The Wild Heir(94)

So, so, lucky.

“Now,” the Bishop says with a smile, addressing the crowd, “if anyone should know of a reason why these two should not be married in holy matrimony, speak now or forever hold your peace.”

Normally no one ever pays attention to this part of the wedding.

But now these words have weight, a weight that I know both Magnus and I are feeling at this very moment, a weight that could threaten to undo everything we’ve worked hard for.

My mind trips back to when I saw Heidi in the museum.

When she said this was a sham marriage.

When she said I had been invented.

How had she known that?

Was it just a guess?

Good lord, is she going to say something?

I look at Magnus, trying to hide the fear in my eyes, but he picks up on it. As subtly as we can, we both look over at Heidi in the crowd.

She’s staring right at us.

And grinning.

I don’t think it’s her blessing.

“Then, by the power vested in me,” the Bishop says, and his words bring our attention back to each other, “I now pronounce you man and wife. You may kiss the bride.”

And just like that, crazy Heidi is forgotten. She stayed silent. And now our love is speaking the loudest.

Magnus steps forward, takes my face in his hands, tells me he loves me, then places a deep, passionate, searing kiss on my mouth, the kind that I’ll never, ever forget.

Everyone starts applauding and cheering, but I don’t hear it.

I only hear his heartbeat and mine.



The fact that we did it, that we made it, that we’re married, doesn’t actually hit me until later, after we get in the horse-drawn carriage and are paraded around the snow-covered cobblestone streets, bundled up with faux furs, waving to everyone as we pass.

It all hits me when Magnus and I are standing on the palace balcony in front of the palace square and waving at the thousands and thousands of citizens, tourists and well-wishers who have gathered below.

With bands playing and champagne corks popping and cannons firing and a whole nation celebrating, that’s when I realize that I’m Magnus’s wife.

The Crown Princess of Norway.

Eternally his.

I turn to him and pull him toward me, kissing him hard, the crowd going wild.

But it’s not for them.

It’s for him.

“My husband,” I whisper to him as I pull away.

“My wife,” he whispers back.





Twenty-One





Ella





“Do we really have to go home?” I whine.

I never thought I’d be much of a whiner and I hate the fact that I’ve only been a wife for a few weeks before I started but the truth is…

I really don’t want to go home.

Right now, it’s cold and snowbound in Norway, and here on a yacht anchored off Tenerife in the Canary Islands, it’s warm and sunny and majestic.

Granted, this honeymoon might feel especially warranted as it was a bit delayed. After our wedding, it was just a few days before Christmas, which meant a lot of time spent with the new family between our estate and the royal palace while we celebrated the holidays.

Now, it’s finally January and everything is off to a fresh start.

Helps that my royally hot prince of a husband has been lounging around on the deck beside me in next to nothing, his skin all oiled and glistening from the sun.

God, I love this man.

I love how much closer we’ve gotten since we’ve gotten married. It’s like we finally passed the test and now we can just relax with each other and enjoy the relationship we cultivated for ourselves instead of the one the public knows about.

It doesn’t even bother me anymore how we started out. The way I look at it, it’s just the way that we met—in an extremely unconventional way. Maybe it’s not the way everyone knows, but it’s our way and it’s still valid. What counts is how we feel for each other now.

And what I’m feeling at this moment, is well, kind of frisky.

Magnus is lying on his back, a towel covering his face from the sun, his body on full display. As we’ve been stationed on the yacht, there hasn’t been any paparazzi around. I think it’s because the actual royal yacht is currently sitting off the coast of Greece with Cristina and her boyfriend who, at a far away glance, resembles me and Magnus. They’re the perfect decoy and it’s worked for our entire honeymoon, giving us all the much-needed privacy in the world.

And it’s needed. Just lying here and staring at my husband in all his sculpted, muscled, sun-kissed glory, I have a hard time keeping my hands to myself.

I move on over, sidling up to him.

“Magnus,” I whisper so that I don’t surprise him.

“Mmmm?” he asks lazily from under the towel.

I place my fingers on the hard, taut planes of his chest and slowly, teasingly run them down until they’re skimming over his rigid abs, the oils from his suntan lotion making his skin slick.

“Do you want to go for a swim?” I ask, my voice throaty, craving him. I think marriage and this sunshine is a lethal combination.

He clears his throat. “I guess I am burning up.”

My hand goes lower, sliding over the bulge of his swim shorts and I can feel his dick twitch, growing harder under my palm.