by Marian Tee
“Don’t ever ask that again,” Saffi pleaded. “I don’t want you figuring out how not to want me.”
“See? That just made me even hornier.”
“Staffan!”
He grinned. “Fucking love you, baby.”
Moisture gathered in Saffi’s eyes. Even after spending almost every night with Staffan this past month, she still couldn’t get used to hearing Staffan say he loved her. It made her want to pinch herself to make sure she wasn’t dreaming.
Staffan Aehrenthal, the rock star she adored from afar all these years? The guy she personally dubbed Mr. Rock Star Chic, not knowing the nickname would stick – the man women all over the world literally worshipped as a sex god…how could this man be hers?
She started to tell Staffan she loved him too, but someone was calling Staffan’s name. She heard Staffan answer, his voice muffled, as if he was covering the mouthpiece of his phone.
When he got back, Saffi said brightly, “I know. I get it. You need to go.”
“Of course not---”
“Staffan, I’m a fangirl, remember? I need only three guesses to figure out exactly who’s talking to you and why you’re needed. First, it could be a backstage interview request. Second, it could be---”
“My know-it-all baby.” The smirk in Staffan’s voice was absolutely sexy.
Saffi couldn’t help making a face at his words even though Staffan couldn’t see her. “That’s soooo funny, har-har.”
“You love me, Saffi,” he said easily. “So of course you find it funny.”
Her mouth opened and closed several times. She could not figure out how to answer that.
Staffan suppressed a smile even as he nodded at the guy who was begging him silently to follow him for the backstage interview. Saffi had guessed correctly. “Saffi?”
He got garbled noise, like Saffi was trying to speak but was unable to.
This time, he couldn’t help smirking. “Yeah, I get it. You really love me---”
More garbled noise.
He chuckled. “Fuck you later.”
Saffi stared at her phone as Staffan ended the call. Fuck you later?
Annoyingly adorable aholehole!
Her phone buzzed with a message from Staffan.
Call you back in thirty minutes. Don’t go to sleep – I want to make you come before you do.
Her lips trembled. She didn’t know if she wanted to cry or smile at his message. It was so…Staffan. And then she tasted something salty, and she knew the tears had won the battle. Hurriedly wiping the tears away, Saffi pinched her cheeks to bring back some color into her suddenly pale face. She checked herself in the mirror where her reflection stared wanly back at her.
Damn. She needed to apply more makeup. Steel was going to whisk her to the E.R. if he saw her like this. Her hand shook as she applied lipstick. She needed to look cheerful and healthy, the way a well-loved girlfriend should. The way an expectant mother should.
The lipstick fell from her hand at the last thought.
Fuck you later. His words played in Saffi’s mind over and over.
Someone knocked on her bathroom door. “Saffi?” Jeremy’s quiet voice was lined with concern.
Without planning to, Saffi fell to her knees, sobbing. She was sure most people would tell her it was just pregnancy hormones. But it was not that. It was because she was scared. She was so terrified, her heart ached with fear.
“I’m forcing the door open if you don’t come out in three seconds, Saffi.” Steel spoke the words matter-of-factly, and Saffi knew her oldest brother meant it. He always meant what he said. She wished she could be like him.
She wished she had been like him from the very start.
Three seconds passed, and Steel kicked the door open. Staffan was going to wonder about that, she thought absently as Steel knelt down next to her with a curse. Staffan thought she was with her family, but she wasn’t. She couldn’t be with them, didn’t dare go home until she was sure of what to say or do if, as Staffan would so aptly put it, the shit hit the fucking fan.
A hysterical choking laugh escaped Saffi at the thought.
Saffi’s brother carefully drew her in his arms. “Saffi.” Steel’s voice was bleak.
“I’m scared,” she whispered. “What if Dad loses the election again because of me, like he did the last time? What if Staffan doesn’t believe me when I tell him the baby’s his?”
“You have to tell him the truth, Saffi. I can kill this story for now – but I can’t do it indefinitely. It will go out sooner or later.”
“We just got back together again. He loves me…I know he does, but what if he’s not ready for a baby? He’s at the peak of his career---”
“If he loves you as you say he does, then his career will not be more important than your unborn child.” Jeremy’s cold voice was accented, betraying the exotic lineage he had tried his very best to bury for so many years.
Saffi clutched Steel’s arm, her nails digging unconsciously into his skin. “Please, Steel. Please kill the story – kill every story until I can make myself tell him. Please.”
Pulling his sister closer, hating the frailness of her body, Steel pressed a kiss on her forehead. “You don’t even have to ask, baby. I’ll do everything in my power to protect you.”
But she didn’t seem to hear him. Saffi was crying too hard, her body shaking at the strength of her silent sobs. “Please,” she begged over and over. “I don’t want to lose him. Please. He’s everything to me. Everything. I can’t lose him again.”
Steel murmured comforting words even as he lifted his sister into his arms and carried her to bed. “I promise, baby, I promise.”
When Saffi woke up, her brother and Jeremy were gone, leaving a sweet note asking her to take care next to the bottle of prenatal vitamins she was supposed to take daily. Saffi groped for her phone, her heart beating madly. The first message was from Staffan, telling her that he had tried to call her twice but figured she was already asleep and that he would see her soon. She then switched to her phone’s browser.
Please, please, please---
She sagged back against the bed when there was no mention of her, Jeremy, or her condition.
The next day, Staffan’s curse woke her, followed by the crash of her bathroom door, which she had forgotten to have maintenance repair. “What the fuck, Saffi?”
Staffan was back. Staffan was cursing. It was morning!
Even with her eyes itchy from sleep, Saffi grabbed her phone, her heart beating madly in her chest. It was seven in the morning – late enough that the newspapers should be out by now. She scrolled through the headlines, but there was still no news about her, Jeremy, or her…condition. For now, that was how she wanted to think of it.
She moved on to the next page, but there was still nothing that would destroy her world.
Saffi collapsed against the bed, shaking with relief.
She was safe for another day.
Staffan suddenly loomed over her. He looked beautiful and sexy, stubble covering his jaw. “What the hell happened to the door of your bathroom?” he demanded.
Saffi could only smile weakly. “I accidentally locked myself inside.”
His jaw dropped.
And then the next thing she knew, Staffan was doing his best to undress her.
“Wha---” Her words were swallowed by his hungry kisses, and with a sigh, she kissed him back, all her worries driven away by the force of his need.
“I told you,” he groaned against her mouth. “Everything you do and say, baby. It fucking turns me on.” Staffan moved down, his hands shaping her breasts as if they were something he missed holding, cherishing. He nuzzled the valley between them. “Everything, baby,” he whispered. “Everything.”
She closed her eyes as Staffan’s kisses slowly went further down, her legs parting sweetly under his command. Please. It was her very last thought before desire caused her mind to go blank.
Please let that always be true….
&n
bsp; ****
All eyes were on him when Staffan groggily came out of Saffi’s dorm room, his back aching like shit because of her too short and too narrow bed. One more year, Staffan told himself. Just one more fucking year of torture and Saffi would graduate and they could finally have a fucking decent bed. But right now, the space constraints of her dorm room didn’t allow for changes, so it was either the bed or the floor.
He bit back a curse and a sigh at the thought. One more year, Staffan reminded himself.
As he slid a ten-dollar bill into the slot and ordered a cappuccino, Staffan caught sight of the reflection of a redhead gazing at him on the mirrored surface of the vendo machine. Normally, this would not be something he would notice, but there was something weird about the way she was looking at him.
After bending down to take his coffee and his change, he turned to her.
Guilt flickered in her eyes before she quickly retreated into her room.
It was the same with all the other girls he walked past. On his way back to Saffi’s room, he heard Mary – the nice quiet girl Saffi was close friends with – arguing heatedly with another girl.
Staffan frowned. “Hey. Everything all right?”
Mary appeared pale and upset, and she became even paler at his question.
The other girl flashed Mary a triumphant smile before turning to him. She was tall and dark-haired, with an impressive rack made even more eye-catching by her tank top, which seemed to be a size smaller than it should be.
“She thinks I’m being a bitch but I’m not. I just really care about you ‘coz besides being hot and loaded, you seem like a really nice guy.” She handed him a rolled-up tabloid, which he automatically took. “It seems like you don’t know so…sorry to be the bearer of bad news. If you’re looking for someone to comfort you afterwards, my room is just down the hallway.”
“Staffan---” Mary was looking anxiously at him.
He carefully unrolled the tabloid.
Lies, his heart insisted, but Staffan’s mind knew the truth. Without a word, he stalked back into Saffi’s room. He took her phone from the bedside table and scrolled through the recent calls.
Jeremy
Jeremy
Jeremy
Jeremy
All in the course of one fucking weekend, the same weekend he had been away. All of Saffi’s calls were from the son of a fucking desert prince.
A bitter laugh escaped Staffan. Only Saffi…only Saffi would have found a way to make him feel insecure and lower than shit right now. How the fuck could he compare to a goddamn modern-day Aladdin?
It was like Chloe all over again, but this time it was worse. It was fucking worse because with Saffi, he had loved her so fucking much he had made himself forget the first rule one had to learn from the streets.
Self-preservation.
****
Bag of rolls in one hand and a paper holder with two cups of steaming hot coffee in the other, Saffi debated with herself whether to buy today’s tabloid or not. She shouldn’t really. She knew that. Steel told her not to. Staffan told her not to, and even Yanna and Constantijin told her not to. With the report of Chloe Gustav’s marriage breaking down all over the news, she was likely to see a lot of awful rumors about Chloe and Staffan possibly getting back together.
But that was because they didn’t know about her and Staffan, Saffi told herself. They didn’t know that he loved her so much he had been living in her dorm room since they got back together, with everyone in uni turning a blind eye to it.
Jeremy had been calling her nonstop last night, but surely it didn’t mean anything. She had to believe in Steel. She had to.
Saffi looked at the tabloid again.
She was…going to buy it.
Putting everything down for the moment, Saffi decided it was better to browse through the whole thing without Staffan around. If she did it back at the dorm and Staffan happened to be awake, she would never get to see even one word written in it.
So far so good, Saffi thought, scanning the front page and seeing nothing written about Staffan or Chloe. She flipped through the pages, her smile widening with every page that had nothing about the two until she reached the penultimate page.
The photo, together with the big bold letters written over it, made her feel dizzy with horror.
Homosexual halosaur.
Saffi broke into a run, gasping when she finally reached her room. She threw the door open, her gaze immediately falling onto the empty bed.
Staffan was gone.
Saffi slid to the floor, numb with shock, the tabloid slipping past her fingers, falling open to the page where a photo of Jeremy and her was printed. They had been caught on camera leaving the pharmacy, and a small in-set shot was zoomed in at what she was holding: a pregnancy kit.
ILLEGITIMATE SON OF PRINCE KHALID WITH SECRET FIANCEE, ONLY DAUGHTER OF SENATOR MARCH: BABY ON THE WAY?
She fell on her knees as she picked up her phone from the bedside table. The screen listed her recent calls, and Saffi knew Staffan had seen all her calls were from Jeremy.
Her fingers grew numb as she dialed his number over and over. Saffi grabbed her laptop. It tumbled to the floor, but she didn’t care. She picked it up and opened it. She only needed to find a way to contact him, to hear his voice, to make him listen to her.
Please, please, please.
But he didn’t answer.
Time crawled at an excruciating pace. Or maybe it flew past her. She didn’t know, didn’t care. She just needed to hear Staffan’s voice. He had to listen to her. He had to.
The shadow of a tall dark figure from the doorway fell over her. She looked up, heart in her throat, but it was not Staffan.
It was a prince to the rescue, but it was not her prince.
“I need to take you away from here, Saffi,” Jeremy told her quietly. “The press will be coming any time now.”
“I have to wait for Staffan. He’s coming back.”
“He can talk to you in Steel’s home. I’m taking you there. We have to leave now.”
She shook her head. “No, you don’t understand. Staffan’s coming back.” Her voice broke at the end. “He’s coming back, Jeremy. He loves me. He’ll listen to me.”
“I’m sorry, Saffi. But you don’t seem to understand either.” His voice was pained. “Your university’s going to kick you out. They can’t have the press descending on them. You must leave.”
She shook her head. Her head ached. Her heart hurt. And her---
Saffi looked down at herself in horror.
“Jeremy,” she whispered. “Take me to the doctor. I don’t want to lose my baby.”
****
“You need to go back to Saffi’s dorm,” Constantijin said implacably the moment Staffan answered his call. When his friend didn’t answer, he said quietly, “Give her a chance to explain. You didn’t give her one before, and look at how well that turned out.”
Staffan squeezed his eyes shut, Constantijin’s words hitting a raw spot.
“I made sure none of the newspapers or agencies I own carry this shit, but I can’t control the others. They’re going to Saffi because she’s more vulnerable than you are. If you still love her, then get your ass over there and give her a fucking hand.”
Staffan ended the call.
“Go back to Saffi’s uni, Bob.”
Bob nodded, turning the car around so fast the wheels squeaked underneath them. The sight that greeted them there was horrendous, a mob of reporters that seemed more like vultures than humans as they pestered university students for news about Saffi.
Staffan was about to get out of the car when he saw the crowd parting, double rows of liveried men creating a path that led to a waiting limousine.
And then…
Saffi.
A tall dark man walked beside to her, his arm wrapped protectively around her shoulders.
Damn you to hell, Saffi March.
Damn you to hell.
Chapter Three
&n
bsp; Saffi March set her Facebook account to private.
Saffi’s father stood and immediately went around his desk the moment the door to his office opened. At the senator’s nod, the secretary reluctantly closed the door behind Staffan Aehrenthal, a still-dazed look on her face. She could not believe she had just seen the famous rock star in her boss’ office. Most times, his guests were boring old farts and snooty women from his old hometown. None of them certainly deserved the title ‘sex god’, even if they were to walk in here naked.
Maybe, she mused, this had to do with the scandal poor Sapphire March had become recently embroiled in – maybe the very same reason that the men of the March family were now here en masse.
Senator Samuel March was tall and distinguished looking, his patrician features only made more handsome by age. At the other side of the expansive office stood three men. They had a look of privilege to them, and even the youngest of them appeared immensely self-assured.
Staffan despised them all on sight, especially the fucking prince whose name was still being linked to her. The man was too handsome for his own good, and he even had a fucking princely air about him, as if it was part of his day job to rescue damsels in distress.
Did that fucking include knocking up a girl who already belonged to another man?
Senator March moved forward, asking politely, “Staffan Aehrenthal?”
Staffan forced himself to look away from the royal asshole. He took the hand offered to him and shook it, answering mockingly, “Senator March?” If the old man thought he’d fucking kowtow to him just because he had a seat in the fucking government, then he would be fucking mistaken. The old man should be thankful Staffan retained enough of his manners to call him by his title when he wasn’t even American.
The senator didn’t appear to mind the mocking tone to his voice. He only nodded, continuing in the same polite voice, “Thank you for accepting my invitation, even if it was on such short notice.” He gestured to the seating area at the side. “Shall we?”
