Chapter 40
CHAPTER FORTY
Resting his heavy arms around me, Wolf sets his head on top of my crown. “Are you going to tell me your name?”
“Katalina Evelyn Pembroke.”
“But you prefer Kate, don’t you?”
“I do. It’s who I am now.”
A slow breath heaves from his chest as his calloused thumb traces a slow circle over my elbow.
“I think it’s fair for me to tell you about why I am the way I am.
” I take a tight breath. She was my world.
My wife. I was so fucking young. We both were.
Foolish, really. I was I thought she was okay.
My wife. But she wasn’t. The stress. The fear. Loneliness. It was too much.”
I rub my hand across his forearm, tracing the lines of the thick muscles, and wrapping my fingers with his. “I’m so sorry. That had to be incredibly hard.”
“I didn’t give her what she needed. And she found someone who would. A professor at her college. I was on a long deployment. When I came home, she told me the affair had been going on for months. She got pregnant by another man in my bed—”
“Oh, Wolf. How unthinkable. I’m sure the hurt was gut wrenching.”
“It took a long time to feel human. Even then, my heart never felt alive again. Still doesn’t. I’m not sure I’ll ever get over it.”
I lean into him and press my cheek to his heart. “I understand. You don’t have to say anything else.”
He holds me for the longest time. The blue of his eyes is filled with the dark shades of his mood. “Do you want to stay with me?”
His thumb draws across my lower lip. “Yeah. I do.”
When he lets me go, I fold back the blankets and welcome him with open arms. I want to ease his pain. To make him know he’s cared for.
But as much as it’s for him, it’s for me.
Nothing feels certain right now, except for this moment. The two of us curled up together in the dark of night.
* * *
A sound in the hallway wakes me. Soft laughter follows. It’s Simona teasing her husband about something.
Wolf’s asleep, his muscular biceps catching the first rays of morning light, where they are stretched above his head.
I force myself to be perfectly still. It’s incredibly hard. I want to touch him. To mold my fingers to his strong jaw. To imprint him in my memory every way I can.
A simmering frustration rears its very familiar, ugly head. My life has never been my own. When other people were free to fall in love, and be free to truly be what and who they want, I’ve been wearing shackles.
A voice filled with morning gruff interrupts my spinning brain. “You’re going to give yourself an aneurysm if you think any harder.”
When Wolf opens his eyes, the blue is clear and bright. Breathtaking. Heartbreaking.
“What are you thinking about, beautiful?”
“Life.”
His arm lowers and wraps around my back. The tips of his fingers brush along my spine. Gentle. Soothing. “Tell me.”
“I wish I’d never been born into a royal family.”
“We don’t get to pick how we come into this world, though.”
As I press my palm over his heart, I say, “What’s your story? I feel like that comment has meaning.”
“It’s a long one. But I learned last year that I had siblings that I didn’t know about.
Simona is my sister. We didn’t meet until then.
She and I have a lot of other biological siblings as well.
Six more besides her, to be exact. We are still trying to find one lost sister.
Agile has taken the case and one of the team members is on an international hunt for her. ”
“Eight of you? I can’t imagine. I had a brother. He died young. A swimming accident. So, you know what that means…”
“That your offspring or your husband is in line for the throne.”
“Unfortunately. According to our rules, a male has to take the throne. And the truth is, I could care less about being a leader. Not that I don’t love my country.
I really do. I’m just not the person to be in the palace.
I mean, can you see me doing that? Plus, that would mean I need a husband.
A real husband. Which is absolutely something I’m not interested in after dealing with my father. ”
He laughs softly. “I can, actually, see you in a palace. I think you’d do great. You’ve got that air about you.”
Pinching at his ribs, I warn. “Hey!”
Wolf sighs, pulls me closer, and presses his nose into my hair. As he nuzzles my ear, he asks, “How did you get away from it all?”
“I finally got bold enough to break the so-called ‘rules’, and move to the States. My father had a major freakout. But my Nan is pretty good at diffusing him.”
“This may be a bad subject, but where is your mother?”
“She didn’t survive my brother’s birth.”
His hand stills on my back. “Sorry, luv. That’s a hard way to grow up.”
“In some ways it was. I was young. My Nan is all I really knew, and she was amazing.”
“She’s something.”
Just the mention of her causes my throat to tighten. “And she’s counting on me to take care of things. But I need to get that pendant back.”
“We’ll get to work on tracking down that pendant. But first….”
He rolls on top of me, giving me his full weight. The heat of him sinks into my bones and warms my heart until it’s glowing.
“What’s first?”
Grazing his teeth against my ear, he lets out a low, rough growl. “You give that sexy body of yours to me again.”
Tracing a finger down his sculpted back, I ask, “What do I get in return?”
His gaze turns dark and possessive as he spreads my thighs more to allow him to fit deep against my core. The thickness of his morning erection presses hard against my mount, making me shudder with hunger. When he leans down, brushing his lips over mine, he whispers, “Everything I have to give.”