CHAPTER SIX
“YOU have to get her out of Kyonos. Now.” King Stephanos slapped the day’s paper down onto the polished surface of his desk.
It had been three days since the ball. Three days since Mak had held Eva in his arms. Every one of those days since had made seeing her a sweet torment that he found he almost enjoyed. To want her as he did, to have the memory of what it felt like to have her heat beneath his hands … it kept him awake at night. Kept his body on edge. Made seeing her and not taking her into his arms again a near impossibility.
And yet, he had not done it. He had not touched her since.
Three days since that dance, more than two weeks since he’d dragged her out of the casino, but that event was now coming back around to bite Eva in a very big way. Or perhaps it was an example of things finally going according to her plans.
“Father …” Eva stepped closer to her father’s desk and touched the edge of the paper.
“You have done enough, Evangelina,” King Stephanos growled. He turned his focus on Makhail. “How do we solve this?” The king pointed at the offending headline, one that promised an interview with both men who had spent a wild night with Princess Evangelina Drakos before she was dragged out of their private room by her other lover.
“You’re right in suggesting she leave Kyonos. She needs to lie low until it all calms down, which it will, once the story is proven false. Easy enough to do, since I imagine I am the man they’re attempting to paint as her lover, and the room I took her from was anything but private.”
“I didn’t do anything with them,” Eva said, her voice shaking with anger.
“Don’t pretend this isn’t the headline you were after,” Mak said.
“Not this one specifically!” Eva said.
“You can’t control the media,” Mak said.
“You made this mess, Evangelina, you can hardly act indignant about it now,” Stephanos said. “This is why we have to be careful. This is why I have to hire someone to make sure you’re making appropriate decisions. A hint of anything scandalous and the press twists it into the most perverse version they can think of, better if a couple of fame-seekers are involved.”
“I have a place,” Mak said, his stomach tightening even as he suggested it. “There are very few people who know of its existence. It’s completely private. A couple of weeks there should help get her away from the worst of it. You can tell everyone she’s gone on a personal spa holiday.”
“Good. Take her there. I don’t even want to know where it is,” Stephanos said.
“Father …”
“No, Eva. We’ll talk later. For now, you’re going with him. And you will do as he says.”
Mak could see Eva tense, could tell she was grinding her teeth together in protest, holding in words she wouldn’t say.
“Come on,” he said, gesturing to Eva. “We’ll go and get your things together.”
Eva looked at her father one more time before heading toward the door of his office. Mak let her go through first, then followed her into the corridor. He closed the office door behind them, leaving them alone in the empty hall.
Her stomach lurched. Two weeks. For two weeks they were going to be alone. She and Mak. Just here, in the corridor, with her father in the next room, being alone with Mak made her heart pound faster and her hands shake.
To really be alone with him … She expected to feel a bit of fear at the thought. But the dominant emotion was excitement. A sort of limb-weakening excitement that she’d never experienced before.
She shook her head. There wasn’t anything to be excited about. Her name was splashed all over the tabloids, shocking claims attached to it. Blood flooded her face, making it feel hot, prickly, at the thought of what those two men claimed she’d done with them.
“Don’t look like that,” he said. “You wanted to get out.”
“I didn’t really want to be barricaded in your secret…. panic house, or whatever it is.” She swallowed hard, her heart fluttering.
“It’s a chalet. In Switzerland. It’s more Ritz Carlton than Alcatraz.” She barely smiled, her full lips turned down as they made their way toward her chambers. “What’s the problem?”