Royal Pain (His Royal Hotness 1)

His voice is warm, his hands comforting, and if I couldn’t feel how tense he is beneath me, I might actually buy what he’s trying to sell. But I can feel the tenseness, can feel the way he’s so tightly wound—even after that mind-blowing sex—that it’s like he’s vibrating.

I know not to push, though. I may not have known Kian that long, but I know him well enough to recognize the No Trespassing signs he’s currently got posted all over him.

It hurts. I’d be lying if I said it didn’t, considering I’ve never felt more vulnerable in my life than I do right at this moment when it looks a little like he’s readying himself for battle. Or worse, like he never dropped his guard at all.

The knowledge is enough to have me sliding off his lap onto my still shaky legs. He reaches for me, tries to pull me close again, but I elude him by reaching for my nightshirt, pulling it over my head.

“Hey, wait.” He grabs my hand, lifts a brow. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing. I’m just going to go to the bathroom and clean up.”

“I thought maybe we’d go another round.”

It’s my turn to lift a brow. “Oh, really? Is that what you thought?”

He doesn’t get the prickles. Instead he smiles lazily at me, tugs me closer. “It is.”

“I have work soon. I need to get ready.” I’ve got an hour before I have to get ready, but he doesn’t need to know that.

“Oh, right. Sorry.” He lets go, as I hoped. But then he’s buttoning up his jeans and trailing me through the house, which kind of ruins my plans to grab a couple minutes alone, a little air. “I was actually hoping that we could talk.”

I want to tell him no or at least tell him not now, but there’s something in his voice that has me turning back, concerned.

“What’s wrong? What’s happened?” Visions of Garrett’s dead body fill my head, make my own worries of losing myself to Kian seem insignificant.

He shakes his head. “Nothing’s happened yet. But they think they’ve found Garrett. We’re sending a team in to extract him tonight.”

“Oh my God! That’s amazing! Kian!” I throw my arms around him, hold him tight. “Baby, that’s wonderful!”

He holds me back just as tightly, and this time when he buries his face against my neck, I can feel a wetness that has my knees wobbling from something other than a few fantastic orgasms.

“Oh, sweetheart, I can’t imagine how hard waiting is for you.” I drop kisses on whatever parts of him I can reach. “But you have to think positive. You have to believe it’s going to be okay.”

He nods, but the wetness only grows. Shit. He’s been balancing everything so well since I met him—his new position, the search for his abducted twin, me—that I forgot he’s not superhuman. That underneath all that competence he is a man with the same doubts and fears and insecurities as any other. I forgot he bleeds just like everyone else.

Wrapping an arm around his waist, I propel us the rest of the way down the hall to my bedroom. Then I pull him onto the bed with me and hold him tight against me as his whole body shudders like he’s undergoing electroshock therapy.

He never makes a sound, never lifts his face from where it’s pressed against my neck. But somehow feeling his tears—and the pain shooting through him—is so much worse than seeing it. I don’t know what to say, don’t want to promise him that everything is going to be okay when I really don’t know that it will be.

So I just hold him instead, muttering all kinds of nonsensical things as I find myself falling deeper and deeper down the damn rabbit hole of my emotions. So much for catching my breath, for finding some perspective. Right now, we’re so close I don’t think we could get a piece of paper between us—and I don’t just mean physically.

There’s a part of me that wished I did.

But then I wouldn’t be able to give Kian what he needs, wouldn’t be able to hold him as his own emotions overwhelm him, and the truth is—I wouldn’t trade this for the world. Kian’s been strong for months—for the country, for his family, for himself. If he needs to replenish that strength for a few minutes, I’m honored if I can somehow help him do that.

Long minutes go by as I hold him, my arms and legs and body wrapped around him as tightly as I can. But eventually the shaking stops, eventually he gets himself under control and raises his head.

“I love you,” he tells me, those crazy green eyes of his staring directly into my own.

/> It’s the last thing I’m expecting to hear right now. “I’m sorry, what?”

That stupid crooked smile flashes again. “I said, I love you, Savvy. It’s not what I expected to have happen when you dumped that champagne on me—”

“When I rescued you, you mean?”

“Yes.” He lifts my hand to his mouth, presses a long, lingering kiss to the center of my palm. “It was the last thing I expected when you rescued me. It’s certainly the last thing I’m looking for right now.”

I stiffen a little at the implications of that, but he just smooths a hand down my back. “But just because I wasn’t looking, doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate you. Because I do, so much. I know my life is a mess, I know it’s asking unbelievable things of you to expect you to be with me considering my family has a giant target on its back right now and considering it’s never easy to be a royal—or be with one.