Page 41 of The Prince and His Stolen Groom
“Personally, no,” he replied with a simple shrug. He looped his finger through the collar and held it up. “What about this?”
I blushed and grabbed for it, but he leaned backwards, holding it out of my reach. I caught myself with a hand on the bed before almost falling on top of him, then cursed my own reflexes. Straightening up, I replied primly, “Not everything is magical.”
He gave me a slightly evil smile at that non-answer. “Can I see you with it on?”
My lips parted in shock. Did he really want to … with me? I flashed back to him using the ropes against me, trying to escape. Was this just another escape attempt? Maybe he genuinely hadn’t seen the door standing open, and he thought the only way to get out of the tower was to seduce me.
And gods dammit, I was so tempted to let him.
But even more than that, I wanted it to bereal. It couldn’t be as long as he thought he was my prisoner. “You can go,” I blurted out.
His brow furrowed. “What?”
I stood and gathered up an armful of toys and tools, focusing hard on the task. “Since marriage is the only solution, there’s no real reason to keep you in the tower anymore.” I dumped stuff into the trunk without bothering to organize anything. “You can go back to the castle, switch places with Kit, and marry—” I choked on the rest of the sentence.
Brendon grabbed my arm and turned me around to face him. I stared down at the floor rather than at him. “You’re sure?” he demanded. “You don’t want to stall a little longer? Maybe the wizard isn’t the only one who could help.”
I sighed and carefully extracted myself from his grip. Sitting on the bed, I looked down at my tightly clasped hands. “We don’t have time. I got bit by an imp in the marketplace the other day—”
“Is that what happened?”
Confused, I looked up at him. “What?”
He hesitated for a moment, then said, “You looked sick the other day. And then there’s the—” He drew a circle in the air around my face.
Fuck, I’d forgotten about the rash. He’d been nice enough not to bring it up until now. “That was unrelated.” He didn’t need to know about the love potion. We were talking about evil mages, not whatever weirdo had drugged my tea. “Anyway, on top of the imp, a friend of mine said a mage was seen in town. If the protection spell is already degrading, we don’t have time to find another solution. It’s marriage, or let the kingdoms fall to evil.”
“I see.” Brendon stepped toward the door, eyes still locked on me. “So, you want me to leave and marry”—there was a long pause—“Francesca?”
God, I couldnotimagine him and Franny together. Between her growing affection for Kit, and my growing … whatever for Brendon, that was literally the worst possible outcome. “I—”
“Yes?”
“I don’t want—”
He took a step forward, his eyebrow rising in inquiry.
“To make any decisions for you.”
A soft smile touched his lips. “That’s certainly a change of pace.”
I put my head in my hands and groaned, “I know. I’m sorry. I fucked everything up.”
“That’s not what I—”
“Can you just go please? I want to clean the rest of this up, but you shouldn’t hang around here any longer.”
Another long silence followed, and then the soft sound of footsteps walking downstairs.
I sighed in relief even as my gut clenched in despair.
Picking up everything else, I began cleaning up the room. I still had a candle and one of the paddles in hand when a loud yelp startled me, followed by Brendon shouting, “What the fuck?”
Chapter Eighteen
I ran down the stairs, brandishing an unlit candle and paddle like a sword and shield. A green, thorny vine squirmed its way through the open door. “Light.” Flame flickered onto the candle’s wick. Even though they were low-heat candles, when I held it to the vine, it reeled back from the flame. But it was too green and alive to catch fire.
Holding the paddle in a guard position before me, I jumped over the vine and ran outside. Brendon was still cursing up a storm—for good fucking reason. Sometime while we’d been talking, the forest had erupted into a tangled bramble. More vines twisted around Brendon, climbing up his legs and torso.
