I snuggled in against Charles, the wicker squeaking beneath us. “Thank you,” I said.“For what?” Charles asked.“For accepting me. For including me. I never asked you to fold me completely into your life.”He kissed the top of my head and held me close. “I told you I wanted you around me always. The closer you grow, the more I love every part of you. And if I love you this much, my family won’t be able to do anything but love you, too.”I bit back hesitations. He was promising someone else’s feelings now. Instead, I changed the subject.“Will we have time to walk down to the beach?”Charles again laughed outright. This was the happiest I’d seen him for a prolonged period of time, probably since high school.“Not a chance,” he answered. “If we were calculating the amount of time between now and when Mother’s going to set dinner on the table, then there probably is enough time. However—““Charles!” his mother called from in the kitchen.Charles grinned at me. “See? Duty calls.”He beckon
We took a few minutes to clean up, then went down to brunch well-rested and in a glowing mood. In fact, if it weren’t for Agent Tang lurking around the property somewhere, this would have been the most perfect and romantic weekend I’d ever spent. Thankfully, we hadn’t seen much of Agent Tang.Just being with Charles here was amazingly restful. It helped that Brindle Cove seemed to exist without worrying about finding another story to write, or staying safe, or trying to ditch our guard. Here we could just be.Gwen greeted us in the kitchen, the last of pancakes and bacon cooking. “Good morning, you two. How did you sleep last night?”
By the time we went to bed that night, I had tried fifty different ways of asking Charles if we could just leave everything else behind and come live here in Brindle Cove. He could run Rafe Media remotely and just put managers in charge to do the daily grind for him.Leaving behind the city didn’t have to mean losing the business. But every time I tried to open my mouth, I’d stopped. Charles wasn’t that kind of man. I mean, he was definitely family-oriented, more so than I’d ever realized. I’d seen that sign of him this weekend.But he was an alpha, and he needed to be hands-on with his business. Or he wouldn’t be satisfied. He
There was something desperate about our lovemaking this time. Charles both drilled into me and yet held back and kept our moment going as long as possible, taking us both to the brink several times but not letting either of us finish.In the back of my head, I knew this was probably because he was worrying that we wouldn’t have the privacy to be ourselves in the bedroom again, the same as we hadn’t for the last two weeks in Lupinton.I tried to do my best to keep up with him, gripping his hips or pushing him away from me slightly when I thought I might climax for fear that I would send him over the edge as well. I wanted us to orgasm when he was ready to be done.
It took another twenty-five minutes before Governor Kruck finally opened the door and entered the room, wearing a very satisfied smile. He crossed to the table and sat directly across from Charles, folding his hands on the expanse of wood in front of him.“I do hope I didn’t keep you too long,” he said in his typically oily tone. “I would hate to inconvenience such an important alpha as yourself.”Charles made a face at him.Governor Kruck ignored this. “Governor’s business. I’m sure you understand, seeing as how you have a family empi
I stared openly at the governor. I had the distinct feeling that he’d be speaking from personal experience. What a story that would make. And woe to the poor girl he’d made go away, assuming she’d lived through that ordeal.Now, Governor Kruck scared me even more than he had before. He may not have been born with an alpha’s power. But he clearly had no conscience when wielding the power he did have.Someone above him must really like him. Because if anyone I knew had said even half of what the governor said, both insulting the alpha king and talking about disappearing people, I’d have had investigators up in every orifice before I could blink. Yet Governor Kruck sat comfortably in his office.
“Oh, Elena’s with Charles,” Agent Bell chuckled. “If you’re stuck with them long, you’ll hear it over and over again.”I bit my lip hard, causing the inside to bleed. Utter mortification ran through my veins. How could they joke about something so personal to Charles and me?Did Lupinton have a hiring service that screened for creepy people? Only putting them in the job of security officers?Lustrum might have had its fault, but in our city, we didn’t let our peacekeepers act like total asshats.
When the flight crew announced the last beverage service before landing, Charles poked my arm on the side by the window and pointed to the bathroom, using my body to hide the gesture from the marshals. I turned, giving him a questioning look. Charles grinned and nodded.I shrugged and unbuckled, then stood. “Bathroom,” I said when the air marshal shot me a look.He grimaced and got out of his seat, following me to the bathroom, which was stupid because it was right in front of our seats. I let myself in and waited.Nerves sent my blood pounding in my ears. What felt like
For one moment after I arrived in the garden, the sun blinded me, and then my eyes cleared. Before me spread an amazing event: the wedding of our country's princess.It still hadn't fully sunken that I was that princess.The guests sat in orderly rows of brilliantly white chairs festooned in lovely shades of blue and lavender. I had chosen them because they most reminded me of the moon, and I wanted to honor the goddess at this event, as well. Without her, I would not only not have been at this wedding, but I wouldn't have been alive. She had done so much for me. The least I could do was throw a little recognition her way.I clutched the bouquet in my hand, and Theo hooked his arm through my elbow. “Are you ready?” he asked.“I'm ready.”We took a step toward the altar on the red carpet spread out in front of me, and the music swelled. The quartet played a beautiful melody full of promise and love.I didn't see the people looking at me, specifically, only that all eyes were on me. My
I signed and kept my head tipped back, inviting him to kiss my neck. Charles obliged, working himself inside me with the magic he always seemed to conjure up, driving my excitement higher. My heels fumbled for a place to rest, and finally, I settled for wrapping my legs around him, gripping his hips with my thighs and locking us together.Charles groaned and pulled us as tightly together as possible. And I wouldn't let him go. This left his movements small but the pleasure intense.His rubbing quickly brought me to orgasm, and I tried not to make too much noise and call attention to what we were doing. I really didn't want to be held in contempt for defiling the judge's bench or some such.A moment later, Charles got his release. He stepped back and tided himself, allowing me to do the same.“Now,” he asked with a grin, “Are you ready to go outside and face your adoring public, my princess?”“As long as you're by my side, I can face anything,” I agreed, hopping off the judge's bench.
“Of course,” Queen Yarrow said, “details like training successors aren't left to chance. The king and I already had arrangements made for a royal tutor, assuming that I would get pregnant one day. I'll connect you both with him. Hopefully, you can get started right away.”“So?” I asked the judge. How exactly does this work? What do you mean? She asked, looking quizzically at me. “I mean, what do I do with myself? Where do I go from here? When does all of this happen now?”She said, “The king will be escorted out of Orlune. They're probably already helping him pack. From there, he'll be on the next flight off the vampire kingdom. You get to move straight into the castle if you wish. It's essentially your house now.”“There's no, there's no legal paperwork or anything like that?” I babbled. “It just seems so abrupt.”The judge grinned. “I'll have all of that taken care of taken care of for you. So you don't have to worry about it, your majesty.”“Come, my dear,” Queen Yarrow said, putti
By now, the king’s lawyer had a hand on his shoulder, whispering furiously in his ear. The king gripped the arms of his chair so hard his knuckles were white. And if he could have turned people to stone with a look like a gorgon, the judge and I would already be statues.Still, the judge spoke as if unafraid. “The former king will serve out his sentence off the shifter continent, in the vampire countries,” she announced.A murmur went up from everyone in the gallery at that, but the judge held up her hands. “I chose that location specifically. It has been a standing tradition for generations upon generations that vampires and werewolves do not get involved in one another's politics.”“I would imagine he will find it very difficult to sway anyone into doing his dirty work for him in a country that holds itself neutral. Thereby providing anyone in Orlune that the king feels has wronged him in the safest position that I am able to leave them in.”Further murmurs rose up from the crowd, a
I hadn't even caught my breath when Charles scooped me up in the hardest hug I'd ever gotten from him. It was so hard that it almost drove the remaining air from my lungs.The rest of that morning flew by as Charles and Gwen helped me to avoid questions I couldn't answer from the press while Theo, David, and the other four guards pushed a path through the paparazzi so we could navigate our way back to the safehouse.We decided it was better to stay there than go back to our apartment, yet, at least until we made sure that any of the king's remaining supporters were under control.Gwen wore a mysterious smile on her face for the rest of that night and into the following morning. But I couldn't get her to confess to what she was up to. We'd barely finished breakfast when someone knocked on the door.Gwen hurried to answer it and admitted two people who took my breath away. One of them was Cathy!Since I didn't know the other, I ran straight to Cathy, hugging her as tightly as I could. T
It took me a long time to fall asleep that night, plagued both by worry and growing apprehension over how the next day was going to play out. It could end up being the longest, most brutal day of my life, if I had to spend it waiting and wondering what the jury was going to decide.Worse, what if they took weeks? Months? I’d go crazy before I found myself free from this mess.When we woke in the morning, Charles distracted me by teasing me in every possible way before bringing me to yet another overwhelmingly intense orgasm. I would never have thought that pleasure and pain could be such close neighbors, but he managed. However Charles and I were connecting in bed right now, it was certainly coming very close to more than I could handle.Theo must have told the chef what my favorite foods were because when Charles and I left the bedroom, breakfast was waiting for us. And it was one of my favorites. Belgian waffles with lots of fresh strawberries and whipped cream.I sat down and ate r
I kissed Charles, and he pulled back, eyeing me. “Should we be careful or anything?” he asked. “You know, for the baby.”I shrugged. “It's not like I've been pregnant before, but I would guess not. The doctor didn't say anything about that.”“And you haven't even searched things like that online yet?”I shook my head. “How could I? I've been so busy, not to mention the fact that I'm trying to keep certain people from finding out.”“Then we'll go slow and be careful,” he said.His kisses came soft and gentle, and his caresses all over my body were the same. Keeping secrets from him had been a bad idea. Now that they were out in the open, just these small touches made the connection between us feel so much more real as if I had closed some invisible distance between the two of us.This drove me to smash our lips together, desperately seeking the rest of the connection that I hadn't even realized I'd been missing.He chuckled and pushed me back. “What happened to taking it easy?” he teas
All of a sudden, a whisper of a breeze rippled through the courtroom and around my head, whispering reassurance in my ear. This breeze wrapped itself around me and then swirled out into the courtroom, where it produced an answering wind of murmuring whispers. Suddenly, everyone was shaking their heads, turning toward one another. Members of the jury shook their heads as if trying to clear them.Again, I heard a whisper in my ear, and I recognized the voice of the moon goddess. “Don't fear,” was all she said. And then her presence was gone. But the entire courtroom, everybody in the gallery, the jury, the judge, the lawyers, and even the king had all relaxed.The judge brought her gavel down and dismissed the jury to go deliberate. But this time, I wasn't frightened. The goddess had never steered me wrong yet. And she told me not to fear, that I needed to trust her and the fate surrounding her and me.I scurried out of the witness stand and back to my spot beside Mr. Wilcox. “What was
When I exited the bathroom, the importance of the day hit me in full measure. Today I was going to court. What and God's name was I supposed to wear?Someone knocked on the door, and I wrapped my towel tighter. “In a few minutes,” I called.“Elena?” I recognized Gwen's voice. “I brought you a suit for today. May I come in?”“Yes,” I said.She opened the door and entered the bedroom.“I'm just fresh out of the shower.” I bit my lip, feeling foolish. As if she couldn't gather that by my wet hair. But I seem to need something to fill the silence.She held up a garment bag. “You'll want to look your best today,” she said.I let Gwen dress me, taking comfort in the fact that she knew her way around important functions as a luna. When she finished, she grabbed my face and gave my forehead a kiss.“Do exactly what the lawyers, Charles, and I tell you to,” she said. “I don't want you to leave my son a widower before he's even officially married.”I patted her hands, which still rested on my c