Chapter 1
𝕭𝖑𝖆𝖎𝖗 𝕸𝖆𝖗𝖎𝖓 ❀࿐
“Your highness” A woman said, her accent being clearly from some other
country but I couldn’t pin point it. Earlier too, when he showed up to rescue me from Julia–who had been relentlessly bullying me all day and night.
“We have come to take you back,” she continued, just as the door behind me opened and he stepped in. Andrei Calin. The bane of my existence.
I stared at him, cursing under my breath for him being here. In the same room as this woman and two bodyguards. “Mother… Please, I told you I would handle this.”
“And you have not handled anything. The coronation is the week after and yet she is still here…doing god knows what in… wherever this is,” she said, pointing to my small apartment.
Andrei sighed, dramatically of course. “I told you she would be there a day before and not a day late, Mother. Now can you please step into the hallway while I speak to her?”
He gestures for them to wait out in the hallway. They are talking as if I am not here. “Make sure she agrees to leave or we drag her back,” she said pointing to Andrei before she steps into the hallway with the two guards flanking her.
He seems to be struggling. Like really struggling with how to tell me whatever it is he is going to tell me. Running his hand through his hair, dark and wavy, he turns to face me. I clutched my diary close, my backpack about to slide off again for the fifth time today–ready for any news, maybe that my parents were alive but that wasn’t what he was about to tell me.
Andrei let out another deep breath. “Look, princess… I can’t drag you anywhere… nor them… but that birthmark on your neck symbolizes power. And…”
I wait for him to keep going. Well, I wait for so long, my feet start to go numb. Why did he call me princess? I chalked that up to a nickname cause why else call me that.
I never thought my black hair or stark green eyes would mean anything, or at least not until today. “Princess Blair Maria De Hohenzollern, you are the sole heir, The Queen and King have been waiting for so long to return, and you can not say no right now… Six months.. That is all we need and then I can convince them to let you go… and also one more thing…
“My mother enrolled you in another school.”
Those eyes were pleading with me. “Are you serious?” I say, disbelief dancing between my eyes. The backpack slid to the ground with an audible thud.
“Deadly serious.”
I move past him to get something to do some damage to him if I can of course. Anything. Knife, a book or a lamp. The heavy textbook should do.
I position myself in a stance ready to strike at him. “You can hit me if you want but… it’s best if you don’t. My mother is looking for an excuse to… smooth over the transition to make her be… the heir instead..”
With the textbook, I hit him. His shoulders more than once. “Stupid… Mother-fucker! So my… birthmark was not just a ‘make-fun’ type thing anymore?”
Yes, that was pure rage. And he was going to be on the sharp end of it. He winced at each force I used on the textbook–each thud falling on his shoulder and arm. By the last hit, he grabbed out my hands and sighed.
“I hope you’re done with assault… and bodily harm,” he said, admiring it and then me.
“So you the whole ‘following me around’ like a creep was about this?” I say, trying to breathe.
Deciding to back me into the wall, with the wallpaper that is about to come off, seemed to be his version of ‘I am a bad boy’ thing. He doesn’t do much else except smirk and stare.
A throat clears and we both break apart. Well, he just leaves me be. Is he blushing? Saying something in language under his breath he walks off. To probably wait in the hallway.
But then he stops near me, and leans in just to say the very words that I would loathe him for.
“Thanks for agreeing to the six month thing,” he whispers to me and goes straight to the hallway.
**
What can I say except for the fact I am stuck with him and his mother, who is apparently going through stuff on her tablet. And we were in a private jet set to go to Romania or somewhere in there. His mother seemed so keen that I came with them, and him too.
Andrei murmurs something of what I hope is ‘six months’. He leans forward to grab a drink, the ice clinking against the glass. I guess we really are headed to Romania. And I am going to have to get used to this.
He proceeds to watch me for the rest of the flight, but I try to doze off. It’s like I am melting under his gaze.
“We’ll be landing in an hour,” His mother’s voice grates through my soft brain. “There will be a car waiting. No Cameras yet but be prepared, anything can happen. Andrei, are you listening?”
He grunts in response with his eyes squarely on me. I can feel his gaze even as I doze off.
**
When I finally wake up, Andrei is here but the rest of the people are gone including Ambassador Calin. I yawn, stretching my arms out to the side.
“Sleeping beauty finally makes her presence known to the waking world?”
That’s it, he is definitely going to grind me to the ground. I narrow my eyes at him just as he gets up and leaves.
“You coming or should I get the royal entourage?” he shouts back. Oh my god.
Clutching onto my backpack, I follow him without another word. His back is attractive but annoying. His mother kept blabbering but my eyes were on his shoulder–broad and strong. Does he work out a lot?
I collide with his back just as he opens the door to the awaiting car. Rubbing my nose I look up at him. A smug smile is painted on his stupid face. “In you go, princess…”
Well, my life as I know it has turned a complete 360. Andrei is already in my orbit. Except there will be many eyes on me.
