A Girl in Black and White (Alyria 2)

With a sigh, I realized this favor was going to be at least male-whore worthy. “Fine. Let me get my cloak.”

I grabbed my ‘Hate Weston List’ from Tasha’s fingers as he eyed it sideways, and laid it back on my desk, receiving a glare from him like it had actually been his.

“How did you get up here with your eyes closed?” I asked Henry, shutting the door behind me. “Didn’t you run into walls?”

“A couple,” he grumbled. “Think I got a real bruise on my head now.”

Amusement rushed through me. Only Sunny would tell her son to walk through a brothel he’d never been in with his eyes closed.

I laughed. “Cry wolf . . .”

This was more than male-whore worthy—like two of them at once. Wait, how would that even . . . oh. Huh.

Anyway, I’d missed supper, and now I was going to hear it from Agnes. Hopefully, she didn’t contact the Superior Sisters like she’d always threatened. I would just say I’d accidentally boarded a ship to Aldova and had to find my way back . . . or something.

The last bit of the sun was dying behind the horizon, a tiny slit of orange glowing across the ocean water. As soon as it began to get dark, the heat had snuck up on me, grabbing on and not letting go. I tucked my skirts into my girdle, not even caring that it made me look like a true loose woman. Comfort over reputation any day. Grandmother might have said otherwise, but she wasn’t in Symbia melting. Who knew where she was, abandoning me here. I should really whore to teach her a lesson.

Leaning against the wooden counter, I sipped some wine that seemed to only make me lightheaded from the lack of food. Sunny wasn’t jesting that she couldn’t keep up with it all. Even Henry had been carrying mugs and running errands all evening.

It wasn’t as bad as I’d imagined. Yea, I’d gotten my backside smacked more times than I cared for, but the next time I came back to the table, I was sure to subtly persuade the man with wandering hands to make sure that in the future he always asked a woman whether he could touch her. It was a light persuasion; they shouldn’t have lost their minds. Keyword: shouldn’t.

With a sigh, I pulled my heavy hair off my neck and around my shoulder. It was longer than it should have been, but that was the last thing I’d worried about when waking from the dead. Tugging on my bodice, trying to get some airflow anywhere I could, I stopped when I heard someone yell, “Just take it off. We won’t mind!” Laughter ensued.

I sighed. Well, as much as I tried to turn this into a respectable establishment, I didn’t think it was going to happen. I tipped my head back, wishing for patience. And then I felt a tingling at the base of my spine, a rush of awareness running over me. I didn’t even need to glance at the door to know who just came in.

Pulling my gaze in that direction, my breath caught in my chest as I met Weston’s heavy stare. He stood there for a moment, watching me, slowly taking me all in from my head to my toes, before glancing away and taking a seat at a table. Some man I hadn’t even noticed took a seat across from him.

It seemed all the air was sucked out the doorway when he stepped inside. This place was too small for him.

“Bloody hell,” Sunny breathed, coming to stand beside me. “Tell me that’s not—”

I nodded, my unfocused gaze in the opposite direction. “It is.”

“Bloody hell! The other prince was in here the other day and I ‘bout had a heart attack, but this one . . .”

Yea, this one was something.

And he could hear all of this, I was certain.

A shiver of uncertainty went through me, settling in my stomach. “Sunny, you can serve them.”

“What! No. Don’t think I could without dropping their drinks, I’d be so nervous. You do it, darlin’. They’ll want the likes of you anyway.” She leaned in, her shoulder brushing mine as she gave the table another glance. “Maybe if you’re lucky, you’ll get that prince as a patron. Imagine that!”

I groaned, imagining what Weston would think about that statement, but not daring to look.

What was it with princes trying to mesh in with the commoners? The other men didn’t seem like too much was out of place. The laughter died down a little bit, but they didn’t act like a prince just stepped into the room. I guessed that was because he fit in here fairly well.

I grabbed two mugs, cursing myself for somehow being in the position to serve Weston, but there was a part of me, after he walked away from me last night, that wanted to show him I was indifferent to him. That I didn’t care he was here, sitting right there.

Weston didn’t give me another glance, only stretched his legs out, sitting as simply as a prince would.

Looking at the man across from him, now that I was up close, I noticed he was a captain with just a glance: darkly suntanned skin, lines on his face from the harsh weather, and rough, calloused hands from handling the rigging. As if he felt me looking at him, he glanced over, watching me carry two mugs to the table, his eyes falling to the bare legs I’d suddenly regretted showing.

A little flame of irritation pulsed in my stomach as I made it to their table and Weston completely ignored me like he hadn’t kidnapped me, hadn’t gotten me killed, and hadn’t then stolen my horse. And so, I pretended I’d forgotten all the above and treated him like a common patron. I set the mugs on the table, but when I turned to go, the captain grabbed my wrist.

“Don’t reckon I’ve seen you here before.”

“I’ve seen you,” I responded, a smile pulling on my lips. I lifted a shoulder, saying, “You must have forgotten me is all,” and tried to pull my wrist out of his grasp, but he held tight.