The Devil's Favourite Obsession

Cixi glanced at her bare ring finger and made a mental note. She would buy one herself. Nothing expensive — just something to sit there and stop people from asking questions she could not answer.

She added it to the list of lies she needed to maintain. The list was getting long.

Not long after Tatiana had left, a knock came at the door.

Cixi didn’t move from where she stood. She stared at the door and weighed it.

If this was the same twerp coming back for round two, she was not sure she had the patience left to — then a second knock followed, lighter than the first, almost tentative.

No! That can’t be that little brat. That girl would not strike one as someone who knocked twice.

”Come in.”

Anna stepped inside. The same girl who had earned a butler’s reprimand simply for speaking to her like a human being. She stood at the threshold with her hands clasped in front of her. Her posture was stiff, but her eyes carried a gentleness that the other staff had withheld.

”Anna?” Cixi questioned.

”You have been summoned to the dining room, Ma’am.” Anna gave a curt nod.

Cixi’s irritation softened. Not because Anna was bowing no — but because Anna treated her like a person. She had been kind from the start.

Even Emily avoided her. Perhaps Cixi should try to mend things with Emily. But first things first. ”By whom?”

”Mr. Michael Crown.”

Of course. Because the day hadn’t quite finished with her yet.

”You may go. I need a few minutes.”

She didn’t want to run downstairs the second someone called for her as though she were some obedient servant waiting for orders. She had barely returned from work, survived Titania Romanovs, and now apparently she was expected downstairs again.

Anna shook her head gently. ”I will wait for you, Miss McLore. Take your time.”

Cixi nodded and said nothing more.

She walked to the washroom, crossing the bedroom. She stood before the mirror and looked at herself without flinching. The exhaustion was obvious on her face. She ran cold water and pressed a towel against her skin, patting gently until it was dry. She straightened her shoulders, lifted her chin, and studied her reflection once more.

She unwound her scarf and set it aside. Pulled the tie from her hair and let it fall loose, thick and blonde, all the way past her hips. She combed through it slowly, reapplied her Kajal with a steady hand, and touched gloss to her lips. Looked at her reflection one final time.

Good enough for a battlefield.

Anna was waiting in the corridor as promised, and together they walked the length of the palace to the dining room where Cixi had eaten breakfast that morning.

When the guard opened the dining room doors, the scene inside unfolded like a painting.

The dining room was transformed from the morning. Candlelight ran the length of the table, giving a warm feeling masking the scent of cold people at the table, and the chandelier above threw everything into soft gold. The room was fuller now, the empty chairs replaced by new faces Cixi didn’t know, and the atmosphere carried the particular weight of people who had gathered expecting to matter.

Cixi walked in alone, stepping inside. Anna bowed once and disappeared to attend to her other duties.

She scanned the table without making it obvious. Most faces were unfamiliar. But two pulled her attention immediately. An older man sitting on the corner, silver-haired, impeccably dressed, with settled authority. Beside him, a woman whose composure was so precise it looked architectural. Back straight. Hands folded. Eyes already on Cixi the moment she entered, tracking her to decide how to classify her.

”Cixi, please take your seat.” Michael asked Cixi to take her place.

She looked toward where she had sat that morning. Tatiana had taken the chair beside Rafael, and the two of them were sitting with the particular stiffness of people pretending not to know each other. Cixi didn’t linger on it. She moved to the empty chair beside the woman and sat down.

The woman beside her said nothing, but her gaze didn’t shift from her, like someone reading a document slowly to make sure they haven’t missed anything.

”Good evening,” Cixi said to the woman beside her.

The woman inclined her head. ”Good evening.”

Food began to arrive almost immediately. Cixi looked around the table, puzzled. No one had begun to eat. Had they been waiting for her? That seemed unlikely.

Before she could examine the thought further, Michael stood from his chair at the head of the table.

”Cixi McLore is carrying Cassian’s child. The DNA report came back positive. That makes her child Crown blood.”

The silence that followed was not empty. The temperature in the room shifted. Several faces tightened. Others went carefully blank. The displeasure moved around the table like something passed from hand to hand, and Cixi watched it travel without expression. It was full of things people were deciding whether to say.

Rosetta said it. ”Are we truly going to welcome an illegitimate child? Is this is path Crown is planning to show its future generation? What is the point of formal marriage if Crown men can simply produce heirs wherever they please?”

Ursa didn’t bother with abstraction. She looked directly at Cixi. ”Why don’t we simply offer her a settlement and be done with it? Why should she be at this table at all?” She set her wine glass down with deliberate care. ”Take the money and go. Whatever sum you want... Name your price. No one here needs to pretend this is something it isn’t.”

The table waited for Cixi to open her mouth and demand millions.

Cixi returned the glare at Ursa. She didn’t look away. She let the silence stretch just long enough to make clear she was not rattled, and then she opened her mouth.

However, Michael spoke first.

”Cixi holds fifteen percent of Crown Capital.” He let that information settle among all the members. Tatiana turned and looked at Cixi with wide, uppish eyes. ”Cassian transferred the shares before his disappearance.” Michael informed further.

The fork Rosetta had just lifted went back down.