by Raye Morgan
“I’m honored,” Emma said, unable to hide her relief at seeing a friendly face.
“Did I hear Sebastian say you were recruited from London? Is this your first visit to Meridia?”
Emma smiled at her. “Not exactly. I was here a few weeks ago to meet with officials, but this is my first extended stay.”
“You’ll find us quite dull, I’m afraid. None of that snap and crackle of the big city here.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said a deep, masculine voice.
Emma looked down the table and met the glittering gaze of a darkly handsome man with a narrow face and thin hands.
“I think it might be possible to find a spark of something interesting going on in our little city if one tries hard enough,” he said, favoring her with the hint of an oily smile.
“My cousin, Romas,” Sebastian murmured to her softly. “Beware.”
Her back went up immediately. So he thought he could steer her, did he? She gave Romas a bright smile.
“I’m sure I’ll be very happy with a more leisurely pace,” she told him. “Anyway, I’m going to have my hands full. I won’t have time to sample the nightlife.”
People were beginning to murmur. She thought she recognized the tall, emaciated minister of finance and the rather portly prime minister as well as the head of the opposition party, all of whom had been pointed out to her earlier. They didn’t look friendly at all. She could hardly blame them—and yet, she couldn’t help feeling a bit of resentment at the same time. They could at least be polite.
“Cooks at the table,” the duke was muttering to himself, searching for his dropped napkin. “What’s to become of us?”
“Not just any cook, Uncle,” Sebastian said patiently. “Todd went looking for the best and he came back with Miss Valentine.”
He looked up and down the table, including them all. “You see, that’s how such things are usually managed in the twenty-first century. You have a top-level job opening, you search for someone special to fill it. You look for outstanding candidates, interview them, test them a little, then make an offer and see if your choice takes the bait.”
“What is your point, Sebastian?” Romas asked, his tone deceptively lazy.
“Just this, Cousin. Top jobs should be filled competitively. This hereditary nonsense weakens countries that still cling to it.”
Gasps started popping up all over the room as each person began to realize just what Sebastian was implying. But Romas was the only one who had a response.
“Are you saying we should post out the job of King of Meridia and take on all comers?” he asked, incredulous. “That’s insane.”
“I’m not saying that at all,” Sebastian replied. “You take me too literally. I’m merely throwing ideas out for open discussion.”
“What?” The duke finally left off muttering about cooks and rejoined the conversation. “That’s plain foolishness, my boy. Open discussion never did anyone any good. It just riles people up.”
“People need to be riled up every now and then,” his nephew told him.
Emma looked at this man who was soon to be king and, for just a moment, she thought she detected a deep, smoldering emotion in his eyes. Was it anger? Resentment? Or grief? It was gone again before she could make a good guess. But it had been real, and it fascinated her.
“At any rate, Miss Valentine is, by all accounts, a wonderful chef. I know she’ll prepare a spread that will be talked about for years.”
He glanced at her, then looked back at the others. He didn’t speak again for almost thirty seconds, but something about him still held their attention. They waited.
“Not only that,” he said finally, his voice calm yet full of meaning, “but, as a food expert, I’m hoping she’ll be able to help me figure out who poisoned my father.”
Shock flashed around the table, quickly followed by outrage.
“Sebastian!” the duke exclaimed.
“What the hell are you talking about?” Romas demanded, half rising from his chair.
“My dear boy,” his aunt Trudy cried, her hands fluttering like little birds. “What are you saying?”
Emma turned to look into his golden eyes. There it was again, just a quick glimpse, as though a curtain had been drawn back to reveal his feelings, then let fall again before those emotions could take control. She saw the pulse throbbing at his temple and knew what this was costing him, no matter how cool and disdainful he seemed. He believed his father had been poisoned. But was it true?
She needed to leave. The prince was manipulating these people and she wanted no part of it—and she certainly didn’t want to start empathizing with him.
“Let’s not play games,” he said, taking a sip of wine and slowly lowering the glass again before he looked about at the others. “I’ve heard the same rumors you’ve all heard. Well, we’ll know soon enough. The final autopsy report is due the day after tomorrow.”
“You’re ignoring the fact that the preliminary findings were negative,” Romas said icily. “You have no grounds for making such an outrageous accusation.”
“I’m making no accusations, Romas. I’m only trying to prepare you all for what may be to come. If the autopsy finds evidence of foul play, I won’t rest until the guilty party is found and punished.”
Romas said something angrily and Sebastian answered him in kind, and Emma took the opportunity to slip away while no one was paying any attention to her. But she didn’t go far, just behind the brocade drapes, before she turned and looked back at the prince.
He was still arguing with his cousin, baiting him, really. The more hot-headed Romas got, the cooler Sebastian seemed—like a man in charge. She had a feeling this was probably a pattern that went back to childhood with those two.
“Remind me to stay away from both of them,” she murmured to herself as she hurried back into the kitchen. She had enough on her plate without taking on an ancient cousins’ rivalry, much less a blood feud or a castle conspiracy. This was just what everyone had warned her against when she’d been trying to decide whether or not to take this job.
“Don’t get caught up in the intrigues between different factions,” her older half-brother Max had said. “Picking the wrong side could ruin everything.”
She’d brushed aside those warnings at the time, but now she saw how perceptive he’d been.
“Focus, focus,” she chanted under her breath, vowing to make sure she didn’t get drawn into Sebastian’s sphere of influence again. She had to keep her mind on her work. After all, that was what had brought her this far. And she had much further to go.
Emma managed to keep her promise to herself for a good eighteen hours. The morning was full of activity as she met with Todd, the coronation manager, to go over the facilities. How and where the food was presented was very important and she was learning as much as she could, soaking up every detail.
It was mid-afternoon as she was finding her way back from the outdoor fields where the medieval tournaments would be performed, when she made the mistake that landed her once again at the prince’s feet.
It was his cousin Romas’ fault, actually. She’d started up a ramp that rimmed a large inner courtyard when she caught sight of him coming down the same ramp, only on the other side of the opening. Continuing as they were, they were bound to meet halfway around.
That was something she didn’t need. Casting about for an escape, she decided to slip into the hedge that bordered the ramp and wait for him to pass. The brush was thick but she squeezed her way into it.
If she’d stayed there, she might have been all right. But she took another step and the next thing she knew her feet slipped out from under her and she was sliding down a steep slope of grass, right through a gap in another hedge, and when she finally righted herself and got back on her feet she realized she’d somehow landed inside the castle maze.
“Oh, bother,” she muttered, brushing grass and dirt off the seat of her pants and looking around for the exit. She had a few scr
atches on her arms but nothing was really hurt except her dignity. Luckily, no one seemed to have seen her wild ride and she had to chuckle when she thought of how she must have looked sliding down the slope.
Oh, well. At least she’d kept her mouth shut—no screams of anguish to bring people running. And she’d managed to avoid Romas. Now to find her way to the exit.
She started in the logical direction, forgetting that logic would work against her in a maze. By the time she realized what she was doing wasn’t working, it was too late to just tunnel back through the thick plantings. She’d wound her way deeper into the network and the hedges were now impenetrable and braced by iron fencing.
She was stuck in a maze. This was just plain silly. How could this have happened so fast? Turning this way, then that, she was only getting deeper into trouble. What if she had to start yelling for help? How silly would that be?
An old familiar feeling of dread began to tug at her heart, the feeling she’d always had as a child when she’d known her father was going to find out about her latest mistakes. Gritting her teeth, she pushed the feelings away. She’d spent a lifetime learning how to fight off those fears and she wasn’t going to give in to them now.
A couple of deep breaths, a quick reminder to herself of how much she’d achieved in her life, and she was all right again. She would get out of this maze and get back to work. It was only a matter of time. After all, these corridors couldn’t go on for ever without getting her to something recognizable. Could they?
Still, where was everybody? Maybe the maze was closed. Maybe no one ever came here.
She started off again, walking quickly and wondering which way to go. The faster she went, the more lost she got. And the thirstier. Pictures of desert travelers crawling toward dry water holes began to flit through her mind’s eye. She was beginning to imagine her bones as they might be found years later.
“Ah, yes, that chef we hired for the coronation. Looks like she died of starvation, poor thing. You’d think she could have known enough to gnaw on the plant bark at least.”
She was still brooding on that tragic scene when she turned a corner, and suddenly found herself face to face with Prince Sebastian.
“Oh!”
She came to a screeching halt and tried to catch her breath. It was lovely to find another human being in the maze—but did it have to be the prince?
CHAPTER FIVE
NEVER mind. Running into the prince was better than constantly running. Emma quickly decided she would pretend she wasn’t really lost. Hopefully, he would never guess how close to panic she’d been just a few minutes ago.
Sebastian was dressed in a simple blue shirt and form-fitting jeans and he could have been any handsome young man his age, anywhere. Except—no. She might as well admit it. There was something special about him, something that set him apart. And it wasn’t just the fact that she found him incredibly attractive with the afternoon sunlight lighting his hair.
She was glad she’d put on nice slacks and a crisp white shirt, though the dirt and grass stains on the seat of her pants were bound to embarrass her eventually. Her hair was loose, a tangled mess of curls now that she’d had her tussle with the bushes, and she wished she could run a brush through it. Too late.
“Ah, Miss Valentine,” he said, one dark eyebrow raised in surprise as he did a double take. “How did you get in here?”
“I just sort of…dropped in.” She took a step backwards, then stopped. Where, after all, could she go?
His sharp eyes did not look friendly.
“Didn’t you know this maze is forbidden to anyone outside the royal family?” he asked icily.
“Oh. Sorry. I took a wrong turn and lost my footing and found myself crashing through the bushes and…”
Her voice trailed off. Here she was, on the verge of admitting everything. What was it about him that drew these things out of her?
The shoulders. It had to be the shoulders. They were very wide and some primeval instinct in her found comfort in that—as though he were a protective force she could cling to.
If she were the clinging type—something she’d vowed long ago never to be. Still, if she wasn’t careful, she might just find herself spilling the details of every humiliating thing she could dredge up to tell him. She started to turn.
“Well, I’ll just get out of your way and—”
Stepping forward, he took hold of her arm and frowned at the small scratches. “Crashing through the bushes seems to be dangerous work. Think you can find your way back on your own without destroying the landscaping?”
There was an exclamation from behind him and, for the first time, she realized his aunt Trudy was sitting on a bench a few yards away.
“Don’t listen to him, my dear,” she chirped. “We’re very glad to see you again. Please, come and sit down by my side.”
“Oh.” Pulling away from the prince, she took a few steps in that direction. She couldn’t help but return the older woman’s warm smile. “I don’t want to intrude.”
“You’re not intruding at all.” She patted the stone seat beside her. “Sit down. We’ll have a nice chat.”
Sebastian’s frown darkened. “She must have something more important to do, Aunt. She looks busy to me.”
“How can she be busy? She’s wandering about on the grounds. In the maze, no less!” Trudy made room and smiled, offering up a bottle of water, which Emma took gratefully. “You look like you’ve been through quite an ordeal, my dear. You must rest before you go back. It’s so pleasant here.”
Trudy was prattling on but Emma suddenly lost all ability to hear. Her gaze had met Sebastian’s and though his look was half-exasperated, half-amused, it was also completely aware, as though he knew everything she was thinking and wasn’t in the mood to put up with it for much longer. But more than that, his golden eyes cast a spell, drawing her in, and for just a moment the world faded away around them and she could have sworn he’d touched her.
That was impossible, of course. He wasn’t even in arm’s reach. But she felt as though he’d reached out and run his fingertips down from her cheek to her collarbone, lighting her nerves on fire. She drew her breath in sharply and put her hand to her collarbone, as if to push his away. But there was nothing there.
It seemed like magic.
She blinked, finally, willing herself to look away and begin breathing normally again. And when she glanced back at him, he was looking off into the distance as though nothing had happened at all. Maybe for him it hadn’t. And maybe she’d been imagining things.
But she wasn’t imagining the feeling of tension in the air and suddenly she realized she’d interrupted an argument of some kind, and that Trudy was glad to have her here. Perhaps she thought Emma would keep Sebastian’s anger at bay. Good luck! She was more likely to spark it again.
Looking down at a stack of newspapers on the ground in front of the bench, she began to get an idea of what the discussion had been about. Each one featured a front page article on Sebastian, and each one contained plenty of photos of the prince with beautiful women. Noticing her interest, Trudy began to use her foot to push the papers under the bench, but not before Emma had taken in the tone of the coverage. It seemed uniformly sarcastic and critical.
“Trying to hide my past, Aunt?” he said wryly. “Don’t bother. When you make the front page of every local paper, the secrets are out.” He pulled a paper out and stared at the cruel headline. “This is what the country I’m to rule thinks of me.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Trudy said soothingly. “Once they get to know you again…”
His bitter smile held not a hint of humor. “My aunt is under the benign illusion that to know me is to love me,” he quipped. “Au contraire, dear relative. The local governing element knew me well years ago, and none of them could stand me. They loved Julius. They want Julius.”
Emma felt a twinge of compassion for the prince, and suddenly she heard herself blurting out, “Well, Julius didn’t love
them enough to stick around for them, did he?”
He looked at her as though she’d said something surprising. His mouth suddenly stretched into a lopsided grin with none of his usual irony.
“Out of the mouths of babes,” he muttered softly.
“Hey, I’m not a babe,” she protested, hoping he didn’t suspect her pleasure at seeing a real smile from him.
“Oh, yeah?” He grinned at her. “Could have fooled me. I’ll bet you clean up pretty good.”
“Sebastian!” Trudy admonished. “None of that.”
He shrugged, but his gaze lingered on Emma and she felt a flush of warmth spreading through her system like a shot of brandy on a cold winter day.
“Never mind about the attitude of the town,” Trudy said quickly, looking uncomfortable. “Once you’re married the attitude will change. Now if only you could manage to find someone suitable.”
The corners of Sebastian’s wide mouth twitched. “I resent that, Aunt. The women I’ve dated have been perfectly suitable—for me.”
“Suitable as playmates, perhaps.”
The look that flashed between the two of them made Emma think they were about to start up their argument again. But before that could happen, Sebastian’s expression changed as though something new had occurred to him.
“Speaking of playmates, what happened to Julius’dog?”
Trudy shrugged. “Lago? I’m sure I don’t know.”
Sebastian frowned thoughtfully. “He wouldn’t have taken that mutt with him.”
“Perhaps he’s down in the stables.”
“The stables! He’s a house dog.” Sebastian seemed outraged at the thought. “I’d better go down and see if I can find him.”
“Not yet,” Trudy said sharply. “We’re still waiting for Agatha.”
Emma wondered fleetingly who Agatha was, but the talk about the dog had stirred a memory of her own.
“I had a dog when I was a girl,” she murmured, then was surprised to realize she’d said it out loud. The other two were looking at her, so she went on quickly, wrapping it up. “She was my best friend when I was about eight, but I had to get rid of her when we moved into a flat in London.”
