‘I’ve been a fool, Astrid.’
‘You’ve been a fool?’
‘I couldn’t see what was under my nose.’
‘A woman who acted badly and who is still fiercely determined to get her own way?’
‘A woman who puts everyone before herself—’
‘And who will stop at nothing to achieve her goal?’ If she was going to make this work, she had to be totally honest.
‘When that goal is to stand up for the people of your country, I’ll go with that. I wouldn’t have you any other way, Princess. Weak and malleable has never held any appeal for me. I’ve loved you from the moment I first set eyes on you—’
‘Stop right there,’ Astrid commanded. ‘You love me?’
Karl shrugged, the wicked smile she loved playing round his lips. ‘Didn’t I just say so?’
‘Well. That’s convenient.’ Astrid shook her head as if surprised.
‘Convenient?’ Karl queried.
‘Yes. Because I love you, too.’
‘The similarities between us just keep growing, Princess.’
They shared the wry beginnings of a smile.
‘Truce?’ she whispered. ‘For the sake of the baby?’
‘For all our sakes,’ Karl growled, dragging her close.
They decided to talk more over tea but somehow didn’t make it farther than Astrid’s bedroom.
‘Can you forgive me?’ Astrid’s voice was tense with excitement and anticipation as Karl backed her into the room.
He kicked the door shut behind them. ‘I already have, though I can’t forgive you for not having heating installed in the palace.’
‘We managed just fine in the polar tent,’ she said suggestively.
‘We were restricted,’ he argued, nuzzling her mouth as he steered her towards the bed. ‘I was hoping to unleash something a little wilder, now we’re not huddling together to keep warm.’
‘But I like huddling. So that doesn’t sound like much fun to me.’
‘Don’t jump to conclusions, Princess.’
‘Don’t make me wait.’
‘First I’m going to light the fire.’ He glanced at the empty grate.
‘Tease.’
‘Always.’
Astrid’s glance took in the bulge in his jeans.
‘Forget the fire. This may take some time,’ Karl warned.
‘Lucky for you, I cleared my diary.’
‘You talk too much, Princess.’ Karl laughed as he swept her into his arms and gently laid her down on the bed. He frowned. ‘Do I have to be gentle with you because you’re pregnant?’
‘No. You have to be gentle with me because you’re so damn big.’
Karl was gentle. He was gentle and sensitive and tender to the point where tears started pricking the back of her eyes. ‘What have I done to deserve this?’ she asked with a sigh of contentment.
Karl, who was using his hands and tongue quite inventively at that moment, raised his head. ‘This is selfish work, Princess. I’m only interested in preparing you so I can enjoy you all the more.’
‘Liar.’ Catching hold of his shoulders, she lured him up the bed. ‘You’re doing it because you love to hear me beg.’
‘Possibly.’
‘Definitely,’ she argued, claiming a kiss.
‘Then let me see what I can do.’
She gasped as Karl grabbed her hips, positioning her exactly where he wanted her. ‘Go carefully with that thing. You’re not just big, you’re enormous,’ she warned.
‘And you love it,’ he growled, driving deep.
‘Well, maybe not too carefully.’ Exclaiming with shocked pleasure as the unexpected and violent release shook her, she screamed Karl’s name as the waves of sensation rocked her back and forth.
‘Thank goodness one of us is in control,’ she managed a long time later as they lay side by side.
‘Not me,’ Karl admitted as he rolled over and began to kiss her again. ‘I want wild, I want hot, I want hard and fast. I want all you’ve got to give, Princess. I’d forgotten just how good you feel.’
‘Trust me,’ Astrid murmured as her hands roamed over Karl’s shoulders. ‘You won’t ever get the chance to forget again.’
* * *
Astrid’s cries of appreciation could probably be heard across the border in Thorberg, and the night was only just beginning. There would be no more lengthy separations. He needed her. She needed him. If a solution had to be found, he would find it.
It came to him in the grey light of dawn when exhaustion finally claimed Astrid and she curled up in his arms to go to sleep.
‘What about that fire I was going to light?’ he murmured, glancing at the fireplace.
‘It will never go out,’ she murmured groggily, sighing with contentment.
‘Amen to that,’ he murmured, brushing a kiss against the brow of a woman he adored, who was also the mother of his child and who he hoped would one day be his queen.
If she would have him, Karl mused wryly as he stared down at the sleeping face of his gutsy woman.
EPILOGUE
IT WAS A very modern royal wedding between the rulers of the houses of Thorberg and Hammersvik. Karl and Astrid’s two-year-old daughter made the prettiest flower girl ever. Tula’s long silky blond hair, caught back with ice-blue ribbons, was just a little ruffled, which seemed right for the daughter of an adventurer and a very modern queen, but Princess Tula behaved impeccably as she toddled along with her hand placed trustingly in that of Astrid’s childhood friend and maid of honour, Britt Skavanga.
The bridesmaids wore long pale blue silk gowns with overskirts of floating white chiffon, while the bride wore an elegant polar-white column of silk decorated with thousands of tiny crystals. Fragrant white roses had been specially flown in from France and the red carpet was strewn with their petals. Astrid’s bouquet comprised lilies for happiness, hyacinths for steady love, ivy for fidelity, and myrtle, the emblem of a long and happy marriage. Her ring was a simple band of flawless blue-white diamonds from the newly successful Skavanga diamond mine run by Britt, now more properly known as Sheikha Sharifa al Kareshi since she had married one of the main investors behind the powerful consortium that had saved her family’s mine.
‘You’re so beautiful,’ Karl whispered when Astrid reached his side, ‘and I’m so proud you’ve agreed to be my bride.’
Karl’s warm glance was all Astrid needed to reassure her. In his official uniform Karl looked more the warrior than ever, and though this wedding ceremony, attended by over two thousand guests and presided over by four ministers in the glorious old cathedral in the centre of Hammersvik’s capital city, was magnificent, Astrid longed to be in the arms of the man she loved and for them to be alone with their daughter. They had decided to wait until Tula was born and their countries had agreed on an official mutually beneficial treaty before getting married. ‘Which gives us at least two years to get to know each other’s faults and foibles to see if we can put up with them,’ she had joked with Karl at the time.
‘I know your faults and I can’t put up with them, Princess, but you’ll learn the error of your ways in time.’
‘I doubt that,’ she had replied.
With a hum, Karl had given her one of his amused looks. ‘You’re probably right, Astrid, but I’m prepared to take my chances.’
But neither of them was prepared to take a chance when it came to allying two royal houses. They had to be absolutely sure. Astrid was certain. In the polar tent, it had been more a case of something monumental and life changing happening, but by the time Karl had delivered their baby daughter in the royal summer house on the lake—when the adorable Princess Tula of Hammersvik-Thorberg had decided she absolutely couldn’t wait to meet her parents—Astrid was only confir
ming what she already knew: Karl was the love of her life.
And that was one thing she would never change her mind about, Astrid thought as a great well of happiness erupted inside her when the presiding minister declared Prince Karl of Thorberg and Princess Astrid of Hammersvik man and wife.
‘Man, wife and baby daughter,’ Karl amended as he turned to lift Princess Tula into her parents’ ecstatic embrace.
* * * * *
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ISBN: 9781459253803
Copyright © 2013 by Susan Stephens
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