Page 175 of Enchanted Kingdom
Owen must have told him what happened. I shook my head. “Please, Krew. Please let me go. I don’t want to marry Keir. I don’t want to be forced to wear that damned crown. I don’t want him. Please.” Needing him to shut off his magic before he got me caught, I stepped closer and put a hand on his wrist. “Please, Krew,” I begged. “Please just let me run.”
I was close enough that I could see him swallow even as his magic dimmed. “I can’t.”
“Why?”
He ran a hand down my arm and felt the bag. “Dammit.”
“I’m trying to run!” I explained. “I don’t want to be Keir’s prize anymore.”
He rested a hand on my shoulder. “I hear you. Breathe, please. We have to figure out a way to get you out of this.”
“By helping me run?”
He shook his head. “No. My father is looking for you already. Keir panicked. He didn’t alert just me, but also some other guards to help find you. I wouldn’t have even put it past my father to have been prepared for this after he set you up tonight. He likely wanted you to do something like this. So he could catch you.”
The king had been trying to make me run? Just tonight or all along? I’d never considered that.
Krew grabbed my arm gently. “Listen to me carefully. Give me that bag and go back inside. Slip into the kitchens.”
“No,” I snapped. “No. I’m not doing it.”
“I am trying to save you, Jorah,” he offered gently.
“Me too,” I choked out. “I’m trying to save me too.”
He must have had better acclimated vision having been waiting here in the dark. He reached out and brushed a tear off my face. “I know you are so let me help you.”
I heard some voices approaching and approaching fast.
He tipped his head back to the sky. “Dammit.”
Oh no. Was that the king?
“Of course it is,” Krew answered.
I hadn’t even realized I said it out loud. “Krew?” I asked. “What do I do?”
“Take off your coat,” he commanded.
I did, and he took off his tailcoat as well. He tossed them on the ground next to us none too gently, my bag along with them.
The steps and voices were coming closer and closer. We were out of time.
He came so close I could see his eyes in what little moonlight there was. “You can hit me for this later, just know I’m trying to save you too.”
And then he kissed me.
His body crushed into mine as he wrapped a hand into my hair and another around my waist.
I wanted to smack him or wiggle away. But then I remembered his words. He was trying to save me too.
By kissing me?
I heard voices behind us, but Krew was in no hurry to pull away. I gripped his shirt, clinging to my road to freedom. And I kissed him back.
“What is this?” the king’s voice barked.
Krew kissed me once more, before pulling back only slightly. “What do you think?” he snapped, moving in to kiss me again and not even looking the direction of his father.
