The Reluctant King (The Star-Crossed Series)

by Rachel Higginson

  And it wasn’t fair…. because I had set out to prove to her that she was mine, but now that I was doing exactly that I suddenly wanted to make sure I was hers. I wanted to confirm that her feelings were as strong as mine and that all this kissing stuff was Ok with her.

  And mostly that there would be a lot more of it in my future.

  It was kind of annoying, since I could have happily kissed her until the end of time. And now I had to talk about feelings when there was a real possibility she could still reject me.

  Damn it.

  I slowed the kiss down, detangling my mouth from her and ending it by a simple peck on her perfect lips. I was rewarded with her stretching up to meet my lips for one last lingering kiss.

  That meant something right?

  I looked down at her, memorizing her face, the beautiful lines of her jaw, the sexy pout to her lips, the depth and wholeness of her eyes. She wasn’t going to speak first, I knew that, but at the same time I felt like I had lost the ability to verbalize any kind of coherent thought. I wouldn’t survive rejection and even though the last, however long it was, tried to speak up inside my head and remind me she kissed me back, I couldn’t get over the fear that she would come to her senses and realize she didn’t like me and never would.

  “Hey,” I finally sighed, smiling down at her.

  “Hey,” she smiled back. She lifted her fingers and brushed my hair out of my face and my whole being sighed with the movement.

  I nuzzled into the crook of her neck, hating the inches of separation between us. She giggled and squirmed as my breath tickled her skin but I just pulled her closer to me so that we were both lying on our sides facing each other. She was cradled in my arms.

  This was the most perfect moment of my entire life.

  A mixture of the fear that was still crippling me and a deliciously hazy fog from her kisses prevented me from speaking. She had to be the first one to break this second silence. “So you kissed me?” she asked as if she were confused on the details of the last few hours.

  “Is that Ok?” I tested taking liberty by kissing the side of her mouth and then her jawline and then her ear. I wanted to remind her that even if her brain told her it wasn’t Ok, her body was clearly in agreement.

  “Uh, huh,” she murmured. She leaned into my lips and then stretched her neck to give me better access. “It’s Ok.”

  “Good,” I laughed, my voice raspy and low. “Because I plan on doing a lot more of this.”

  Her fingers wandered down to my side and slipped beneath my shirt. She made trails of gentle lines up and down my bare skin making me quiver.

  Damn it, she made me quiver. What girl had that kind of power?

  “You do?” she sounded so innocently confused I paused from paying her neck such reverential attention and propped my head up on my hand to stare down into her gorgeous eyes.

  “Mmm,” I nodded my head slowly, holding her gaze with the intensity of mine. “I don’t play games very well Amelia. I conquer things. So we are done with this game. I might not have conquered you yet,” I waggled my eyebrows trying to lighten the situation. She slapped me on the arm. “But I do plan on taking this very seriously…. I plan on taking you very seriously.”

  “Avalon, you can’t seriously mean you want to date me,” Amelia laughed incredulously and tried to wiggle out from underneath my arms.

  I wasn’t having that. I tightened my hold on her and laid her back on the bed so that I could partly hold her down, but mostly so I could draw her back into kissing me.

  “That’s exactly what I mean,” I whispered.

  I kissed the side of her mouth to tease her and I was rewarded when her lips turned into mine immediately, like she couldn’t stop herself from kissing me…. like she was as addicted to me as I was to her.

  “But you don’t date,” she said against my lips in a breathy voice that had me pressing closer to her despite her argument.

  “I do now,” I growled, deepening our kiss. Her mouth opened to mine and I extended the kiss meeting her tongue and swallowing her gentle moan.

  “Wait, wait,” she panted, out of breath, her fingers pressed gently against my chest.

  I obeyed, but dropped my head against her shoulder in a resigned sigh.

  “Amelia,” I said sternly, lifting my eyes to meet hers. “I haven’t dated before because there was no point. There was no girl that could hold my attention for more than five minutes, let alone trap me inside this never ending tornado of emotions and anxiety and…. want.”

  She raised her eyebrows in surprise, but then lowered them into a scowl. “I’m not just a conquest Avalon. I am not a war you can win.”

  I laughed at her fierce anger and her scowl turned into a hateful glare. “Believe me when I promise you I have never thought of you that way! If anything, you have waged a war against me and won.”

  Her expression softened infinitesimally. “What do you mean?” she squeaked.

  “Ever since you arrived at the Citadel Amelia, I have not been able to stop thinking about you. My mind is usually a constant whir of activity, but never before has it been because of a woman. And yet my thoughts are consumed with unanswered questions about you…. What are you doing? What are you thinking about? Who are you talking to? What your lips will feel like against mine? Which even my wildest imagination never did them justice by the way…. complete perfection.” She blushed beneath me and my confidence grew exponentially. “Do you feel the same way about me? Am I even a blip on your radar? What will happen when I ask you to be my girlfriend? And ever since I found out Eden was pregnant, I can’t seem to stop myself from asking questions about what our children will look like.”

  “Eden’s pregnant?” she gasped and then her face blushed to the most beautiful deep red. “Our children? Girlfriend?”

  She yelped her questions. I smiled down at her, but inside I was a crumbling ball of anxiety.

  “Mmm,” I settled on paying more attention to the soft skin of her neck, rather than stay for a minute more under her scrutiny. “I want you to be my girlfriend, Amelia. I want you to consider what that means for you, what forever would look like with me.”

  “Avalon,” she pushed me away so that I was forced to meet her eyes again. “Are you serious? You really like me?”

  “Amelia, I more than like you,” I admitted. “I will wait until you’re ready to hear exactly how I feel about you, but you need to know that I have only ever planned to make this decision once. Forever is a long, endless time. And I want you to be sure before you give me any kind of answer.”

  Well, that’s what I said. I stayed diplomatic about the whole thing. But what I meant was that she needed to say yes so that I didn’t completely implode into tiny bits of nothing in a future that didn’t exist without her.

  She was silent for a while, but she held my eyes tangled in her serious gaze. She was searching for something, something like the truth and I wasn’t about to back down to her. She had the truth, I had just laid everything out to her and I would prove it no matter how long it took.

  “I have a crush on you,” she blurted in her adorable English accent and then covered her mouth quickly with her hand.

  “What?” I asked, completely confused.

  She laughed then, shaking beneath me in her fit of giggles. A tear ran from the corner of her eye as she dissolved into more laughter. I smiled down at her and caught the stray teardrop on my pointer finger.

  “What is so funny?” I demanded but I couldn’t help but laugh along with her.

  “I have a crush on you,” she gasped and then settled her laughter. “I’ve had a crush on you, Avalon for…. for forever. At Eden and Kiran’s wedding I fell head over heels for the new King.”

  “Are you serious?” I demanded, my voice gruffer than I intended. But after all this confusion, after she made me chase her like a madman, she had a crush on me the whole time!

  “You were all recklessness and trouble and I was just so young back then,” she pouted
, reaching her hands up to smooth the lines of my collar. “You didn’t even look twice at me. And here I’ve been pining after a man that didn’t even know I existed for years.”

  “You’ve liked me this whole time?” I clarified incredulously.

  She nodded, biting her bottom lip again as if she were afraid I was mad at her.

  “Jericho? Titus?” I asked still grumpy with her for not falling immediately into my arms and declaring her undying love for me from day one.

  “Attempts at finding something else…. anything else to protect myself from you,” she admitted with a casual shrug of her shoulder.

  “What do you mean?” I demanded.

  “After Eden’s wedding I was crushed. I mean, as crushed as my young heart could imagine. I really thought you would notice me and fall as immediately in love with me as I had you. But you didn’t. You didn’t even spare two glances my way. So I decided to forget completely about you. You and your cocky attitude and devilishly handsome good looks.”

  Her flattery pacified my frustration with her stubbornness and I allowed her a small, tiny, miniscule smile. She pinched my cheek in response.

  “But I didn’t forget about you, I couldn’t forget about you.” She continued. “So I decided to just avoid you at all costs and hope that someone else caught my attention even half as much as you had. But then as soon as I walked into the castle, there you were. And worse you were staring at me like you were a man dying in the desert and I was the first drop of water you had seen in years. And I wanted to run from you and every feeling I felt and was convinced you didn’t.”

  “But, but…. but…. Then I pursued you,” I argued, still confused.

  “And I was convinced it was just because I had grown up and finally caught your attention. I heard all about the girls that you went through. I didn’t think I could take being just one of your conquests,” she admitted in the sweetest, most unsure voice ever. “I was protecting myself.”

  I couldn’t think verbally. I didn’t want to think verbally. I crushed my lips to hers, taking her mouth in the most passionate kiss I was capable of. My hands slipped beneath her thin t-shirt but stayed planted on the soft skin of her waist. My mouth moved against hers in aggressive possession and I tangled our tongues together like she said, like I was a man dying of thirst and she was the drink of water that would save my life.

  I slowed down into soft, gentle, loving…. that’s right…. loving kisses, pouring my emotions into her like now I was the water and she was the glass. She responded. I wanted to shout that. She responded! She kissed me back with the same emotion plunging into me, drowning me and I would happily give up air and breathe only her until my last, final breath.

  “Why were you protecting yourself?” I breathed against her lips.

  I didn’t want to stop kissing her, but I had to. I had to get to the base of our feelings for each other so we could do this…. live the rest of this together.

  “I didn’t want to get hurt,” she admitted shyly. “My feelings for you were too deep.”

  “But it didn’t work,” I tried to make my statement into a question, but my determination made me say it in a way that could make her believe it was true.

  “No, it didn’t work,” she shook her head and held my eyes tangled in her gaze.

  “I’m glad it didn’t work,” I smiled at her, lifting her hand from my shoulder and kissing her knuckles.

  “I’m sure you are,” she laughed at my arrogance.

  “Do you need to think about this…. us?” I forced the words out of my mouth but they felt heavy and vile on my tongue. Her eyebrows pinched together in confusion and I knew I had to explain. I thought these words would be hard for me, that they would come out unsure and anxious, but as I prepared myself to explain I realized this was one of the easiest speeches I would ever make. “Do you remember saying that whoever I asked to be with me would have to live forever too? You made it sound like a burden, like living with me forever was an impossible thing to ask of someone.” She opened her mouth to protest, so I silenced her with a quick kiss. “You were right. Asking someone to be with me is a huge request. Not only am I asking you to be Queen, and give up whatever life you are leading now, I’m asking you to take on my magic and live with me…. be with me for potentially ever.” I laughed at the irony of my love. “You see, when I say I want to be with you forever, I literally mean…. forever.”

  Her eyes danced at my joke. She brushed her fingers across my forehead, pushing my hair out of my face. “It is a lot to ask. Do you think I’ll get tired of you?” she asked seriously, but the light in her face let me know she was joking.

  “I’m serious,” I pouted. And then more seriously, “Amelia you can walk away from me as soon as you can’t stand me anymore, but I would like to try. I would like you to be with me for as long as you can stand me.”

  “And how long will you be able to stand me?” she asked. A flash of fear crossed her expression.

  I dipped my head closer to her so that I was ready to swoop in and kiss the uncertainty away from her as soon as she would let me. “Always,” I whispered.

  “Always?”

  “Always,” I confirmed.

  She nodded her head then, her eyes filling with unshed tears. I stared down into her beautiful, perfect face and waited. But then her lips quirked into a small smile and her fear was replaced with unwavering certainty and she nodded again.

  “Ok, Avalon,” she whispered. “I want to try too.” And then her fingers tightened on my collar and she pulled me into the most perfect kiss of my life.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Hours later, after the hottest makeout session of my life, Amelia laid cuddled up in my arms. There was a word floating around in my head that I wanted to share with her, but I was afraid that I would scare her. She had just admitted to “try” this out, not to marry me and definitely not to live by my side for the foreseeable and future forever.

  Although technically that’s all I had asked of her.

  But her, tucked into my side, tracing lazy circles on my bicep with her delicate fingers had cemented into my mind exactly what I wanted and it was a whole hell of a lot more than a trial run.

  Not that I wanted much.

  I mean, only everything.

  Except I talked myself out of asking her for it and offering her my everything in return.

  Well, for right now.

  I had to prove to her that I was serious and that she wouldn’t be just another set up that I would get bored of. Hell, I could never get bored of her. I could never give her up. And even the idea of her deciding she wasn’t into us was hard to swallow. I couldn’t even think it without pulling her closer to me as if my physical proximity to her would keep her from thinking those thoughts.

  “You need to throw Lilly and Talbott an engagement party,” Amelia announced casually.

  “What?” I laughed at her subject change after the thoughts that had been rolling around in my head.

  “You do!” she defended her position.

  “That’s what Eden’s for,” I explained as if she forgot I had a sister and a co-ruler to do that kind of dirty work.

  “Yes, but everyone will expect that because Eden is her best friend,” Amelia argued.

  “Exactly.”

  “No, wait. This is everything you want. Talbott and Lilly will change everything for our people, they will break the invisible barrier keeping others from doing the same,” Amelia explained gently.

  “I know all this,” I smiled down at her. She was adorable when she was trying to prove a point.

  “Ok, good. Then you should also know that our people don’t think of Eden as their Queen. I mean, they do. They know that she’s the Queen. But they think of you as the King that makes all of the important decisions and runs things. Eden and Kiran have basically been on vacation for the last several years. You have been behind the wheel of the machine and the people associate you with the actual power of the Kingship.” I opened my mouth
to argue, but she shushed me by placing one of her irresistible fingers over my lips. “If you really want their marriage to make an impact then you have to be the one to endorse their union. You already let Kiran announce their engagement when it would have been much more profound coming from you. If you want real change then you’re going to have to buck up and play benevolent King.”

  She giggled when I chomped down playfully on the finger that had silenced me. “Are you always this good at diplomacy?” I pounced on top of her, loving that her point made sense. I tickled her sides so that she squirmed and writhed underneath me. It wasn’t the easiest thing for me to admit that I was wrong and even more so that someone else could be right…. but somehow the fact that Amelia had her head wrapped around this whole….. Monarchy thing, made me fall for her all the more.

  “It’s easy to be good when you’re so bad at it,” she giggled, gasping in between words while I attacked her relentlessly.

  She wiggled her arms from underneath me and pulled me down to her mouth with her hands tightly on my collar. It was a move I was very quickly becoming fond of.

  “Mmmm,” I murmured against her, trailing kisses along her jaw and ear. “You’re so unbelievably sexy.”

  “That reminds me,” she declared in a tone that was not so much sexy but attention grabbing. I lifted my head reluctantly from her soft skin to look her in the eyes. “While we’re on the subject of diplomacy….”

  “We’re not on the subject of diplomacy,” I argued, dipping my head back to pay her neck some much needed attention while she let out a soft sigh of approval. “We moved on to a new subject.”

  She laughed and her chest moved against mine. “Have you thought about filling the rest of the Kingdom in on Terletov?”

  “Mood killer,” I moaned grumpily and plopped back down next to her. I lied though. Even Terletov could not stop me from wanting this girl. I pulled her close to me and thought over her words. “I’ve thought about it.”