Pregnant with the Prince's Child
Page 15
Janis reveled in happiness. This was exactly what she would have expected him to do. But she had a question. “Why the wedding ring?” she asked.
He smiled and hugged her close. “I wanted to show you that my commitment to you was stronger than my work, my patriotism, than anything else in the world. It was just you. You are all that matters to me. And we’re going to be together through all this royalty nonsense. Nothing is going to tear us apart again.”
She shook her head, still worried. She just didn’t see how it could work. “Mykal, don’t you understand? There are just too many things against us.”
He pulled her up where he could look into her face. “Like what?”
“My betrayal, which is something you can say you’ll push aside, but you know it will always be there. Then there’s my time in prison camp. How many royals have been there? There’s the problem of my birth into the most notorious crime family in the nation. There’s the fact that my family almost ruined your adoptive parents. How could anyone accept that you might want me after all that?”
He shook his head, mocking her. “And then there’s the baby.”
She made a worried face. “Oh, yeah. The baby.”
He smiled down at her, covering her tiny belly with his big, wide hand. “I can’t give up my baby.”
“But, if the royal family won’t accept me, I’m afraid they’ll still want the baby and I can’t leave the baby with you.”
“No, Janis.” He smiled at her. “You’re getting all confused. You won’t leave the baby with me, because I won’t be here, either. If you can’t stay, I can’t stay. I go where you go.”
He was ready to give up a place in the castle for her. She could see it in his face. She loved him more than anything and she was beginning to believe they just might be able to do this thing.
“Oh, Mykal. Are you sure?”
“If this royal family can’t accept me with a wife like you, they can’t have me. It’s simple as that.”
She threw her arms around his neck and clung to him. “I love you so.”
He winced. He still had those wounds on his back. But he didn’t let her see it. Right now, he wanted her happiness more than anything else.
“That goes double for me,” he said huskily and he drew her closer. “Because I’ve got two of you to love.”
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ISBN: 9781459223202
Copyright © 2012 by Helen Conrad
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