Page 85 of The Duke's Virgin
“Ginger tea,” he said, smiling crookedly. The smile faded as he looked at me. His mouth firmed out, and he approached silently, offering the tea.
Dread filled me as I accepted the cup. I wasn’t surprised when he sat next to me. The tea had a spicy scent to it, and I breathed it in, surprised when it didn’t immediately turn my stomach. I took a small sip, then lowered it, staring into the pale amber liquid.
Next to me, Aeric sat and waited.
I took another sip and squeezed my eyes shut, wondering if maybe I should go back to bed, beg off and tell him I was just feeling too bad. He’d have somebody on staff handle my travel arrangements, and I’d have some time to get myself together before dealing with this.
Dealing with it, I thought, disgusted.
How did Idealwith the knowledge that the father of my child thought I was just a mercenary, money-grubbing bitch?
Money or marriage…I bet it’s money.
I had to swallow back the noise that tried to escape me, had to fight back hot tears.
Aeric could tell, too. He covered my shoulder with a comforting arm. “You’re not just feeling poorly, sweetheart. You’ve been crying.”
“I’m fine,” I told him. I even managed to keep my voice steady.
“I didn’t ask if you were fine. I said you’ve been crying.”
I didn’t respond. Taking another sip of tea seemed wiser.
He sighed and shifted on the divan next to me, stretching out his long legs and leaning back on his hands. “All right, cousin. Don’t tell me. I can wait.”
I got up, moving too fast, causing the tea to slosh out of the cup. I took another sip, then put it on the table. “I need to be getting ready for my flight home.”
“Tell me why you’ve been crying.”
Spinning around, I glared at him. “Damn it, Aeric! You’re the Prince ofMonaco, but I’m an American!”
“Impressive.” He cocked a brow and gave me an arrogant, smug grin. “But you know I’m not asking because I’m a prince of anything. I’m asking as your cousin.”
“You haven’taskedanything.” With a sullen look, I crossed my arms over my chest and stared him down.
“Very well.” He rose and came closer, his face sobering. “Stacia, will you please tell me why you’ve been crying? I hate it when one of the people most dear to me is hurting.”
The concern in his voice landed on all the raw, ruined places inside, and I closed my eyes, covering my face with my hands. I didn’t want to do this, didn’t want to tell him. I knew how he’d react, and how it could affect things between him and Luka.
“Stacia.”
I jumped and lowered my hands, not realizing he’d come so close that we were now only inches apart.
“Do you remember a conversation we had once? It was the summer after you turned nine. You’d come over to spend a month. Remember?” Aeric caught my arms gently in his hands and lowered his head, pressing his brow to mine. Without waiting for me to answer, he continued. “You were visiting for the summer, and we were out with my mother. We ended up at some boring society lunch, and a classmate of mine was there with his father.”
I remembered. “Otto.” I sighed and hugged him quickly before backing away. “Of course. How could I forget Otto? He was an asshole.”
“He still is. He’d heard you talking and knew you were American but hadn’t realized who you were…remember what happened?”
I huffed out a sigh and glared at him.
He tapped my nose. “Of course, you do. But I’m going to finish my story. We were at the window, talking and bored out of our minds, and he comes over, all but pushes you out of the way so he can talk to me about the polo team.”
“And then I pushed back between you two,” I said, taking over. I managed a faint smile because the look on that obnoxious teenager’s face still managed to amuse me. I’d been skinny and several years younger, but he’d made me mad—andmy mother hadn’t been there to scold me for not being alady. “Then I told him that if he wasn’t intelligent enough to realize when two people were having a conversation, then he wasn’t intelligent enough to play polo and maybe he should focus in improving his observation skills.” I rolled my eyes. “And he got all angry about it and tried to push me again, and you grabbed him and shoved him back, and he ended up falling over a table, then tripping over his feet and landing on his ass, right as his father was bragging about how close the two of you were.”
“He looked like he’d swallowed an egg whole,” Aeric said, clearly thinking back to it with fondness. “And while the old idiot was sputtering about boys being boys, Otto gets up and starts yelling at you and how rude Americans were, not knowing who their betters were.” He hugged me, then eased back. “You looked like you wanted to poke him with something sharp, but you just looked at him and said that I was your cousin, and it didn’t matter to you if I was going to be a duke or not, that I wasn’t allowed to be friends with people like that. Then you looked atmeand said I’dnevertalk about people not knowing who their betters were. Oh, and we would always be friends before we were anything else. My mother was hard-pressed not to laugh. It could have been quite the scandal except most of her acquaintances had seen how Otto pushed you, and two of them had already been moving to intervene, but I just beat them to it.”
The look he gave me brought tears to my eyes, and I blinked them back before glaring at him. “What are you getting at?”
