The Illegitimate King (Castaldini Crown 3)

Then, he’d been a stranger to her father’s court. Now he resided over what would be his own.

Another major difference was that she’d escaped him then. Now she found no escape from his logic. Or her own weakness, which kept whispering that in six-months’ time, she could become more than his convenient bride. With that hope prodding her and her love igniting its flame into an inferno, she’d capitulated.

The moment she had, yesterday, he’d taken her back to meet with her father and the Council to announce his acceptance and their decision to get married. Immediately.

They’d been in the general assembly chamber, and Ferruccio had just estimated that, to prepare the wedding befitting his princess and future queen, he needed six days. She’d been wondering if he was playing up the god connection when her father had dropped his biggest bomb yet. He was abdicating.

She vaguely remembered hearing him say he was no use as king anymore, that he wanted Ferruccio to have the full range of authority to turn around Castaldini’s situation right away, that he wanted Ferruccio to be crowned king during his lifetime, and on the same day he married Clarissa.

“So, do you think five days is enough time for us all to make peace with each other, to say good-bye to this life and prepare for the next? Can’t you convince your groom-to-be to give us more time? I’d say this mean feat needs at least a couple of weeks.”

Clarissa rounded on her friend. “Oh, Luci, shut up.”

Luci’s eyes gleamed unrepentantly. “You know the price of my silence. Spill.”

“What’s to spill? You know everything.”

Luci narrowed her eyes. “I was born a good bit before yesterday, you know. You’re telling me, or I’m walking up to your godly hunk and asking him for his version of the developments. I bet he’d be willing to share…” She stopped, groaned. “I didn’t mean it that way.” Clarissa’s lips twisted. Luci’s embarrassment evaporated. “But you know that. So?”

Clarissa shrugged. “He asked me to marry him, and I agreed.”

“Okay, our king, in five days’ time, seems about to have an opening in the queue waiting to suck up to him. I’m running to take that spot in three…two…”

Clarissa rolled her eyes. “Okay, okay. What do you want to know?”

“You slept with him, didn’t you?” Clarissa gaped at her friend. She knew Luci was straightforward, but she still hadn’t imagined that would be her first question out of the gate. “Don’t answer that. I know you did. You’re radiating it.”

Clarissa held her hand up, turned it back and forth. “I am?”

Luci snickered. “Cute. And you are. And he is, too. Remember that first night when you turned to look at him across the ballroom? It was as if you generated a field of attraction between you. That was why I was so stunned when he approached me and Stella, and then when you tried to pretend he didn’t exist from then on. It was weirder when I sensed that he was always on your mind.”

“Everyone’s a psychic nowadays.”

“Not me.” Clarissa closed her eyes at the sound of the new voice. Antonia. Just what she needed. To be sandwiched between the two and only busybodies in her life, now of all times. “I certainly didn’t see this coming. Not this fast, anyway. When I told you to go snatch him up, you took it to heart, didn’t you, ragazza impertinenta?”

“She’s not only a naughty girl,” Luci complained. “She’s downright wicked. She won’t tell me details!”

Clarissa wondered if the earth had ever truly swallowed anyone. Now would be a good time. She was so ready to disappear.

Antonia looked at Clarissa shrewdly, her fighter jet–fast mind working it out. “Si, do tell us details. You were gone for a night and you returned with him on your arm, in an obscene hurry to get married and unable to tear his eyes off you. It must have been one hell of a night, to land you a man like Ferruccio Selvaggio.”

Clarissa choked on shock. “And to think I lived all these years thinking you were a conservative pain, bambinàia.”

“Me? Conservative? By the time I was your age I’d had three lovers, and I’ve since had two husbands, God rest their souls.”

“Donna Antonia conservative? She’s a regular black widow!”

Antonia and Luci had overlapped. They looked at each other, Luci in impish challenge, Antonia in I’ll-get-you-later threat.

Then Antonia sighed. “You were every nanny’s dream charge as you grew up, one guaranteed to never get herself in trouble. But then you passed the age of consent….”

“About a century ago!” Luci put it.

Antonia glared at her, yet nodded. “What she said. And it got really old, this puritanical existence you led. I’d look at you and seethe with the waste of all that vital womanhood, especially with the epitome of manhood hanging around, courting you and getting rebuffed for his trouble. Now I’m wondering if you’ve just been devilishly clever all along.”

“You mean, have I been sexually active and pulling the wool over your eyes?” Antonia’s eyes wavered in surprise. “Hey, you can say intrusive stuff, and I can’t say things like that?”

Antonia glowered. “If you were, and it wasn’t with him, then you were a colossal fool.”

“Then you’ll be happy to know I wasn’t a fool, colossal or otherwise, with him or with anyone else.”

Luci poked her in the chest. “Till two days ago. I’m sure of it. You looked like another person then. Now you’ve…”

“Turned into some sort of radiator.” Clarissa smirked at Antonia’s confusion. “Previous bit of conversation before you barged in, bambinàia.”

Antonia gave Luci a sideways glance. “And you, too, are a colossal fool, ragazza delinquente, that you haven’t found yourself a man till now. And I mean a permanent one.”

“Who knew my abstinence method would work better in the end?” Clarissa poked her friend back, taunting her for a change.

Luci poked back. “Hey. All I had were a couple of nonstarters. But I have to face it—not every woman is going to find herself a Ferruccio. Or a Durante. Or a Leandro. Or even a finger’s worth of them. You’re just plain lucky.” Luci’s eyes glowed with mischief, assuring Clarissa there wasn’t the least tinge of envy in her friend’s heart. “So…just how lucky were you? On a scale from one to a hundred?”