“Hey!” Saber begins, moving as if to stop the bot, and I grasp his arm with both hands, holding him back. I’m not sure how I’d explain it if my new employee were to actually break a top-of-the-line Amalgamated service bot.
He hesitates and looks down at me—something many men are physically incapable of doing. Particularly when I’m sporting heels. Though the look he’s giving me says let go, almost of their own accord my fingers tighten on his arm, feeling the ripple of muscle there. It’s strange to want to say so many things and feel the words stick in my throat.
He despises me. He’d likely despise me even more if he knew the reactions I have when he’s near.
“It’s better if you let them,” I say, struggling to regain my poise. “Even if you unpacked on your own, they’d rearrange everything once you were gone. It’s their way. M.A.R.I.E.’s way.”
“So this is how it’s going to be?” he asks softly. Venomously. “I sleep in here like your pet, follow you around and take orders, do your bidding in my cute little uniform? Did you actually need help, or were you just trying to lure me to the palace?”
“I didn’t know it would be you,” I explode.
“You had to have suspected.”
“I thought—” I thought he was too important. But I don’t want to remind him of the insult Reginald gave him in Paris. That he’s nobody. Indignant tears sting my eyes, and I blink them back. “I’ll have you know I’ve been running on fewer than four hours of sleep at a time for a fortnight. I can’t keep up on my own, and I can’t risk sending the work out. This,” I say, gesturing at the dainty room, “is the safest place for you to be in the entire palace. And not just for my sake; what do you think His…he would do if he discovered the truth about you?”
More emotions race across Saber’s face than I could possibly attempt to decipher, but finally his shoulders slump. “I’m sorry. Look, I don’t want to be here. But it’s not fair to take it out on you.”
“I’m sorry too,” it’s my turn to say. And I mean it; I sense Saber’s not one to apologize easily. “Come, let’s leave the bots to their duties—I’ll show you the back corridor.”
“You know,” Saber says, following me, “you don’t have to talk so formally when we’re alone.”
“Pardon?” I ask, pausing with my hand on the door handle.
“This formal speech,” he says, waving his hand vaguely through the air. “When it’s just the two of us, you don’t have to…” His voice trails off. “Damn. You have no idea what I’m talking about. It’s not an act, is it?”
I simply stare, still uncomprehending.
“You talk all…hoity,” he says, not meeting my eyes again.
“Do I?”
“A bit. Okay, a lot. I guess I thought you relaxed a little when you weren’t on show.”
“On show?” I find myself feeling slighted, though I can’t put my finger on precisely why.
“Around normal people.”
“Oh.” I pause, then say, “No, this is actually how I speak—my apologies if that disappoints you. Though now that you bring it up, I think the problem is going to be the opposite. It’s your vernacular that isn’t quite the thing here in the palace. It’s a bit…vulgar.”
He just grins, apparently not feeling slighted in the least.
I look away from his smile. “You’ll give yourself away in three words. I think it best that you not speak to anyone we encounter at all.”
“Oh, goody,” he grumbles.
“That sort of response is precisely what I mean.”
“So was yours.”
“I suppose it was.” I peer up at him, trying to think. “Most of the board members who have secretaries are endlessly whispering back and forth. Hissing like snakes, in point of fact. That may be the most logical course for us as well. When in doubt, you can simply speak French.”
Saber sighs. “You’re the boss.”
Then why does it feel the other way around?
SABER IS SUITABLY impressed by the organization in my father’s study, and even more so by the lack of M.A.R.I.E. waiting to accommodate our every need.
“It’s my safe place,” I say, then chastise myself for revealing something so personal.
“Where’s your father?” Saber asks when I clear my throat and turn my face away.
“Down the hall in his room,” I say, pointing. “Asleep. I checked on him before I unlocked the desk. He can never know.”
“Certainly not,” Saber agrees grimly.
“He’s no danger, though. Beyond being an addict. Easily mollified and mostly harmless. It’s my mother you have to watch out for.”
“And she lives here?”
“Not in my father’s chambers. She sleeps in my old room.” I run my fingers along the edge of the desk. “I keep everything in here.” I unlock each drawer and explain how I’ve been running things and which duties I’ll need him to take over.