Aria’s shoulders drooped. “I see. Yes, I think we will make an admirable royal couple.” She looked down at her hands.
“Is there something else?”
He was standing very close to her but he made no effort to touch her.
There was no way to say it but to blurt it out. “But what about us? What about me as a woman? Do you feel anything for me besides as a queen?”
Julian’s expression didn’t change, but he reached out and put his hand to the back of her head and drew her to him, then kissed her with what could only be expressed as long-repressed desire. When he pulled away, Aria still had her eyes closed and her mouth open.
“I look forward to the wedding night with great anticipation,” he whispered, and she could feel his breath on her face.
Aria opened her eyes and straightened her body. “I did wonder,” she managed to say at last.
At that Julian smiled at her, and he smiled with great warmth. “You are a beautiful, desirable young woman. How could you have doubted that I am longing to make love to you?”
“I…I guess I never thought about it.” Once again he was standing away from her, looking at her.
“Has something happened?” he asked softly. “Tonight at dinner you seemed different, as if you were worried about something.”
The thought that he had noticed made her smile. She had agreed to their marriage without giving the marriage much thought. She had been much more interested in his ancestors and his training than she was in Julian as a man. But now it was different. Now she understood more of what went on between a husband and wife.
“In America,” she said, beginning slowly, “in America I saw young lovers holding hands, walking together, and kissing on park benches.”
“I had envisioned America to be like that,” Julian said with disapproval.
“America is a wonderful place,” Aria snapped. “There is a feeling there of moving forward. Nothing remains the same. They are not burdened with hundreds of years of tradition; they accept what is new. In fact, they seek the new.”
“Lovers in a park is not new,” Julian said, amused and smiling. “I forget how young you are. You have never seemed to want courting. You accepted my marriage proposal without seeming to want more than a handshake and a ring. Was I wrong?”
“No, but things happened in America…”
“The sight of the lovers made you wonder what it would be like if you had your own lover?”
“Something of that sort,” she murmured, then looked straight at him. “Julian, I want our marriage to work. I need for it to work. It has to be more than a marriage for Lanconia. I am a woman and I want to be loved for myself and not just for my crown.”
Julian looked even more amused. “No one has ever asked something easier of me. Shall I court you?” He took her hand in his and kissed her palm. “Shall
I show up at your door carrying a bouquet of wildflowers? Shall I sing love songs under your window? Shall I whisper love words into your pretty ear?”
“That will do for a start,” she said, watching him kiss her hand.
“I will meet you at dawn and we will ride.”
“At dawn? But I am scheduled to ride at nine.”
“Break it,” he said commandingly. “I will come for you at dawn, but now I must escort you back to the White Horse Courtyard. We will be seen by fewer people if we enter there.”
He turned around and motioned for her to lead, as was her right, but then he smiled and pulled her arm through his.
At the edge of the courtyard she turned to him. “Will you kiss me again?” He glanced at the windows of the palace and seemed to hesitate. “Please, Julian. I need to know that our marriage will be good. I need to forget—”
He put two fingers over her lips. “We all have things we wish to forget. I will kiss you until you can bear no more, my darling.” Slowly, he drew her into his arms and kissed her as if she were Rita Hayworth and Betty Grable rolled into one.
He released her. “Now go!” he ordered, smiling. “I will see you in the morning.”
She started to move away but he caught her hand.
“If it takes kissing to make you forget, you will have amnesia by noon tomorrow.” He released her and she ran inside the palace.