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I looked at Kaya. “That’s true. My father did build a bridge and dam with lilies for children. He’d told me he’d done that hoping that it would bring children to the castle. He’d loved children.”

He would have loved to have known his granddaughter.

Although I looked for him, I did not see him, not then or thereafter.

But I could feel his presence every springtime when the daffodils flowered. I felt him smiling when Monica ran through the fields of the castle as I had as a child.

Finally, I had settled down with a family and wife.

It was what he had always wanted for me.

I had Kaya to thank for all of that and I’d never forget it.

She had brought me the greatest happiness on earth and that evening, after we had tucked Monica in bed, I waited for her on the roof while she went out hunting. She came back and found me, looking over the grounds.

“What are doing up here?” she asked me.

“I am waiting for my queen,” I said.

“Here I am,” she said in a husky voice, sliding into my arms.

“What will you do with me now?” she asked me in a teasing, sexy voice.

I could feel myself becoming aroused by her proximity, wanting her as much as I had right in the beginning. Our sex life was as wild and passionate as it had been then, it showed no signs of abating.

“What will I do with you?” I pretended to think. “Only absolutely everything,” I said, leaning in to kiss her.

Her eyes sparkled in the dark. “Just what I was hoping for.”

*****