His Princess - Stacy Gail Page 0,10

my proudest achievements is not hurling all over the place while live-streaming the event.” Annnnnnd, now she was talking about vomit. Wonderful. Any second now he was going to bail. Like in five… four… three…

A low chuckle rumbled from him before he reached out and laced his fingers with hers. “That just might be the weirdest thing I’ve ever heard anyone say on a first date.”

“This is my not-surprised face.” Discreetly she glanced down at the hand holding hers and tried to figure out why the heat of a single hand touching hers could suddenly rival the sun. “I would say that being weird is simply my way of being charming, but it would be a lie. I’m honestly just weird.”

“You’re definitely unexpected, and that’s not a bad thing.” His fingers gave her a friendly squeeze as they walked along the cobblestone path that snaked through meticulously maintained beds of exotic plants, from bromeliads, to bamboo, to fan palm trees covered in delicate orchids. They entered the Palm House, with the path changing to flagstone, and the humidity in the air was palpable as they approached an indoor pond filled with koi and covered in lily pads. “I think the biggest thing that’s surprised me about you is how you work for a living. You’re good at what you do. Very professional.”

“How do you…? Ohhhh, you looked me up,” she answered her own question, and found she couldn’t hold it against him. After all, she’d done the same thing with him. “I don’t suppose you saw the whole corpse flower segment? I was a spectacular shade of green by the end of it.”

“I’ll be sure to look for it,” came the drawling reply. “How’d you get into becoming an online personality?”

“That sounds way cooler than what I really am, which officially is called a content creator and fashion journalist. I actually started out with my own channel on YouTube when I was in college, focusing mainly on fashion and the latest trends. Since my degree was in Communications, I mainly used that channel to help me hone my understanding of what it was I was trying to learn. Day by day I kept pushing to get new followers, grinding out content and perfecting my editing and on-cam skills, until finally I got an official blue check by my name and the sponsors started coming in. About a week after that, Buzzword came knocking on my door.”

“Do you still upload content on your channel?”

“Absolutely, though not every single day like I used to. Now I post fashion content on Wednesdays and Fridays, and stream a live chat once a month in addition to everything I create for Buzzword.”

“And I thought I had a busy schedule. You ever get downtime?”

“Sure. Just this past December my brother Felix, Alice and I went on a cruise to the Bahamas. Felix blew through every cent he had for the trip in one night at the casinos and wouldn’t shut up about begging for loans until we got back stateside. Alice got such a bad sunburn with that fair Irish skin of hers, she basically turned into one giant blister. I had a great time laughing at both of them. That’s what big sisters do, you see.”

“As an only child, I’ll have to take your word for it.” The gentle scent of moist earth caught her attention as they moved into the Fern Room, and she took an appreciative breath as they paused near a rock wall covered in spongy moss and creeping ferns. “I’ve never been big on family, though you seem pretty tight with yours.”

“I suppose I am. I’m protective, anyway. Alice was our chauffeur’s daughter, and when he died and she became a part of our family, she was sent to the same school as Felix and me. Try to imagine how she was received by all the rich kids who went to school there.”

Something dark and deep moved in the depths of his eyes. “Couldn’t have been easy.”

“There was one girl in particular who tormented Alice. For an entire school year she made my foster sister the butt of all her jokes and cruel pranks, from supergluing her locker shut to taking pictures of her in the shower and then plastering them over the main hall. She was the cruelest person I’ve ever met, or probably will ever meet.”

“Sounds like a goddamn worthless bitch.”

“You could tell me if she’s still that way.”

He threw her a sharp look. “What?”

“Francesca Osterhaus.”

“Ah.” A calculating gleam