A Throne for the Taking by Kate Walker Page B

it.’ She shook her head violently, sending her hair flying around her face.
    Another lurch of the plane, more violent this time, made her stumble. She almost expected to hear the sound of shattering dreams falling to the floor as the movement coincided with the loss of all those hopes she had once had for the word ‘wife’ coming from this man.
    ‘You can’t make me.’
    ‘I won’t have to. You’ve done it to yourself already.’
    As Ria watched in stunned disbelief, Alexei seemed to change mood completely, subsiding into his seat again and relaxing back against the soft, buttery leather.
    ‘Let’s see now—where shall I begin? Ah yes—the eruminium mines.’
    She knew then what was coming, acknowledging an aching sense of despair as she watched him lift one long-fingered hand and tick off his points across it one by one. All the arguments she had ever brought to bear on the subject of his possible accession to the throne, all the reasons she had given why he had to take the crown, to prevent Ivan doing so, to protect the country and to avoid civil unrest. They were now all repeated but turned upside down, twisted back against her, landing sharp as poisoned darts in her bruised soul. Alexei used them to provide evidence of the fact that she had no choice. That she had to do as he demanded or prove herself a liar and a traitor to everything she had held dear.
    And break her mother’s heart and health—possibly her mind too—if she left her father mouldering in his prison cell, as she had feared she was going to do when she had failed to bring Alexei back with her.
    She had no choice. Or, rather, she did have a choice but it was between being trapped into this marriage and honouring the contract her father had made with Ivan. An arranged marriage to a man she loathed and feared. A man who made her skin crawl. Or a cold-blooded union to Alexei who would give her a marriage without love. A marriage with no heart. A marriage of shattered dreams.
    ‘Do I have to go on?’ Alexei enquired.
    ‘Don’t trouble yourself.’ She dripped the sarcasm so strongly that she fully expected it to form a pool at her feet. ‘I think I can guess the rest.’
    She couldn’t see any way out of it. He had tied her up with her own arguments, left her without a leg to stand on. Looking at him now—at the ice that glazed his eyes, the cold, hard set of his face—the momentary hesitation, if that was what she had seen earlier, now seemed positively laughable. She had to have been imagining things.
    ‘Good, so now we understand each other. I said sit down, Ria.’ One lean hand pointed to the seat she had vacated.
    Fury spiked, making her see sparks before her eyes.
    ‘Don’t order me around, Alexei! You don’t have the right.’
    ‘Oh, but I do,’ he inserted smoothly. ‘That is, I do if I am to do as you want. As king I can command and you...’
    ‘You’re not king yet.’
    ‘Perhaps not, but we are approaching Mecjoria.’ A nod towards the window indicated the way that the deep blue of the sea over which they had been flying had now given way to a wild coastline, a range of mountains. ‘Any moment now we will be coming in to land. You should sit down and fasten your seatbelt.’
    Was that the quirk of a smile at the corners of his mouth? Knowing she was beaten, Ria forced herself forward, dumping down into the seat with her teeth digging hard into her tongue to hold back the wave of anger that almost escaped her. Focussing her attention on snapping on her seatbelt, she addressed the man opposite with her head still bent.
    ‘I had it wrong earlier, Alexei. You don’t need any practice, you have the autocratic tyrant down pat—absolutely perfect. No need for anyone at your side to support you or to instruct you in any of the etiquette needed.’
    ‘Perhaps so.’
    His tone was infuriatingly relaxed, disturbingly assured.
    ‘But you know as well as I do that the one way to settle this accession situation once and for