Page 43 of Awestruck (Starstruck Love Stories #4)

Chapter Twenty-Five

Freya

“Freya.” Elliot speaks in a whisper, his eyes roaming my face and lingering on my lips. He wants this as much as I do, but there is hesitation in his eyes.

I understand why. We need to talk about this and what it would mean, but right now I do not want to talk. I want to know how it would feel to kiss the soldier who has become a fixture of my life in only a few weeks.

Freeing one of my hands, I lift it to his cheek, then slide my fingers through the short hair on the side of his head.

I am being bolder than I ever have been, but before Wulfric found us, I thought I was going to lose this man.

That is not a pain I wish to endure. I do not know what I would do without him.

Elliot’s eyebrows pull together, but he doesn’t shy away from my touch. He leans into it, closing his eyes. “What are you doing, Rapunzel?” His fingers find my hair near my collarbone and wrap around the locks, making me smile despite my nerves.

I move closer until our noses almost touch. “I am answering your question.”

He shakes his head, but the movement brings him close enough that his nose brushes mine, and I can nearly taste him. “We shouldn’t do this.”

“I have lived my entire life dictated by shoulds and should nots,” I whisper. “Let me have this moment for myself.”

He drops his forehead to mine and takes a shaky breath. “Freya.”

“Will you kiss me, Elliot? Please? Just this once.” If he resists me again, I will accept his choice, no matter how much I want otherwise. At least I will know that he is not willing to—

Elliot’s hand slides to the back of my neck, cutting off my thoughts as he pulls me across the last bit of distance between us and presses his lips to mine.

While this is not my first kiss, I do not think a few stolen kisses from fellow dignitaries at events in my young adult years really gave me a good grasp of how my body would respond to someone I am attracted to.

Those long-ago kisses were secret and exciting, but they did not spark a fire to life in my chest and drown out the world around me.

But as Elliot kisses me, his lips warm and soft, I become all too aware that this is unlike anything I have experienced before now.

He pulls back, breathless, and brushes his thumb across my cheek. “Frey—”

I cut him off, pulling him close again and taking my turn, asking him for more.

He obliges. As he parts my lips, deepening the kiss, something shifts between us, like the ground falls away and sends us into a freefall.

I press a hand to his smooth chest as the kiss intensifies and grows more heated, my other hand gripping his hair.

I am desperate to be nearer to him, so when Elliot’s large hands wrap around my waist and tug me toward him, it is only logical for me to move to his lap.

I am halfway to him when he curses and pulls back, glaring down at the angry red wound on his torso as his face drains of what little color it had.

“Oh!” I cry, immediately moving back to my chair. “Elliot, I am so sorry!”

Groaning, he slowly lowers himself onto his back, wincing when he rests on the stitches there. “Not your fault,” he grunts, shutting his eyes. I can only imagine the pain he is in—for a moment, I forgot about the bullet holes.

“I should not have done that,” I whisper, covering my mouth with my hand. My lips feel swollen, tingling with the remnants of Elliot’s kiss. I may never recover, and all I want is to do it again.

His expression twists even more than it already was. “I told you it was a bad idea.”

Though he cannot see me, I glare at him anyway. “Kissing you was a bad idea only because you are injured, not because it should not have happened.”

That gets him to look at me again. “Freya, I’m your bodyguard.”

“I am aware.”

“We can’t…” He grits his teeth and shakes his head.

Taking a slow breath, I wait a moment to let his pain recede.

But if he thinks we are going to kiss like that and pretend nothing happened, he is wrong.

I have spent the last several days ignoring the tension between us, but I cannot do it anymore.

“Elliot,” I say firmly, “there is a connection between us that goes beyond tabloid speculation and internet gossip. You cannot argue that.”

His scowl seems only half-hearted as he looks at me, but his jaw is so tight that he says nothing.

So I continue. “I am well aware that a relationship would be complicated at best.”

He huffs a small laugh.

“I have never met anyone who infuriates me the way you do, and I am certain I drive you half mad most days.”

He grunts.

“There are few people who would want us to be together.”

“Is there a point to this?” he asks in a grumble.

I grin. “There is a point to everything I say, Elliot.” When he smiles back at me, my heart swells with affection for this man. There is every reason I should not—cannot—entertain ideas of being with him, but those reasons fade with each second we gaze into each other’s eyes.

“You and I,” I say, taking his hand and lacing my fingers through his. “We are not an obvious pairing. But surely you can admit that we are good for each other.” I look down at the haphazard stitches holding his skin together. “For the most part,” I add with a wince.

“This would have happened even if I wasn’t falling for you, Princess.”

My eyes jump back to his. “You’re…?”

“Falling? Yeah.” He looks downright angry about it, though I feel as if the ground has disappeared from beneath me once again. “Do you have any idea how frustrating that is? This wasn’t supposed to happen.” He gestures between us. “We’re not supposed to happen.”

Despite his words, I smile wider and bring his hand to my lips to brush a kiss against his knuckles. “If I have learned anything from my friends and their stories, love always comes in the most unexpected of ways. You and I are no different.”

It is only when his face goes slack that I realize what I said.

Love. I could take it back, explain that I did not mean things the way they sounded, but I do not.

I let my words fill the space between us and settle in my chest. I love my friends as I love my family, but the way I feel about Elliot is different.

That should scare me, but I am more afraid of keeping these feelings to myself and never giving them a chance to blossom.

“Your friends,” Elliot says after a long while, “the celebrities?” He quirks his lips up in a smile that warms me to the core. “You know you can’t base anything on their lives, right?”

“I can when I am a princess,” I argue.

“But I’m not.” He winces, his smile shifting to amusement. “You know what I mean. I’m not royal.”

“I know.”

“Even if I wasn’t your bodyguard, I’m not Candoran. I can’t…” He has thought about a future together like I have? He shakes his head and sighs. “Laws aside, I’m not royalty material.”

“You are not,” I agree. “But I think you could be.”

Groaning, he adjusts himself on the bed, tilting to the side to lessen the pressure on his stitches. “You don’t know that, Rapunzel. I’m just a kid from Montana with a lot of weird and specific skills that don’t really translate to anything outside of the Special Forces.”

I snicker and stand because he looks wildly uncomfortable, and the least I can do after he took a bullet for me is help him relax.

“You are remarkable with languages,” I tell him as I help him roll over to his left side, leaving both sides of his wound exposed and untouched.

Despite his beautifully muscled body, he must be cold after losing so much blood, so I take a blanket and drape it over him.

“You have a natural inclination toward reading body language and facial expressions.” He is turned toward the wall now, and I would like to see his face while we talk, so I settle on the bed, my back against the wall and his head on my lap.

He fights me but doesn’t resist for long, resting the full weight of his head on my leg.

“You are far more intelligent when it comes to politics than you pretend to be.”

He looks up at me with his eyebrows low but his eyes soft.

Like he wants to argue against everything I am saying but does not want me to stop talking.

He looks so tired—of course he is tired—and he should really sleep while he can.

I do not know how long it will take for someone to come for us, but he needs his strength.

“You keep a cool head when it matters,” I tell him and start running my fingers through his hair, smiling when his eyes immediately slide closed.

“You make connections with people. And you are selfless, and strong, and kind, and more than once I have wondered what it would be like to have you by my side, not as my protector but as my equal.”

I am not usually this open with people, particularly when it comes to my heart, but Elliot makes it easy. He has proven time and time again that I can trust him. That he has my best interest at heart, and not just because he is paid for that. It is who he is.

“I’m no good for you,” he mumbles, half asleep now.

I snicker. “Who says so?”

“Your mom. The internet. Everyone.”

“Not me. I think you and I could be something great, Elliot Reid. You could be great, if you would only give yourself a chance.”

He hums but says nothing, and soon his breathing slows and deepens.

I continue running my fingers through his hair, thinking through the things I said to him.

I meant every word, but his qualifications, great though they are, will only go so far.

A man like him marrying a queen, assuming that is the direction our lives take us, is not unheard of in other parts of the world, but Candora is steeped in tradition.

I cannot know if my people would accept him if we found a way around the laws preventing it in the first place.

Am I willing to take that risk?

Wulfric comes back inside a few minutes after Elliot falls asleep, his gentle eyes taking in the pair of us.

When he first came across me in the forest, his wild look frightened me, but he has been nothing but kind.

The way Candorans have been for centuries.

I wonder what he would think of a queen marrying someone like Elliot.

“You are not a royalist, Wulfric,” I say to him, keeping my voice low to not wake the man asleep in my lap. Using Wulfric’s own words will hopefully make him receptive to my coming question. “Do you think the monarchy needs to change?”

Setting a bucket of water on his rickety table, he shrugs. “Politics don’t have much effect out here.”

“Would it bother you? If a queen married someone like him?” I nod down to Elliot, smiling at the way he looks so peaceful. He was in so much pain before, even unconscious, but now I no longer fear for his life. He will take time to recover, but I am certain he will survive.

Filling a cup with some of the water, Wulfric grunts before handing it over to me. “Depends on your reasons, I suppose. Are you trying to stir up trouble?”

I smirk at him. “I have never been known to stir up trouble, as fun as that sounds.” No, if I were to begin a relationship with Elliot, I would do it fully knowing the consequences of my choice. Prepared to pay for them, whatever the price may be.

As it stands, Candoran law prevents a monarch from marrying a non-citizen in order to protect the country from foreign influence.

Gaining Candoran citizenship takes time, and as proven by today’s near-catastrophe, the longer I remain single and childless, the more vulnerable the throne will be, so time is not on my side.

If I had met Elliot years ago, before my mother ever announced her retirement, we might have had a chance to convince the people to love him as I am coming to.

But that is not reality.

Perhaps marrying Grimstad is not as selfless as I first thought, but it is impossible to see a relationship with Elliot as anything but selfish.

Are these my choices? Give up my own happiness for the sake of my people, or betray my people for the sake of my happiness? Why must it be one or the other?

Still stroking Elliot’s hair, I look down at the soldier and imagine this being my life. Not the gunshot wound or holing up in a rundown cabin in the woods, obviously. But having Elliot close to me. Kissing him. Trusting him with my thoughts and my heart.

Building a family with him.

My body warms at the thought, but guilt builds too. I was born to privilege, and with that comes responsibility. I have made many promises throughout my campaign, things I truly believe in, and I would never forgive myself if I did not follow through.

“Can someone like me be allowed to choose love?” I am not really asking Wulfric. No Candoran monarch has ever married this far beneath them, and even choosing Markham would go against tradition. But at least he is Candoran. And known by the people.

In reality, neither Markham nor Elliot are beneath me.

Not where it matters. They are good men, with so much potential, and they should have every opportunity for a life of greatness.

Markham will find that no matter what I choose; he has the ambition and the confidence to get whatever he wants.

But Elliot? Just a kid from Montana. He is so much more than that, even if he cannot see it himself.

He is not Candoran and has no title, but I fear he will soon have my entire heart.

If only that could be enough.