Royally Chained (Crowned Book 1)

by Rebel Fox

  He was the one who said he wanted a fertile woman for his wife. But that was as a business arrangement and nothing more. That’s not a situation I could ever be happy in. I need more. And I don’t have any intentions of forcing it from him by revealing the truth.

  “Would you like to dance?” Aleks asks.

  I look down at my heels. “I would love to, but honestly my feet are killing me.”

  He smiles. “It’s okay. That gives us an excuse to leave. I think we’ve done our part.”

  I take the arm he offers me, and we make our way to the exit, retrieving our coats from the coat check.

  “Be prepared for another round of photos,” Aleks chuckles. “They try to catch you after you’ve had a few too many.”

  “Sounds like you know from personal experience,” I laugh.

  We walk arm in arm out the front doors, and the madness begins all over again. The flashes are blinding, and the questions are many of the same that I heard on the way in. But this time, there is one man in the crowd waiting for us near the car. He doesn’t seem to be in any hurry to ask his questions, and I don’t think much of it at first.

  Charles opens the door for us and Aleks gestures me inside, but before I can climb in, a voice from behind stops me.

  “Ella, how far along are you in the pregnancy and is the baby Aleksandrs?”

  Everything that happens next happens in slow motion. I don’t know how to stop it. I don’t even know how it’s happening. I turn to the lone man waiting there with his camera. My first instinct is to deny it, but he doesn’t give me a chance.

  “These photos of you at the doctor’s office just went live, and a source confirmed it.”

  I look to Aleks, and there are so many questions in his eyes. But that isn’t all. There is anger and betrayal and confusion.

  “You’re pregnant?”

  “I think this is a conversation to have inside the car,” Charles suggests carefully.

  Agreeing, I get inside and Aleks follows, but he maintains his distance by staying on the other side of the bench seat. And as soon as the door closes behind us, he begins demanding his answers.

  “Is it true?”

  “Yes.” I swallow, and my eyes burn with tears.

  “You didn’t think it was important to tell me that?” he growls. “You didn’t think to warn me before the whole world found out?”

  “I don’t know how they found out,” I insist.

  He looks like he doesn’t believe me, and that’s what hurts the most. Or at least I think it is. Until his next question.

  “Is it mine?”

  “Of course, it’s yours.” I glower. “Who the hell else have I been with? You were my… first.”

  The last word comes out on a whisper, and before I can control it, the tears start to stream down my face. This night has been a disaster.

  “I don’t understand why you wouldn’t tell me,” Aleks presses. “You had the morning after pill. How do I know you didn’t take it? How do I believe any of what you’re telling me?”

  I look up at him, and the pieces that have been so jumbled finally start to fall into place.

  “Is that what this is about? Is that why you set the pill on the nightstand before you left?”

  “Of course it is,” he says. “Why would you have it unless you planned on taking it?”

  “It was in case of an emergency. You never know what’s going to happen. I wanted to be prepared.”

  “And yet you didn’t argue when I fucked you without a condom?” he contends.

  My cheeks heat when I glance to the front, but I’m relieved to find that Charles had the privacy screen lifted at some point after he entered the car.

  “You were the one who insisted on taking me,” I say. “You wanted a baby. I didn’t think it was going to happen with me. I just… you really hurt me when you left the way you did, and I don’t know why, but the thought of taking that pill… it made me feel dirty. Ashamed. I didn’t want to feel that way. You were my first. It was the best night of my life, and you just abandoned me.”

  Sobs wrack my body and I turn away from him, trying in vain to dab the mascara leaking away from my eyes. I’m humiliated and confused, and I don’t know what else to do.

  “I just want to go home,” I murmur. “Please take me home.”

  A full minute of silence passes before I hear the click of a seatbelt. The seat dips as Aleks slides beside me, pressing his front to my back and wrapping his arm around my waist.

  “Look at me.”

  I shake my head, loose curls falling out of the updo I worked so hard on this evening.

  “Ella, please.”

  His voice is tender, but I am terrified to look at him. I don’t know what I will find if I do.

  Strong fingers come up to caress my cheek, gently turning my chin back towards him. I squeeze my eyes shut, and warm lips come to rest on mine, kissing me gently.

  “Ella,” he murmurs. “Please look at me.”

  Against my mind’s protests, I look at him. And when I find a sea of calm in his eyes, I know instantly that it’s exactly what I need right now.

  “You are mine,” he whispers. “Do you know that?”

  I shake my head, sniffling.

  “You have been mine since the moment I first took you. I have been under a spell that I haven’t been able to break, and it’s frustrated the hell out of me.”

  “Why?” I ask.

  “You are the first woman who saw me for me. You didn’t know who I was. You didn’t care. None of that mattered to you. But it was more than that. You enchanted me. I never wanted to hurt you, but I didn’t want to believe it was real. It felt like it couldn’t possibly be real.”

  “So that’s why you left me?”

  He nods, regret filling his eyes.

  “It was real,” I insist.

  “I know.” He pulls me closer. “And now you’re having my baby. It’s terrifying, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t the happiest man on earth right now.”

  “You are?” I examine his face for any traces of doubt, but I can’t find them.

  “Ella, there isn’t anyone else on this planet more suited to me than you are. I want your every touch. Your kiss. Your orgasms. Your happiness. Your tears. I want them all. And more than anything, I want you to be my wife.”

  “Wife?” I squeak.

  A thrill shoots through me at the thought of it. The thought of loving this man for the rest of my life. And I know that more than anything, this is what I want too. He is so much more than the Prince of Brighton. He is the King of my heart.

  “Will you?” he asks. “Will you be mine for the rest of our lives?”

  “Aleks,” I whisper. “You just have to promise me one thing.”

  “What is it?”

  “You have to promise to trust me,” I assert. “No more doubts. No more walls. If we are going to make this work, we need to break down any barriers that might come up.”

  “I know,” he tells me. “You have my word, Ella. I will do whatever it takes to make this work with you.”

  His hands reach for mine. “I guess I didn’t really do this properly, did I? You should have a ring. We will find you one tomorrow. Anything that you want.”

  “Even if it costs five dollars?” I joke.

  He smirks. “My wife is not wearing a five-dollar ring, Ella.”

  His wife.

  I still can’t believe it. It sounds so surreal. But when I look into his eyes, I know that this is the crazy ride I want.

  Sometimes the only thing you can do is take a leap of faith.

  Epilogue

  Ella

  “Hey,” Aleks murmurs, his nose dragging against my throat.

  “Hey yourself,” I say sleepily.

  “Still tired?”

  He peppers my neck with kisses and I smile.

  “Yes. It’s exhausting chasing around a two-year-old all day.”

  “Well lucky for us Aunt Emily and Winston took her out for
ice cream.”

  I open my eyes and look up at him. “They did? That’s like the third time this week.”

  A smile plays across his lips. “I think Aunt Emily has more babies on the brain.”

  I laugh at the notion, but also because we’ve become so used to referring to each other as mommy or daddy or aunt Emily that almost nobody goes by their adult names anymore.

  They say it takes a village to raise a child, and I’m lucky to have one of the best villages there ever was. Aleks amazes me every day with his kindness and patience as a father. He might be royalty with an enormous amount of pressure on his shoulders, but his family always come first.

  It caused quite a scandal when we had a shotgun wedding and then baby Elena was born six months later. But as it turned out, the media fell in love with our daughter just as much as we did. Now every appearance she makes is photographed and speculated upon.

  Admirers from all over the world send her gifts and letters. Sometimes I worry that it’s all too much for her, but then I see her doting on the cameras and I realize that this is the life we’ve chosen. It’s a crazy life, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

  “How about mommy and daddy work on giving Elena a little brother or sister?” Aleks rumbles as his lips move over my ear and his fingers finds my breast.

  “It could take a while,” I tell him with a devious smile. “I just came off the pill.”

  “We have all the time in the world,” he growls as his hand slips into my yoga pants. “But just to be safe we should probably practice every day.”

  I turn into him and smash my lips against his, groaning at the rock-hard erection poking against my thigh. There is nothing that turns him on more than the idea of making babies with me. We’ve been talking about it for a while now and we are both ready.

  Eventually, I’ll have to put a cap on it because if Aleks had his way he’d be knocking me up every year. But for right now, we are both happy with the status quo.

  “God, I missed these,” Aleks says wistfully as he lifts my shirt up, exposing my braless chest.

  “You just saw them yesterday,” I chide.

  “Seeing isn’t playing with them,” he justifies as he swoops in to suck a nipple into his mouth.

  I cup the back of his head and arch into him, crying out as his fingers find their way between my legs, working me over. He knows my body like the back of his hand now, and he never gets tired of it.

  I’ve never felt more relaxed than I am lying naked in his arms.

  “Take off your pants,” he orders. “I need to eat that pussy.”

  I kick off my pants and he kisses his way down my stomach, perching on his elbows as he wraps his forearms around my thighs and pulls my sex against his mouth.

  It’s the most divine feeling in the world when he’s worshipping me this way, and there’s nothing else I can do but lay back and enjoy the ride.

  I shatter around his tongue, and Aleks draws it out until he’s wrung every last ounce of pleasure from my body. Seconds later, his pants are hanging from his hips and he’s inside of me. On top of me. Pumping wildly as he declares his love for me over and over.

  “God, baby, you feel so good,” he rasps. “I’m going to fill you with my come. Over and over and over again.”

  My nails dig into his back and I suck on his throat, edging him closer and closer. I know he can’t handle it when I do that. And he knows it too.

  “Fuck,” he roars as he plants himself deep inside of me, shuddering out his release. “That wasn’t fair, Ella.”

  I smile up at him and stroke his cheek. “I like making you come.”

  He kisses me and thrusts a couple more times. “Fine with me. We can play this game all night, baby.”

  * * *

  The End.

  Afterword

  Thank you so much for reading Royally Chained! If you enjoyed it, I hope you will consider leaving an honest review on Amazon or Goodreads.

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  The Crowned Series will continue with Emily’s story in Royally Tamed. You can add it to your TBR here.

  About the Author

  Rebel Fox is a stay at home dog mom who likes to write dirty stories and read scandalous romance in her spare time. She has a slight addiction to caffeine, tequila, and cats in no particular order and can be found on a sunny beach somewhere when her schedule permits.

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