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‘Lykos—’
‘Not yet,’ he interrupted. He might have won the battle but not the war. He needed to focus on what came next, and he couldn’t do that with his hand on the curve of Marit’s backside, holding her to him and destroying concentration.
He approached his convertible and pressed the key fob so kindly replaced by the dealership. The locks clicked satisfyingly as he came to the passenger side door, pulled it open and poured her into it. There was less tulle this time, the affair much sleeker than it had been ten days ago, but he still wasn’t happy with her dress. She looked, once again, as if she were playing dress-up, but this time it came off as old, staid, serious. All the things that she wasnot.
Marit fumed up at him from the seat of the car as he shut the door on her, but simmering beneath the glare was heat. Heat and something he didn’t quite yet dare to hope for. Lykos rounded the car, half expecting her to flick the locks, but she didn’t. He couldn’t tell whether that was a good or bad sign.
He opened the door and slid behind the wheel, his hands wrapping around it to stop himself from reaching for her, from dragging her to him in a kiss that would never end. There were things that needed to be said.
‘Lykos—’
‘Notyet,’ he said again, unsure that he could trust himself to say what he needed to if she distracted him. ‘I need you to know that, no matter what, you can go. You can go anywhere. You don’t have to choose me. You don’t have to feel obliged or indebted. Your life is your own now. I know what you were doing. Aleksander and Freya know too. And clearly it meant a lot to them, for you to be willing to make a sacrifice of yourself.’
‘Ly—’
He pinched the bridge of his nose and squinted his eyes shut. ‘Marit, so help me, if you don’t let me say this, I never will.’ He practically felt the way her lips closed, imagining them pressed together between her teeth. ‘The thing is,’ he pressed on, ‘they are your family. And they will support you, no matter what, just the way that you and Aleksander will support Freya. But you cannot expect them to see you, if you erase yourself in such a way. And I promise you, Marit. Marriage to that puffed-up Prince would have made you invisible.
‘Makethem see you by showing them who you are. By honouring yourself and them with choices that come from your heart,’ he said, thumping his chest—which might have been a little dramatic but, dammit, that was how she made him feel. After all, he’d just kicked open the door of a church and walked off with a princess bride. ‘And if that choice is not me, Marit, then,’ he said, breath shuddering in his lungs, ‘I will stand by that.’
The car was filled with silence for much longer than Lykos liked.
‘Is that it?’
‘What?’ he asked, turning to face her.
‘That’s your big declaration, is it? Pick me? Choose me?’
‘Well...yes,’ he answered, a little stuck for words.
‘I didn’t hear anything about love in there. Not once,’ she huffed—and his heart rose up in his throat at the sight of the tease in her eyes. Not that she wasn’t right. He’d been so worried about making sure she knew that she didn’t have to stay, he hadn’t told her why she should.
‘Prinkípissa mou, you are the key to my heart and everything that lies within it. It was closed, locked away until you snuck past defences that no one haseverbreached. I might have been a criminal in my youth, but you are the real thief. You have stolen my heart for ever and I don’t even want it back.
‘Because Iseeyou. The talented, crazy-hearted, beautiful, fiery, fun woman that you are. Because I see the incredible partner, the amazing wife and perfect mother you will be some day. And because I love you. With every single beat of my heart and breath in my lungs, I love you.’
Marit’s eyes glistened, the shards of jade and gold glowing with a love that Lykos had to pinch himself to believe. Her lips had formed an O and a gentle sigh fell from them and warmed his heart.
‘Lykos...’
He waited, but she remained silent. ‘What is it?’
‘Well, I had thought you might interrupt me, so I was giving you time.’
He glared at her, but it was such a mockery of anger, Marit knew that he enjoyed her tease as much as she did.
She reached for his hands, loosening their iron grip on the steering wheel and taking them in her own. She reached up to cup his jaw in her palm and her heart soared when he leaned into the affectionate touch.
‘Thank you,’ she said at first, because she did need to say it. ‘I am sorry that I would have done you such a disservice in the name of duty.’ He shook his head as if to ward off her apology. ‘I...’ She paused, finally allowing herself to believe that this was real. That he had freed her from a duty she wasneversupposed to have borne. ‘But what about Freya?’
‘I believe that your brother has plans for her that will make things right.’
‘Really?’ Marit looked up, so very hopeful.
‘Absolutely.’
With his confidence so assured, Marit’s heart soared. ‘I love you, Lykos. More than I ever thought possible. I didn’t know that this was what it felt like, to be loved and to love. I didn’t trust in it before but now I do,’ she said, her heart trembling in her chest. ‘You make me feel so special, so wanted and so loved, all I can hope to do is show you how much that means to me, each day for the rest of our lives.’
He turned the key in the ignition. ‘We need to leave. Now.’
