Total pages in book: 121
Estimated words: 117920 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 590(@200wpm)___ 472(@250wpm)___ 393(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 117920 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 590(@200wpm)___ 472(@250wpm)___ 393(@300wpm)
He pulls away just enough, his forehead pressed against mine, gazing wildly into my eyes. “Did you mean that?”
I nod, swallowing hard because I’m getting choked up and I can’t say much more without babbling. “I meant it. I meant it. I love you. I’ve loved you for a long time, it’s just taken this long to find the courage to tell you. And I wanted to tell you. I wanted you to know that I love you.”
“You love me,” he whispers, closing his eyes and rocking back and forth slightly on his feet. “You love me. I am home.”
Tears spring to my eyes. “Home?”
He nods, just an inch, brow forever furrowed. “I’ve waited forty years for my heart to have a home,” he says softly. “I’ve waited for you.”
Sweet Jesus.
Is this man for real?
My heart is so damn full, I don’t think my chest can contain it anymore.
If that isn’t the most raw, honest thing that anyone has ever said, I don’t know what is.
And more than that, I relate. I know. I know what it’s like to search for something, not knowing what it is, feeling restless and unrooted and wondering if you’ll ever find your place in the world.
I’ve found my place. It’s in his arms.
My place in this world is with him.
He kisses me again and it’s like everything dissolves into stars.
Then he pulls back and grins. “You do know I love you, right?”
I smile right back. “Well, now I do.”
He lets out a soft laugh. “I love you.” He kisses my nose. “Jeg elsker dig.” My cheek. The corner of my mouth. “I love you, Aurora, and there’s no escaping it anymore.”
“You tried to escape?”
He shakes his head, kisses my temple. “It was hopeless. I thought I could get you out of my system. But you’re in my system. You’re in my blood, in my veins. I feel you with every pulse and every heartbeat that I have. I feel you, always”
This man, this man.
How can I be this lucky?
How can we be this lucky to find each other?
All these souls in all this world and I end up at his door.
I pull back slightly to look him in the eye. “You keep talking like that and you’re going to get it.”
He pauses, cocks a brow playfully. “Get what, exactly?”
“Anything you want,” I tell him.
“Oh really,” he muses, then his expression turns serious. “First I want you to promise me that you’re not looking for someone else.”
Bloody hell, this again?
Gently, I tease, “Are you jealous?”
“Jealous? Of some other man taking you away from me? Fearful is more like it,” he says. “But jealous works too. I’m not above admitting it. I love you and I can’t share you with anyone else. I won’t.” His voice cracks just a little which makes me think this is a little more than just plain old jealousy or insecurity. “You belong to me. I belong to you.”
It makes me wonder about Helena. About some of the things Henrik alluded to, that perhaps she had someone else, that she wasn’t faithful.
Shit, if that was the case, Aksel really got handed the shit end of the stick.
“Aksel,” I tell him, running my hands around to the small of his back. “If your heart has a home, mine does too. We can make a home together.”
He seems appeased by that, the creases in his brow smoothing.
“You really are a goddess,” he murmurs, kissing me again.
“And yet, I’m at your beck and call,” I say against his mouth. “You tell me what to do and I’ll do it.”
That got his attention, like I knew it would.
He cranes his neck back to get a better look at me, dubious. “There you go again.”
“Tell me what you want,” I say again, teasing him. I take a step back out of his grasp, biting my lip coquettishly. “Perhaps you think I need another spanking.”
“Where on earth did you come from?” he says breathlessly.
“Australia.” I grin at him and start to undo the drawstring to his pajama pants. “So what will it be, sir?”
Now I have him.
A sly, hungry smile graces his lips.
“Get on your knees and call me Your Majesty.”
That I can do.
Chapter 19
Aksel
April
“I think I’m going to be sick.”
I look over at Aurora who is holding onto the railing and leaning over, looking positively green.
“Hang in there,” I tell her. “If you keep going below like that, you’ll only make it worse. Stay up on deck with me.”
“But it’s cold and wet up here,” she says. “And it’s warm and dry downstairs.”
Her words are punctuated by a slap of water to her face as the hull dips against a whitecap.
It’s the first sailing trip of the year, which means it’s late April and the waters around the Øresund Strait are rough thanks to the winds and the endless traffic of schooners, ferries and cruise ships that ply the waters nonstop.