He nodded. “The circus begins.”
The first flicker of fear snaked along her spine. “How bad?”
“I don’t know. Just do me one favor. Don’t get difficult about having me around. Before I was your bodyguard on the whim of the king. It was a precaution but not necessary. Now I’m going to earn my paycheck.”
She didn’t like the sound of that, but it was too late to change anything now.
Zara tried to blink normally as the hairdresser snipped wildly around her head. Pieces of dark hair went flying and the low-grade panic she’d been fighting for the past two days increased about 15 percent.
“You look like you’re going to bolt,” Sabrina said from the salon chair next to Zara’s. She took a sip of water from the crystal glass the receptionist had carried over on a tray. “Relax.”
“Easy for you to say,” Zara muttered.
She found herself blinking frantically again and had to remind herself that eventually she would get used to the sensation of something being in her eye.
“Beauty is pain,” Fiona had always told her.
That went double for contact lenses, Zara thought, trying to find the humor in the situation. If only her world would slow down long enough for her to catch her breath. In less than forty-eight hours everything had changed.
Two days ago Sabrina had arrived in her rooms shortly after the king had left. Armed with a secretary and a massive list, they’d gone to work, organizing the first few days of Zara’s life as a princess. Their first stop that morning had been at the eye doctor, where Zara had been fitted with soft contact lenses. From there they’d hit several boutiques. She couldn’t remember what she’d bought and what had been discarded. Sabrina had done most of the choosing. There had been ball gowns and day clothes and suits and dresses and shoes and handbags.
Zara fingered the fabric of the linen slacks she’d worn out of the last shop. Sabrina had paired them with a turquoise silk shirt and simple loafers. All very upscale and very expensive. She didn’t want to think about how much all this was costing. In theory, as the daughter of a king, price shouldn’t matter. But she was still Fiona’s daughter, as well, and from her mother she’d learned how to stretch a dollar until it whimpered for mercy.
“You can’t avoid the press conference,” Sabrina said, pulling out the notebook that had accompanied them everywhere. Hassan had already made a formal announcement, and the press were clamoring to meet the new princess. “However, we can limit participation and the number of questions. We’ll schedule a few magazine interviews, as well. Maybe one or two weeklies and several monthlies. That should satisfy the public’s need to know, at least for a while.”
More hair tumbled to the floor. Zara was about to give in to her panic and run when the stylist put down the scissors and reached for the blow dryer.
It was impossible to talk over the hum of the dryer, so while Sabrina made notes, Zara glanced around at the shop. The large open area was decorated in black and red, with white accents. She didn’t doubt her cut and style would cost more than she’d spent on food the previous month. After her hair was done, she was to get a makeup lesson and whatever new products she might need. Then she could crawl back to the palace until the press conference the next morning.
As warm air blew over her head, she thought about Cleo. Her sister would have loved the attention and made the situation a whole lot more bearable. But Cleo was back in Spokane, and the couple of times Zara had called to talk to her, Cleo had been distracted.
Three hours later she and Sabrina ate small sandwiches and tea cakes in Zara’s palace suite. Dozens of bags and boxes filled the rooms. Stacks of cosmetics and hair products filled her bathroom. Zara figured it would take her half the night to get everything put away.
“The thing is,” Sabrina was saying, “you’re the princess. You can’t forget that. You might have been raised in a relatively normal family, but everything is different. Wherever you go, you represent Bahania. An insult or slight to you reflects on the people.”
“I haven’t gotten used to having people,” Zara said wryly. “I’m not sure they’re going to be real keen on me, either.”