you?”
He kissed me hard, just to prove his point. “Yes,” I said. “I ache for you the same way.”
“Then let me love you,” he said. “We can be careful.”
I felt the blood thundering in my ears. “Can we?” I asked. When I kissed him, his passion overtook him. He grabbed me tightly against him, one hand tangled in my hair and his tongue jammed deep in my mouth, like he was trying to climb inside our kiss.
He was breathless when he broke away. “I guess we can’t,” he finally decided with a sigh. He gathered me up in a fierce hug. “But one day we can…,” he promised with a growl. “One day we will. Wife,” he added, likewise trying it on for size.
“You better start taking your multi-vitamins,” I grinned. “You’re going to need them.”
“Good. Because I plan on keeping you pregnant.”
“You do?” I asked with a raised eyebrow.
He nodded. “You’re so damned sexy when you’re pregnant,” he said, his hand sweeping possessively over my widening curves. “Thank God we have all these rooms to fill.”
I laughed. “You’re lucky I like big families.”
He caressed my face. “I’m lucky, period.” He kissed me again, softer this time. “The next time we come to Ademar, I want to marry you in that church. And I want to consummate the marriage on this throne.”
A shiver ran through my body. “You’ve got yourself a deal, Your Grace.”
I felt him shudder as well. He moved me off his lap before he stood. Then, he swept me up into his arms. “We should probably get back to a boring old bed,” he decided. “Before you make me lose all control.”
We got a few more hours of sleep before we were served breakfast out on our private patio overlooking the ocean. “Legend has it this is where Abyleen landed,” he told me.
“I can see why she would want to make it her home,” I replied.
“Speaking of which, we should probably start thinking about that soon.”
“What are our choices?”
“I’d love to live here,” he said, “but Ademar uses it as a tourist attraction. It makes quite a bit of money. I felt guilty shutting it down for a couple of days.”
I nodded. “Fifty Oaks?”
His mouth thinned into a thin line. “That was my life before you. The raunchy rock star living like a king. Not exactly a place we would want to raise Jack.”
I nodded. He wasn’t wrong. “Have you thought about returning to Aldayne?”
He sighed as he reached for his coffee. “There are a number of royal residences there. Graystone Castle, overlooking Midnight Falls on the northern coast. There’s Castlewick, with a view of Unity Lake and King’s Keep. This is the official family home. It’s in the center of the country, nearest the Tremwells,” he added, no doubt so I could figure it in my calculations that would be where Fern would settle. “There’s Shimmering Falls,” he added. I already knew that was the Queen’s residence, so both of us shook our head.
“I think if I had my preferences, I’d want to live on Mercy Island.”
“Mercy Island?” I echoed.
He nodded. “It’s this little spec of land off Castlegate Harbor, facing Ireland in the east. It’s beautiful and green and untouched, except for Castlegate itself. It’s one of our oldest castles, originally built as a military stronghold, to defend Aldayne from European advances from the east. In WWII, they used it as a hospital as well as a fort. It’s larger than Luz Del Mar,” he added.
I couldn’t imagine.
“There’s a chapel in the castle and a lighthouse on the northern shore.”
“Sounds elaborate,” I said.
“It is,” he confirmed. “But Old Mother would let me have it in a second if it meant that I was returning home to Aldayne.”
I hesitated only briefly. “Is that the plan?”
He sat back in the chair. “Life has changed,” he admitted. “Now that I have you and Jack, my life as a raunchy rock god is definitely over.”
His admission shocked me. This was certainly the first I had heard of any drastic change of plans. “What? Why?”
“You can’t be the Duke of Mayhem and a family man,” he pointed out.
“It hasn’t stopped Vanni,” I countered.
“I’m not Vanni,” he said. I had no response to that. “Besides, someone will have to help you raise all those babies.”
I laughed.
He reached for my hand. “I want something like what your folks have.”
“Is that even possible?” I asked softly. God, I hoped so, but it didn’t seem likely.
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “But I promise I’ll