Chapter Eight
JAVIER DIAMANDI WAS no psychologist. He didn’t generally make a habit of delving into the troubled pasts of the lives of the women he slept with. There was never any need. Everyone had a history, a backstory, a reason for being the way they were.
So why had he seen the way her face flashed—for the briefest moment of time—with shards of grief and loss and wanted to make it all better? Why had he hated the way she’d turned her back on him, to hide those emotions, even more than she already was?
Queen Astrid Thyra of Norvenheim was a study in hiding, he’d come to realise.
She felt deeply, but showed little—at least to the outside world.
More and more, though, he was seeing beneath that veil, to what was at the heart of her and he didn’t want her to pull back from him. He liked seeing that side of her.
At first, all he could think about was using Astrid as a pawn in his revenge scheme, but very quickly, he’d come to realise that a silver lining of whatever they were doing was removing her, permanently, from the clutches of his stepmother and half-brother.
He could save her from them, save her from being chewed up and spat out as he’d been.
Perhaps, though, he wanted to save her in general.
To be someone in Astrid’s life, even if only for a couple of weeks, that she could talk to.
Which brought him back to the fact he was no psychologist and that none of these impulses made sense.
He wasn’t unfeeling, nor was he a bastard.
He treated his lovers with respect, kindness and courtesy.
But as far as he was concerned, those relationships were always skin deep.
Perhaps it was Astrid’s determination to keep him at bay, to hide her innermost feelings, that had him knowing how isolated she was.
How cruelly alone. Adored and revered by everyone in the country, celebrated across the world for her stoicism and beauty.
She was a single reed, doing her best not to sway in a growing breeze.
When it came down to it, he couldn’t say precisely why she was different, only instincts were demanding he let this play out.
Just for now. He would leave Norvenheim, as agreed, and get on with his life.
Wild horses wouldn’t induce him to stay in this country, one that he associated with so much of his own suffering and loss.
But for now, he was here so he could be here for her, too.
He felt Astrid suck in a deep breath and dropped his head, pressing a kiss to the curve of her neck.
‘How do you do that?’ she asked, softly, but the words ran with an emotion he didn’t understand at first and then, didn’t like. Fear.
He moved his hands, placing them on her forearms and turning her slowly. Looking down into her face, she was like the queen he’d first met, her expression unmistakably regal and formal, but her eyes were awash with confusion and feeling. ‘Do what, Your Majesty?’
She blinked quickly. ‘You see through me in a way I don’t think I like.’
Something like satisfaction thrummed in his veins. ‘I don’t see through you,’ he said. ‘I see you.’
More quick blinking as she dragged her gaze over his shoulder. Hiding from him. Satisfaction turned to frustration, but he didn’t push it. This was as new to Astrid as it was to him. ‘How?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Is this a sex thing?’
He almost burst out laughing, but didn’t, because her voice was slightly tremulous, as though she was terrified. He sighed roughly instead. ‘Probably. I’m your first lover. That’s emotionally resonant, even when neither of us want it to be.’
She looked into his face again, as if for reassurance. ‘I can’t be with you,’ she said, forcibly.
He arched a brow, understanding her fear. This was feeling too real. Too much. For both of them. ‘I promise, nothing between us is going to change. I’m not staying in the country, you have to marry and move on with your life. We both know the deal.’
She didn’t look reassured though.
‘But you can’t keep me on the outside, like you do with everyone else.’
Astrid had a habit of pressing her teeth into her lower lip when she was angsting.
It was the one foible in an otherwise perfect outward demeanour.
As she did it then he was tempted to lean down and drag her lip between his teeth instead.
To kiss her until there was no room for doubt in her face, only heat and lust.
‘What does that mean?’
He lifted his hands instead, cupping her face, holding her steady. ‘You know you do it. You don’t let anyone in. You have no one in your life you talk to, no one you’re close to. No one you love and let love you back. Right?’
He was holding her face steady so she couldn’t look away. Instead, she closed her eyes to blot him out. ‘And you do?’
The fact her tone had taken on a slightly combative edge should have warned him he was pushing her buttons too hard, but Javier wanted to make this point.
He needed her to understand she could let him in and let him go, all in one breath—just as he planned to do with her.
Caring for each other wasn’t an indication of permanence, nor dependence. He knew neither of them wanted that.
Not that he had experience with this, but he could accept it was just the way things were with them.
Perhaps because any other alternative was impossible.
He knew he had to leave. That was non-negotiable.
He also knew he wanted to get beneath the surface with Astrid, to understand all the gears that turned inside that beautiful head of hers.
Equally non-negotiable. But she wasn’t the only one fighting demons of her past. Once upon a time, he’d been a little boy, asking his stepmother to love him, his brother to play with him, and he’d faced rejection after rejection after rejection.
Only his father had welcomed and wanted him, yet he travelled so often, it was like being thrust from light to dark at the drop of a hat.
Astrid was trying to reject what he was offering and though he was now a man of thirty-two, he couldn’t contemplate that without a twist of remembered pain and a whisper of self-doubt.
‘We’re different people,’ he said, finally.
She blinked her eyes open and looked at him, frowning slightly. ‘What does that mean? You’re happy being alone but I’m not allowed to be?’
He was. If the alternative was putting himself in the position of being hurt, of wanting more than was offered, he’d always choose the life he had. He’d never met anyone who’d made him question that.
Until now?
He shut the thought down before it could take hold.
Astrid was only different because she was different.
What had started as revenge against his brother had morphed into a desire to know her as a woman, not just a queen, but of course her status and life played a part in this. She was fascinating and unusual.
‘You’re not happy, though, Astrid.’
‘How can you say that?’
‘Am I wrong?’
She shook her head and he dropped his hands away, moving them to her hips instead.
‘Life is about more than happiness,’ she said.
He heard the stubbornness in her tone and knew that pushing her was futile. ‘I don’t want to fight with you. Particularly not as a mechanism you’re using to shut me out.’
She opened her mouth, perhaps to deny it, then made a sound of frustration instead. ‘Can we just decorate the tree?’
Another tool to keep him at a distance but he didn’t push it.
Her words channelled that same rejection feeling he hated.
But she’d think about what he’d said and maybe understand that she had a rare opportunity to be close to someone without it bringing any risks.
Time would separate them and they’d go back to their lives, which meant they could fall headlong into this for now, without worrying about what came next.
But maybe he was asking her for too much. To trust him with her pain, with the truth of who she was when he hadn’t shown the same willingness. He was suggesting she go out on a limb without doing the same himself.
‘Help me with this?’ she asked, back to normal in the blink of an eye, proving his point. She had an impressive ability to lock away whatever she was feeling and put on a mask. Impressive, but damned annoying.
He took a page out of her book, though, reaching out and taking the plug end of the lights.
Her smile was tentative, her eyes not quite meeting his.
He watched as she moved to the tree, so graceful and perfect, so regal.
She began to unspool and string the lights from the bottom up.
At the halfway point, she turned to him and said, ‘Let’s swap. ’
It made sense. She wasn’t tall and there was no way she could reach the top of the tree without a ladder.
‘But it’s far more fun watching you,’ he responded, enjoying the way colour flooded her cheeks and her eyes narrowed with obvious sensual heat.
He took the lights from her though, doing the same thing she had, walking slowly around the tree and threading the lights into the branches, all under Astrid’s watchful gaze.
Finally, when the lights were all in place, he looked at her.
‘Ready?’
He arched a brow expectantly, as Astrid crossed to the window and crouched down, to where a power point had been discreetly placed. When she plugged it in, even Javier—a cynic from way back—felt something deep down inside of himself.
For most people, Norvenheim had an almost fairytale like association with coziness.
It was a country renowned for all things homely and sweet, for warmth and hospitality and yes, for Christmas.
The traditions, the markets, the culture, the music and the decorating of a tree, were all hallmarks of these people.