Brinley made an inelegant grunt of shock and chagrin, then gripped the sides of the ladder with her hands and the insides of her feet, and slid down instead of climbing. It was faster that way, and offered less opportunity for anyone to look up her skirt. Not that Finn would ever do such a thing.
“Ah...” Brinley began, when he only continued to watch her. “I thought you were still...” Hearing about how my sister had abandoned you and crushed your dreams. “...elsewhere.”
“I was dismissed.”
“Oh. Right.”
They stared at each other, ten feet separating them. It felt like much more, like they had not known each other since childhood, like he had not been the one to teach her how to wield a sword after she’d bribed him with a package of gum. She’d nearly poked out his eye that day, but instead of tattling he’d told his father he’d gotten the scratch from walking into a rose bush, and because Finn never lied, no one questioned the story.
“I’m sorry,” she added finally. “For your...” She knew loss wasn’t the right word; Elle wasn’t dead. “...situation,” she finished awkwardly.
Something flickered in Finn’s gaze. “My situation,” he repeated. “Yes, I suppose that’s what it is. Or not.”
Finn was many things, but never vague or poetic, and she had no idea what the hell he meant. Still, she offered an uncertain, “Or not,” like she was in on the joke.
“And I should offer you my condolences,” he said after a strained moment. “Your situation has changed rather abruptly as well.”
“Yes. It...has.” He was the first person to offer condolences and not congratulations, the first person to recognize that inheriting a role no one wanted her to fill was not quite the honor it was supposed to be. She was grateful she did not have to muster the feigned enthusiasm or utter the canned party line about how delighted she was to accept this responsibility, how she recognized it as an honor and would do her utmost to live up to the kingdom’s expectations. She did not know how anyone expected her to deliver those lines with a straight face. She was twenty-two and she had never lived up to anyone’s expectations but her own.
“Are you...disappointed?” he ventured.
“It is my honor and my duty,” Brinley replied, trying to keep the bitterness out of her voice and replace it with goodness and graciousness. She had heard the castle staff whispering about how unfit she was; saw the doomsday tabloid headlines. It’s not like she would be queen anytime soon—they didn’t need to start preparing for the apocalypse just yet. Still the magazines had shared a list of supplies to include in a home emergency preparedness kit, just in case.
“Right.” Finn nodded tersely. “Honor and duty.”
Those words felt rehearsed, even though they suited him. If Brinley were to describe him as anything, it would be honor and duty-bound. And tall and handsome and sexy, in a stern way.
She racked her brain for something else to add, and stumbled upon the easiest solution. “Would you like something to drink?”
The library was equipped with a small bar, always well-stocked, with high wooden stools arranged in front. Her father entertained guests here some evenings, impressing them with their world-renowned book collection. Books he had never read or touched or even particularly cared about.
“I don’t see why not,” Finn said.
Brinley slipped behind the bar and plucked three heavy glass bottles from beneath it: tequila, scotch, vodka. All imported and old and expensive. “Your choice.”
“Whatever you like,” he replied predictably.
Brinley contemplated her options. What drink should she choose to share with Finn on the last day she would ever see him like this? With Elle gone, there was no longer any reason for him to visit the castle. No reason for them to cross paths more than once or twice a year, no reason for them to be alone together. No reason to hold on to even a single whimsical thread of hope.
She picked the tequila. She wasn’t in the mood for sipping. She wanted to toss it back, feel it burn, let it take over. She wanted to howl at the full moon as she had done as a child, trying not to laugh at her nanny’s admonition that howling was for wolves, not princesses. She wanted to believe again that she could transform into something other than herself, if only for a night.
She selected two glasses and poured them each a shot, sliding one across the bar and taking one for herself.
“To honor,” she said, touching her glass to Finn’s.
He met her eye, not buying the toast at all. Still, he said, “To honor,” and drank.
It burned. It burned in the best possible way. Brinley blinked away the tears that threatened, telling herself it was just the alcohol, that she would need to drink much more to become maudlin.
She poured another two shots without asking, then rounded the bar to sit on the stool next to Finn. His posture was perfect, and no doubt she could choose the heaviest book in the room and have it sit upon his head without ever threatening to tip. Brinley herself had been forced to pace back and forth in this library with a dictionary on her head, chest out, stomach in, learning to be a lady even as she demanded to know why they still printed dictionaries when they had the internet.
“To duty,” Finn said quietly. He tipped his glass to hers, then held her stare as they downed their drinks. He exhaled heavily afterward, contemplating the empty bar top, and it occurred to her that she might be a bad princess, but he was a sad prince.
She could not say which was worse.
“I hate squab,” Finn announced.
She blinked. “What?”
He lifted his head. “I hate squab. And turnips, too.”
“But you...” She thought back to the meal they had just finished. “You said they were scrumptious.”
“There is nothing scrumptious about a pigeon or a bland root.”
“Are you still hungry?” Brinley ventured. “I have some bagels in—” She cut herself off before she could say “my room.” “The kitchen,” she finished. “If you would like.”
“No.” He reached for the bottle. It was clear he needed something, but it was not carbohydrates. He waited for her nod before filling her glass again. “To hidden bagels,” he toasted.
Their fingers bumped and energy arced through Brinley, making her twitch in her seat. She was pretty sure she was drunk, that’s why she was feeling such an intensely magnetic pull toward Finn. His gray eyes weren’t as shuttered now, luring her in, tequila the key that unlocked the gate to all his hidden hallways.
Hallways she still very much wanted to explore.
She drank, the alcohol making her pleasantly light-headed. In the weeks since she had been escorted home early from university, she had not felt this carefree, this unburdened. She had given up on the far-fetched dream of one day ruling Estau and committed herself to her studies, and then she had been abruptly told to give up that dream and replace it with the original, even as everyone scoffed at the plan. This week she had exhausted herself with the effort of appearing pleased with her new role, but now, with Finn watching her closely, she did not bother to pretend. She just nodded for him to pour another shot, which he did.
“To your situation,” Brinley said, extending the glass.
Finn paused, then touched the brims together. “Or not,” he said.
“Or not,” she echoed, less uncertainly this time.
He no longer had a situation because he was no longer intending to marry her sister.
Brinley no longer had a situation because she had been pulled out of university.
They were both...free.
So they drank.
Then before she could figure out what to do next, Finn kissed her.
2
IN ALL THE TIMES BRINLEY had fantasized about kissing Finn, she had never once truly imagined him kissing her. She had always been the one seizing him by his starched lapels and pulling him close, pressing her lips to his, finding his tongue with hers. But as his remarkably skilled mouth now dominated hers, she noted that
her right hand still held the shot glass and her left gripped the edge of the bar, as though anchoring her to reality. Without that grip, she would be certain she was dreaming, that this fantasy simply felt a little more real than the others, hot and hazy and shockingly erotic.
She let go of the bar and fumbled for Finn’s shoulder, needing to anchor herself to something far better than furniture. The heat in her belly and the pounding of her heart were things she had felt before, but never to this degree. She had fought her parents for the right to attend university because she wanted the experience. She wanted experiences. And she very desperately wanted this experience. It was likely her last shot, her only shot, and if Finn were due to live on only in her memory, she very much wanted it to be a naked memory.
A hot, sweaty, passionate, filthy sex memory.
Because there was little doubt that that was where this kiss was headed. Finn made aroused sounds in his throat, noises that made her think of dark rooms and slapping flesh and building pleasure. Brinley wasn’t sure if she was making any noises of her own, but she gasped loudly when she finally broke away, dragging in air in great, heaping gulps and clutching at her midsection to stabilize herself.
Finn’s cheeks were flushed and his gray eyes were impossibly dark and close. For once they lacked the cool aloofness he was so known for, giving her a glimpse of the man inside and not merely the prince. Not the illusion or the fairy tale. Just the flesh and blood man who had kissed the already-questionable common sense right out of her.
“I can’t breathe,” she said, fingers curling into the satin at her hip. “This dress is too...tight.”
Finn’s gaze scorched every inch of her body it touched as it dropped from her eyes to her nose, her lips, her chin, her throat, her chest, the fingers at her waist.
She got even hotter. Molten, perhaps, if the wetness between her thighs was any indication. She had experienced this feeling at university. Enjoyed it, even. A lot, sometimes. But back then she had looked forward to it the way you did something you were curious about, like touching the thorn of a rose to see how hard you had to press to draw blood. Back then it had been an experiment.
Now it was an almost painful anticipation.
“Remove it,” Finn suggested, his serious features underscoring the words.
Brinley wanted to hear the words, she just hadn’t truly expected to hear them. Not from Finn.
But she wasn’t stupid. She turned on the stool and gave him her back. “Unzip me.”
Finn had the zipper down in a heartbeat, grazing his coarse palms along the smooth skin of her shoulder blades as he nudged the fabric over her arms.
Brinley had a split second pang of doubt, the same nagging voice that had admonished her not to swing the sword in the portrait gallery or eat the red mushroom with the spots, but like so much well-meaning advice, she ignored it.
The gentle pressure of Finn’s fingertips on her shoulder turned her around, and she resisted the urge to cover herself. The top of the dress pooled at her waist like a sea of gold, her white lace bra stark against the dark circles of her nipples through the fabric.
Finn looked at her like he couldn’t decide if he should memorize her or devour her, and while she was flattered to think he might also want to remember this night, she was very grateful when he opted for door number two and kissed her again instead.
This time the dress was not the reason for her breathlessness. It was Finn’s hands on her bare skin, rasping over every inch he could reach, tormenting her in ways she hadn’t anticipated. When she was called home from university she had thought her chance at freedom and experience and pleasure was gone, but now she had one more shot and she had no intention of wasting it.
So many times she had dreamt of working loose the brass buttons on his jacket, pushing the heavy wool garment off his shoulders and undoing his starched shirt to expose a chest as sculpted and perfect as the Prince Finian dolls they sold to tourists. Now she was actually doing it and the reality was better than any dream.
Finn faltered just slightly as she took her time looking at him, like it mattered what she thought. That he wanted her to like what she saw and worried somehow that he might not measure up. But there had never been any doubt. She knew he swam and cycled regularly, and he had the clearly delineated physique of an athlete. He was tall and broad and tanned and toned, muscular but not huge, his stomach flat and tapered where it disappeared into the waistband of his pants. A fine dusting of golden hair traced the same route and Brinley wanted desperately to follow it.
She stood and so did Finn, watching as her dress puddled at her feet. She stood in matching white panties and bra—oh, thank heavens they matched today—and she saw his throat bob as he absorbed her.
“Wow,” he said, after a moment.
Brinley flushed, pleased and embarrassed.
Then she flushed even brighter as his hands went to the brass buckle at his waist, and before she could blink he was standing before her in black briefs and socks, complete and hard and utter perfection.
Not once had her dreams been this wonderful.
He embraced her again and kissed her, deep and thorough. His hands weren’t shy or timid, moving to the clasp of her bra and opening it, cupping her breasts in his palms, the contrast of his tan skin against her pale flesh captivating them both. His thumb swiped across her tight nipples and her skin pebbled even more, her pussy growing wetter.
He opened his mouth to speak, then closed it, then tried again. “May I...?” he asked cautiously, sliding one hand down her stomach and pausing with his fingertips at the top of the lace that covered her. Like she was the one with a hidden passageway and a gate that needed unlocking. Hell, she would tattoo the passcode on her forehead if he would touch her there.
“Yes,” she said breathlessly. “Please.”
His mouth twitched and a smile broke through, then she smiled too, and perhaps the moment she would remember most about this night was that shared exchange. The unexpectedly private connection of that smile was the real reward for a princess locked up once again in a lonely, metaphorical tower. The sex was just a bonus.
His hand slipped inside her panties, his fingers seeking and finding her slick folds, sliding between them and stroking her with unexpected expertise. He made more of those hungry sounds, ones she would never be able to forget, ones she would hear when she did this herself, reliving the memory.
She clutched his shoulder and raised onto her toes, kissing him again, breath hitching when he pressed a finger inside. He touched her sweetly at first, then with more confidence, more purpose. A second finger joined in, the heel of his hand glancing her clit, and Brinley couldn’t help but grind against him, even though she wanted this to last much, much longer. He was so good, so—
The library doors banged open and Brinley froze.
Everything froze.
Finn.
His fingers.
The air.
The planet turning on its axis.
The only things that moved were the tourist cameras, clicking frantically as they caught the bad princess in her most compromising position yet.
3
“OF ALL THE...”
“I can’t even...”
“What were you...”
“This is...”
“No, what it is is....”
“Ridiculous...”
“Stupid...”
“Thoughtless...”
“Immature...”
“Reckless...”
The words washed over Brinley as so many years of repeated criticisms had. She and Finn sat in her father’s private office, an enormous space with dark paneled walls and heavy velvet curtains, the huge desk no buffer against his fury and disappointment. Oil paintings of past royals scowled from their gilded frames, assessing the situation without humor.
She and Finn sat side by side on an overstuffed sofa emblazoned with the castle emblem. Queen Vivienne sat opposite on a matching sofa, and King Luke and King Edric paced
irritably behind her, like a swinging ax pendulum. Brinley was vaguely aware of all this, but instead of retreating to the place in her mind that allowed her to absorb the criticism without being terribly bothered by it, she was overly aware of Finn.
It did not take a genius to know he had never been in trouble before.
Not real trouble, anyway.
Not caught-gazing-wide-eyed-at-the-camera-with-his-pants-around-his-ankles-and-his-hands-covering-the-breasts-of-the-little-sister-of-the-woman-who-had-just-abandoned-him trouble.
The photos were already on the internet. It was nine o’clock at night and tomorrow had its scandal.
“Finian,” said King Edric, in a failed attempt at calm. “We know you are grieving, but acting out in such a manner is unbefitting your status.”
Finn said nothing.
“Brinley,” said King Luke. “Acting out in such a manner is all-too-fitting for you, but even this...this...” He cringed as he remembered what this was. “It’s unacceptable.”
Brinley also said nothing. For the first time in her life, she did not know how they would end their threat or wrap up their tirade. Historically they would have thrown her second-best status in her face, remind her that this was why she would never be queen, never ascend the throne, never be taken seriously. But now there was no Elle Vida to soften the blow of her behavior, no Elle Vida to placate them and make them think, At least we have Elle.
Because they didn’t.
Bad Princess Page 2
