Why not, indeed? Melody asked herself later, when, filled with too many pastries, cakes, and squares of baklava oozing with honey, Griffin led her back to their new home.
“What do you normally do for Christmas dinner?” she asked, when they arrived in his entry hall. Their entry hall, she corrected herself.
“Are you hungry?” He sounded amazed.
“Not in the least. But I will be. Later.”
“Well. Typically I have a light supper before...” He cleared his throat. “But, of course, I have no plans to go out this evening. I would be delighted if you would join me for a meal.”
“Wonderful,” she replied, smiling up at him.
As if he’d handed her the heavens instead of agreeing to share a meal with her. One he would clearly not be cooking himself.
Not that it mattered. She was pleased all the same.
Though, then, it was nothing short of torturous to allow him to carefully lead her back to her suite, clearly under the impression that she couldn’t find her own way. And that even if she could, she was so breakable that she might crack into shards without his supervision.
There had been a great many years that she’d lain in her bed in her father’s house as a girl, dreaming of one day being treated as if she was precious and perhaps fashioned from spun glass. Not a princess. But more the way Calista had been treated.
She wished she could go back in time and tell that girl how annoying it was.
“Thank you for a lovely Boxing Day, Melody,” Griffin said in that marvelous voice of his that rumbled through her, collecting between her legs. “I am honored that I got to spend it with you.”
Melody had the ridiculous urge to curtsy. And curtailed it. Barely.
“I am, too,” she replied, laying it on a bit thick. In her opinion, she sounded more tearful than anything else.
“I will see you this evening, then,” he said, in that rich, heady way of his.
“Yes,” she whispered.
Melody slipped into her suite, then stood there, her back to the door she closed behind her. She heard the sound of Griffin’s steps receding down the corridor. And then, moments later, the faint brush of a footstep at the end of her own entry hall.
Fen.
“Have you ever seduced a man?” she asked her sensei.
“Naturally,” Fen replied, sounding unfazed.
Because Fen was always unfazed.
“You need to teach me how,” Melody said. Because Fen was her sensei, yes, but she had also long been Melody’s partner in crime when it came to quietly, secretly, making the embarrassing scandal of the Skyros family into a whole lot more then met the eye.
Pun intended.
“Very well, then,” Fen said in her usual way, stern and sedate at once. “We have work to do.”
CHAPTER FOUR
LATER THAT EVENING, Griffin waited for his bride with his back to the cozy, intimate dining area he’d had his staff prepare with this holiday supper he’d told her was his tradition. They’d run with it, festooning the room with evergreen boughs that made the air smell crisp and sweet, and small, twinkling lights better suited to more northern climates.
The truth was, Griffin had no such tradition.
Historically, Boxing Day was what he considered the finish line of the deeply tedious run of holiday balls that characterized the last bit of each year. It was an Idyllian tradition. Every week, another holiday ball. All of which he, as a royal prince, was expected to attend. For years he had performed this duty at his father, who had stopped asking Griffin to do anything—because Griffin would refuse him. On principle.
But he would happily walk over burning embers for his brother.
It often felt as if he had, come Christmas. The good news was, after his final command appearance for the traditional Boxing Day photos the palace liked to release, he was free to do as he liked until New Year’s Eve.
And what Griffin liked usually involved rounds of debauchery to balance out so many weeks of tedious duty and responsibility.
There would be no more of that, obviously. That was the promise he’d made.
That was the promise he would keep.
Griffin might have felt a faint pang at that, but he ignored it. He gazed out toward the sea instead. His residence sat up on the same hill with the rest of the palace complex and, on clear days, offered him sweeping views of whitewashed buildings with the Aegean forever beckoning in the distance. Tonight there were only the bright lights of the island’s only real city and the brooding dark of the sea beyond.
A match for the brooding dark within him—but he was ridding himself of that, too. Griffin had been so many versions of himself in this life already. A doting son to a fragile mother. A rebellious son to a despised father. An avid student, a clever soldier, a playboy prince. What was one more role?
A protector, this time.
This time Griffin intended to get it right.
He heard a sound behind him as the door was opened and his bride was led inside. His bride. His wife.
Griffin still wasn’t used to those terms, but when he turned to face her, he forgot whatever pangs he might have had for careless nights with reckless people. Because Melody seemed to blot out any memories he might have had. Simply by entering the room.
He imagined that if it was daylight, she might block out the sun.
“I hope I’m not dressed inappropriately,” she said in that breathy voice that made him want to conquer dragons and raze cities on her behalf. With his own two hands.
Melody looked frail and uncertain as she clung to the arm of her aide. The other woman was dressed all in black and held herself still in a manner that poked at him. Too still, something in him warned, as if he was still in the military. The aide was of indeterminate age and bowed slightly at the sight of him. Very
