Page 42 of Royal Rebel

“I’ve known exactly what I was supposed to do for most of my life. At an early age, I realized I was going to be yours.” I run my hand down his neck. “Each time you’d come to our house, I’d watch you, wondering what it would be like when I was with you every day.” I smile, feeling protective pride as I look at him. “It’s far exceeded my expectations, Tris.”

He makes a noise in his throat, and I wait to see if I’ve woken him up. When he doesn’t make any more noises and I know he hasn’t come out of sleep yet, I continue lightly stroking his neck, needing to get out everything on my heart.

“I’m gonna be honest though, when I was told you hadn’t found anyone on your own, and I would be expected to marry you, I got scared. Scared that I wouldn’t be enough, scared that you wouldn’t be enough. If I’m honest, I was more afraid of you not being enough. As a kid, I wanted to be a princess.” I laugh lightly, thinking about my dreams. Cinderella was a loved story in my home, and I wondered all the time what it would be like to have someone love me enough to look everywhere with a shoe. Now, I realize how crazy that is, but back then? It was my dream! “Don’t we all? But I had plans about how I wanted my life to go, about what I expected from the person I would spend the rest of my days with.”

“I had plans too.” His deep voice surprises me so much I jump slightly. His arms tighten around me, keeping me right next to him. I don’t mind, after all, it’s become my favorite place to be in the last few weeks. “I planned to never let anyone force me to do something I didn’t want to do. I watched my mom…” He stops for a second, clearing his throat. He’s reliving something, and I want to know what it is, but at the same time, I don’t want to pressure him. What he tells me absolutely has to be on his own time. “Watched this life take everything out of her.”

“Take everything out of her?” I question, because I’ve never heard anyone say this before. From everything I saw she was loved by our country, and had a life most only ever dream about. But I’m also learning, not everything is as it seems.

He sits up against the headboard, pulling the sheet and blankets around his trim waist. I grab the blanket, securing it around my chest, before moving up to sit beside him. There’s an energy vibrating from him, one I’m not sure I’ve ever seen him have before. He scrubs his palms up and down on his face before shoving them through his hair.

“She was done.” He tilts his head back against the headboard. “She loved me and my dad, but she was done with this life. She hated it. She hated not being able to go out where she wanted to. The press made her anxious and she hated always having security with her. It was smothering her.” He shakes his head. “It was like she’d been this flame who burned so bright, and the oxygen feeding it was going away, dwindling to nothing. It was burning out, and there was nothing that was going to breathe air back into it. She was sick of being smothered. She wanted to live free and wild. The night of her accident, her and my dad had the biggest fight I’d ever heard them have.” He stops again and I can see the pain in his eyes. I’m wondering what he’s thinking, which spaces of time he’s reliving. “She left, running out to her SUV. I hopped in because I didn’t want her to be alone. I remember her telling me to leave, but I wouldn’t. She finally accepted I was going to be there with her. Together, we sped away while my father ran down the drive after us.She didn’t want it, though. She’d listened to promises he made, and he’d broken one too many.” He looks over at me.

“Why was she done?” I don’t remember everything about Tristan’s mother. She died when I was younger, and while we mourned as a country, I was too young to realize what exactly was happening.

“My mother,” he whispers almost reverently, “was gorgeous. Everyone worshipped her, especially me and Dad. She had this way about her, where she could look at you and make you think you were the only person in the room. She made everyone feel not only special, but heard. So many people assumed the monarchy wasn’t listening to them, but they truly believed she was. She was amazing, a mother to every single person in this country.”

“I remember.” I smile fondly. “Her being the queen of the people.”

“She was,” he agrees. “Everything she did was because she wanted to be a good role model, the best mother, and the type of leader others would want to follow.”

“What happened the night she died?”

This is something I’ve never asked anyone. It was in the tabloids when I was younger, but I could never bring myself to pick one up and satisfy my curiosity. It seemed wrong in every single way. There were videos, but I couldn’t watch them. Especially when I was clued into the fact I would be marrying Tristan, it felt wrong. All of it felt wrong.

He cracks his knuckles, something I’ve never heard him do before, and I wonder if that’s a nervous gesture I have yet to be privy to.

“Like I said, they argued, and I’m still not sure about what. I think…” He swallows roughly. His eyes cloud with hurt as he remembers a time I think he would much rather forget, but there are some things in life we’re never able to forget. The things that follow us into the depths of our subconscious. They leave a mark that we’re never able to erase, and I have a feeling this is one of the things Tristan will never be able to forget. “I think it was about me. About this.” He gestures between the two of us. “There are certain snippets of conversation I can remember, and it fits, that it would be about what’s happening between us right now. Even though she and Dad loved each other, she resented having an arranged marriage and she wanted better for me. She wanted me to meet the woman of my dreams, fall in love, marry, and give her a castle full of kids. She used to tell me that was her biggest wish for me.”

“Would she have hated me because I wasn’t your choice?” I ask quietly. It will kill me, but I want the truth.

“No.” He shakes his head, a smile breaking across his face. “She would have loved you as much as I do.” He reaches over, pushing the hair out of my face.

Immediately I smile. The little trip in my chest when he says he loves me will forever be my undoing. It’s still weird to hear him say that he loves me. I never expected it, so hearing it is always a little bit like me pinching myself to make sure I’m still awake and not in a dream.

“You think so?”

“Oh yeah.” He pulls his full bottom lip between his teeth. The dark beard on his face makes the white color of his teeth, even lighter. “You remind me a lot of her. She wasn’t exactly sure about being a queen, knew the things she would have to do would be hard, and wanted more than anything to make a difference. I see you.” He grabs hold of my hand, pulling it up to his lips. “I see you and I worry that you’ll end up being like her, which is why I hold a piece ofmyself away from you. If I don’t share that piece, then I won’t get hurt.”

I disagree. “If you hide that piece of yourself, then you’re not allowing me to love the entire you, Tris. I want it all, every single bit of you. I’m willing to give you every bit of me.” I straddle his waist, forcing his eyes to meet mine. “I want every bit of you.”

CHAPTER 25

AMELIA

Looking around the room, I let the smile I’ve been holding in, out. It’s been hard to do this without Shannon knowing, considering the two of us are together for hours most days.

“It looks great in here,” my mother says, coming up behind me.

“Hey.” I reach in, giving her a hug. “I didn’t know you, Dad, and Thomas had made it.” I’ve not seen them since before Tristan’s birthday.

Seeing them now, while good, is almost odd. At one time my home was with them, I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else. Over the course of the last few months, that’s changed. Home isn’t the house or the bedroom I grew up in. It isn’t the kitchen I came down to every morning to share bacon and eggs with my dad. Home has become where Tristan is. Over the course of this time together, he’s become my home.

It hits me like a ton of bricks, and I’m shocked. Shockedthat I haven’t realized it before. I should have, but as I hug my mom, I realize they now don’t know me as well as Tristan does.

She hugs me back tightly. “Just a few minutes ago. Parker let us in.”

“Is he watching everyone who comes in, like they could rob us of the silver?” I joke, giggling with her.

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