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“Nice to meet you,” Gordon said impatiently. “Privacy, please?”
The men cleared out of the hallway, and the door shut behind them. Isabelle watched him with new eyes. He already had the authority thing down pat with the royal guard, and he wasn’t even married to her. “Did you get rid of them so you could run? Because you should.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose. “No. I’m not running…yet. I got rid of them so we could talk without a bunch of people listening to us.”
“That’s what your life will be like from now on, if you agree to this crazy idea. People always watching. Judging. Ripping apart everything you do.” She crossed her arms. “How does that make you feel?”
“Like I still don’t give a damn about who watches or judges me.”
“Then you won’t make a good royal,” she said quickly. “We have to care. It’s what we do. Who we are.”
“Not me.” He caught her hands and squeezed them gently. “All I care about is what you think. Are you upset that you might have to marry me? Because of who I am? What I do?”
“How can you ask me that?” She wasn’t upset because she might have to marry him. She was upset because he might have to marry her. “This just isn’t right.”
Dropping her hands, he paced back and forth. “What isn’t right?”
“Everything.” She covered her face. “Think of the way you felt about arranged marriages when we talked about it before.”
He swallowed. “Yeah, but that was different.”
“How?” she asked, confused. “How could this possibly be different?”
“Because I don’t consider marrying you an arranged marriage.” He hesitated, avoiding her eyes. “I like you, Belle. And you’re not a stranger.”
She swallowed hard, her heart picking up speed. “I like you, too, which is why I don’t want you to get stuck marrying me.”
“Yes, because it’s so awful to have to marry a princess.” He snorted. “I totally could have scored a queen instead. Exactly how happily married are your parents?”
A laugh escaped her, and she smacked his arm. “Gordon.”
“What? I’m not allowed to make you laugh?” He rubbed his chest. “Man, this being married to a princess shit is hard.”
“We’re not married. We’re not even engaged.”
His eyes sobered, the amber sparkle dying down. “We could be. If this is what needs to be done to protect you, then I could do it, if you want. I told you I’d do anything to help you, and I meant it. But not if you don’t want me to.”
Some small—okay, huge—part of her wanted to say yes. Wanted to selfishly ask him to marry her, because she had a feeling being married to him would be pretty amazing. But it wasn’t fair to him, so no matter how much she wanted to…
She couldn’t do it.
“It’s not that I don’t want you to.” She took a deep breath. “But you don’t have to. I’ll be fine.”
“Fine isn’t exactly good.” He leveled a look on her, his brown eyes pulling her in with their magnetism. “What if we could be more than fine? What if we could be happy?”
Her heart twisted. If he didn’t stop trying to convince her they would make a team…she might stop fighting it. And he didn’t want that. Not really. He was just doing what he thought was right. Being an honorable gentleman.
And she wouldn’t punish him for that.
Forcing a smile, she crossed her arms. “I’m sure we could be. Honestly. But not like this. Don’t listen to them. Listen to me. The people of Maldeva will get over this, and so will all the ‘princes’ of the world. If Harry can party in Vegas nude and be forgiven for it, then I can have sex in a car.”
“Were you there, too?” he asked, all wide eyes. “Who would have guessed that underneath that prim little exterior, you were a—”
“Gordon.”
“Fine.” He held his hands up. “I’ll focus.”
“How can you be so calm right now?”