Water cascaded over my naked wife, the drops clinging to the shower walls as if to taunt me, blocking patches of her smooth skin from my gaze before sliding down the smooth glass.

I dragged the razor across the last strip of shaving cream along my neck, and tapped it clean in the sink, my eyes never leaving the curve of Charlie’s ass.

My wife.

She was my wife.

Maybe if I said it another dozen times, it would sink in—would feel real. We’d been married three days, and I still felt like I was living a fantasy. Like I’d wake up at any second and find out she was still promised to Xander.

I splashed water on my face, cleaning it off of any shaving cream remnants. When I looked up, Charlie’s hands were in her hair, rinsing through her conditioner. Her breasts were thrust forward, her perfect nipples hard and pinkened from my attention these last three days. Her eyes were on me, her lips parted.

I dropped the towel I had wrapped around my waist and got in with her. The shower was large, with stone walls on three of the sides, and a bench furthest from the jet.

“I thought you already took a shower,” she said, her head rolling back against my chest as my hands rose up to cup her breasts. Her skin was hotter than the warm water.

“You can never be too clean.”

“Is that so? Because I’m feeling awfully dirty.” She rubbed her ass against my already hard cock. How the hell could I be hard again? I’d come inside her so many times I was shocked I wasn’t raw, but my body just wanted more and more of her.

My mouth sucked lightly on her neck as my hand slid over her smooth belly to the juncture of her thighs.

She widened her stance, and my fingers slid along her slit, until I deepened my touch, grazing her clit.

She hissed, her back arching.

“Sore?” I moved my hand. She immediately grasped it and put it right back.

“Yes, and if you stop, I’ll kill you.”

I swirled lazy circles around her hypersensitive flesh, tweaking her nipple with my other hand until she was arching against me, rocking back against my dick.

“Jaime…” she moaned. “God, that feels good.”

“It’s supposed to.” I pressed lightly and felt her muscles lock beneath my touch. She was close. It would only take one little—

“I need you inside me.” She spun to face me, her hands wrapping around my cock.

Now I was the one groaning.

“You’re sore.”

“You told me you’d always give me what I wanted. I only had to ask.” She licked the water off my nipple and then ran her tongue down the line of my abs.

She may have been a virgin when I first took her, but damn she was a fast learner.

She kissed her way back up my stomach, and I tilted her chin so I could look in her eyes. It didn’t matter if she was naked, dressed in thousand-dollar lingerie or in a ballgown. Charlotte’s eyes were the sexiest part of her. They told you exactly what she was thinking if you knew where to look.

“What do you want?” I asked.

“You. I want you.”

She took a step around me and kneeled on the bench. Then she spread her thighs, and looked back at me with a smile that almost made me come.

“Damn it, Charlie. I don’t want to hurt you.” I’d been planning on giving her a day to recover, for her flesh to lose a little of the sting. My actions didn’t match my words, and I found myself snug against her back, my cock hitting her entrance so perfectly it was almost like the shower had been designed with us in mind.

“You won’t.” She looked over her shoulder, and I captured her mouth in a kiss. I tried to be gentle, but she sucked my tongue into her mouth, and all bets were off.

My hand swept down her hips, and my fingers slipped along her entrance.

“Fuck. You’re wet.” And it had nothing to do with the shower.

“I told you. You won’t hurt me. Now. Jameson.”

I adjusted my stance and thrust slowly, penetrating her in one smooth motion until I was seated to the hilt. God, the woman was silk and fire. Cupping her breast with one hand and securing her hip with the other, I started a slow, easy pace.

“Jaime,” she whimpered, squirming against me.

“What, Charlie? Don’t you like that?”

“Yes,” she moaned, her head landing along my shoulder as I pushed in and out of her tight heat. Fuck, I was never going to get used this, never get enough of it.

“What do you need, baby?”

“I...need…” She arched against me, pushing her ass harder into me, and I backed off.

“What?” Another slow stroke.

“Fuck me, Jameson.”

I thrust into her, hard, and then paused, resting my head against hers to gain some control. Those words out of her mouth were explosive. She wiggled against me, and I thrust slowly.

“I’m not kidding. You’ve made love to me countless times, Jaime. But I want all of you. Every side of you. I’m your wife, and I deserve it.”

I groaned, nipping at the wet skin of her shoulder.

“Now,” she ordered. “I promise, it doesn’t hurt.”

Damn it. My wife was sore, her beautiful body used repeatedly over the last three days in the most delicious ways, and she wanted it hard. I almost laughed. I could command my entire nation, but only this woman was capable of commanding me.

“Put your hands on the wall,” I ordered.

She splayed her fingers on the rock, bracing herself.

I gripped her hips, my fingers digging into the smooth skin.

“You want me to fuck you?”

“Yes,” she keened, pushing back against me.

“Your wish is my command, wife.”

I slammed home, and we both groaned. Fuck that was good. Everything with her was good. Better than good. Fucking epic.

My pace quickened until I was fucking her hard, driving into her deep, her moans coming with the rhythm of my thrusts. My name had never sounded so good echoing off a shower wall.

I pulled her against me but didn’t relent on the pace, swirling my fingers over her clit until her keening cries were constant. Only when I felt her muscles tighten, her pussy clamp down on me in the flutters of her orgasm, did I let myself go. My orgasm ripped through me, nearly violent in its intensity, but I managed to stay on my feet.

“I love you,” she whispered.

“I love you,” I answered.

Then we washed, our touches slow and easy. Once we were clean, I killed the water and wrapped her in a fluffy towel.

“Now what?” she asked with a grin.

“Now we get to work.”

“No more sex?” she pouted.

I laughed and kissed her forehead. “Tell you what. You ever get the urge in the middle of the day, just lock my office door and cry Switzerland.”

“Deal.”

She smacked my ass as I walked toward the closet.

God Damn, I was a lucky man.

* * *

Holy shit, I was fucked.

The daily report was a pile of fresh hell on my father’s massive, antique desk.

It was mine now, and so was that damn report.

“So if you get through this by nine, we’ll have a good idea of where each day is headed. You’re briefed on the state of affairs and can go about other business,” Anthony said from the chair across from my desk.

“Right.” I removed my suit coat and hung it over the chair.

“I can take that,” he offered.

“In here, my office, my rules. Coat stays on the back of my seat.”

He nodded. “Got it.”

Two hours later, it was nearly lunch, I was starving, and I was finally at the end of the damn pile. Apparently we were in trade negotiations with Japan, health care was undergoing a mini face-lift when it needed a massive overhaul, and there was still a wage gap between the sexes. All before lunch.

“Okay, so basically, I need to get in here by eight every morning.”

“If not seven,” Anthony agreed, managing my schedule on his iPad.

“See what we can do about getting this information digitally. I know it’s classified, or at least some of it is, but let’s get a system going where we can cut out this giant stack of shit on the desk, shall we? Modernize a little?”

“Sounds good, Sir. Now, about the coronation details…”

“What’s not done?”

“There’s a matter of flowers, timing—”

“Get ahold of Sophie. She’s always good at that stuff, and she won’t mind.”

“We’ve had a request from the Foundation of Women’s Progression to open an office in the administration wing of the palace. Of course, they’re out of their minds—”

“Allow it.”

“Sir?” His eyes flew wide.

I moved the papers back to the giant box they’d been sent in. It looked like a coffin. For my soul.

“My wife took a job chairing that foundation, so unless we want security running around with her to their offices, it seems safer to open a branch in the administration wing. Plus, it lessens her commute time.”

“Her Highness has a job?” His jaw just about hit the floor.

“Yep. New era, Anthony. Over the next couple of weeks, we’ll see what Queenly duties she’d like to take on, and which she’d rather delegate. But make no mistakes about it, Charlotte has the choice.”

“Yes, Sir.” A slow smile spread across his face as he typed onto his iPad.

“Now, if you could contact Sir Naughton and Lady Livingstone, set up two separate meetings so I can figure out why the hell they can’t agree on this healthcare bill. Also, contact Tessa Amers at the Women’s League and get her here, too. We’ll see what’s on their agenda for this pay gap issue. Also, I know we have a mid-term election coming up for the House of Commons. I won’t sway the public, but I’d like details on who is running and what their platforms are.”

“Right away.” He grinned.

“You’re smiling. A lot. Not going to lie, it’s a little creepy.”

He pressed his lips flat, but the smile was still there.

“It’s nothing, Your Highness. I’m just excited. You are exactly what our country needs.”

Well, shit.

“Thank you.” I cleared my throat. “Now, if we could—”

The door flew open, startling me. Sophie raced through, Oliver hot on her heels.

“I need him first!” She snapped.

“Whoa, Sophie…” I put my hands up, like that would calm her. She never took that tone, let alone with Oliver.

“I assure you, my matter is more important,” Oliver answered, his voice quiet and deadly calm.

Blatantly ignoring him, she slammed a newspaper on my desk.

“The Globe? Seriously? You read this shit?” I raised an eyebrow at her.

She gave that look right back to me and flipped it over to reveal what was beneath the fold.

“Fuck,” I hissed.

Brie was splattered all over the front page. She was in a white gown cut straight to her belly button, with some asshole’s tongue down her throat and a bottle of champagne in her hand. And was that his hand in her dress? Damn it.

The headline read, “Princess Brie grants a stage hand an All-Acess Pass.”

“Where the fuck is she?” I seethed.

“Paris. The new Dior show. I guess this was backstage, and the curtain...well, it didn’t stay closed.”

“Neither did her fucking dress.”

“I really need to speak with you, Jameson.” Oliver barked.

My eyes flew to his, my stomach sinking at the tense set of his face.

“Go ahead.”

He glanced at Sophie.

“What? I’m not the weeping, simpering little girl you seem to think I am, Oliver. Go ahead.” She folded her arms and glared.

Huh. Well, this dynamic just got more interesting.

He gave her the classic WTF look and sighed.

“Go ahead, Oliver.”

He removed an envelope from inside his suit coat, opened it, and placed the contents on my desk. They were pictures of Brie with the same french breast-grabber, but they were from above.

Directly above.

“How the hell did he get this angle?”

Oliver shook his head. “I don’t know. I’ve already demanded answers from her security, but you know she likes to give them the slip. That’s not the worst part.” Using a pen, he flipped the picture over.

Typed in neat letters, on the center of the photograph, it said:

My breath abandoned me in a rush as if I’d been punched in the stomach.

Sophie craned her neck, turning to read the message.

“Whoa.”

“Yeah.”

She shook it off. “God, people are sick. I’ll get Georgia and see what PR wants to do about this latest little Brie scandal. A kiss is one thing, but he’s practically at third base.”

All the male heads swung in Sophie’s direction.

“What?” she asked.

“Do you know what third base is?” I asked.

My little sister flushed, the color of her skin turning as pink as her dress. “Of course I do. Look where his hand is.”

We remained silent.

“What? That’s not…” She glanced at us in turn.

Anthony dropped his gaze to the floor.

She looked at me, and I shook my head. “Not going there with my little sister.”

She scoffed. “I’m twenty-five years old.”

“Yeah, still not going there.”

“That’s…” She looked at Oliver and pointed to the picture.

“Not third.” He didn’t look away, simply stared at her like he’d never seen her before.

She looked back at the picture. “Well, whatever it is, it needs to be handled. It as in the situation, not her breast. Or...him. Oh my God, I’m leaving.” She made her way to the door, turning at the last second. “Oh, and Jameson. Don’t stress. We get sick crap like that all the time. Don’t let it upset you. Dad just used to burn them.”

The door shut softly behind her as she exited.

With Sophie gone, the atmosphere in the office turned tense.

“You know why I brought this to you,” Oliver said, taking the pictures and putting them back in the envelope. “And before you ask, there are no fingerprints or other ways to identify the sender.”

I nodded.

“What is it?” Anthony asked.

“The words in the threat. They’re twisted versions of what I said to Parliament to get them to change the Coronation Laws.”

“Oh. That’s weird. What am I missing?”

“It was a closed session,” Oliver said quietly, his jaw locking.

“Whoever set this up was there. This threat is coming from someone in Parliament. Bring Brie home right-fucking-now.”