his guardianship. Over the last few years he’d avoided seeing her, missing every Christmas, every birthday. He knew his actions had hurt her. But it couldn’t be helped. As her guardian, he had to protect her from predatory men. What he’d never expected when he took on that role was that he would be his own prime target.
“Julienne, all this is beside the point. You are required by treaty to marry Prince Alphonso next week, and marry him you will.”
She shook her head, lower lip thrust out rebelliously. “I never signed any treaty,” she insisted. “I never gave consent.”
He jerked to his feet and began to pace the floor, holding back his quick surge of exasperation. Was he going to be forced to go over the whole history with her once again? No, she was just being stubborn. She knew all about the fighting between the three royal houses that had ripped their country apart for generations.
Right now an uneasy truce prevailed, but it had only come about after a long, bloody war. Too many people had died. He thought, with a quick slice of pain, of his own mother, killed by an assassin’s bullet. The factions had fought each other to a standstill, and then it had taken a long, torturous struggle of negotiation to finally settle things, and that had only happened once Julienne’s parents, the King and Queen of the House of Emeraude, had agreed that she would marry Prince Alphonso when she reached twenty-one years. Their marriage would tie the houses of Emeraude and Diamante together for evermore, and help balance the struggle of power between the three houses.
It had to happen. If she didn’t follow through with the treaty’s promise, the country was very likely to go up in flames again. No one wanted that, and as one of the architects of the plan he couldn’t let it happen. In fact, it was up to him to make sure she followed through.
“Your parents gave all the consent that was needed,” he told