“You just seem too buttoned up for that.” Color springs forth in her cheeks. “No offense.”
“Ja?Well. I’ll have you know that I was once arrested.”
Her eyes widen. “Wait, you were? What happened?”
“It was… I’ll call it a youthful lapse. I partied a little too hard, did too many drugs. Got sick all over myself. Resisted the police when they were only trying to help. You know, all the usual embarrassing things.”
She winces. “You didn’t!”
“Oh, I really did.”
“Oh, your parents must have been so angry!”
I exhale a slow breath. “Sort of. They knew, they were just… busy. My grandmother kept a keen eye out for all of her grandchildren, so she got the call instead of my father.” I chuckle, shaking my head. “If you think I am stoic, wait until you see my grandmother receive bad news. But that night when the police brought me to the palace… the door shut, and it was just the two of us… It was the only time I can ever remember her being openly furious.”
“That sounds terrifying.”
“What, my grandmother?Ja, it wasn’t great. You have to imagine someone about your size wagging her finger in my face and telling me how I wasn’t living up to the family name. My grandmother was worried that her voice would carry and so she whispered and yelled at me, all at once. After about four hours of that, most people would go crazy.”
She cracks a smile. “She sounds intimidating.”
I squint off toward the place where the sky, sea, and land all seem to blend together. “You should meet her.”
Margot pulls a face. “Uh… yeah, right.”
My heart pounds in my chest. “No, I’m serious.”
She stops, pulling her hand from my grip. I turn and look at her, my eyebrows lifting. She shoots me a confused look. “What?”
“I love you. You love me. So?— “
“So we shouldget married?!” she says, horrified.
I give her a funny look. “No. I’m just saying... maybe we should… I don’t know…date.”
She crosses her arms and cocks her hips. “Stellan… we both know that’s a terrible idea. You have a list of girls to choose from?—“
I reach out and grab her by the waist, tugging her up against my hips. Then I cup her heart-shaped face, tucking a strand of those pink cotton candy curls behind her ear. “But I am not in love with any of them. I’m in love withyou.”
She bites her full lower lip and pins me with her intensely blue gaze. When she speaks, her voice is a mere whisper. “I know.”
“So? I want you here. Stay with me.” I draw in a deep breath, feeling more naked before her than ever before. “I’ve never felt like this about anyone before. And I’m not willing to just throw that away because it might upset some people.”
She shakes her head, taking in what I said. Her brow hunches. “I don’t even know how we would make that happen. Are you going to come up with a lie to tell your family? Am I going to lie to my editor?”
I take her hand, pulling it against my chest and trapping in beneath mine. “Is that what you want?”
Margot looks at me for a moment, as if trying to decide something. Then she shakes her head again. “No,” she replies softly.
“So date me. We’ll just show up holding hands and let everyone else deal with the fallout.”
One corner of her mouth turns down. “That’s not the best attitude to have, Stellan. Besides… dating you… I would assume that it comes with certain…expectations.”
“It doesn’t have to.” I mean the words, but even as they leave my lips, I sense that they’re not the fullest truth. “Look. I’m saying… this is all new to me. It’s all new to you. Let’s just… forge a path together.”
She sighs, looking away. For several moments, I can hear nothing but the sea in the background and the hammering of my own heart.
Is she really going to turn me down?
