Settle Down, Princess by Sam Hall EPUB & PDF – eBook Details Online
- Status: Available for Free Download
- Authors: Sam Hall
- Language: English
- Genre: contemporary romance
- Format: PDF / EPUB
- Size: 8.9 MB
- Price: Free
“Jessalyn, come and see! Quickly, now.”
As I paused in the doorway of the dressmaker’s studio, my mother
turned and beckoned me toward her. Although she stood in a group with
several of the ladies of the court gathered around her, my mother’s
demeanour and her tone made it very clear that it was she who was the
queen of all Stormare. She motioned again for me to come closer, but I
found myself unable to move. My gaze was focused on the dress in the
centre of the room.
Dresses had always marked important moments in my life. My first
memory was of the one I’d worn as a toddling child, with skirts stopping at
my knees because I was too small to manage the longer trail of fabric of a
‘grown-up dress.’ Then there was my graduation to a full-length dress when
I was thirteen and had gone through the bloody rites to become a woman.
And now there was this one…
I felt a fine tremor in my hands as I stood there, my heart pounding. My
mother’s ladies-in-waiting were talking all at once, standing around and
pointing out the features of the dress, but I was struggling to take in all the
details. White—bright, blinding white satin—was all I could see at first.
Then as my eyes adjusted, I saw the pearls, several pound-weight of them,
all stitched to the tight bodice. In decorating it thus, the seamstress had
cleverly included a nod to my second name, even though it was only ever
used in formal settings where I was announced as Princess Jessalyn Pearl
Yasmina Tennesley.
“Do you like it?” Mother asked, moving toward me in the slow,
measured way one might approach a nervous horse. I pulled my eyes away
from the dress to look at her. I parted my lips but couldn’t find the words to
express my response. I lifted my hands helplessly in the air, and a worried
expression crossed her face. “Darling, if—”
“How could she not?” questioned my grandmother as she stumped
forward, one gnarled hand wrapped around the head of her cane. She
nodded toward the bodice. “There’s a king’s ransom in pearls on that
dress.” Grandmother turned back to me. “Well? Speak up, girl!”
The world might know me as the king of Stormare’s only daughter and
address me with the respect owed my title, but to my paternal grandmother
I was frequently ‘girl.’ The dowager queen was known for not suffering
fools, and her blunt way of speaking had a similar effect on most everyone
who came into contact with her.
Her no-nonsense tone always had me
fighting the urge to drop a curtsey or stand up straighter. This time, it also
prompted me to pull myself together, and so, when I turned to speak to the
seamstress, I could actually get the words out.
For More Read Download This Book
EPUB