Chapter 12

"I don't need a month."I fling myself into James's arms. He catches me easily. I pepper kisses all over his handsome face and I smile at him. I can't believe he's done all this for me. I don't think I even want to wait a month. "Let's get married right now."

His grip on me tightens, and my body fills with need as it always does when he's near. I lock my legs around him, placing my hands on his shoulders. His face grows serious. "I'd love nothing more than to marry you right this second, but Mom would lose it."

I love how he says mom like she's mother to both of us. I know I had a mom when I was little, but I don't remember her. The idea of having a mom is almost more than I can even begin to wish for.

"She wants to plan this wedding with you, but if you want to get married now I will do whatever you wish. You always come first." I want to melt into a pile of goo at his words. I can wait. I want to plan the wedding with his mom, too, and get to know his family.

"I can wait." I press my chest into his. "Even though you're going to make me wait." I pout. He takes my mouth, kissing the pout right off my lips.

"Play with your goats before I drag you back to our bed and show you all the other things I can do to your little body while we wait." He slides me down his body until my feet touch the ground.

I kind of like his idea. "It's getting dark," he reminds me that we don't have a ton of time. I look over my shoulder to see the baby goats all jumping around and playing. I break away from James hold running towards them. He helps me climb over the fence.

We spend the next hour playing with them and naming them all. There is a total of five babies, each one more adorable than the next. He talks about how each time we have a baby we should get a new one. Every word he says makes me fall deeper in love with him.

I wonder if falling in love is always like this. So fast and consuming. It takes my breath away but fills me up inside, too. I hate my uncle, but I'm thankful that in a way he brought me to James. The years I spent with him were worth it if at the end this is my reward. I'd do it all over again.

James scoops me up into his arms. "The sun is almost down. Let's get cleaned up so I can give you the rest of your birthday surprises." I rest my head on his shoulder as he carries me back through the rose garden and into the castle. I bury my face in his neck when I see people turn to look at us, and I feel a little shy.

It's something I'll have to get used to, I'm sure. James is king, after all. Our lives will always be in the spotlight. I'm not used to being the center of attention. It makes me wonder what everyone else will think about him marrying me. His mom is okay with it, but what about everyone else?

I wonder if they will be like Nicolette. I still feel slightly guilty about that. I couldn"t fault her for wanting James. The man is everything that I could ever want. I kiss his neck in adoration.

"Princess," James growls, making me smile, and I do it again. This time I give a tiny nip like he does to me. His arms lock around me even tighter.

"Will people care that you're marrying me?" I ask him as we enter his home wing of the castle.

"Don't give a shit what other people think," he tells me easily. It's clear that he really doesn"t.

"That's not what I mean. I just…" I'm not sure how to say what I mean. I guess that I want them all to like me. To accept me.

"Everyone will love you. I'm allowed to marry whoever I like," he says as if reading my mind. "There's no way they won't love you. Your sweetness is infectious."

I pull back to look at him. He always says the right thing to make me feel better. "I just want to be a good wife," I admit. "I'm new to all of this. You know relationships."

"Thank fuck. I hate the idea of your heart having belonged to another." Jealousy flashes in his eyes as he puts me on my feet in the bathroom. He pulls my dress over my head, stripping me of all my clothes and leaving me naked. "This is mine. All of it." He takes off his clothes next.

"I'm new to this, too, Kate. I've never done the whole relationship thing either," he tells me. That takes me a little by surprise. He's already admitted to me that women are always trying to get his attention but for the wrong reasons. "I wanted what my parents had and I wasn"t willing to settle." He picks me up again, carrying me into the shower and turning the water on.

"But you bring out a side of me that I didn"t even know was there. You make me do and say things I never thought I would. Who knew an angel could make a man want to do such dirty things?"

"You do the same to me." I admit. "Make me want to do things I've never even thought about before." I love hearing that only I get this from him. It puts me even more at ease.

"And, for the record, you're already the perfect wife. All you need to do now is walk down the aisle to me to make it official." He pulls me under the water with him and starts washing my body. He doesn"t miss an inch of me.

When he's done he washes himself before turning the water off and then drying us off. "Stay," he tells me as he exits the bathroom and comes back with pajama pants on, with a white nighty in his hand for me. He slips it over my head, and the silk is soft against my skin.

"That doesn"t stop me from wanting to take you right now," he warns, looking almost frustrated. His hands come to my hips. I was surprised he hadn"t done anything in the shower already—I could tell he'd wanted to. His cock was begging for attention. Each time I tried to touch it, he'd grab my hand, kissing my palm before telling me to be a good girl. I don't want to be good.

He was hard. I'd never seen a naked man before and he was more than man. He looked like a warrior. He might not have let me touch his cock, but my hands had wandered everywhere else. I place my hands on his chest, my fingertips grazing over the hair on his chest.

"This is the best birthday I've ever had," I tell him, bringing his eyes back to mine. I can tell he's about to lose all his control and he doesn"t want to do that yet.

His hands on my hips grip me harder as he lifts me, throwing me over him shoulder. When he sets me down, I see there is a picnic laid out on the floor.

My eyes lock onto a cake my body stills. "I saw the cake in all your birthday pictures," he says into my ear. "The recipe was in the box I got from your uncle's." He kisses me below my ear. "I had the chef make it. If I made it, I likely would have burned it," he chuckles.

My grandma and I made that cake together for every birthday. Hers or mine. It was a tradition, one I would now be able to carry on with my own children.

"It's perfect." I reach out and swipe my finger across it. I bring my finger to my mouth and moan around it. It's even better than I remember. I do it again, this time bringing it to James's mouth. He wraps his mouth around my finger, sucking on it. Slowly I pull my finger away.

His mouth takes mine. He flips us so I'm under him. "I can't wait another second." Before I know what he's doing he's slipping a ring onto my finger. I bring my hand up to look at the antique ring. "It was my grandmother's," he tells me.

The thick gold band has a large square pink diamond in the center, with smaller diamonds all around it. It's unmissable on my finger.

"I love it," I tell him. "I love you," I add. "I know it's soon and—" His mouth crashes down on mine, taking my breath away. I thought we'd kissed before, but this is different. This is everything. This is the beginning of us.

"You don't have to explain or reason anything to me, princess. I know because I've loved you from the moment that hood feel from your head revealing my future to me."

"You love me?" I ask. I want to hear it again.

"More than anything, princess." He kisses me again. "I love you," he says against my lips.

"Now I'm going to show you all the things we can do without me taking the cherry you saved just for me." He gets to his feet, bringing me to my knees. "Now let your king show you where else you can lick that cake from."

He gives me a devilish smile as he reaches inside his pants. I have no doubt this wait for our wedding night is going to be bittersweet.