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“It’s not!” she tells me, her whole body trembling as she backs away from me. “It can’t be. You belong on the throne of Wildemar. Everybody knows it.”
“Everybody but my father. And I’m done groveling to him, done trying to convince him I’m not defective.” It feels liberating to say it, and even more liberating to mean it.
“So what are you going to do then? Just spend the rest of your life feeding Kian information so he doesn’t cause absolute chaos in your country?”
“If that’s what I have to do to keep my country safe, then yes. That’s what I’ll do.”
“You’ll be miserable!”
“Not if I have you.”
She looks like she’s been hit with a two-by-four, which I get. God knows, I’ve been feeling like that since I first saw her at the lake, mouthing off to my detail in that tiny purple bikini.
“Garrett…” She trails off, shaking her head.
“Lola…” I mimic as I pull her back into my arms where she belongs.
“I’m not going to let you do this.”
“Too late. I’ve already done it.”
She tries to hand me her phone. “Call your father back. Tell him you were wrong. Tell him—”
I stop her with another kiss. She whimpers, bringing her hands up to push me away. But her fingers end up curling into my shoulders, and that’s when I know I’ve got her. That’s when I know she’s mine.
“I love you,” I whisper against her lips. “I love you, Lola, and no trumped-up ultimatum from my father is going to change that.”
She whimpers again, pulling me closer. Holds me tighter as her mouth moves against mine.
This time, I’m the one to pull away. “Not to be too uptight here, but it’d be nice if you said you loved me back.”
“I love you!” she tells me. “Of course I love you. How could I not?”
“That’s all that matters, then,” I tell her as I sweep her up into my arms.
“But it’s not, Garrett. Your country—”
“Will still have me. It just won’t have me as their king.”
“I’m not okay with that!”
“Yeah, well, you’re going to have to be. Because I’m not changing my mind and I’m sure as hell not caving to my father’s ridiculous demands.”
“You can’t just decide to give up the throne on a whim.”
“I already lost the throne. And what I feel for you is about as far from a whim as it can get.” I lower her slowly, carefully, to the bed before climbing in next to her.
“Yesterday you were all about the throne. What’s changed?”
“Nothing’s changed. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. Yesterday I wanted the throne, yes. There’s a part of me that will always want it. But yesterday, I was all about you. Today I’m all about you. Tomorrow I’ll be all about you—”
“You don’t know that!”
“I do know that.” I lean forward to press kisses to her neck, her collarbone, the hollow of her throat.
She tilts her head back to give me better access even as she says, “We need to talk about this some more.”
“We will.” I unknot her robe and slide it off her shoulders. “Later.”
