‘And you wanted a taste of it?’
‘No,’ he denied, his voice a harsh rasp.
‘Then what did you want?’ she pushed.
‘A night—’
‘You risked your reputation for a night?’ She cut him off, her insides twisting. ‘We haven’t even made it to your bed.’ She blew out a puff of agitated air. ‘Not your bed.Not the only bed you deem fit for purpose.’
‘Make no mistake,’ he warned. ‘Things have changed.’
‘Changed?’
‘My bed is off-limits.’
She laughed, a throaty gurgle. ‘How dare you pull me from my life, fly me who knows how many miles into a kingdom I’ve never heard of and then turn the tables on me?’ She fixed him with an exasperated glare.
‘If the tables have turned on anyone,’ he replied, ‘it is me. Because you will be my wife.’
‘Wife!’she scoffed. Old hurts bloomed fast, and his cruel joke hurt more than it should. ‘I’m a one-night stand,’ she reminded him. ‘Not your future Queen.’
She exhaled heavily, forcing herself to blow out all the heaviness in her chest. In her heart.
‘I’m done with this game,’ she said, steeling herself to the truth. This was over before it had begun. He was a prince, and she was the daughter of Damien Hegarty. It was in her genes to fail. ‘I don’t belong here. Send me home, Akeem.’
‘It’s too late for that,’ he said, and a deep flush stained his cheeks. ‘There is only one solution and your leaving is not it.’
Her gut dropped to her toes. ‘Solution?’
‘When you leave this plane you will enter my kingdom as its future Queen.’
Her mouth open, she stared at him. He hadn’t been playing with her.
He nodded—a small inclination of his head.
‘They could have caught you with anyone...’
‘But you aren’t anyone.’
‘No, I’m not,’ she agreed, ‘but I could have been. Would you have married someone else?’
‘No.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because there has only ever been you, qalbi.’
‘What?’she asked. ‘What about no one ever complaining about your stamina? What about you being more skilled than the boy I remember? You’re lying,’ she accused, her cheeks tight with tension. ‘Why would you lie?’
‘No one has ever complained because no one has ever been in my bed besides me. The boy you remember had no control—he was a boy. I am a man. I have control in more ways than one,’ he told her. ‘And I do not lie.’
‘If the only person you’ve ever been with is me, how could you possibly know that you could give me extreme pleasure?’ she pushed, trying to catch him out in his unnecessary lie.
Why was he doing it? Telling her it had only ever been her. To persuade her to say yes? To get her to marry him? It wasn’t her destiny to be a queen. If her dad had been right, she was only ever destined to fail. And he had been right, hadn’t he? The one time he’d needed her she hadn’t been there. The idea of her being a queen... Ridiculous!
‘You couldn’t,’ she answered for him, because his lies would not convince her to say yes to being his wife when he didn’t want her in his bed. Let alone his life! ‘Then why...?’ She searched for the right words, but she didn’t have any. She knew why she hadn’t been with anyone else. But him? The son of a king had denied himself. It made no sense.
‘Because the only thing that matters here is my duty,’ he answered. ‘My people need stability. Not a king who puts his pleasure first—’
‘But today—’
‘I made a mistake.’
She furrowed her brow. ‘Is that why you wanted me here? In your bed?’ she asked, her gut twisting. ‘Because I represent a life you can’t have—?’ She cut herself off as an acrid taste flooded her mouth.
‘Yes. That is exactly why I wanted you in my bed, qalbi. Because I knew when you left it—when our night was over—the past and the boy you knew would be gone. For ever.’
‘That makes no sense!’ she screeched.
‘It doesn’t have to make sense to you.’