by Pippa Grant
He’s shirtless, in loose sweatpants that hang low on his chiseled hips, his broad back to me as he cracks eggs into a skillet.
I pause, admiring the slope of his shoulders, the solid bands of muscles weaving down his arms, the twin dimples at the base of his spine, because even when I’m furious on his behalf—and maybe some at him too for not having taken care of this betrothal years ago—the sight of him makes me go all soft and gooey on the inside.
He rubs the back of his neck, turning his head enough for me to see his profile.
There’s no smile turning his lips up. No mischief sparkling in the corner of his eye.
He just looks tired. In need of a hug. All this time he’s playing hockey and doing interviews and smiling and looking after the interests of his family and his country, who’s taking care of him?
I take a step, and he turns to glance at me.
The smile is automatic, even as his eyes register surprise. But the surprise quickly melts into warm affection, and I feel an answering warmth swelling in my chest.
He’s a good man.
“Did I wake you?” he asks.
I shake my head and slide onto a stool at the bar. “Got hungry.”
“Can’t have that. Eggs?”
I grimace before I can stop myself. “Crackers. I can—” get them.
But he’s already reaching up into the cabinet holding sixteen different varieties of crackers while I blatantly admire the flex and stretch of his muscles. Even with a sour stomach, I can’t help myself.
He selects the Saltines and offers me an open sleeve from the box. I didn’t realize he’d noticed which crackers I’ve been sneaking into my room, but apparently he has.
I wonder how much else he’s noticed.
“Feeling all right?” he asks, his eyes taking total inventory of my body and making me simultaneously gooey in my chest and hot in my hooha.
“Mostly.” I touch my cheekbone in the same vicinity where a bruise is forming on his before digging into the crackers. “Does it hurt?”
“Had worse.”
“That hit looked like it would’ve hurt.”
“Ah, the lady confesses to watching my game.” His grin turns cocky, and once again, it’s impossible to not smile back at him.
“Joey made me go,” I lie.
“Would’ve been my pleasure to get you better seats.” He moves to flip his eggs, then returns to leaning his elbows on the island, all that solid arm muscle on full display while he quite smoothly moves his long, capable fingers closer to me across the granite. “Your diabolical sister too. Where is dear Joey? It’s been far too long since I’ve had the pleasure of ruffling her wool.”
“I left her at her hotel so she could have uninterrupted phone sex with Zeus before a late-night burger run with Ares.”
His gaze dips to my chest, which is not only covered with the hoodie, but also with cracker crumbs now. My nipples tighten, and my fingers clench around the cracker package, making it crinkle loudly in the still evening. A subtle sizzle comes from the eggs on the stove, but there’s another sizzle building and coiling in my core.
All because he glanced at my chest after I said the word sex.
I’ve never been so easily turned on in my life. Maybe it’s pregnancy hormones.
But more likely, it’s him. Because he did this to me even before that night in the locker room.
“What would you be if you didn’t have to be a prince?” I whisper.
His attention lifts back to my eyes. “Yours.”
My breath catches. It’s not a line. There’s no charming smile or flirty grin, nothing but a rare intensity that I’ve seen only twice before.
Both times I was well on my way to being naked with him. Which doesn’t make sense, because I hardly knew him the first time.
I could argue I still hardly know him, except it’s not true. I know he works hard. I know he’s loyal to a fault. I know he shoulders more responsibility than his smile and reputation would imply.
And yes, I know about his reputation back home.
But the truth is, he could’ve talked me out of my pants the night we met if he’d wanted to. But he didn’t. And not because he’s afraid of Joey, and not because he wasn’t attracted to me.
I might be a small-town girl, but human desire is universal.
Even the night in the locker room, he waited for my go-ahead.
That’s not what I’d expect of a playboy.
It’s what I expect of a prince.
He leans further across the island. I lean in too, though the island is so wide, there’s still at least a foot between us. “What would you have me do if I were but a common man?” he asks.
It’s such an impossible question, because I know he can’t ever be a common man. Even when he’s free from his betrothal, he’ll still be Prince Manning of Stölland. Ambassador for his country. Loyal son and brother to his family.
But I can think of one thing I’d ask. “Stay,” I whisper.
He caresses my cheek with his thumb, and I want to melt into his touch. “You’re quite the irresistible woman, Gracie Diamonte.”
I’m a woman in over her head. “I’m just a poor girl from Alabama who barely graduated high school.”
“You’re utterly perfect.”
“I run a side business printing genitalia on cookies,” I confess, my voice as small as it will go.
His fingers trace my ear and slide into my hair while his smile grows impossibly warmer. “Bloody brilliant business move. Although I’m afraid I’ll have to kill several of my teammates for having sent you pictures of their dicks. Damn things are all over the dressing room.”
“It’s not a big deal. Once you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all. They’re just body parts.”
“I beg to differ, madam.”
He’s smiling broadly now, and I can’t resist smiling back. “Don’t tell me you suffer from penis insecurity.”
“I’ve no reason to. As you well know.”
He’s inching closer and closer, both hands cupping my head now.
“I haven’t gotten a good look,” I tell him. “But I can compliment you on your equipment skill level.”
“Why, thank you.” His laughter rolls off his lips and tickles my face. I could tilt forward and kiss him.
“I didn’t come here to seduce you.” But I still can’t resist stroking my fingers over his short beard.
“You seduce me merely by existing.”
That warmth in my chest is spreading everywhere over my body. “Such a charmer.”
“I have a confession of my own.”
There’s nothing he could say right now that would make me want to kiss him any less. Or make me not want to climb onto the island and do some kind of Dirty Dancing crawl to get to him. “Later,” I tell him.
“The night we met, I bet Zeus a ridiculous sum of money that he couldn’t get your sister to leave with him.”
“Oh my dog, you didn’t.” I laugh, then clap a hand to smother the noise so I don’t wake anyone else. The idea of Manning making that bet is both completely ridiculous and completely believable.
Also, I suspect Joey probably knew the whole time, because she’s like that. There’s no sense in getting offended on her behalf.
“I did,” he murmurs against my cheek, his lips and stubble teasing my skin. “Because I hoped the challenge would present an opportunity to get closer to you.”
“Me?”
I was a star-struck bumpkin making half a fool of myself that night, when I was supposed to be making sure Joey didn’t do anything, well, Joey-ish at the charity tournament that her company was co-sponsoring.
“You,” he confirms. “You brushed against me on your way into the room, and before I could say so much as excuse me, you were diving for a teetering tray that was troubling one of the servers.”
“I don’t remember that.” Most of the night was a blur until Manning and I escaped to walk the golf course. His flirting was so outrageous I didn’t let myself bel
ieve it was real, but dog, did I feel like a princess for a few hours.
“And that is exactly what makes you unforgettable. You incorporate simple human kindness into your every breath. You’re a rare woman, Gracie. And I’m but a spoiled brat who has servants to do his kindness for him.”
“You are not.”
His chuckle, combined with the circles his fingers are drawing over my scalp, makes goosebumps race over my skin. “Oh, but I am.”
“And that’s why you’re cooking your own eggs at three in the morning instead of waking your hordes of servants to do it for you.”
“Perhaps I lack servants because I’ve driven them all away.”
I grab his cheeks and pull back so I can see the twinkle of mischief in his perfect blue eyes. “Clearly,” I agree. “You’re nothing but an overgrown toddler who throws temper tantrums at every opportunity. And your eggs are going to burn.”
“You have a good heart, Gracie. A big heart. A noble heart. You deserve every happiness in this world.”
I blink.
Because my happy-go-lucky prince charming is once again turning serious on me.
Deadly serious.
“Everyone deserves happiness.”
He presses a soft kiss to my forehead before disentangling himself. He turns to the stove, kills the flame on the burner, and pushes the pan back.
But instead of grabbing a plate, he walks around the island and takes me by the hand. “Come upstairs with me.”
“No.”
He lifts a brow. “No?”
“I’m not having goodbye sex with you.”
His smile is again a new smile. Soft. Gentle. Affectionate. “I’m informing my father first thing in the morning that I’ll not marry Elin, and I’ll handle whatever consequences follow.”
I don’t know what kind of consequences he’ll have to deal with but, given his insistence that duty and the good of his people demanded that he follow through with the marriage, I can’t help wondering just how much trouble this will cause for his family.
And if he’ll be able to fix it from here, or if he’ll have to go home.
“Will it be bad?” My stomach is cramping like I might have to puke.
He steps closer, still gripping my hand, until I can feel the heat radiating off his skin. “I’ve no idea.”
“Will you have to go home?”
“Not if I can help it.”
His free hand strokes down my spine. I lean into his solid chest, resting my ear against the steady thump of his heart. “I had a really good plan to save you, you know.”
“And you executed it quite brilliantly.”
“You don’t even know what it was.” I hate that he keeps calling me brilliant. I’m not brilliant. I’m me. But he’s sweet to think so highly of me. “You’re stealing my thunder.”
“Quite the contrary. Your courage has given me the strength to handle my problems as I should’ve long ago.”
“You’re welcome,” I murmur, because it’s suddenly easier to be flippant than it is to face the pounding of my own heart and the desperate need to fling myself at him and ask if, even though I came for the baby’s sake, he might ever fall in love with me too.
His lips brush my hair, and a shower of fairy sparkles lights up my skin. “Come upstairs with me, love. Stay with me. I can’t bear the thought of you sleeping another minute with another man.”
I lift my face to his. “I shouldn’t.”
“I’m not asking as a prince, Gracie. I’m asking as a man. You haunt my dreams. You live in my every breath. I fall asleep to memories of your skin against mine and the taste of your lips. I wake to memories of your face as you come around my cock, and I smile to thoughts of your laughter throughout the day. My blood may belong to my country, but my heart belongs to you.”
My breath catches, my eyes water, and I hiccup.
“I bloody adore your hiccups.” He kisses the corner of my lips as I hiccup again. “Come upstairs, love. Please.”
32
Manning
Gracie may not believe herself to be princess material, but she feels so bloody right beside me.
Her hand in mine as we climb the stairs. The way she twists into my arms and pulls me down for a long, slow kiss the moment we’re behind the closed door. The fit of her body against mine.
“I intend to explore every inch of you,” I tell her while I slide my hands beneath her bulky sweatshirt bearing the logo of my team.
“I’ll be keeping track,” she replies.
Her fingers are tracing my ribs around to my back, expertly playing my body. I’m already hard as diamonds and desperate for her, but her touch is coaxing me impossibly thicker and harder.
I smile against her lips as I claim her mouth once more, backing her into my bedroom and toward the bed. Her skin is softer than finely spun silk, her hums and moans more melodic than an entire bloody symphony, her curves and firm muscle the perfect artwork of a master.
Explore?
No.
Worship?
Yes.
It’s a gradual path across my bedroom, stroking and kissing and pressing our bodies together, until I can take no more and I lift her into my arms, carrying her the remaining distance to my bed. I settle her in the center, climbing onto the mattress with her, unable to keep from kissing those plump lips.
“Your shirt, my lady,” I murmur against her skin. “I must remove it.”
“Well. If you must.”
“That beautiful smile of yours is my undoing every single time.” I lift the hem of her hoodie and the T-shirt beneath it together. She raises her arms, I tug her coverings off and toss them aside, and—“Beautiful, Gracie. Utterly beautiful.”
“My bra’s getting tight,” she whispers.
I attend to the tight nipples poking at the satin—pink again—and she gasps and offers me more of her breasts. “Perhaps you should go without,” I murmur.
She laughs, a lovely breathy laugh that makes more blood surge to my cock. I stroke the swell of breast overflowing its cup, and her laugh melts into a moan. “Touch me more. Manning, please, touch me more.”
“Such good manners deserve a reward.” I lower my head to those lovely mounds and lick at her nipple.
“Ohmydog.” She grips my ears. “More.”
I take my time, stroking, suckling, worshipping until a simple breath upon the wet fabric makes her nipples harden to stiff peaks begging for a closer inspection. I can smell her arousal, and I would very much like to stroke that lovely patch of heaven between her legs to see just how wet she is for me. I unclasp her bra, make quick work of pulling the straps from her slender arms, and lie her back on the bed while I lick the flesh between her mounds and trail my hand down her stomach.
She brushes her hands up my forearms to my shoulders, then my neck and cheeks. “You feel so good,” she moans.
“My lady, you feel exquisite.”
My knuckles reach the emerald stud in her belly button, and my hand stills as it travels lower.
My baby is growing within her. Right beneath my touch.
“Manning?” she whispers.
I move my lips down her abdomen to linger on the soft skin below her navel. “How big is he now?” I ask.
“About the size of a grape.”
My little grape. Bloody hell, fatherhood is such a terrifying and monumental idea, yet everything in this moment is perfect and right. “Can you feel him kicking?”
She giggles. “She barely has legs yet.”
“She? If she has no legs, how are you to know she’s a she?”
“Why wouldn’t she be a she?”
“There’s not been a she born in the palace in at least eight generations.”
She blinks quickly, and though her smile stays on her lips, it fades from her eyes. “Then it’s a good thing she won’t be born in the palace, isn’t it?”
“Wherever he’s born, he’ll be a he.”
Her fingers comb through my hair. “You’re happy abo
ut the baby?” she whispers.
I brush my hand over her belly and the waistband of her jeans. “This baby has very likely saved my life,” I tell her honestly. “You—”
I’m unable to finish, because she’s sat up, grabbed me behind the head, and is now kissing me as though I’m her savior.
When the reality is so very different.
“You can’t marry her,” she gasps as she breaks the kiss. “You’d be so miserable.”
“Certainly can’t have that,” I agree dryly. I’d be miserable for an eternity if the trade-off were ensuring Gracie’s happiness.
She laughs, and the sheen glistening in her eyes fades. “I just need to know you won’t be miserable,” she whispers.
As though it’s not even crossed her mind that she would be with me, beside me, bringing more joy to my life than I ever expected and deserve. “To what lengths would you to go ensure my happiness?” I inquire.
“Are you making a blow job joke?”
By the gods, this woman is everything. “Never, my lady. Although I must confess, I’m rather obsessed with a similar goal.”
She grins. “I’ve noticed you’re pretty good with scoring goals.”
“Then allow me a shot at another.” I tug at the waist of her trousers, her eyes go wide, and I find myself laughing yet again. “Do you truly still not know just how bloody irresistible you are?”
“I’ve never—no one—” she stutters, and I catch a hint of pink staining her lovely cheeks.
“Never?” I ask softly.
She shakes her head.
“Excellent. You’ll not know if I screw up.”
I do so love making this woman laugh. “I listen to a lot of books,” she warns me. “I think I’ll know.”
“Ah, a challenge. Shall we put a wager on it?” I’m tugging her jeans, and she’s helping me, pulling them down her perfectly curvaceous thighs and knobby knees, revealing pink satin hiding that pussy I intend to worship until the sun comes up.
“What kind of wager?”
“If I should fail and you not notice,” I say, pausing to stroke the toned muscle from her knee to her hip and enjoying the pebble of gooseflesh rising beneath my touch, “then I shall owe you three more climaxes and a bubble bath.”