Saints and Sinners [On Hold]

Ivy League salt rims

~Xavier~

"I'm not fücking ready."

Marcus, my overqualified butler, took one look at me in my worn out jeans and "Panic! at the ballroom" t-shirt.

His eyebrows went higher than Snoop Dogg.

Clearly, good music and sarcastic disdain for the waltz offended him.

"We have two hours till take off." I knew I sounded more like a whiny brat than a monarch. "So if you'll excuse me, I have some important business -"

Marcus expertly reached over my desk, turned my laptop around, and read out the pdf I'd hastily pulled up when he'd entered my study.

"The complete and revised guide of hair styles for dogs." He said, not impressed.

I shrugged, the poster child of totally-not-guilty.

Without skipping a beat, the butler minimized the window to show off a leather clad redhead on Skype.

"Your Highness," Marcus said, calmly. "I don't believe there were any suggestions for this particular breed."

"Did you just call me a bîtch?" Victoria replied. "Let me just grab a valley real quick and cry you a river."

And here we go again.

"It is not in my place to say but that this little fling has gone on long enough -"

"It is in my place to say that your nose is about twenty inches too deep in Xavier's business. Overcompensating for something else, Marcus?"

Okay. That's enough fun and games for today.

Grabbing the laptop, I made kissing noises at the screen and closed it before Marcus became a little teapot and blew steam from his ears.

The guy had an Ivy League education, four PhDs and knew thirteen languages.

Why he chose to spend his life babysitting me and sprinkling salt on my martini rims was beyond me.

"Your Highness." He said now, his back straighter than I was. "I truly apologise for the intrusion -"

"What do you like doing, Marcus?"

I didn't interrupt him because I was being disrespectful.

Quite the contrary - I sure as shît wasn't going to let him apologise to me merely for having a spine.

"I like serving my country and King." Marcus chanted back, eerily like Siri.

"No." I said, amused. "If you weren't born here at the palace, what would you do?"

He hesitated.

"Well. I haven't given it much thought." Yet it sounded a lot like he had. "But I believe I would be an engineer. Master Daniel's work interested me deeply."

Hearing Danny's name sent a dull ache through my chest. I hadn't heard from or about him in a year since that day at the Court of Trials.

But that meant he was still alive.

Probably.

Yeah, I was definitely winning at friendship.

"Then you should do that." I said, getting up. "Become an engineer. Do what you like. Do you have a family -"

"You're firing me."

His tone was flat. No questions, no argument, no accusations.

"Fück no." I said. "I couldn't find my toothbrush without you."