Page 121 of Thrones We Steal

It’s just like a fairy tale.

38

“Stop Me From Falling” - Kylie Minogue

Sunlight flirts with the drapes, teasing them until they finally relent and allow it to beam in and caress my bare skin. I feel well-rested for the first time in an eternity, which is a miracle considering how many times one of us woke the other during the night. We’re like former dieters at a buffet.

Something akin to liquid paradise bubbles in my belly. I realize it’s bliss. Complete and utter bliss.

I am sandwiched by warmth: the sun glowing in on one side, Henry’s deliciously bare chest beneath the other. The light touch of his fingers drifts up my back. I incline my head and devour the sight of him sleep-tousled and sex-drunk.

Crinkles spread out from his eyes as the side of his mouth tugs upward. “Good morning, beautiful.” He buries his nose in my hair and inhales. “God, you smell good.”

I prop myself up to drop a kiss on his lips. “You’re still here. I didn’t think you did the whole morning-after thing.”

He grunts and rolls so I’m under him. “I don’t.” His lips on my throat fly me to another level of heaven. “We happen to be married. Besides, this is my hotel room. You’re the one who stayed over.”

I pinch the flesh under his arm. He squirms and grabs my wrists. “I can’t believe we’re here, after all this time,” I murmur. My body sighs his name as he consumes me. Henry.

“What do you mean?” His mouth travels lower and lower, waking every inch of my skin.

I roll my shoulders back as tingles of pleasure ripple down my spine. “I gave up hope so long ago and now—” I gasp at a particularly hard nip at my nipple. “It feels like a dream. How did I get so lucky?”

“You are many things. Lucky is not one of them.” His voice is low and gravelly from sleep. The sound of it, coupled with the roughness of his stubble against my bare stomach, clenches my insides into a tight ball of pleasure.

“Agree to disagree,” I say right before he claims me, and I lose myself in him once again.

When we finally emerge from the bedroom, Henry’s designated room butler has set the table for two and kept the food in the warming trays. “Your Royal Highnesses.” He pulls out both of our chairs in turn.

Heat climbs my neck, and I wonder how much he heard while setting up. We weren’t exactly quiet.

Henry smirks at my embarrassment. He leans over to plant what I can only assume was intended to be a chaste kiss on my lips, but which quickly escalates into something much baser. There’s something about the scent of his pheromones that turns me into an animal.

The aroma of bacon, sausage, and fried eggs must wake his stomach, because it loudly protests. I break off the kiss and grin at him. “Maybe we should focus on assuaging one appetite at a time.”

After setting our plates in front of us, the butler gives a stiff bow and excuses himself.

“What kind of business brought you to London anyway?” I cut into my eggs. “Besides escaping me, of course.”

He narrows his eyes and looks at me sidelong. “I wasn’t escaping. There’s a hotel chain that needs restructuring.” He shrugs and spears a bite of sausage with his fork. “I’m in the process of buying it.”

I lower my fork without taking a bite. I assumed his reasons for being there had to do with Wesbourne and the Crown, not his own personal business. “You’re buying it? What are you going to do with it?”

“Hire a competent CEO to run it for me, one who won’t run it into the ground like the last one did.”

“You’re going to keep it?”

He takes a sip of coffee and nods. “Unless it seems more profitable to sell it to the highest bidder. In that case, I’ll use the capital from the sale to buy something else.” He spreads butter on a piece of toast and pops it into his mouth.

“You sound so confident, like you’ve done this before.”

He chuckles. “That’s because I have.”

I set my coffee cup back on the table. “How did I not know this?”

“It’s not something I really talk about.”

“Why didn’t you tell me when we talked about your dreams?”

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