that low, commanding voice, somehow making it impossible for Lara to turn and get into her car as she knew she should. “The last of an ancient bloodline, warriors and kings throughout history. The only child of the great King Azat, may he rest in peace.”
She felt the blood drain from her face. Her knees wobbled beneath her.
“May he …?” she echoed. She shook her head, trying to clear it. What could this mean? How could it be true? Her father was the monster under her bed, the nightmare that lay in wait when she closed her eyes. Hadn’t her mother always told her so? “He’s … dead?”
“At least you do not deny your own father,” Adel said, his expression stern. He moved closer to her but then stopped, as if he felt called to an action he chose not to take. Still, somehow, she knew he grieved for her father in all the ways she could not. It made a headache bloom to life in her temples. “Perhaps we can dispense with the rest of this game of pretend now.”
“You approached me in a parking lot, like a vagrant,” Lara hissed. Unwilling to face what he’d just told her. Unwilling to imagine what it might mean. “What did you think my reaction would be?”
“I did so deliberately.” His gaze was cool. Assessing. Dangerous. “I assumed you would feel more at ease in a public place. After all, you have spent most of your life running away at the slightest hint of your homeland.”
Lara shifted the bag in her arms, and wished her head would stop spinning. How was she supposed to act? Feel? She had not heard from her autocratic father directly in twelve years. She had not wanted to hear from him. If asked even five minutes before, she would have announced without a qualm that she hated the man.
But that did not mean she’d wanted him dead.
“I need to inform my mother …” she began, her temples pounding, wondering how fragile, prone-to-hysteria Marlena would be likely to take such news. Wondering, too, what her mother would center her life around now there was no more King Azat to hate and fear and blame. But perhaps that was unkind.
“Your mother is being notified even now,” Adel replied coolly.
Lara found herself staring at the play of muscle in his strong arms, his hard abdomen. She felt her body’s treacherous heat, its instant response to the very sight of him, despite her emotions.
“I am afraid your business is with me, Princess. I cannot allow you the necessary time to grieve.” Was his tone ironic? Or did she only imagine his judgment? Was that guilt she felt, pooling inside of her? “We must wed immediately.”
“You are insane,” she told him, when she could speak. When the red haze of confusion and emotion receded slightly. When she could jerk her attention away from his warrior’s body. “You cannot really believe I’ll marry you!”
Adel smiled again, though this time, there was nothing particularly sympathetic about it. Where was that younger man she remembered, who had been so eager to see her smile?
“I understand that this is a shock,” he said. “But let me be clear. You have only two possible choices before you, and while I am aware neither one is necessarily easy, you must choose one of them.”
“Your attempt at compassion is insulting,” Lara managed to say, her hands clenched tight into the bag she held. Part of her wanted to fling the sack at him as he stood near the trunk of her sensible sedan. And then run. Only the fact that he probably expected that reaction kept her from it.
“Nonetheless, it is real,” he said. His storm-colored eyes moved to hers, and darkened. “It would never have been my choice to confront you in this way, with this news. I regret the necessity. But it does not change anything.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Lara said after a moment, her temper kicking in—replacing the wild swirl of far trickier feelings. Anger was better. Anger felt better— more productive. “And more important? I don’t care.”
“Yet you must listen,” he told her. So quiet. So sure. And she could only stare at him. And obey. “I am sorry for that, too, but so it is.”
There was something about the way he looked at her then that … bothered her, in a way she couldn’t quite categorize. As if he could see the buried truths she’d denied existed for years. The