He swipes the wet strands of my hair away from my face. “Jesus,” he says, “you scared the shit out of me!”

I can’t see him in the dark, but if I could, I bet I’d see that vein in his temple throbbing. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were concerned.”

“Why would you think otherwise?”

Water laps around us, swirling with the tide. My dress tangles itself around the king as he holds me to him. I taste saltwater on my lips and try to ignore the way Montes’s dress shirt clings to his chest.

“Oh, I don’t know,” I say, “maybe because you killed my parents, destroyed my homeland, and are now forcing me into marrying you.” My voice comes out flinty.

Rather than responding, the king releases me. He walks out of the water and back onto the beach, leaving me staring after him.

“Oh, now you walk away!” I yell at his back, mostly just to rile him up.

It works.

He comes stalking back into the water. “What do I have to do to prove myself? I’ve already moved mountains—an entire half of the world will prosper because you wanted it to be so. What more do you want me to do?”

“I want you to leave me the hell alone.”

He grasps my jaw and holds it firmly, and in the dim moonlight I can just barely make out the shine of his eyes. “That is the one thing I cannot do.”

He lets me go and leaves, this time for good.

Chapter 16

Chapter 16

Serenity

The day of the wedding I sleep in. Normally I’m loathe to waste away the first hours of the morning, but not today. Today I want to forget that I have to get married. To the king. I make a face in my pillow.

People have been knocking on my door for the last two hours, and up until now I’ve done a pretty good job of ignoring them. But the pounding on my door right now is louder and more insistent than the others.

When I don’t answer, the pounding stops. I smile into my pillow until I hear the click of my lock being thrown back. The door opens and footsteps cross the room.

My bed dips as someone sits down on it, and then I feel the feathery touch of fingertips on the bare skin of my shoulder. “You need to get up now.”

My eyes snap open at that voice. “I thought you were ignoring me?” I say to King Montes. He’s leaning over me, and his nearness is doing strange things to my body. I haven’t seen him since that night in the ocean.

“When it comes to you, that’s impossible.”

I bury my face in my pillow. “I want to sleep in.”

“We’re getting married in two hours.”

“Don’t care,” I say, my voice muffled.