Courted By The Mountain Prince: An Arranged Marriage Romance

by Frankie Love

  “Is your father a little old school, then?”

  “Isn’t that how all kings behave?” Violet sighs deeply. She shakes her head, and then says, “I was going to say, a second ago, that I think I would’ve been a good queen. I love Elexia with all my heart and soul, and I hate the way that things have gone for the people there.

  “I could have done some powerful work if I had been given space to pour my whole heart and soul into the country. To be honest, I’m a little bitter that I’ll never have a chance to prove that—to prove to them that a woman could be ruler.”

  “Well, I don’t think having a crown is the end all, be all.”

  “Oh really, you’re a chauvinistic pig like my father? I love him to pieces but he is seriously living in the 18th century.”

  “No that’s not what I’m saying at all, I think a woman can be a great queen, the best. I have no issues with that whatsoever. The crown can go to whoever wants it. The issue for me is, I don’t want the crown at all. It’s mine for the taking, and it’s the last thing in the world I want.”

  Violet doesn’t respond, and the energy in the snowcat changes as I watch her absorb the injustice of it all. She can’t have what she wants because she’s a woman; I get to rule even though I don’t even want it, because I’m a man.

  For the first time in my life I feel like the asshole everyone has always condemned me to be.

  “Over there,” I say, lifting one hand from the wheel and pointing to the hill we’re about to crest. “That mountain peak is my favorite spot in this entire country. It’s called Mount Alkali. Salt and stone. The earth. And all the snow from this mountain runs down to the lake below.”

  I turn off the ignition, unlock the doors, and jump out. Walking to Violet’s door, I open it for her and take her hand. The snow is deep and thick, but we’re both in coats and boots; we’ll be fine.

  I grab a thermos and a blanket from the back. There’s a stone bench, and I brush off the snow that’s gathered upon it since I’ve been here last. I stop at this exact spot every time I come to the mountain cabin; I tell Violet that.

  “Why do you love it here so much?” she asks.

  I smile, knowing she hasn’t turned around to see the water below.

  “Below Mount Alkali is Lake Alkali. There.” I take Violet’s gloved hand and pull her toward the edge of the cliff. I want her to see what I see, and a part of me wants her to love what I love.

  “It’s majestic,” she breathes out, shaking her head at the beauty of the bright, sparkling water, surrounded by so much snow.

  “I love the mountains. I could drive that snowcat for days; I have. I love to come out here and track wild animals, the herds. I know all their migration patterns. Just like the gaillia we saw last night—I’ve tracked those creatures across this country. I’ve spent my whole life doing that.”

  “This morning must have been hard for you, then,” she says softly.

  I take her hand and lead her back to the bench, where I spread out the blanket and pour hot chocolate for us both.

  “Hard, but reality. We live in the mountains; it’s a harsh climate. I love this land, but it isn’t perfect here.”

  Violet nods in understanding, then asks, “So when you track the herds, what do you use the information for?”

  “It’s incredibly useful for the forest and ranger departments of Cressia. It’s become my area of expertise—though my father doesn’t find it altogether valuable. To him, a ruler should be on a throne or behind a desk.”

  “I see,” Violet says, smiling. “So you actually are pretty devoted to your country, for all the attitude you give, the glib responses to the paparazzi that see you having your wild parties. They don’t do much reporting on your nine-to-five job, do they?”

  “Nine to five? I don’t do that bullshit. In fact, the whole reason I like this gig is because it keeps me free, keeps me in the wild, exactly where I want to be. But living in a castle? It would fucking kill me.”

  Violet takes a sip of her hot chocolate, and I watch her mind working. She’s an easy read. I don’t mean that in a bad way; I mean it in a beautiful way. She’s not hiding behind anything. She’s making no false claims on her heart’s desire, nor am I. Maybe that’s why we have a connection that’s bigger than our titles.

  “How’s that going to work, Hunter?” she asks me. “I mean, how are you going to be the prince, married to me, the princess—how are we going to someday be the king and queen, if you don’t even want to live in the castle?”

  “I don’t know, Sunshine. There’s the rub.”

  “Are you really going to marry me?”

  The question catches me off guard. “Hell, where’d that come from?”

  “I’m wondering, like, how serious are you about all of this? About me? My father thinks you might back out at the last minute.”

  “Are you always this heavy?”

  She laughs softly. “You got me there,” she says, shaking her head at herself. “I called my sister after you invited me on this overnight—mostly because I was pretty terrified of being alone with you, if I’m completely honest. “

  “Oh, be honest.”

  “Okay, well, the thing is … my father warned me about sleeping with you before we took our vows. Because the truth is, you could walk away and leave me at the altar.”

  “I’m not going to do that.” I snort. “Hell, I honestly hadn’t considered it. Of course I don’t like that my father chose my bride—but the truth is, he did a damn fine job of it.”

  Violet’s eyebrows knit together as she studies me. “I want to trust you.”

  “Good. You should. I may be an ass, but I’m not a fucker who’s going to hurt the virginal princess. God.” I run my hands through my hair, hating that my reputation has gotten me here.

  “My sister Iris told me that I should enjoy this time with you and not overthink it.”

  I raise an eyebrow, not expecting this addendum from Violet. “And now? Are you overthinking?” My hand moves to her face, and I tuck this strand of hair behind her ear.

  “No,” she whispers. “I’m not overthinking anything right now. Right now I want to stop thinking altogether.”

  “That’s something I can help you with.”

  I kiss her. It’s different, though, than when we kissed in her bedroom—because, right now, no one is around for miles.

  Right now, the sky overhead is bright blue and crystal-clear, and the air is clean, and the timing is right.

  Right now, her mouth meets mine, and it’s not lust that we’re looking for. We’re looking for something deeper—a connection, a spark.

  I swear, we’re looking for something we’ve already found. When she talks with me, I’m not trying to be a bastard, an asshole, a prick. When we’re together, I can be myself.

  I kiss her, and I don’t think I know how to stop.

  12

  Kissing Hunter is like falling into the deep blue sea. I’m swimming. I can’t breathe. I’m going deeper than I’ve ever gone before. But I’m not scared.

  I love to swim. My father jokes that when I was a baby he threw me into the saltwater and I was like a fish; my arms knew how to move, and I began to push my body through the rippling water.

  So I was born swimming.

  This—kissing Hunter—is not something I grew up doing, yet it feels as effortless as my first strokes. It feels as natural as moving through the salty sea.

  He nibbles at my bottom lip, and I moan under him. And then his hands are on my face, pushing back my hair; he’s kissing me deeper, and deeper still.

  My entire body is warm—no, scratch that. It isn’t warm. My body is on fire. My toes unfurl in my fur-lined boots, my knees are weak, and I’m glad we’re sitting on this icy bench because I don’t think I could stand.

  The space between my legs tingles treacherously. I want something I’ve always considered dangerous, taboo—something I’ve always considered forbidden.

  Right now, I want what I shouldn’
t have. I want what is mine. As if in an out-of-body experience, I crawl into Hunter’s lap. I can’t even rationalize this choice in my brain. It’s a desire, and my body responds.

  As I straddle him on this cold bench, his arms wrap around my waist and he grabs my ass cheeks as if they’re his.

  I close my eyes, relishing the idea that I am his. His alone. I’m no longer my father’s daughter. Now I’m betrothed to Prince Hunter.

  I know I keep saying I feel so far from home but in this moment I wonder, perhaps, if Hunter could be my home. Maybe home isn’t a place, but a state of mind.

  And my state of mind says yes, yes, yes.

  My state of mind says more, more, more.

  Hunter’s fingers move under my coat, under my sweater, under my tank … and I wonder why I have on so many damn layers. His hands are on my back, warm and big and secure.

  He kisses me again. His tongue is in my mouth, entwined with mine, and I sink deeper into the kiss. He’s gotten my panties damp, my nipples hard; I want his hands to move all over my bare skin.

  “I need you naked.” He holds my face with both his hands, looking in my eyes. “I need you naked and I need you now.”

  I think he says it directly because he’s scared I might resist. He thinks I’m a scared girl, but that was before he made love to my mouth.

  Right now I’m not going to resist anything Hunter requests. I want to say yes to him. I want to give him everything he desires, even though I have no clue where to begin. He’s the one with experience. I’m the virgin.

  “Then strip me down,” I tell him. “Take me somewhere warm, and take off all my clothes. Take me somewhere I’ve never been before.”

  He growls, pulling me from his lap and carrying me to his snowmobile. He drops me on the seat and shuts the door before jumping into the driver side.

  Within a matter of seconds we’re crossing the slopes, ricocheting over the white mountains. The motion causes my core to become hotter, and alive. So ready. Willing.

  “Tell me how wet your pussy is,” he says. “Tell me how wet your pussy is for me.”

  “So wet,” I whisper, never having talked dirty to anyone in my life. It feels liberating. I want to use more words, more descriptions that excite him. I want his cock to get hard because of me. I’ve never had power like this in my life. “My pussy aches, aches to be touched.”

  “We have a fifteen-minute drive, Sunshine.”

  “I can’t wait, Hunter. My pussy is drenched and hot. It needs to be taken care of. It needs to be stroked.”

  Hunter groans and adjusts his pants. I look at his groin and see a large, thick rod in his jeans. He looks uncomfortable. I bite my bottom lip thinking about the fact that I made him grow to that size. That makes me even wetter.

  “Unbutton your pants,” he tells me. “Pull them down to your knees.”

  I do as he says without any question. I unbutton my pants and tug them down to my knees.

  “Now what?” I ask, clenching my throbbing pussy. “Now what do you want me to do, Hunter?”

  “Now I want you to pull down those panties.”

  I pull in my bottom lip, knowing Hunter is guiding me toward uncharted territory. But I want to get lost in the woods with him. I want to follow his trail of breadcrumbs and enter the deep, dark forest he knows so well.

  I tug down my panties, my ass cheeks resting against the leather interior. My pussy is properly waxed—when you grow up on an island, you wear a swimsuit more often than anything else. I always waxed myself bare for the purpose of a bikini, not to please a man.

  But the way Hunter is growling beside me as he sees my bare pussy, I know he loves the look of me. That causes my entire body to light up with excitement.

  I want to please Hunter.

  “Sunshine, that pussy is going to be mine soon.”

  “It’s yours already,” I tell him, reaching for his hand, taking it from the steering wheel and pressing it down on the space that trembles with desire, the space that is seeping with pleasure.

  “You don’t know what you’re doing to me, Violet,” he says, his foot pressing harder against the gas pedal as if he needs to get somewhere fast.

  “But, Hunter,” I moan.

  His fingers graze my opening.

  I part my legs, giving him more access to me. “You’re the one doing things to me.”

  He plunges a finger into my dripping gap, and flutters it back and forth against my clit. I’m on fire; he moves his middle finger against me, putting the slightest amount of pressure on my opening.

  “Oh, oh, oh, Hunter. My body … It’s like—” My head falls back to the seat and my knees drop apart and my ass arches into the air, all uncontrollably.

  He rubs two fingers in fast circles over my entrance, faster and faster until I start moaning louder.

  I run my hands through my hair. “You have to stop,” I beg him. “I don’t know what’s happening.” My body is on fire, and my juices pour from me.

  He moves harder against me. The snowcat stops, and he turns his body toward me. His fingers begin to rub faster still, until I squeeze my eyes shut as the most delicious sensation rolls over my entire body.

  I cry out in release as he rubs against my untouched pussy. Finally, the pleasure reaches its height and I sink into the seat, my body spent. Gasping for breath, I open my eyes.

  “What did you do to me?” I ask, pressing my hand to my heart.

  “The was called an orgasm, Sunshine.” He smiles confidently, then pulls his fingers from my pussy and licks his them.

  My eyes widen; I’m turned on all over again by his complete unabashed desire for my body.

  “You taste fucking delicious.”

  “You want more?” I ask, looking up and seeing a gorgeous log cabin perched on a mountainside. “Because, Hunter, you can have it. You can have anything of mine.”

  “Good, because we’re home.”

  13

  My cock is on fire, ready to motherfucking explode. I want to pull Violet from this vehicle, drag her into my cabin, throw her on the bearskin rug, rip off her clothes, and fuck her now. But there are a million reasons I can’t do that.

  For one thing, I’d come in about two seconds. Sure, I’ve had plenty of hookups—plenty of women offering their bodies, and I’ve taken them. But none of those women, not a single goddamn one, comes close to the way Violet makes me feel.

  When I’m with her, I feel like a man. She tells me she wants me to touch her, she tells me she wants me to take her. Her innocence drips from her pussy, and her purity is written across her face.

  But when I touched her, when I made her come for the first time in her entire life, I felt like what we were doing wasn’t dirty, what we were doing was more than a way to get off. What we were doing was something … deeper.

  And watching her now, as she pulls up her jeans, with her eyes on the cabin—full of want, full of hope and expectation—I want to do right by her.

  Looking at Violet, I see she has both an innocence and a wild side that has never been unleashed. I’m guessing it’s been under lock and key because she’s been the glue that kept her family together. There’s been no space for her to be anything but responsible.

  That makes me respect her, so fucking much, because she is exactly what I’m not. She has this part of her that she clearly wants to explore, this part that is legs spread open and heart willing to give in, but she hasn’t allowed herself to enjoy any of that.

  So yes, I want to fuck her hard and I want to fuck her fast. But more than that, I want her to know that when I look at her I see a woman who deserves more than a hard fuck.

  I see a woman who deserves the fucking kingdom.

  I swallow back a fear that’s quite real: the fear that I’m not the man for her. Violet deserves a man that’s honorable and upright.

  Not a man who indiscriminately enjoys sucking pussy. Not a man who has given his father the middle finger, metaphorically and otherwise.

  But now I’ve
got to fight that fear. I don’t want Violet to feel rejected by me, because my question of whether or not I’m the man for her has no bearing on whether or not I want to please her tonight.

  “What are you waiting for, Hunter?” Violet asks, looking over at me. Her hand is on the door handle. She’s ready to get out of the snowcat and get into my cabin.

  “I’m not waiting for anything,” I tell her, even though I am. I’m waiting for my hard-on to soften a bit, because her seeing ten inches of my hard cock would fucking have her running for the mountains. We can’t have that. So we’re going to take this nice and slow.

  I get out of the cat and walk to her side, open her door, and then grab her luggage from the trunk. I take her hand and lead her to my house, our footprints marking our way in the white snow.

  I fucking love my home. I built plenty of it with my own hands, and designed the entire place myself.

  A security detail is here, of course, patrolling the royal property. But those fuckers can stay outside tonight. Not one of them is getting over this threshold. Not one of them is going to witness Violet here, naked before me.

  “You stay where you are,” I tell the commander of the crew. He raises his eyebrows, then nods. He has his rifle on his back, because there are a lot of bears out here, and wears a fur coat and a wool hat, thick gloves and leather boots.

  “Roger that, Prince.” The commander turns to his crew, filling them in on logistics I don’t have to worry about.

  “They just do what you say?” Violet asks. “They’ll stay out here all night in the freezing cold?”

  I take her hand and lead her to the entrance.

  “Those boys will be fine. There’s a bunker at the end of the lane, and this entire property is fenced. There’s a detail working this site 24/7. Sure it’s my place, but I’m a Prince. Security detail is important, no matter how much of a mountain man I want to be. I try to be a loner out here, but you know that the press finds a way into these hills, takes pictures of the women that my guys—”