Page 20 of Striking (Red Lips & White Lies #7)

“Up you go. We’ve got work to do before your meeting today because you are never again allowed to leave the house dressed like...”—her finger circles me as she shakes her head—“well, dressed like that.”

“I was going to change,” I murmur defensively.

“Perfect. Let’s get you ready to make your debut, Your Highness.”

J oss isn’t just good. She’s incredible.

I still look like myself but better. Elegant.

Subtle makeup manages to highlight my features without hiding my face behind layers of heavy foundation.

My hair is down in sleek waves, and the black cashmere sweater and skirt still let me feel like myself, not a little girl playing dress-up.

A long Chanel necklace and pink Louboutin heels bring everything together in a way I’m not sure I’ve ever looked before. Polished.

And when Rhys steps into my room right on time, the exhaustion in his eyes immediately morphs into something else. Something that looks an awful lot like desire. He runs a thumb gently along my jaw as heat grows in his gaze. “You sure you’re ready for this?”

“Not even a little.” I cover his hand with mine, knowing if I’m going to demand the truth from him, I need to be able to give it myself. “But this is what we have to do, right?”

He ghosts his lips over mine. “Smart and beautiful.”

“If you say so, Your Highness .” I press up on my toes and wrap my arms around his strong shoulders. “But if I was so smart, I’m not sure we’d be married.”

“I’m not so sure about that, love. I think marrying you may just have been the smartest thing I’ve ever done.” Rhys presses his big palm against the small of my back, holding me against him. “Will you go with me somewhere after the meeting?”

“If it’s the Seven Swords, I’m not sure I’m ready to go back there just yet,” I joke, trying to lighten the mood.

“Not the Seven Swords. Just something I like to do. Typically, I go alone, but I think you’d enjoy it. Do you trust me?” Rhys’s beautiful blue eyes beg me to say yes, and I’m quickly learning I don’t want to tell this man no.

Do I love this man? That’s not an easy answer.

Do I think I could? Yes. I think it’s going to be hard not to fall in love with him. With the way I feel when I’m with him. With his big heart and big brain.

Do I trust him? That’s an easier answer.

“I trust you.” The words are quiet but powerful.

They’re my truth.

His eyes close for a moment, like I just gave him a peace he’d been searching for, and Atticus’s words from earlier play over in my mind.

I’ve always wanted to be a nurse.

Helping people is part of who I am. Taking care of them. Easing their pain.

I thought I’d be able to do that in a different way with the foundation. Now I’m realizing that maybe... just maybe, I’ll be able to do that for my husband as well.

When his eyes open, there’s a look there I haven’t seen before.

“I won’t let anyone hurt you, Bellamy. I promise you that.” He takes my hand in his, and that wave of electricity that always seems to spark between us sizzles along my skin. “It’s time, love.”

I guess it is.

I send up a silent prayer that this meeting goes better than I’m expecting.

S o much for better than I was hoping.

This is worse.

So much worse.

“Are you out of your mind?” The loudest, angriest, hairiest council member yells across the long table in what Rhys called the high-council chamber.

Apparently, according to tradition, only high-council members are allowed in this room.

And from the looks of it, it hasn’t been redecorated in over a century.

I’m expecting someone to walk in and yell, Off with her head!

at any moment. “You cannot do this, Your Highness.”

Rhys’s thumb rubs soothing circles over my palm under the table, but it does nothing to soothe me.

“She’s a commoner,” another rounder, redder, possibly angrier man with a thick, gray combover gasps, like commoner is a four-letter word only to be whispered in dark alleys.

I was introduced to everyone when Rhys and I walked into the room, but the arguing started so quickly after we sat down, I can’t remember anyone’s name.

“She’s a bloody American,” yells Lord Dalton Armstrong, the only gentleman who’s name I do remember, and I half expect him to bless himself after, like he’s just seen the actual devil.

Joss wasn’t kidding when she said her father was an ass.

He looks so similar to her and her brothers, but all I see is a man who won’t accept that his daughter is in love with a woman or apparently, that his king is married to an American.

I might be a bloody American, but he’s a bloody asshole.

There is one remaining man sitting next to Atticus. He seems to be the oldest of the group and so far, the quietest as well. “Holbrooke,” Rhys challenges him. “You seem to be quiet over there.”

“I’m considering my words, Your Majesty, because I do not think you are going to like what I have to say.

” He leans on a black cane as he pushes to his feet and faces Rhys.

“You’ve broken the laws of your own country.

The ones you’re charged with upholding as monarch.

The Royal Marriages Act of 1772 states that the queen must be either a natural-born citizen of Mornea or must be of royal blood.

If my understanding is correct, Ms. Bellamy Wilder is neither of those things. ”

He looks at me with pity in his gray eyes.

“You cannot sit on the throne with her as your wife or your queen. I’m sorry to say, but you can’t.”

Rhys presses his palms against the table and rises, every muscle in his body strung tight as he looks around the room at his council.

“Bellamy Wilder became Bellamy Windsor the night before my grandfather died. We were married by a Bishop of the Church of Mornea in the palace chapel. It was a legal and religious ceremony. She is my wife, and she will be my queen. In the eyes of God and the law, she is who I’ve chosen.

So you had better figure out a way because I am not going to let a law that was passed two hundred and fifty years ago dictate who I spend my life with. ”

He holds his hand out for me, and I slip mine in his and stand on shaky legs, stealing strength from my husband... my king.

“Your highness,” handlebar moustache man stops us. “This is bigger than us. You’ll need to get Parliament on your side.”

“Then I suggest you all start working on that.” Rhys’s arm slides around my waist and guides me out of the room and down the hall until we’re hidden in an alcove among paintings older than the country I grew up in.

His strong hands frame my face as he presses me against the wall under a painting of a group of men on horseback, swords raised in what I can only imagine was a rallying cry. “Was that supposed to be you asking for forgiveness?”

“Kings don’t ask for forgiveness, little bee.

We tell people what we want done, and we let them make it so.

” He presses his forehead to mine. “And I’ve wanted you from the first moment I saw you on the island.

I’m not going to let a law from centuries ago determine whether you’re fit to rule by my side. ”

I reach up and run my fingers along his temples. “What is it like?”

“What?” he asks with hooded eyes.

“Being so confident in who you are and what you want.” I’m not sure I’ve ever felt that kind of certainty. “Leading people.”

He kisses the corner of my mouth, then licks along the seam of my lips, demanding entrance. And this kiss... this kiss isn’t like the others.

This kiss is a claiming.

This is the kind of kiss that steals your senses and maybe just a little piece of your soul.

“Ask me again in six months, little bee. Now come on. We’ve got places to be.”