Page 185 of Shâhzâdeh

“About everyzing. I’m sure you checked on zhose people and you know zheir fate.”

I smiled faintly thinking about how I’d gotten the alert while Xerxes was away that the first of my adoptive family members had died. From then it was interesting to watch how one death so quickly led to the others. It had taken several weeks, each day I’d awoken with a wonder of when they would expire and the morning after it happened, I woke up with an even greater peace than I could’ve ever imagined. I was free from the past that attempted to break me and was now reconnected to the past that had loved me even when I was only a faint memory.

I traced the outline of the colorful words and symbols on his chest. I kissed our last name that he had scrawled over his pecs. “I did. I don’t feel anyway about it. I’m happy that we can have everything behind us while we move into this next chapter of our lives. I hope that everyone around us can find the peace they deserve, despite the business we are all bound by.”

“It will happen. By choice or by force. Peace is always attained zhrough means zhat some don’t want to face. We are men wiz power but we don’t hoard it. We understand zhat we have to be the bad guys in certain people’s minds and zhat’s alright wiz me.” His breathing settled slightly and I wondered if he was going back to sleep.

“As long as the people who love you know you’re the best bad guy there is.” His laughter rumbled softly in his chest and I loved hearing and feeling that sound. I sighed because the morning was thrown off, but I still needed to get something off my chest. “This seems to be the worst day to do this.”

“Do what?” His hand was now lazily making circles up the exposed part of my back. Since we’d gotten married I had kept wearing the silk nightgowns that I’d gotten for our honeymoon. Something about them made me feel beautiful. Sensual. And there was a safety now in feeling sensual that I hadn’t had before.

“Give you a present.”

“What is zhe present, ziba?” I pouted because he stopped rubbing my back but I needed to move so I didn’t fuss. I moved over to the elaborate bombé chests that we used as bedside tables. Pulling out the top drawer, I grabbed the gold package.

By now he was sitting up curiously with his brows furrowed at the item I had in my hand. He looked like the idea of getting a gift was foreign to him and it bothered me that he didn’t look accustomed to getting gifts.

“You have to open it.”

I shoved the package into his hand laughing because he looked so spooked. Xerxes carefully opened up the box that I’d had wrapped up in real gold foil paper. It was as if he could tell by the weight it was real and he didn’t want to mess it up.

“I suddenly have zhis deep sense of promise. Zhat zhis box is fortuitous.” He stopped unwrapping and looked down at the package like he was going to throw it across the room.

“Well, my husband and his mother and father all love to spoil me. And since you all don’t wait to buy things I can’t ever figure out how to get ahead of any of you. But I think I got you beat this time.” I grinned, hoping not to give anything away about what his surprise was.

When he got down to the box and saw Nev’s business name on the top he paused and looked up at me through those mysterious eyes I loved to get lost in. “Ziba, if I open zhis and zhere is a giant diamondMahdavichain or somezing like zhat we are going to need to talk.”

I put my hands on my hips, a move that had him smiling at my attitude because this man adored when I acted like a brat. “I don’t know about all that. Because you shouldn’t be mad at me even if it was. Nyima says she loves to wear Priest’s chains around their neck while they—”

He held a hand up as I giggled. Xerxes’ eyes narrowed glancing at my form before biting his lip. He kissed my breast bone before sliding his tongue between them. I immediately stopped giggling and my mind went to him making me cum. “Do not make me buy chains just so zhat I can watch you ride my dick wiz diamonds zhat match your crown dangling between zhese beautiful breasts of yours. Matter fact—” When he reached for his phone I put my hand over it to stop him.

“NO! We’re focused on the box. Open your gift. I promise it’s not a chain!” He almost looked disappointed but sat back in the bed and lifted the lid off of the box. He stared at the contents for only a moment before looking at me confused.

“Ziba, I know my mother has provided us with zhe dishes, but I didn’t zhink she was remiss in sending cutlery.”

“She wasn’t.”

“Zhen why is zhere a spoon in here? Is it a teaspoon?” Xerxes held up the spoon from where it had been nestled in the box. His confusion was apparent until he read the words I had inscribed on the spoon. “Baby’s first bite. Vanya, what does zhis mean? Baby’s first—” his eyes drifted slowly from the spoon to my mid section before they traveled up to reach my eyes. “Does it mean what I zhink it means?”

“It does.”

He jumped up with the package falling to the ground with the spoon still gripped in his hand. My husband’s hands went gently to my hips pulling me toward him before one massive hand covered my lower belly and pelvis. “But how are you pregnant? You said zhat zhere might be issues. Zhat your body might not conceive. It is why I wasn’t ever careful, zhat and I didn’t zhink of putting something between us. Are you happy? Zhis feels like a miracle.”

I bit my lip and smiled before I said, “Alhamdulillah.”

His eyes watered, and he smiled before pressing his hand firmly on my womb. “Praise be to God indeed. Well, we will have to find all W names for our kids.”

He was so confident in his declaration I wondered what affinity this man had for the letter W. “W? Why W?”

Xerxes got down on his knees and kissed my belly affectionately multiple times before he spoke up. “Because it is the letter than links V and X together in the alphabet. And children are our permanent tether to one another. A bond and a symbol of love that no one can erase. I was right, this box was very auspicious. A beautiful beginning to the family you and I are creating.”

“We have to make sure everything is okay—”

He looked up from his place of supplication his eyes serious. “We only speak life, Vanya. Life, health, happiness and wealth. You have given me my heart’s every desire. First, it was for you to not hate me. Zhen it was for you to be my wife. For you to love me and now you are making me a fazer.”

“I think I’m the reason you’ve been sick.” I was thinking of how I got the call from the doctor that had done my bloodwork for the DNA test and finished running whatever tests they needed to do for my life insurance. The Consortium needed it on file and of course Xerxes wouldn’t trust anyone outside of the building to do it. Dr. Tavior had been the one to do all the bloodwork and he called me to give me the news. I was pregnant. I apparently had a honeymoon baby because I had already cleared six weeks.

Xerxes chuckled and stood up, giving me a squeeze. “Because I love you so much zhat I have taken on zhe physical symptoms zhe pregnancy gives you now because zhe ones you will face later will be so great. The same zhing happened with bâbâ. I should’ve expected it.”

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