Page 120 of The Thing About My Prince

“I’m fine here, thanks.”

“Please.” My father sighs. “Please sit.”

I stay where I am and, I swear to God, Giles only just about managed to stop himself from rolling his eyes.

“Yes, Oliver. For goodness’ sake, why won’t you sit down?” my mother snaps.

“What difference does it make if I’m sitting or standing?”

“Sitting is more civilized,” my father says.

He might as well have tossed a lit match on the powder-dry tinder inside me.

“I thought you’d learned long ago that I’m not civilized.Ironic, really. Because yesterday, I learned that I’m considerably more civilized than a lot of other people around here.”

I did not intend to go straight in with snark, but it slipped out. Well, maybe not slipped—more like spurted. But Jesus, they press my buttons like no one else on the planet.

But the last thing I want to do is lose the moral high ground. Lord knows I don’t have it that often, and I have every intention of making the most of it.

“If only on the basis,” I continue, “that I do not go around spying on people or digging up dirt to sell to the gutter press.”

I sense Giles’s eyes boring into the side of my head, but there’s more chance of me juggling the crown jewels one-handed than looking at him.

My parents shuffle uneasily on the sofa. Dad picks up hisFinancial Times, opens it, then refolds it exactly as it was. Mum dusts off a cushion as if she’s suddenly spotted some heinous, immovable fluff.

Why are they both suddenly uncomfortable?

The awkward silence is broken by Giles. “I have some new news for you, sir. I’ve heard?—”

“Hold on.” I silence him as a realization hits me like an ice block to the stomach.

My focus remains entirely on my parents, who’re still not looking at me. “Did you both know all this was going on? That my room was bugged? That Giles or one of his cronies was going around digging up dirt on Lexi, buying old photos from a college boyfriend, then getting their friends at the tabloids, who are undoubtedly on backhanders, to serve them up to the public to humiliate her?”

Dad pulls out a scrunched-up cloth from the pocket of his slacks and polishes his glasses.

Mum gets up and walks away, looking around. “Where did I leave my embroidery?”

I didn’t know it was possible to physically notice yourblood pressure rising until right this second. This isn’t stress. This isn’t even anger. This is downright disgust. And I’m not certain I’m going to be able to stop myself from losing my shit about it.

“You werein on this?” The tension in my jaw makes it painful to get the words out.

“It was bad enough to think this arsehole was going rogue and betraying me”—I stab the air between Giles and me with one finger—“but my own parents?”

“Arsehole,huh,” Giles mutters.

“Well, if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck,” I respond, even though I probably shouldn’t.

“I wouldn’t sayin on it,” Dad says.

“We certainly knew nothing about the photographs until after they were published,” Mum adds, picking up magazines and looking under them as if they might be hiding her needlework. “That was Giles’s independent initiative.”

Giles nods and emits a proud littlehmsound.

“Oh, well, that’s okay then,” I tell my parents. “Your consciences are free and clear.” Since screaming isn’t socially acceptable, I shake my head and blow out a long, incensed breath.

Dad pushes his now thoroughly clean glasses back up his nose. “We’re all just looking out for you. Trying to stop you from making a terrible mistake. Embarrassing yourself. You know, that sort of thing.”

“But you don’t care if you humiliate my girlfriend by displaying her breasts to the world?”