Peach

I’ve been doing my best to ignore this garden reception coming up, but now we’re in that danged stretch limo SUV thing again, heading from the cozy, lived-in palace to the huge monstrosity of a glittery Abbey of Love.

It looms ahead of us, so large and daunting that it’s making the shooting mountain peaks seem insignificant, which is crazy, but then, men didn’t build the mountains to make a woman question her sanity in moving halfway around the world to pretend to be in love with the king of the kingdom of love.

And if that’s not enough, I’m weighed down with so many jewels, my neck alone could probably pay our entire staff’s annual salaries back home at Weightless.

Papaya and Meemaw are back at the palace, which is also giving me some indigestion. I’m pretty sure Meemaw is tupping the butler. Right now. This very moment. And Papaya’s refused to talk to anyone since this morning.

Not even Alexander or Samuel, who have both tricked her out of bad moods several times this week. It’s hard to stay mad when two grown men play charades to guess what’s wrong with the teenager now. Especially when their guesses included things like too much vegan cheese and sat on a thorn bush. You wouldn’t think a grown man could do that in charades, but they did.

“Why aren’t Alexander and Samuel coming?” I whisper to Viktor as the car winds through the city, past signs and banners and balloons in the official royal red of Amoria.

“The focus is to be on you, Your Majesty,” Leonie pipes up.

A muscle ticks in Viktor’s cheek, and I wonder if that’s the whole story. “’Tis supposed to be a small party. Aristocracy only, and I’ve yet to bestow titles on any of my family.”

“But Duke Blowhard won’t be there?” I ask.

Leonie coughs.

Viktor allows one corner of his mouth to lift no more than a freaking millimeter. “Quite right, my lady.”

The mountains are gorgeous today, jutting into a clear, deep blue sky that would probably make for an amazing Weightless flight. Joey’s flying today. I’ll bet she’s in the air now, probably guiding the plane into a perfect parabola to simulate zero gravity. I wonder if anyone’s going to puke.

And I’m suddenly so homesick this stupid lace-and-fluff dress I’ve been forced to wear is choking me, even though the neckline is well below my actual neck.

So maybe it’s the fourteen pounds of jewels I didn’t want to wear either. I’m not a jewel girl. I’m a get shit done girl.

And I’m done with this vacation.

I want to go home.

With Papaya.

Except if I go home without a husband, that dadgum judge will take her away from me.

The car glides through the shiny open gates of the abbey and rolls around a circle drive—no, a heart-shaped drive filled with blooming red roses—to stop in front of two massive brass doors at the top of a marble staircase. Streamers and guards line a makeshift walkway leading away from the steps, though, and toward the side lawn, where—“Oh, no.”

“It’s the tradition, Your Majesty,” Leonie says happily to me.

“You’re taking quite the liberty with the word tradition, Leonie, as there have only been two coronations and royal weddings in the last seventy years,” Viktor says.

“The people are quite eager to see you as both king and newlywed, Your Majesty. And it is the tradition for newlyweds, royal or not.”

Viktor and I share a look.

His is full of security risk and I’ve sworn to never let this woman near a hot air balloon again.

Mine’s full of not another fucking heart, and not another fucking balloon.

“I’m terrified of heights,” I blurt.

Leonie shifts a surprised glance at me. “Your Majesty, you owned a flight adventure company.”

Still own, but that’s not the point. “And did I do the flying? No. No, I did not. For very good reason. I like my feet on the ground.”

“You’ve been in a hot air balloon before,” she points out.

“I thought a baby was in danger.”

Even Viktor gives me a no one believes that look, despite the fact that I know he’s on my side here in not wanting to get in that blasted contraption.

“You’ve flown in a plane,” Leonie argues. “I was with you.”

“I—I—I knew I’d be okay because Viktor was with me.” There. That sounds like a reasonable thing for a newlywed woman in love to say.

“Excellent. And His Majesty shall be with you again today.”

She smiles brightly at both of us.

Dammit.

And that’s how we end up floating in a tethered hot air balloon thirty minutes later, smiling and waving at the crowd from fifty feet in the air, the wind whipping all around my fancy hairdo that Papaya said looked like two mountains trying to twerk their butts together, which you would think would be impossible to replicate with a hairdo, yet here I am. Complete with Viktor’s arm tucked securely around me while the balloon operator titters and tutters in Italian, and based on the way Viktor’s face keeps twitching, he’s either chattering on about how lucky we are to be married, or about how he’s not letting me out of his sight so I don’t steal his balloon.

Or possibly he’s saying something highly unflattering about Viktor’s haircut, but I doubt it.

His haircut is fresh and not too short, not too long, all that thick dark hair with just a few threads of silver in it.

A cry goes up from the crowd below us. Though the reception is small and private in a garden behind the abbey, the balloon ride is for the public to see, and they’ve turned out in droves.

All the winding roads from town—except the road we took—are lined with people. The masses spill over onto the sloping lawns surrounding the abbey, all of them waving red Amorian flags. A chant erupts below us.

And I don’t need a translator to know what they’re asking.

They want us to kiss.

Of course they do.

But the bad part is, I’m looking forward to it.

I’ve had precious few moments in the last two weeks when I’ve felt wanted.

But when Viktor kisses me?

When he looks at me with those pure, one hundred percent dark cacao eyes?

Even if he only wants my body, he wants me.

And even if he’s only touching me because we made a devil’s bargain and he has to, he’s touching me.

His hand at the small of my back.

His gaze flickering over my face as though he’s processing my mood, his plan of attack, and how far he can push me before we cross lines we can’t uncross.

He caresses my cheek with a soft brush of his thumb, and that frosty case I keep my heart in thaws a little at the edges despite my best intentions. “Smile, Peach,” he says softly. “It makes me wonder what you’re up to.”

I ignore the teasing, because he said my name.

Which is honestly more dangerous than him doing a striptease in heart-shaped boxers while he asks me if I’ll touch myself for him.

“Shut up and kiss me,” I whisper back.

Unfortunately, he’s good at taking orders.

His lips brush mine, and the roar of the crowd below us fades behind the buzzing in my ears. His skin is rough but hot, his lips full and firm, his grip solid but not suffocating.

Anchoring.

Addicting.

I know better than to give in to the temptation of believing this is about real feelings. But he’s not mauling me. He’s not overpowering me, though he could single-handed. He’s not even shoving his leg between my knees or grinding his hips into my belly to show off how hard he can get, though I am aware that he’s hardening.

He’s merely tucking an arm around my waist and cradling my head while he makes a leisurely exploration of my mouth.

This isn’t about power.

Or about getting me out of my clothes.

Or about an opportunity to get up close and personal with the peachiest parts of my body.

But it’s not about love either.

Which should be perfect.

Except it’s not.

Viktor pulls back, scans my face once more, and a small frown brings a line between his eyes. “Altitude sickness, my lady?”

I could kiss him all over again.

This is bad.

Really, really bad. “Yes. You know me and heights.”

He says something in broken Italian to the balloon operator, and soon we’re on the ground.

Which really means the fun is just beginning.