Page 33 of Vows to a King
Horrifying speculations abounded in his head, causing a sudden frightening buzz. He rubbed his temple and was about to shake her awake when her amber eyes came alert.
She jerked up into a seating position as if someone had poked her and rubbed her knuckles under her eyes. At whatever she saw in his face, she suddenly pulled the sleeping boy toward her until his head lay in her lap. The protectiveness in the gesture, as if he were a monster, infuriated Adonis and filled his head with wilder theories about the boy’s parentage that made his blood run cold.
“Your Majesty, what did you need of me?” she said, her voice husky with sleep.
Even in his horrified state, it pinged over his skin, filling him with heart-pounding awareness of what he did want with her, of her.
“The child…” he said, not even glancing down at the small face. He had a feeling it would haunt him for nights to come if his speculations were true. “Who is he?”
Jemima frowned and then sighed, as if it were no big deal for her to have a child in her bed. “I will answer that question if you didn’t ask it as if I were in an inquisition. After you so rudely disrupted my sleep.”
He gritted his jaw. “This is not the time to test me, Princess. Just answer the question.”
“I’m not one of your subjects to be dazzled by everything you say and do, Your Majesty. And I’ve had enough of you and your stunts and your…”
With gentle movements, she lay the child back against the pillows and tucked him under the duvet. She threw her legs off the bed with sudden vigor, drawing his gaze to the rucked hem of her nightgown that bared thick, toned thighs.
Adonis could no more look away from the sight of her heaving breasts and the golden cleavage they made than he could stop breathing. All he wanted was to bury his face there and not come up for air.
Coming to her feet, making sure to walk far toward the door, away from the sleeping child, she folded her arms at her middle. “Please…leave. I’m not myself.”
“Is he your son, Jemima?” Adonis whispered, feeling like a drunk fool. “Is that why you went through the elaborate plan of beseeching me to make you my queen? Is he yours and my brother’s son?”
Her head jerked toward him with such alacrity that he wouldn’t be surprised if it hurt her in the morning.
“What?” She looked horrified. Taking his face in, she sobered. “No, of course not. I told you. Adamos and I didn’t have that kind of relationship. Wow, you really think I would trick you like that?”
Air rushed into his lungs as if he had been pulled out of a drowning flood. He rubbed the heel of his palm over his eyes, relief shaking him from inside out.
A confrontation with his father had always made him needy and weak, and today had been the highlight of their miserable, nonexistent relationship. The last thing he could do was to take it out on the one innocent in all this. He turned to leave, only to be blocked by a five-foot-two queen, her arms thrown about in a dramatic fashion, her chest rising and falling. With a splash of pink washing up her ample chest and cheeks, she could drive any man to the edge and he…already dwelled there.
“Leaving without answering my question, Your Majesty?” Jemima said, the softness of sleep gone from her eyes.
“Who is he then?” Adonis asked, the blankness of relief giving way to new questions. Although, whatever her answer, it would only take another shot to bring him to his knees. Because, clearly, his freshly minted queen was attached to the boy.
Jealousy scoured his insides with its sharp, green nails, and this too was new and strange.
“My brother, Zayn. My half brother, to be precise. Apparently, my mother, beaten down by my father, took a secret lover.” She said it all by rote, as if any emotion on the topic had already been bled through. “That he isn’t my father’s son became apparent to me when he started saying he would banish Zayn to some far-off boarding school. He tries to behave like he doesn’t exist. Until he realized that I adore my brother and that he can be used as a weapon to control me. If not for Zayn,” she said, lifting her chin, resolve blazing across her face, and Adonis braced himself for free fall, for the thud and the splat of his poor heart, “I would not have begged you to marry me. I’d have run far away from you, the palace, the damned kingdom, and my father. But in the law’s eyes and the world’s, Zayn is my father’s child and he threatened to take him away from me any moment.”
Understanding dawned in Adonis, but he couldn’t find it in himself to be angry with her for hiding her true purpose. Especially when he knew the kind of neglect the boy could suffer at her father’s hands. Neglect, which would be the best he could hope for.
“He could still send your brother away if you didn’t follow his commands, couldn’t he? If you didn’t finesse me or control me or manipulate me per his wishes?”
She blanched but didn’t deny it. “I hoped as the King of Thalassos, you could order him to keep the boy with me to be brought up in the royal household, as part of this family.
“Our family.”
Adonis had to admire her strategic thinking. “You’re counting on the fact that your father would love the idea of having that continued extra connection to the royal family?”
She nodded. “Once I got to know you, it became clear that you wouldn’t begrudge an innocent boy your love and protection.”
He snorted. “Managing me yet again, Princess?”
“I dare not even think that, Your Majesty. Self-delusion isn’t my favorite vice.”
“And what is the meaning of bringing him to your suite tonight, Princess?” He cocked his head when she blushed, although certain other parts of him also started saluting her. “I imagine there’s a statement you’re trying to make but I’m not sure I see it. Given you have kept a huge secret from me.”
“I am angry with you,” she stated easily, shedding the reserved entreaty for blazing fury. And Adonis wondered, yet again, how easily she gave him her trust, the intimacy of sharing her emotions. “For a host of things I couldn’t even begin to talk about. And I have no wish to share a bed with you tonight.”
