Chapter 4

Sigurd

The woman takes very long, very hot showers.

The fireplace is ablaze by the time I hear the shower turn off. Finally, I glance over to the bathroom door, where steam escapes through the crack underneath.

Anastasia is as indulgent with herself as my baby sister Flora, I see.

All the more reason we can't be together. I don't care as much for luxuries like long hot showers.

I catch myself as I poke the logs in the fire. Where did that thought come from? Of course, we can't be together. That's not even a question. It never was a question.

The woman needs to go and forget she saw me. I'll make sure she's compensated for her trouble. And the same goes for that little twerp from the market. Now, two people have seen me in the wild. I don't know where my head was, showing my face to that bag boy. I saw him staring at the woman's body, and something snapped inside me.

As I turn back to the fire and poke at it for no reason, I hear the scrape of the shower curtain rings and the clatter of the towel holder.

My lonely mind wanders to places it shouldn't. Anastasia's soft skin, pink and damp, red curls clinging to her neck. Long fingers twisting those locks, wringing out the water…One long leg perched on the toilet while she lotions her thick thighs…her struggling with the old flimsy cabin towel, much too small to wrap all the way around her hips, her tits…she uses it to sop up the water from her back, her shoulders, her soft belly, her undercarriage…her tempting scent smearing all over the damp towel…leaving behind a stray, strawberry-colored pube, perhaps.

My cock aches as I poke the fire and think about her naked form moving around the steamy bathroom, tending to herself, her breasts lifting as she poses in the mirror. As if I know what women get up to in bathrooms.

None of these thoughts means anything other than she's a woman—a wickedly soft, warm-scented woman—and that I happen to be attracted to women. And that it's been a mighty long time since I entertained one.

It means nothing. It's only biology. My body recognizes that her body can take a pounding.

I dab the sweat from my brow and realize I've now stoked the fire too much.

I put all thoughts of acting on these long-dormant urges out of my head. I cannot act on it. That would be ungentlemanly of me. The last thing I want to do is make her feel unsafe around me. I'll keep my distance until we decide what to do next.

Besides, she's not interested in me. With me belonging to the royal family, there's a power dynamic there…she might feel obligated to entertain my advances, which would be wrong.

Very, very wrong.

"Anastasia…Stasi."

Her name feels like forbidden fruit in my mouth. Delicious.

Keep it in your pants. And keep those thoughts locked away in your head, where they can't hurt anybody.

No one gets hurt if I squirrel this fantasy away into my spank bank for later.

What is taking her so long? I glance over at the bathroom door. What is she doing in there?

Flora has repeatedly explained to me that "a woman takes as long as she takes in the bathroom," and I still don't know what that means. Maybe she's wrestling those mighty large tits into a bra, and…oh, no.

The last thing Stasi said before she recognized me was to ask if I was holding her bra.

And I had been, indeed. Why was I holding her bra? Now I remember. I was considering breast size to hand ratio when I happened to look up and see her paddling in the rowboat.

Then everything went sideways, and now, that bra is likely sitting on the bottom of the lake.

I'll have to compensate her for that, as well.

As I wait for Stasi to exit the bathroom, my conscience gets the better of me.

I'm out the door and crossing the lawn to the water's edge, considering what to do. Dredge the lake? Dive for it?

Movement in the tall reeds gets my attention. I step closer, and there it is: Stasi's lacy underwire push-up bra has washed ashore.

I'll have to remember to make a thank offering to the old gods because this is truly divine intervention.