“You always say the prince knows best,” I reminded Tiago.
Apparently, that was not actually a comfort.
As I walked under an arbor, still smiling over Tiago nearly hyperventilating about his new duties, Varic came up behind me and pressed his face to the nape of my neck.
I leaned back into him, letting my head fall onto his shoulder.
“My consort, you should leave the prince and come away with me,” he whispered in my ear, his hands on my hips. “He gives you too big a job, assisting the king, working with the prince’s rajan, navigating the relationship between the queen and the courtesans, now that the queen has agreed to remain at court. It will be like herding cats. Why bother? Run away with me instead.”
“To the sea? To my villa? I want to go back.”
He chuckled. “Not tomorrow, but the night after, I will take you back to the villa.”
“Why not tonight? Why not tomorrow?” I asked, leaning into the kisses he placed along my jawline.
“Because tomorrow we’re getting married.”
“Are we?”
“If you’ll have me.”
I turned in his arms and stared into his deep, dark green eyes.
“The court needs a celebration of new life, new promise, and new hope. Only we can give that to them.”
“Then we should,” I murmured, smiling at him. “And afterwards I want you to come back to the villa with me and lie in the sun.”
He eased me close, wrapping me in his arms. “I would like nothing more than to lie in the sun with you.”
“That’s a promise, and I’m going to hold you to it.”
“Yes, please,” he husked, clutching me tight. “Hold me to all my promises.”
And I would. It would be my pleasure.