Chapter Five #3
But in the flurry of this planning, he had not prepared for what it felt like to be near Livia again.
He had not considered the intensity of his attraction as he sat across from her on the quiet deck of this antique boat, watching her sip champagne as the wind blew through her hair.
He had not planned for the way the simple question she had asked had rattled him.
What do you think our marriage will be like?
He had never thought about that because there was no future he could foresee them having together.
The plan had always been to take a wrecking ball to all of this after the documents were signed.
He should have already done that, the moment they had set off from the dock.
As soon as they were safely out at sea, his plan had always been to set the next step of his public-relations war in motion.
His father would have discovered from Henri Jacard that Gustav also controlled the money from this marriage.
Gustav’s plan would only work if he moved quickly, while the king was still off balance from the marriage switch, before he had a chance to wage a new PR campaign.
But instead of setting these final plans into motion, he had found himself drinking champagne and thinking about a different kind of afternoon, one that involved food, conversation and a long night in bed with Livia.
He would enjoy the challenge of turning her anger into a much more satisfying kind of heat, and he found himself wondering if he could take just a little more time to enjoy that heat before this whole marriage came crashing down around them.
In the larger picture, the country could not afford an extended delay—literally.
He could not and would not exist in a world where his father drove Isrikesland’s finances into the ground and his brother stood by, watching.
Maybe Gustav had always understood that this plan would, in the moment, feel like a sacrifice.
But after so many years of sacrifices, he hadn’t foreseen how much this particular one would impact him.
He should back away, but now that Livia was right here in front of him, he wasn’t ready to go.
Not yet. The idea took hold of him to extend this purgatory for a little longer.
Shouldn’t he reap a few personal rewards for the sacrifice he was making?
Just a taste. He could put aside the resentment that she’d been going to marry his very royal brother, just for a day.
Gustav set his glass on the table and turned to her. Her cheeks flushed, and she was so close. He fisted a hand to keep from reaching for her. From giving into the urge to take, take, take.
“I’ve waited for a long, long time for this,” he whispered.
Her eyes narrowed. “Am I now the spoils of your battle?”
His imagination did wonderfully vivid and specific things with her suggestion. “That’s a scenario I can entertain.”
These spoils, as she had called them, were right in front of him.
He leaned closer, close enough to feel her breaths warm his lips.
He wanted so badly to let himself go. The kiss in the church had been full of longing, but now, in the privacy of the open water, a kiss would be something entirely different.
Each caress of her lips would be a place where all his frustrations and anger electrified.
Each sweep of her tongue would hold want and need and the endless tension between satisfaction and longing.
He wanted to carry her down the staircase and lay her on the bed and spend the rest of the day playing out the vivid images that were streaming through his mind.
“It’s our wedding day,” he said.
Her breath hitched.
“We have a royal marriage, not a real one,” she said, but her voice was huskier.
Still, she didn’t close that last distance to kiss him.
She didn’t give in to this heat. How much of her resistance was still wrapped up in her aversion to royalty and power?
She was undoubtedly upset by the…unorthodox path he had taken today, but the Livia he had known was drawn to anything unorthodox.
Was that girl from the forest somewhere inside her?
Another possibility loomed in his mind, one that made everything inside him sour. Maybe she was holding back because of his half brother. Maybe she had even fallen in love with Edvin. Jealousy surged through Gustav, its hot, rotten core infecting every part of him.
He needed to know the answers to his questions, and he found that he didn’t want to wait until she decided to reveal them. He wanted to provoke her into revealing more of herself. She was studying him, and some of the wariness was back in her gaze.
“You always said you didn’t want to be royal,” he said.
She frowned. “Yes, I did. And yet here I am.”
“You may get what you want after all.”
Livia frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Today I will announce that my father has squandered the country’s money on his lavish lifestyle and the crown prince has disappeared off the face of the earth.
And when I reveal that I now hold the purse strings to the projects my father has promised for too long, I am almost sure my father will attempt to revoke my title—and therefore yours, too—in retaliation. ”