Page 126 of Heavy Crown

“You’re engaged to someone else. You kept your engagement from me for months. How was I supposed to know how you’d react when I told you?”

“You also knew I was desperately in love with you.”

“You’re also desperately in love with your country.”

“Not like I am with you. I’ve never felt about my country the way I feel about you.”

His claim softens the anger I need to shield me from his hurt. I don’t want to be the bad person in this scenario. Telling him was a risk I couldn’t take for my own sanity. The last selfless act I did for him nearly killed me.

“I asked you to leave,” I say, “and public perception was more important to you than me.”

He scoffs. “You’re boiling an incredibly complex situation down to nothing. Simone knew about you, Rory. She asked me not to embarrass her. Publicly declaring that I was with her at Nick and Julia’s wedding meant a lot in my circle. A lot. If I thought there was even a chance you’d change your mind, I never would have allowed that situation to happen. Having you come to me weeks later to ask me to change my mind after our public performances is tantamount to political and social suicide. That’s not nothing when you’re a future king. Public perception matters.” He lets out a frustrated noise. “None of that is more important than you, but it all has weight.” He rubs the back of his neck. “On top of that, I finally gained some perspective about how much time I’d miss with my father if I left.”

When he meets my gaze again, my heart constricts.

“That’s not nothing either,” he admits. “Add Nick’s lack of preparation to become king, and I was...” He grimaces. “Overwhelmed.”

“Welcome to my life the night you decided we should run away together while you were drunk.”

“Not my finest hour, but I meant every word then. There was a window to make my exit, and I understood how to do it. Messy, but not impossible. I would have done it. Were you right that I’d have regretted aspects of my hasty exit? Yes.”

There’s nothing vindicating in his admission. A choice riddled with regret leads to resentment.

“When you came to me the other night, I didn’t see a way out anymore without hurting Simone, and she didn’t deserve that. My father’s decline is also becoming more noticeable, and he’s my—” He shakes his head. “He’s my dad, and he’s going to need me.”

He’s killing me with his honest reasoning. Posey already laid the reality of his circumstances out to me, and I had an inkling already. Those factors would make me a single parent, so I tried to pretend they didn’t exist when I went to see him.

“I don’t know if it was Dr. Bennett or Posey who told you about the baby, Alex. But I’m not asking for anything from you. You don’t have to give anything up,” I say. “Time with your dad or, or...” I can’t say her name, and my stomach rolls. “Anything else.”

He lets out a dark chuckle. “You want to know who told me?” He points toward the farmhouse. “Your father, just now. I didn’t have a fucking clue when I arrived.”

My knees go weak at the realization he’s not here because of the baby, and I scramble to grab onto something. Alex is at my side in an instant, and he sweeps me into his arms. He takes me to the hay bale, and he keeps me cradled in his lap.

The room contracts around us, and a frisson of awareness runs down my spine. We haven’t been this close in weeks. “You came for me.”

“I came for you. The baby is a bonus.”

I cup his cheek and graze my thumb across his cheekbone. He rubs his stubble against my palm, and the skin-to-skin contact releases the knot of anxiety I’ve been carrying for weeks. I can breathe again.

He closes his eyes and releases a deep sigh. “I didn’t even realize it was possible to miss someone this much.”

“Me either.” I wrap my arms around his neck and plant a kiss on his cheek. “You brought me flowers.”

“Daffodils. Your favorite.”

Neither of us speaks for a while, and I realize I should ask about Simone, but I can’t bring myself to phrase the question. Her presence was a painful symbol of what I thought I’d never have, and the thought of them together still makes me queasy.

“What happened in Denmark?” I slide my hand into his suit jacket and along his pecks. He hasn’t said it, but he must be mine again. His arrival here, unattached to our baby, back from Denmark early, can’t be for any other reason.

He swallows, and he places his hand over mine to still my exploration. “I broke my contract with Simone. I told her I wanted to be with you more than I wanted to be king.”

The explanation causes a brief bout of dizziness, and I’m glad I’m in his lap. To pick me over a kingdom was inconceivable a few weeks ago. “Are you in trouble?” I ask.

He chuckles. “I have no idea. I haven’t made myself available to anyone. Agreeing to the engagement and then changing my mind is a massive error in judgement, but I think my father might be more sympathetic than he was before.”

“I talked to him,” I admit. “Before I told you no, I had a long chat with him.”

Alex’s posture stiffens. “Did he convince you to say no?”