Page 44 of Jonathon, After All

He had meant to mention it to Leo to see if Muriel’s latest scheme could be helpful, but Jonathon had forgotten all about the butler when they met in the library a few hours later.

Jonathon had closed his laptop and popped to his feet, reaching for Leo when he peeked into their secret alcove, looking far too serious. “Are we a go for Vienna? I found train tickets for me and Aunt Muriel and we should be right behind you.”

“Jonathon,” Leo had whispered, pulling him close and nuzzling into the corner of his neck. “I’m so sorry but I don’t think Vienna is a good idea. We need to slow down and be more careful.”

“Okay…” Jonathon said, even though he hadn’t felt okay as he leaned back and searched Leo’s face. “What happened and what do you mean by ‘slow down’?”

Leo squeezed his eyes shut and Jonathon’s heart sank as tears formed at the corners. “I was too careless. The staff here knows about us and it won’t be long before news spreads. We’d be asking for a scandal if we were seen in Vienna after spending a month together here in Schönbühel.”

“Fine.” Jonathon sniffed hard and nodded, accepting that their plan would need revising. “We can lay low and be penpals for a few months. What about London? You said you can always find a good reason to be there. I’ll be in school and just down the road.”

“Me being in London would be far too risky for us right now.” Leo cradled Jonathon’s face in his hands. “You won’t be able to go to school if this gets out. The media will be relentless and they’ll drag out everything about your family. Sabine says the only way I can protect us is if we marry before it gets too messy and I think I want?—”

“Marry?” Jonathon interrupted, shaking his head. “I was joking before about finding a prince and being an archduchess.”

“I know. You can’t,” Leo agreed, making Jonathon roll his eyes.

“I can dream! But we don’t have to get married. Why can’t we just keep it quiet and date long-distance for a few years?”

“People will assume things about us and me. Dating a college student isn’t a good look. You being a man and an American with a family to expose…” Leo winced apologetically, but Jonathon still felt the burn.

“I see,” he said, taking a large step back and hugging his chest. “Everything about me—us—is wrong and the best thing you can do is marry me quickly and let the Foundation sweep me under a rug. Like Max’s archduchess.”

Leo pressed his hands against his face, muffling a tortured groan. “None of that matters to me and I want to say it wouldn’t be like that! I want to promise that we won’t be like Max and Ella. But I don’t see how you and everything you’re meant to be isn’t crushed by this.”

“That’s our only option?” Jonathon couldn’t make sense of it or the rising panic he felt. “What century is this, Leo? You can be bisexual and you’re not the first royal to date someone ten years younger than them. And let’s be real, a lot of men in your position have much younger mistresses.”

“I can’t start like this, Jonathon.” Leo’s face twisted and his eyes were puddled as he shook his head. “Not as Margrave and not as your husband. I don’t want my legacy and my marriage to begin with a shameful scandal. Not when I know that we are good and that I can use my title and the Foundation to do good. And I won’t ruin your life like Ella’s.” Leo shook his head again, sniffing hard. “I can do good things, but you are capable of brilliant, beautiful things. My life and the Foundation would snuff out every bit of that. You’d be lost in a castle somewhere—swept under a rug—or falling apart for the world to see like Ella.”

“What are you saying?” Jonathon sank onto the seat of their chair as the alcove spun around them and his face started tingling.

Leo dropped to his knees with him, wrapping his arms around Jonathon’s waist. “I don’t know. I know my feelings haven’t changed and they won’t. But I don’t know how to save us.”

“My prince!” Jonathon gasped, spearing his fingers through Leo’s hair. They kissed and their lips and tongues tasted like tears.

“I will always be yours. I love you, Jonathon.”

“What am I going to do? I don’t want to let you go. I don’t care about?—”

“Shhh!” Leo pecked at his lips and rested his forehead on Jonathon’s. “You will. Later, when you’re tired of me and sick of the Foundation and the public poking and picking apart our lives, you’ll regret everything that loving me will cost you.”

Jonathon gave his head a defiant shake, unwilling to accept what Leo was telling him. “But what if there’s a chance that we could be happy? What if we could wait out the storm and find a way to make it work?”

“Wait out the storm? We could be talking years: after you’ve finished school and had a chance to establish yourself and I’ve proven that I’m stable and dedicated to carrying on in Max’s place.”

“Could it work if we waited?” Jonathon asked, his hands shaking as they covered Leo’s.

“I think…it could,” he said slowly, his gaze stretching past the room as he thought it through. “It probably wouldn’t be all that noteworthy in four or five years—understandable, even—if I fell in love with a brilliant young artist who’s taken the world by storm.”

Jonathon would wait forever for Leo and he didn’t doubt his own talent, but he couldn’t help himself. “Is this plan contingent upon the storm? I might flop and be good for nothing but marrying a sugar daddy. Might be saving myself a lot of trouble with you and I might be good at being married to a royal,” he said bravely.

“Stop it.” Leo tapped their foreheads together and kissed him. “You’d be miserable.”

“I’ll be miserable without you,” Jonathon predicted. “But I’d rather give you up for a few years than never hold you again.”

“I can do it,” Leo stated as he sat back on his heels and nodded up at him. “If this gets out, though… I’d have to pretend that nothing happened, that you were nothing but a close family friend. And I’d have to draw attention away from us quickly so that any gossip about you and me at Schönbühel would be too old or too insignificant for anyone to care about.”

“You’ll wait for me, though? I know you’ll have to pretend you’re single and looking, but you’ll wait for me?”

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