Betrothed to a Prince, In Love With My Bodyguard

How Can It Be Wrong?

Rowan's POV

I stare out of Red's bedroom window as she rummages through her closet to find me a shirt to replace the one she ripped apart. My mind is spinning. I’ve never felt happier in my entire life—nor have I felt more afraid.

I shouldn’t have done it; I know that. But how could I not? I heard her frustration through the door before I even stepped in and smelled her desire. How could I let her struggle to pleasure herself when all I can ever seem to think about is how much I want to pleasure her?

At least I resisted making love to her. Not taking her when she asked me to was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, and I’m pretty sure my inner wolf will never forgive me for it. I ached to be inside of her so much in that moment, I wasn’t sure I’d ever stop aching. And then she came for me, and I had no choice but to come for her. Hearing that little scream she cried, feeling her contract so tightly and then release so fully for me… I’ve never felt more turned on in my entire life. I’m not sure I ever will.

And then, the words she said… You’re mine.

The two words I’ve wanted to hear from her for so long—the two words I was certain I never would.

Her wolf picked me.

Her wolf picked me.

I knew it was a possibility, but it feels different knowing that it’s real. I smelled the desire in her before, but never like I did that morning. Red was already passionate before her wolf awoke; it only makes sense that now she’s on the brink of s****l deviancy.

For me. She wants me.

I’m thrilled—I’m elated—but I’m still afraid.

She isn’t the seventeen-year-old girl whose emotions can be dismissed as a crush if someone catches on anymore. The way she ripped my shirt off my back—the way she begged me to take her—things are different. If we make love and the wrong person finds out…

I don’t want to think about it. I can’t ruin her life. I can’t.

“This should work,” she says sweetly as she comes over to me, handing me an oversized s*x Pistols shirt that reminds me exactly how much I love her; most wolves don’t even know about the human bands of old.

When I take it from her, my fingertips brush against hers, and even that small touch is enough to make me start to stiffen all over again. I can feel my wolf pawing eagerly at the thought of another round, but I ignore him, pulling away from her.

“I meant it, you know,” she tells me softly. “You’re mine, Rowan, and I love you. I don’t know what we’re going to do about it, but I’m tired of fighting it.”

There’s nothing we can do about it, and we both know it. But I’m tired of fighting it, too, and despite everything, her words make me feel like I’m floating in the clouds.

- - - - -

I decide against joining them for the brunch Corrin put together for Red's birthday, making up an excuse that I’m sure Red sees right through and then texting the same excuse to Corrin. It’s just too hard to be near Red and not touch her again. I need some time to cool off.

When the knock sounds at my door, I both hope and fear that it’s Red, back for more. But when I invite her to come in, it’s Corrin, not Red, that steps in.

“Hey,” I say, standing up. “What’s up?”

She looks at my shirt, frowning. She stares at it for longer than she needs to before looking back up at me.

“Eli might be an oblivious i***t,” she finally says, “but I’m not.”

I sigh. I’m not shocked she figured it out; honestly, I’m surprised it took her this long. Corrin’s probably the smartest wolf in our entire pack.

“It’s not what you think,” I say, which probably isn’t true. “I mean—we didn’t—”

“Row,” she interrupts. “I don’t want the details. I know what’s going on.”

I swallow, asking the question I know I shouldn’t. “Did she… say something?”

I can’t help but ask. What if she regrets it? What if she’s changed her mind about bringing me with her to Castle Gibbous for fear that it will happen again?

“She didn’t have to. It was as obvious this morning as it was the day we had the unfortunate incident of you seeing her in a corset. And then, at brunch…”

“Did she seem okay?” I ask, which is another stupid question. “I mean, did she seem…”

“She seemed over the f*****g moon,” Corrin grumbles. “She seemed like someone whose horny inner wolf sent her straight into the bed of the boy she’s crushed on for eighteen years.”

“We didn’t—” I start to say again, but she clears her throat, and I fall silent.

“Look,” she says. “I know you. I know you want to treat her right. I know you’ve been saving yourself for your true mate, and I think it’s pretty clear that you’ve both figured out you are each other’s true mates. But I also know that she’s betrothed to the Gibbous Prince, and that you’re supposed to move into his castle with her.”

I know what’s coming. It’s nothing I haven’t thought myself a thousand times.

“Just… be careful, Row. Okay? Don’t get caught.”

I stare at her, dumbfounded. That advice is the last thing I expected from her. “What?”

“Well, what did you expect me to say? You two get caught, our entire pack gets shamed. Not to mention, there’s a strong chance the Gibbouses retaliate with the full-on rebellion they’ve been itching for for fifty years.”

“You’re not…” I can hardly believe it. “You’re not asking me to stop?”

“Of course I’m not asking you to stop. I haven’t seen my best friend or my brother this happy in my entire life.  Now, can you get ready? We’ve got a party to throw.”

- - - - -

Corrin and I head to the stables before Red and Eli to ensure that no straggler wolves from our pack are there to spoil the surprise. As planned, the stable master tells us that all sixteen of the guests have already departed for the campgrounds on their horses.

When Red emerges from the limousine, she takes my breath away even more than usual. The wardrobe she’s donned is a perfect blend between the red carpet starlet Corrin loves to make her up to be and the scrappy warrior princess she truly is. Skin-tight, black riding breeches cling to her perfect, toned thighs and her round, tantalizing ass, met at the knee by her finest pair of black leather riding boots. A long, golden tunic that makes her eyes pop even more than usual covers her impossibly sexy torso, its V-neck dropping just low enough to taunt me without giving away half as much as the dress Corrin had chosen for her at the engagement party. Her vibrant, red hair is braided into a long, simple braid. It doesn’t look particularly brushed, which makes me smile. I love her messy hair. I love everything about her.

She smiles when she sees me. She looks a little surprised, and I realize that my absence from brunch made her think I might not make it to her party. The thought instantly overwhelms me with guilt.

As Eli and Corrin mount, Red steps over to me.

“Just tell me you haven’t changed your mind about coming with me to Castle Gibbous,” she says softly.  

My fingertips twitch with the urge to reach out and touch her face, and other parts of me begin to twitch, too, but I push all my urges away. “Never. Now, tell me you haven’t changed yours.”

The smile returns to her lips, and she hoists her foot nimbly into her stirrup as she replies, “Never.”

I step onto the mounting block, marveling at her flexibility in vaulting herself onto a seventeen-hand Friesian with ease. Yet again, I force myself to shake that thought away, knowing perfectly well where it’s headed.

She glances back at me coyly, seeming to read my mind. It’s then that I realize she can read my mind—at least, when I want her to.

Have you tried it yet? I link to her. Her eyes widen in the most adorable way possible, and she gasps.

“What?” Eli demands as we coax our horses into lopes. “Share with the class!”

Is this thing on? she asks me playfully, ignoring her brother, and it feels so good to hear her voice in my head, I nearly fall off.

I think this might be the most dangerous thing yet, I tell her against my better judgment.

She glances back at me again, gaze turning from coy to devilish. On the contrary, I think it’s the most useful. And don’t think I didn’t catch you watching me mount.

Her use of the word “mount” sends my inner wolf into a howl that I let her in on, and she laughs out loud.

“Mind link,” Corrin realizes, rolling her eyes. “Great.”

“No fair!” Eli whines. I swear, as much as I love our prince, sometimes he acts about five years younger than he is. For the thousandth time I find myself thinking it’s a true injustice that he and not Red will one day rule Canis. I don’t share that with her, though. I know she’d only defend her little brother.

“Have you communicated with the rest of the pack yet?” Corrin asks Red.

Red’s expression darkens, and I know why before she says it: “What’s the point? In two weeks, I won’t have anything to do with them, and whenever we get married, I’ll have to renounce my pack entirely.”

“That’s not entirely true,” Eli points out, earning a little of my respect back. I would have if he didn’t. “If you were only the daughter of an Alpha, and not a princess, it would be. But because you’re the Crescent Princess, you retain your ties to your old pack as well as joining a new one. You’ll be able to hear both packs in your mind.”

Red glances hopefully at me. “Is that true?”

I nod. “You keep your name, too, before his. So, technically, you’ll be Tempest Elianna Crescent Gibbous.”

She groans. “Just what I needed—a name that’s even more of a mouthful.”

We all laugh at that, but my gaze on her lingers. It makes her happier than they realize, I can tell, that she gets to keep ties with her pack. They mean everything to her; they’re the reason she agreed to this marriage in the first place.

When we reach the target practice zone, I expect her to pull out her bow, but she doesn’t.

“You feeling okay?” Corrin teases. “This is a first.”

She nods, eyes cast downward. “I don’t want to think about target practice right now. I just want to enjoy the time I have left with you guys.”

Hearing her words makes me realize how glad I am that I’m going with her to Castle Gibbous. Even if I have to see her with him—even if I have to hear, even smell, things that make my blood boil and my wolf howl—at least I won’t be apart from her.

Corrin reaches out to take Red’s hand and squeeze it. My heart goes out to both of them. They’ve been best friends and soul sisters for their entire lives. Parting won’t be easy.

Eli says nothing, but I can see the sadness in his eyes, too. He’ll lose half his clan when we leave. He has no other siblings, and no mother. Corrin is all he’ll have left.

And he’s all she’ll have.

I hope her crush on him isn’t more than a crush. I hope she finds a true mate who loves her the way I love Red. I hope one of us manages to find happiness.

When we reach the campsite, even I’m impressed, and I helped plan the damn thing. The Omegas and Corrin did an incredible job designing it. Twenty tents are arranged in a perfect circle around a giant bonfire, and the entire perimeter is lined with hanging lanterns that form a natural version of twinkly lights. A dance floor made of chopped, sanded wooden panels lines one side of the inner circle, and the other is covered with picnic tables, on which sit twenty silver domes covering twenty plates of Corrin’s favorite food—lobster. 

“All the game you love to hunt, and your favorite food is a crustacean?” I used to tease her. I think back to the giant boar that tore a hole in her arm and decide I’m glad her favorite food is an animal that couldn’t kill her.

“Guys,” she whispers as she reins her mare to a halt. She covers her mouth with her hand as the tears spring to her eyes. “This is incredible.”

“Happy birthday!” cheer the sixteen members of the pack she is the closest to. She laughs as she dismounts, tying her reins to a post and making her rounds of hugs and kind words with each and every wolf.

When we gather around the picnic tables for dinner, I hang back. I can see how much it means to her to spend these moments with the people she has to leave, and being the one person she doesn’t have to leave, I don’t want to invade that. But within minutes, she comes over me, taking my arm and sitting me down right next to her.

The wine doesn’t seem to stop flowing at dinner, and by the time the dinner is over and the dancing begins, it’s become clear that all twenty of us are much more fuzzy-headed than usual, myself included. 

Corrin left it to me to make the playlist, and given the lovestruck, passionate state I was in while making it, nearly every song on it is a testament to my love for her. The moment the first song clicks on—There is a Light That Never Goes Out by the Smiths—her eyes find mine, and she smiles. She knows I made this playlist for her.

She takes my hand and guides me to the dance floor, wrapping her arms around my neck and looking up at me as if we aren’t surrounded by people we’re supposed to be keeping our secret from. I want to tell her not to, but I can’t. Maybe it’s the wine, maybe it’s my inner wolf, or maybe it’s just my love for her. I wrap my arms around her waist and look right back into her eyes.

We get closer and closer with each song, until her body is pressed so close to mine, it’s becoming hard to think about anything but the things I did to her that morning. That only spirals me into thinking about the things I didn’t do to her that morning—the things I can’t let myself do, but want to do so badly—

I take a step back from her, but she immediately takes a step toward me.

Red, I say softly in her mind. We’re surrounded by wolves.

I don’t care. These wolves are my family. I trust them.

I trust them, too, but there are too many of them. Still, seeing that she’s not going to give in, I decide on a different strategy. “Do you want your birthday present?”

Her eyes light up, which makes me smile. She always tells me I give the best presents in the pack. She probably thinks I give such good presents to everyone, but honestly, it’s rare that I even remember another wolf’s birthday, let alone gift them with memorable presents.

It’s only for her.

“It’s in my tent,” I tell her. “I’ll get it and come back.”

“I’ll come with you,” she says immediately.

It’s not hard to follow where her mind is going, and the mere thought is enough to make my aching return, but again, I push it away.

I’m really becoming a master at that. Someone should give me a f*****g award.

No, I tell her in her mind. We can’t.

Who said I have ulterior motives? You said yourself we’re surrounded by wolves. Do you really want them all to see my reaction when I open a present that will undoubtedly make me want to jump your bones?

I don’t believe her, but hearing her use the words jump your bones to me is enough to bring the aching right back, and I find myself too weak to push it away again.

Let them keep the award, I think to myself as I lead her off the dance floor and toward my tent. I just want her.

It’s cozy on the inside of my tent. A diffused lantern hangs from the center of the roof, and large candlesticks pegged into the ground light each of the four corners of the tent. Where a sleeping bag would normally be is a thick, black fabric akin to a mattress pad nearly as big as a king-sized mattress. Soft, fluffy pillows like the north side of the pad, and a light, puffy black blanket covers it.

Red zips the tent closed behind us and lowers herself onto the bedding, and for a moment, I half expect her to start undressing. But she crosses her legs innocently, looking up at me with that coy little grin that drives me utterly insane.

“I’m ready for my present,” she says sweetly when I find myself unable to move.

My cheeks redden, and I turn away from her, digging into my backpack to retrieve the gift I spent nearly six months making for her.

I hand the box to her. She removes the small, red bow from it and opens the box without a word. I scan her eyes carefully as she pulls the pendant from the box. 

“It’s moonstone,” she says, looking up at me eagerly. “It’s beautiful.”

“Turn it over,” I suggest.

She turns the pendant over in her hands, scanning the silver it is mounted to and reading the words inscribed on them.

I have the words memorized, of course. I must have stared at them a hundred times. Tempest, it reads. A fierce windstorm. A tumultuous commotion or disturbance.

“My mother used to say this to me,” she says softly, fingering the engraving with her thumb. “I’d ask her why she gave me such a violent name, and she’d quote this definition and tell me that it was the name for a girl who could turn the tides—change the world.”

I picture the pious Elianna telling her scrappy, young daughter that, and it makes me smile. It makes so much sense that Red is the way she is. “Do you remember the statue she kept on the mantle above the fireplace in the Great Hall?”

“The Moon Goddess statue Kat got rid of?” she asks, seeming put off by the memory. But the realization sparks in her eyes just after she says it, and she straightens, looking at me with wonder. “It was made of moonstone.”

“The inscription was on the base,” I explain. “I asked your father if I could have it when Kat got rid of it. I kept it in my room for a while, but the more I looked at that inscription, the more I realized you should have it.”

“You made this? Out of that?”

“I hope you don’t mind. I suppose it’s probably blasphemous for me to deface a holy statue like that. But I figured you’d rather have it around your neck than…”

I trail off as she slowly rises to her feet. She takes one step toward me, then another, until her face is inches from mine. There are tears in her eyes, but I can tell she’s happy.

“I love it,” she whispers. “Can you put it on for me?”

I accept the necklace from her as she turns to face away from me, pulling her braid over her shoulder and exposing the nape of her thin, elegant neck. I’m suddenly filled not only with desire, but with the intense, passionate reminder of how much she means to me. It would have crushed me if she didn’t like the gift. Seeing her light up that way…

I slip the necklace around her neck, and by the time I clasp it shut, my hands are shaking. It’s so hard, being this close to her, feeling this way about her. It’s not fair. It’s not fair that I can’t be with her.

She seems to sense my pain, and she turns back to me, taking my shaking hands in hers.

“How can it be wrong?” she whispers to me. “Why should two people who love each other so much not be together?”

There are a million reasons, and we both know it. But standing there, staring into those golden eyes of hers, I can’t think of a single one.

Our first kiss is soft and tender. She can feel my lips shaking, I know. I think every part of me is shaking. I’m scared. I’m scared because I know I can’t say no to her this time, and I know that everything will change if I don’t.

But I can’t stop hearing her question in her head. How can it be wrong?

It can’t, I realize. It isn’t.

When I kiss her again, it’s with every inch myself. When she feels it, she ignites.

She pushes me down onto the bedding, straddling me beneath her as she stretches her long, slender torso across mine. She moves her s*x against me in slow, deep rotations, and as she does, I feel her breasts moving back and forth against my chest. I lift my lips to her collarbone, kissing it once, then twice, before touching my fingertips to the hem of her tunic and starting to pull it off.

I part my lips to ask her if she’s sure, but she interrupts me with her hands before I get the question out, placing them on mine and guiding them up and over her. She rises to a seated position as she does so, and I drink in the sight of her in only her bra. It’s a simple, black bra, not as attention-grabbing as the corset that sent me drooling the day of the party, but I find it even sexier. It’s more her, more real, and it makes me twice as hard just looking at it.

She reaches down for my shirt next, and I can tell from her expression that she means to rip it again. I catch her hands, rising to a seated position myself, throwing her off balance so that she has to use her thighs to cling to me. The feeling makes me even harder.

“Sexy as it was when you ripped my shirt the last time,” I say into her ear, “I need something to walk out of here in tomorrow morning.”

She blushes, and it’s the cutest little blush I’ve ever seen, and somehow it makes me harder still. I grab her by the waist, pressing my erection against her through her breeches. She lets out one of those tiny whimpers of hers that sends my head spinning, and she pulls my shirt off and presses me back down, trailing her kisses from my lips down my neck to my belt, which her fingers swiftly undo.

Before I know what’s happening, she’s pulling off my pants and my boxers, and suddenly I feel her soft, sweet hands on me, and then it’s not just her hands, but her lips. Feeling her little, pink lips kiss my shaft is almost more than I can handle, but when her tongue slips out and she begins to suck, I’m sure I’ll lose my mind with pleasure. 

The thought of pulling her off me feels impossible, but I know that I have to. If I let myself finish now, without having so much as touched her, I’ll never forgive myself. So, before long, I reach town to touch her cheek, and she lifts her sweet, pink lips away from me, looking up at me in surprise.

“My turn,” I whisper, and I grab her and flip her onto her back, ripping her bra open by force and burying my face between her two perfect breasts, planting her sternum with kisses, as my fingers work to remove her breeches.

Once her breeches and underthings are off, I trail my kisses down low, just as she did, but as I do, my fingers trail up towards her breasts. As my tongue presses against her pink pearl, my fingertips take her n*****s in them, twisting and tugging ever so gently.

She arches and twists her back with pleasure as her s*x becomes wetter and wetter. She lets out another of those devastating whimpers, and I lower one of my hands down to join my mouth, slipping two of my fingers inside her so quickly, she gasps. 

Before long, I feel her fingertips on my cheeks, just as she felt mine on hers. I look up at her, suddenly worried. Am I doing it wrong? Does it not feel good?

“I want you inside me,” she whispers. “Please.”

I gently remove my fingers from inside her, moving myself back up her body so that my face is inches from hers. “I turned you down once,” I whisper. “I don’t think I can do it again.”

I search her eyes for anything but desire, any minute sign that she has a single doubt or fear. But I can’t find it.

So I enter her.

I try to be gentle, but the feeling of my tip in her is so intoxicating that before I realize it, I’ve buried myself so deep inside her, I feel like I might drown. She lets out a gasp, and I freeze, opening my eyes to scan her face in terror.

“Did I hurt you?” I whisper.

She opens her eyes, too, and I realize instantly that I didn’t.

“No,” she murmurs, wrapping her legs around me and using them to push me even deeper into her. “Don’t you dare stop.”

I obey this command with the most intense pleasure I have ever felt, thrusting in and out of her with a hunger and lust I have never come close to feeling before. I bury my head in her neck as I take her, wanting more than anything to sink my teeth in and make my mark on her, the way it’s supposed to be—telling the world that she’s mine. 

She seems to sense what I’m thinking, and suddenly she is tightening her legs around me and rolling back on top of me, not letting me out of her as she does so. She grinds herself against me again, but this time there aren’t clothes between us, isn’t anything between us, and it feels so, ridiculously good that I know I only have seconds left.

I twist myself inside her, gripping at her round, perfect ass with one hand and her equally perfect breast with the other. I sink my fingertips into both, and I can feel her melt at my touch, but it’s not enough—she’s not whimpering.

I raise myself to a seated position again so that our chests are pressed against each other. She inhales sharply at the feeling it gives her, and I can’t help but do the same. I press myself up inside her as I whisper into her ear, “I won’t come without you.”

My words seem to send her the extra mile I was hoping for, and when the whimper escapes her, I know that I’ll be able to make good on my promise. I take her by the hips and press her down onto myself as I press myself up into her, again and again, faster and faster. Her whimpers become more frequent, and she bites her lip, digging her fingernails into my back. Just before we both come, she brings her lips to my ear and whispers, “I’m yours.”

When I feel it coming up, I want more than anything to spill it inside her. I want to fill her with it. If it impregnates her, so be it. The thought having a pup with her, of bringing a life into the world with a mother as brave and beautiful as her—

But doing so could ruin her life, I force myself to remember. So I give her one last, deep, final thrust, basking in the sound of her orgasm as I press her down onto her back, pull myself out of her, and spill my seed onto her belly.

She stares up at me for what feels like an eternity. I stay there, above her, scanning her eyes for any signs of regret. I don’t think my heart could take it if she regretted it.

I don’t see it. I see nothing but love.