Well, she was pleasant.
“It’s fine,” Penn said, stepping forward. “Thank you for your time.”
Leoni looked between us, then bowed and left the room, closing the door behind her.
I glared at Penn. “Fine? This is not fine.” I gestured to the bed. “There’s only one bed.”
“I noticed, Lilypad.”
Windows lined the wall, giving unobstructed views of the shimmering blue ocean. At least we had a balcony so I could escape from Penn when I needed to. When whatever this was between us became too much.
“Relax, Lilypad. I can sleep on the couch.” He gestured to the white sofa that sat in the middle of the huge room. I looked up at the gold ceiling, embossed with waves and sea foam. Everythingwas so bright and airy, and the briny air breezed through the open windows, the white curtains fluttering.
“This is all your fault,” I said. “If you hadn’t told them we were betrothed, we wouldn’t be sharing a room.”
He crossed his arms. “It’s better this way. We can be in constant communication, make sure we’re on the same page about our plan.”
A knock interrupted us, and a lady’s maid slipped in, carrying clothes, just like Gabrielle had promised. She sat them down on the end of the bed and excused herself.
I lifted one of the garments, a beige chiffon that would drape across one shoulder and hang to the floor. Not exactly what I was expecting. Penn lifted his own dark green chiffon, about three times the size of mine, and snorted.
“Perfect,” he muttered.
I wouldn’t mind seeing Penn in one of these, seeing his muscled shoulder on display, along with his thick calves, bare arms.
I hadn’t realized I was staring until Penn stood in front of me, gazing down at me, eyes twinkling. “There you go staring again,” he murmured.
“No one’s here,” I said, pushing him. “You don’t have to put on a show.”
Blood and earth, this fake betrothal might be my end. I needed to remind myself all the reasons we couldn’t be together.
1) This was pretend
2) Penn was using me
3) Penn was a criminal
4) This. Was. Pretend.
I couldn’t get distracted just because Penn was good-looking and had some (okay, many) muscles and was brave and strong and looked at me like he’d destroy the entire world just to make me happy. Jasper had once looked at me that way, too, and seehow that turned out? I swallowed. He was a good actor, I’d give him that. A little too good. He must have perfected his skills over the years as king of thieves.
I turned abruptly, grabbing my toga and marching toward an adjacent room that I assumed was the bathing chamber. I stopped inside and gasped at the grotto-like room, made of natural stone, with a pool laid in the floor and oils that lined wooden shelves hanging on the wall.
“What’s wrong?” Penn rushed inside behind me. “Ah. Get yourself cleaned up, and then we have some work to do.”
“No.” I turned to him.
“No?”
“We’re going to eat. We’re going to rest. Then we’re going to let Gabrielle take us on a tour of the water court.”
Penn raised a questioning brow. “You’ve been here many times.”
“But you haven’t, at least not for a while, and it will give us a chance to speak with Gabrielle in a casual way.”
I actually didn’t know how many times Penn had been here, if he’d stolen from them or sent his thieves to do it for him.
“We have just been on a long journey,” I said. “I’ve been kidnapped, imprisoned, threatened, terrorized, almost died from some fire lizards and a dragon. I can’t just dive into our next mission without a break first.”
