“I’ve tried to imagine,” he said softly. “Even imagining it feels stressful.”
I blew air out through my lips. “Stressful doesn’t even begin to describe it.”
“I wish you didn’t care about the royal pressures so much,” Henry said, shaking his head as he looked out at the twinkling horizon. We were at the top of the Ferris wheel now, and Frostmonte Castle was easily visible in the distance.
I stared out at the castle—my home that never felt like home.
“I have no other option but to care,” I said. “Do you know how many times I’ve thought about abdicating? About leaving, running away completely, without a trace? I could do it, Henry. Live the renegade life.”
He gave me a hard stare. “As someone who has lived the off-the-grid, loner life, believe me when I say it isn’t as nice as you might think.”
“It isn’t even about that. Even if I didn’t run away completely… I would have nowhere to go. No access to any money without the castle. I have no one outside of that place, Henry. My entire life, my entire family, everyone who cares about me is in there.”
“I understand that,” he said.
“And I don’t hate every aspect of it,” I said.
Henry let out a quick laugh. “Oh, if fifteen-year-old Sebastian could hear you say that, he’d punch you in the face.”
I couldn’t help but smile. “I know. I hated every single thing about being a prince back then. Now, I’d say I only hate half of it.”
“Well, that’s incredible progress, at least,” Henry said.
“The handcuffs are definitely made of diamonds and gold,” I said. “But they’re still… handcuffs. Tied to the most beautiful jail cell I could imagine.”
Henry was quiet for a while. The sounds of the fairgrounds floated up, the music and chatter and winter merriment of everyone below. It all seemed so simple here in Berrydale. Everything seemed so easy.
“You want to know something?” Henry said quietly, his voice breaking the silence.
“Hmm?”
“I think you’re just scared,” he said simply. “None of the restrictions on you are as tight as you think they are. You’re afraid, like you’ve always been afraid, when it comes to this stuff.”
I glared at him. “Did you come on this Ferris wheel with me to tell me that? To call me a coward?”
His expression was gentle. “I don’t mean it like that, and you know it.”
I shifted in my seat as it gently rocked back and forth, looking out at the fairgrounds and then back at him.
“I’m a lot more scared of you, you know,” I said.
He puffed out a laugh. “Scared of me, huh?”
“Of course,” I said.
“I know I spent many years in the wilderness, Sebastian, but I assure you, you have nothing to be scared of—”
“How am I supposed to feel?” I blurted out. “I’m twenty-six. I’m a prince. I’m set to marry a princess—an incredible, down-to-earth, smart, funny, and gorgeous princess—but still the only thing I want is you?”
I could feel my heart pounding in my throat as the words spilled out of me.
Henry’s eyes searched my face, and for once, he didn’t seem like he knew what to say.
“Don’t act so surprised,” I breathed, looking back down at the town below. “You know I wanted to fuck you. And I know you wanted it too. And it was easier to deal with that nagging feeling when you weren’t… around. But now that I’ve seen you again? It’s impossible, Henry. God, the idea of you is the only thing I’ve made myself come to in the last ten years. Every time, I think about you.”
Henry swallowed, his lips parting. “Christ,” he whispered.
“I know,” I said. “It’s bad. It’s awful.”
“I didn’t say that,” he clarified.
“Maybe you should have.”
“Well,” he said, his voice hoarse. “You could have come with me if you’d showed up in that guest room.”
“Jesus, don’t say that, Henry.”
“Why not?” he said, lifting an eyebrow. “Don’t you ever think about how things would be if we’d both just… been able to stay in Berrydale? Together?”
I couldn’t meet his eyes. I looked off into the distance, focusing on the castle. “I try not to think about that.”
“Why not?”
I let out a sigh. “Because I wanted that more than anything, and it was the one thing I couldn’t have.”
Henry let out a stiff laugh that made me jump slightly in place. “Really?” he said.
I looked at him. I couldn’t even pretend to fight it at this point. I felt like when Henry was this close to me, all of the scaffolding inside me shifted. I was the same person, but a different version.
Henry cut through all of the bullshit.
“Yes,” I said finally. “You know what I really wanted? I wanted to be your simple house husband. Cook you dinner. Rub your back. Blow you every night when you got home from work.”
A small smile appeared on Henry’s face, but his eyes still looked pained.
“Instead I’m a prince,” I said, shaking my head. “Everyone looks to me to be a certain way.”
“Who fucking cares, Sebastian—”
“A lot of people care, unfortunately,” I said.
“You can’t buck any of this stupid tradition?” Henry asked.
I felt the familiar heavy feeling settling on my chest. It had been there for my whole life, and throughout the years it had gotten both easier and heavier, somehow.
“My entire life would dismantle if I did,” I said. “Not to mention the people around me, in the castle.”
“Well, I think that’s BS,” Henry said. “I think you should try breaking a goddamn rule for once, and see what happens. It’s the same as when you were a kid—”
“The one night I finally broke a rule as a teenager, I was ripped away from you forever,” I said. “You know that, Henry.”
“It didn’t have to be that way,” he said quietly. “And you’re an adult now. You’ve been an adult for a very long time. We aren’t fifteen years old, kissing on a pile of firewood in the park. It isn’t like that.”
I puffed out a defeated laugh. “I wish it was.”
“What the hell?”
“Not the… awful parts," I said. "But the kissing you part.”
He let out a frustrated groan. I couldn't blame him. It was frustrating. All of this was.
“Fine,” he said.
Henry’s warm hand was on my cheek a moment later, and my heart jumped up to somewhere near my throat. The gentle sway of the Ferris wheel seat below us rocked as his hand guided my face.
He leaned in, pressing his lips to mine softly.
“There,” he said, leaning back. “We kissed again. All better now?”
It felt like nothing I’d ever experienced. Certainly not with Henry. When we’d kissed in the war room last week, it had been drunken and impassioned and had felt dangerously rushed.
But this? This felt like… how people might kiss if they were in love. Simple and sweet and unassuming. And God, I needed more.