Page 120 of American King (New Camelot Trilogy 3)
“It was all necessary, Greer. Every moment of it. And I’m happy to say that this time I got it right.”
“Got what right?” I whisper, looking up at him.
He smiles kindly and sits next to me, glancing meaningfully at my belly, at the hand that curls protectively over it, where Ash’s ring winks in the scarlet and orange light. “There is a happy ending this time. Last time, you and Embry chose the memory of Ash’s grave over each other, and last time, there was no child of Ash’s body inside you.”
This provokes the first real flash of feeling from me other than shock. My heart flutters in my chest to match the hard flutters in my stomach. “The baby is Ash’s?”
“Yes.”
My eyelids burn and I look away. Embry and I had decided not to do a paternity test because we knew it didn’t matter to our future—in another, better life, I would have carried both their children regardless—but still, I had wondered. Wished for this one last piece of him.
Merlin is still smiling, his eyes on the lake now. “There’s so much ahead of you.”
The sun finally drops below the mountains, kissing everything green and gold and foggy, and I decide to believe him. I decide to push away how impossible it all is, how thoroughly surreal, and just accept what the quiet water and Merlin’s dark eyes already seem to know.
“Another eight years in the White House?” I ask, looking at the lake too. “More children?”
“More children for sure. Too many, some might say,” he chuckles. “But not another eight years in the White House, only four. Embry could easily win if he runs again, but he won’t want to. The next fight will fall to Morgan and Kay, and whoever wins will safeguard Maxen’s legacy just as carefully as Embry would. The future will go to Maxen’s sisters.”
“Embry won’t want a second term?” I ask, confused. “Even if it’s obvious he could win?”
“There will be something else he wants more. Which reminds me, I have your wedding gift right here.” He reaches inside his pocket, withdrawing a small envelope with long, elegant fingers.
“Shall I open it now?”
“Why not?” he says, standing up and smoothing his jacket. “It is for you and Embry both, of course. That’s how wedding gifts work.”
I open up the envelope and a key falls out. Just a plain silver key, the ordinary size and shape of a house key. It glitters orange in the fading light.
There’s a small piece of paper inside as well, with an address I don’t recognize and a string of numbers at the bottom.
“You’ll find the necessary travel plans already made,” Merlin says briskly. “And Embry’s schedule cleared for the next week and a half.”
I blink up at him. Embry and I hadn’t planned on taking a honeymoon—partly because my last honeymoon had ended with an abduction, and partly because we still didn’t have the heart to celebrate our marriage without Ash.
“You planned us a honeymoon?”
Merlin smiles but doesn’t answer, turning to walk back to Vivienne’s house.
“But why did you give us a key?” I call after him.
He pauses and looks back at me. “I only said it was a gift, Greer. I didn’t say it was from me.”
THIRTY-ONE
GREER
now
“I don’t think I’ve ever been here before,” I say the next day, peering out of the window. “Strange to think this is only an hour outside D.C. It’s like another world.”
The car noses down a curving ribbon of road, green mountains swelling prettily in the distance, the road limned with heavy old trees and punctuated with bursts of sunny fields. We’d flown in this morning and then driven toward the address in the envelope, our usual convoy of black cars snaking through the spring-green foothills to take us there. I’m looking forward to some freedom after we arrive; Merlin worked his brand of twenty-first century magic, and apparently this location is secure and outfitted with everything Embry will need to work while we honeymoon. Which means privacy similar to Camp David’s, where the agents are on the perimeter and we are free and mostly alone within.
Thank God.
We come to a large gate, tall, simple, and strong, and the string of numbers at the bottom of Merlin’s paper sends the gates swinging silently inward. We turn onto a narrow drive, lined with even more trees and low pasture fences, and crawl slowly through the tunnel of green.
“Horses,” says Embry in a strange voice. And I look at my window to see that he’s right—at least two of the pastures we drive past have horses grazing and stamping around. They’re gorgeous animals, proud and rippling with muscle, their coats sleek in the afternoon sun, and I’m so taken with them that I don’t see the moment that the drive opens up to a massive house. But Embry does and gives a sharp inhale.
