CHAPTER EIGHT
B Y THE TIME they were seated in his jet, the paternity result had come in. Magnus glanced at the word Positive and handed the tablet back to Ulmer.
“Send it to the queen.”
“I’m definitely the mother?” Lexi asked with a guileless blink.
She was seated in the recliner opposite his own. Aside from Ulmer, his staff traveled in the aft cabin, on the other side of the galley, where they were seated in rows like commercial flights. In here, Ulmer kept to his cubicle while Magnus had a sofa and a dining table, a big-screen television, and windows that tinted at the touch of a button.
There was also a door to a stateroom with a bed. It was midafternoon, but he couldn’t help noticing the tension in Lexi’s expression and the washed-out tone in her skin. He was frustrated by her continued resistance to marriage, but he couldn’t press her too hard, not when he kept remembering the way she’d been so limp in his arms, or how emotional she’d been while she’d been hooked up to all those wires.
“I know it’s a lame joke,” she muttered, shifting restlessly. “Everything has been so heavy and serious. Like a military operation. Is it always like this?”
“Often enough you should get used to it.”
She grimaced.
“How are you feeling? Tired?”
“Why do you ask? Do you have to be nice to me, too?” she challenged lightly.
“No.”
Her eyes widened in shock.
“I’m genuinely worried about you. As soon as we level off, I’ll show you to the bed so you can sleep.”
“It’s two o’clock in the afternoon. How long is the flight?”
“Four hours. But you’ll meet the queen when we arrive. You’ll want to feel rested. Also, I didn’t sleep on the overnight from New York, but I’m not about to leave you slumped in a chair while I stretch out on the bed.”
“Is sharing a bed another thing I don’t have any choice over?”
“It’s just a nap, Lexi. Unless you choose to make it into more.”
“I won’t,” she muttered, and turned her frown of consternation to the window.
A few minutes later, however, she accompanied him into the stateroom. She didn’t remove any clothing except her jacket and lay down on top of the bed in her maternity top and trousers.
He did the same, only removing his shoes and jacket, then his tie and belt before he draped a light blanket over her and joined her under it.
Did he want to reach for her? God, yes, but he was also content—disturbingly content—to simply close his eyes with the knowledge that she was beside him.
Where she belonged.
A discreet ping woke him. The recessed lighting in the floor came on, signaling they were coming into Isleif airspace and it was time to rise.
Lexi rolled to face him, eyelids heavy with sleep. “Do you want to feel the baby move?”
A strange zing went through him. Surprise and apprehension, but also excitement?
“Is it kicking?” He reached out.
She brushed her loose top up and slid the elastic panel of her trousers down, baring her belly, then she guided his hand on the tense ball of her abdomen. Within him, something restless eased as he finally had contact with her soft skin. Her warmth.
“I wasn’t sure how you felt about it,” she said in a small voice. “I know this isn’t what you wanted. You haven’t asked about the baby.”
“I asked the doctor about both of you. I’m still processing this. Making a baby was something I knew I was supposed to do at some point, but it was an abstra—”
He swore as something nudged his palm, striking Magnus like a punch to the heart. A choke of wonder left him.
“Bizarre, isn’t it?” He heard the smile in her voice, but he was enraptured with the swell of her belly.
“Does it hurt?” He lightly explored, searching out more proof of life.
“Not really. Surprises me sometimes.”
“All I’ve been thinking about is the ways I have to adjust my life, not fully realizing... All we did was have sex, Lexi. Now you’re growing a person .”
“Did you still believe they were found in a cabbage patch? Oh, Muffin. I’m sorry to be the one to disillusion you.”
“I don’t know what I believed,” he admitted, smirking at himself as he continued exploring the taut shape of her belly. “That babies were objects? A goal? Not...” The realization was creeping over him that he would have to shape this person the way he’d been shaped. There would be arguments and resistance and weariness. His own resentment at his responsibilities would be mirrored back to him and it would sting.
Even so, there was anticipation in him, too. He wanted to know what this new human would be like. Would they have Lexi’s eyes and smile and guarded heart?
Her resistance to trusting him had been bothering him since she’d admitted to it. It told him exactly how much she’d been hurt in the past. And really, was it any wonder she didn’t trust him to look after her? They were together one night and he had gotten her pregnant. Now he was crashing her life.
“I keep thinking I should apologize to you. Probably to the baby, too.” He drew a slow circle with his palm, searching for another nudge.
“Oh, Gawd, I feel so selfish for making this baby have me as a mother.” Her voice held laughter, but also distress. “Now there’s this mountain of royal duties on top of it. Do you think they’ll ever forgive us?”
“Maybe not. But I keep trying to regret that night and I can’t.” He hadn’t been interested in anyone else since her. The search for a “suitable” wife had only fed his sullenness. Now, however, a different fire was flickering to life within him.
It was passion. Obviously. He wanted this woman in ways that were very base and sexual. But there was another aspect he hesitated to examine. The darkness within him had become less dark the minute he’d had an excuse to fly across an ocean and confront her. To see her.
Now she was here in his bed, in his life. They had made a tiny being who would bind her to him forever. That pushed the darkness even further out, but at what cost?
He didn’t let himself think of it, only slid closer and gathered her in, allowing his hand to run up her back beneath her shirt so he could mold her new shape to his front.
She stiffened in surprise, then gave a small shudder and relaxed. When he dipped his head to kiss her, she tucked her mouth into his chest.
“I haven’t brushed my teeth.”
“I don’t care. Kiss me,” he demanded.
He was in this strange headspace of tenderness and possessiveness and wanting to consume her. It took great effort to gentle his kiss when she let her head tip back. He reminded himself that her trust was tentative, that she was wary.
When she ran her hand into his loose hair, however, and pressed the back of his head while opening her mouth wider beneath his in hungry receptiveness, he abandoned restraint.
He crushed her mouth the way he’d been wanting to since he had glanced across a party in Monte Carlo and saw these pillowy lips part in shock. He slid his knee between hers and grabbed a handful of her lush ass and plundered her mouth with his tongue, trying to slake a thirst that had been driving him mad for months.
She moaned and ran her foot against his calf and slid her hand to the back of his neck, tongue sweeping out to find his.
The ample swell of her breast filled his hand, the silk and lace of her bra an erotic texture. He wanted what was beneath it—soft skin and the pebbled nipple. He swept his mouth down to gently bite through the layers of fabric, liking the way she gasped in pleasure.
“I was afraid you wouldn’t find me sexy like this.” Her hands were running over his shoulders and back, shifting his shirt against his skin as though she wanted to tear it off his body.
“What does this say about how sexy I think you are?” He moved so she could feel his erection against her thigh, then lifted his hips and opened his trousers, inviting her to caress him.
“This is just you waking up, isn’t it?” She slid her hand into his loosened trousers and cupped his erection through his boxer briefs, dimming his ability to think.
“What about you? Are you waking up?” He worked his hands beneath the panel that was bunched beneath the roundness of her belly, finding the lace of her underwear.
She drew in a sharp breath, but she didn’t stop him, not even when he slid his hand around to her backside, pushing the trousers off her ass, down to her thighs so he could come back and trace the vee of silk that covered her mound.
“We, um...”
He liked how she’d lost her ability to speak. He slid a finger inside her panties and traced folds that were slippery and hot. So inviting.
Her mouth opened, but no sound came out, only the hiss of her breath. Her nails curled against shoulders and her breasts quivered.
“You said—” She bit her lip. Her eyelids fluttered. “Our seats?”
“We can circle the airport...” He let his fingertip roll around and around the engorged knot at the apex of her folds. “As long as you need.”
She gave a small cry and pushed her face into his shoulder, but her hand found the top of his briefs and slipped inside. Her fist tightened around his erection as she slid her knee against his leg, opening her thighs for more of his touch.
“Let me kiss you again,” he insisted.
She did. Passionately. They caressed each other as they feasted on each other, writhing and perspiring beneath the light blanket, gasping and moaning until she set her teeth in his bottom lip and groaned with ecstasy into his mouth.
As her hips bucked in orgasm, he let his own excitement take him over the edge, mindful of the fact they couldn’t really stay in the air while he spent hours making love to her, even though this was exactly where he wanted to stay.
Lexi was still feeling undone when she took her seat.
She hadn’t planned to fool around with Magnus. Her desire to see how he truly felt about the baby had turned into sexual desire and one thing led to another.
Discovering they still had a powerful physical connection wasn’t as comforting as she’d imagined it would be. All she’d really learned was that she had even less willpower around him than she had believed.
The way he looked at her as she joined him, with lazy satisfaction and knowing possessiveness, only made her feel more at his mercy—of which he seemed to have very little.
Trying to avoid his gaze, she looked out the window where the sun cast golden beams across a collection of jagged islands, all wearing coats of emerald and ivory.
“Is that it?” She touched her forehead to the cool glass, studying the largest one. It was shaped like a bowl rimmed in granite teeth. A long, silvery-blue fjord stretched in a jagged wedge up the middle. The coastline was a cliff that had been broken off by the axe of an ancient ice age. In the distance, a half dozen smaller islands stood like weathered pyramids. “I expected it to be covered in snow.”
“It’s summer. And we’re not as far north as people think. Also, the islands were formed by volcanoes, so we have enough thermal activity that the snow only sticks in the highest elevations.”
“It’s really pretty.” She squashed her nose trying to keep it all in sight as they made their approach, growing more enchanted by the second. “Is that the palace?” She pointed to a grouping of stone towers with spires and tile roofs. Stairs led from lawns to halls to terraced courtyards. A fat wall surrounded all of it.
“That’s the original castle. One of Queen Katla’s first acts was to name it a heritage site and return it along with its contents to Isleif. It’s open to the public for guided tours. The palace is the long building behind it.”
“Where you live.”
“We. Yes.”
We. He wasn’t going to let up for a second, was he?
The palace wasn’t as fairy-tale-looking, but she imagined it was modernized and far more comfortable than that magical-looking castle.
Seconds later, they touched down. Her nerves dissipated the way they always did when she was about to go on stage. It was a convenient Zen-like state that bordered on disassociation. It probably wasn’t healthy, but it had gotten her through a lot of difficult times so she didn’t fight it.
“Crowds have gathered,” Ulmer informed as he brought Lexi a long coat. “Ignore them and move quickly into the car.”
Lexi glanced at Magnus as she buttoned and belted the light coat that would disguise her pregnancy. “Do they know I’m here with you?”
“A video of us boarding is circulating online.”
She had a quick look at her phone and saw herself climbing the stairs into the jet. Magnus’s hand was splayed in her lower back, his wide shoulders shielding her as much as possible, but she’d been caught in a compromising profile.
Baby Bump or Booty Call? was trending, with comments ranging from I knew it and #StanMagLexi to #golddigger and worse. She clicked off her phone and dropped it into her pocket.
“Welcome to the cage, pretty bird,” Magnus said flintily. He looped a scarf around her neck and set a woolen hat on her head.
“It’s too big.” She brushed the hat back before it slipped over her eyes. “I don’t need this, do I?” He had just reminded her it was August.
“No, but I want you to wear them.”
“Because they’re Isleif colors?” She picked up the tail of the scarf, recognizing the stripes of blue and white and green.
“Because they’re mine.” He gave the edge of the hat a third roll against her forehead, smoothing her hair back from her cheeks as he did. “And so are you.”
That should not have sent a frisson of pleasure through her, but it did.
“Sir?” Ulmer prompted as the door was opened and a fresh-scented gust of air came in, one that was sweet and cool and beckoning.
Outside, a cheer rose only to be abruptly cut off when the crowd realized it was only Ulmer. He was not the star they were waiting for.
Magnus took her hand and drew her out the door where he paused on the top step, holding her firmly in the loop of his arm as he casually waved.
“I thought—” Lexi noted that Ulmer was glaring at them from the bottom of the steps.
“Wave.” Magnus leaned down to speak next to her ear. “They love shots like this, that look like I had something to say that was so urgent and personal it couldn’t wait.”
“Something that implies we have private jokes?” She cupped his bearded cheek so she could look into his eyes with her most captivated expression. “Something that says, I’ve never been so enamored with anyone in my life ?”
“Damn.” His pupils flared. “You’re good at this.”
“I know.” She smiled her cheekiest smile and gave the crowd a wave that caused them to roar. Then she and Magnus descended the stairs without hurry and climbed into the waiting car.
The windows were tinted and they had a police escort to allow them to exceed speed limits, not stopping for lights, but the road was lined with spectators, many waving Isleif flags.
“I feel like they don’t...hate me?” she suggested tentatively.
“We’ve worked very hard to ensure the prince maintains a high approval rating,” Ulmer said stiffly, attention on his tablet. “Weddings and babies are always popular. We’re hoping that news will counter any negative attention that arises from y—”
“Ulmer,” Magnus cut in, quiet and lethal. “We’re not going to play the blame game. We’re especially not going to make Lexi pay for my decisions.”
“No, sir. Of course not,” Ulmer said promptly, nodding contritely at her.
Ulmer and I play a game of tit for tat, but he won’t be able to retaliate with you. I won’t allow it.
“Ulmer?” Lexi bit her lip. Magnus could say he wouldn’t tolerate pettiness against her, but she knew exactly how cold wars and passive-aggressiveness worked. She didn’t want to be subjected to it if she could avoid it. “If you tell me what you need, I will stay on script and hit my mark every single time.”
“I appreciate that, Ms. Alexander. Thank you.” Ulmer sounded sincere, then looked to his tablet and added under his breath. “I can’t tell you how refreshing that would be.”
Lexi was given an hour to freshen up before meeting the queen.
Nothing like this had been in her plans so she was provided a small wardrobe from which she chose a three-quarter-length stony-green wrap dress. It was demure yet flattering and made by a local designer. Her hair went up in a simple chignon and she applied her own makeup in natural colors.
Before she could decide on jewelry, Magnus returned from wherever he’d gone. He held a gold coin dangling from a thick gold chain.
“It’s an old custom to offer a woman a coin as a promise, usually when a man was leaving for a raid, in case he didn’t return, especially if she had someone to provide for.”
“It’s pretty.” She caught the coin to study it. It wasn’t big, but it was surprisingly heavy, telling her it was solid gold. “Are you going somewhere?”
“After pulling this stunt? The dungeon, I imagine.” He twirled his finger.
She turned so he could affix the chain around her neck. While he was there, he kissed her nape, sending a shiver down her spine.
“Thank you for the plane.” His warm breath wafted against her skin as he nuzzled behind her ear. “I didn’t get a chance to say that.”
“Don’t—” She blushed so hard her cheeks stung.
“Now you won’t be so nervous.” There was an amused glint in his eyes. He knew exactly what he had done to her.
“You’re a menace,” she muttered as she took the arm he offered her.
Ansgar Palace was as modern as a two-hundred-year-old building could be. It was full of historic art and odd echoes and staff who moved like ghosts, glimpsed briefly before they disappeared, leaving her to wonder if she’d actually seen them.
Not that Lexi was taking much of it in. She was more preoccupied with wondering if she could enlist the queen in delaying her marriage to Magnus.
Just when Lexi was about to ask Are we there yet? they arrived at a door with a guard outside it. Magnus rang a doorbell and a butler—footman?—let them into a formal receiving room, offering a deferential bow as he did.
Lexi barely got her bearings with a quick scan of a desk, a fireplace and a grouping of elegant furniture before Queen Katla demanded her attention without saying a word.
The queen was a handsome woman in a forest green dress. Her hair was pulled back from her face with pearl-studded combs, revealing tasteful chandelier earrings. She remained seated, expression dispassionate.
Lexi tightened her fist into Magnus’s sleeve as he performed the introduction.
Lexi curtsied, murmuring, “It’s an honor to meet you, Your Majesty.”
“Sorr requires you,” Queen Katla said to Magnus. “He’s in his study.”
“I’ll stop in when we get back to that end of the palace.”
“It’s important.”
“I doubt it.”
A silent battle of wills waged between their locked stare.
“You forced my hand when you came off the plane,” the queen said with muted fury. “You know you did. Go. ”
Magnus looked to Lexi. His cheek ticked.
Her heart began battering inside her rib cage. She had thought Magnus was defying Ulmer when they’d waved from the plane, but he’d been playing power games with his sister.
“I would never leave you anywhere that you would be unsafe,” he said, making her heart swerve. “I’ll be back in fifteen minutes.”
As she was left alone with the queen, Lexi drew a subtle, shaken breath, hoping she could believe him, but she couldn’t help wondering if there really was a dungeon here, and whether his sister had the desire to consign her to it.
“Sit,” Katla ordered with a nod at a nearby chair. It didn’t look nearly as comfortable or ornate as her own. “Has Magnus explained that I’ve endured enough scandal and heartache for a dozen lifetimes, Alexandra?”
“Please call me Lexi. If you want to,” she added weakly, swallowing under Katla’s glare at being interrupted.
“My mother died from an undiagnosed heart defect when I was ten. My brother died by suicide a few years later. It’s too easy to say that losing our mother made him give up hope. Our father was the more likely reason. He was not an easy man even when she was alive. He grew more demanding and intractable as time went on. I kept as many of his scandals behind palace walls as I could, but there was enough in the public record for six hours of a salacious, unauthorized documentary. His assassination was not unexpected, considering how many people he had crossed in his lifetime. I’ve since dedicated my life to righting his wrongs.”
Lexi didn’t move, didn’t say anything. She barely dared breathe.
“Every decision, every sacrifice I have made, has been justified by my love for Isleif. I married a man I barely knew because he had the intelligence to create opportunity and prosperity for our people. Sorr has the heart of a good father, too. I saw my marriage as a means to build a better country and thus a better world to leave to my children. I very arrogantly believed I would produce a better ruler, too.”
Ah. Here was the point she was making.
“I’ve never been able to conceive.”
“Magnus said. I’m very sorry.” Lexi self-consciously slid her hands off her bump and into what should have been her lap.
“It’s not your fault, but I’ll admit to being sick with envy. One and done? It’s so unfair it’s beyond cruel. I’ve learned to ignore such things because I still have the power to leave a better ruler, Alexandra.”
Magnus. Everything within Lexi stilled.
“I know I’m not an ideal partner for him,” Lexi said haltingly, seeing her chance. “That’s why I’ve asked him to wait on marriage.”
Katla snorted. “But you can see how he boxed us in by waving from the plane. He drives me mad at times, finding ways to get around me, but I can’t complain about how shrewd and combative he is about getting his way. He needs qualities like that to rule well.”
“What he doesn’t need is a woman who drags him into the trash with her,” Lexi acknowledged.
“Exactly.”
Ouch. Lexi couldn’t go back and change all the decisions in her life, though. Far too many had been made for her, leading up to this checkered history that followed her. She couldn’t look at the queen. Her eyes were too hot, her humility too bone-deep. She willed the door to open and for Magnus to come in and save her, even though she doubted she would ever escape this sense of being judged unworthy.
“Magnus has made it clear that you are the wife he wants,” Katla said quietly. “I have to believe he knows what he is doing. That somehow, this union will benefit not just him, but Isleif.”
And the world? Lexi strangled a hysterical laugh. No pressure.
“I hope you’ll use this chance to reset your image. Keep both of you out of the trash.”
It was a harsh thing to say, but it also awakened Lexi to the possibility that this was a chance to reinvent herself. Marrying Magnus could be more than playing the part of someone “better.” She could do better. Be better.
“I want to be someone my child can be proud of.” The admission came from the depths of her dented soul, where she secretly wondered if she deserved for people to use her for their own ends. “I would like to be someone that Magnus, and Isleif, could be proud of. I hope...” She had to clear a thickness from her throat. “I hope you’ll provide guidance when necessary?”
“I’m not shy with my opinions. Lexi.”
Was that—It was sarcasm, but the friendly kind. A tiny glow of optimism flickered to life inside her.
The door thrust inward, making Lexi jump in surprise.
Magnus strode in on his own momentum, throwing the door closed behind him with another bang that made her stiffen and widen her eyes at him.
“Eleven minutes. Did you run?” Katla said with a sniff. “You didn’t even give yourself time to choose properly.”
“I knew which one I wanted as soon as I saw it.” He showed the ring pinched between his finger and thumb. “The emerald matches her eyes.”
“I’ve always liked that one.” The queen nodded approval. “It belonged to our great-grandmother. A gift from a Russian czar.”
Lexi was speechless as Magnus picked up her hand. She wanted to remind him that she hadn’t yet agreed to marry him, but he slid the ring onto her finger so quickly, she was only able to admire it once it was there.
It was gorgeous, with a green stone flanked by three white diamonds on either side in a gold setting of old-world craftsmanship.
“It’s beautiful.” Heavy.
This is a chance , she kept hearing Katla said. A chance.
But was she really up to the task? Because this wasn’t a role. It was a position, one she couldn’t leave once she took it.
Their engagement would give her time to think about it, though, so she pushed the ring a little more firmly onto her finger.
“When is the baby due?” Katla asked. “I’d like you married before it arrives.”
“I told Ulmer to arrange it for Thursday,” Magnus said.
“What?” Lexi gasped, very afraid she was about to faint again.