Minerva batted her eyelashes at me and pushed her shoulders back. "Do I look lonely?" she said.
She looked like someone I wanted to push onto her back right then and there. Like someone I wanted to kiss until we were both dizzy. But there were things you didn't say to a princess, not when your station was so far below hers.
***
On her first day working as a maid, Eve finds the king dead on his throne. His murder kicks off a cascade of intrigue, and as the plots of the nobility come crashing down around her, Eve is torn between hungry princes, the ever-watching eyes of the royal court, and a mad princess who seems to know far more than she lets on. Complicating everything further is the Imperative, a magical curse through which the Andan nobles have bent the world to their whims. If she is to survive, Eve must learn what it means to find strength in the face of overwhelming power.
The Maid and the Monarch is created by EOK Gifford-Smith, an EGlobal Creative Publishing signed author.

The Maid and the Monarch

I found Minerva in her bedroom, struggling to open a locked wooden box. She wore a white blouse and a long skirt of faded purple. Her hair had been braided, but several strands had fallen loose and now wisped in the air around her face. She was focused, beautiful eyes narrowed and elegant jaw set firmly forward in frustration.


I leaned against the doorway, allowing myself a moment to admire her.


Minerva looked over at me, her eyes softening first in surprise and relief, then lowering into a defeated frustration. She dropped the box on her bed and fell back next to it with a sigh.


"I thought you would come by a bit later," she huffed. "Sorry about this."


"Sorry about what?" I crossed to her bedside and picked up the box, inspecting the lock. It was a simple make, but the metal inside had corroded and trapped a tumbler in place.


Chapter 41: Apologies and Chocolate