“He can have all the time he needs to heal, Amara.” He drew me closer, positioning our arms in an elegant sweep outward. “But he does not need to hurt you and degrade you in the process. Now—” We moved away and stepped onto the dance floor. “Let us dance.”
As we circled the room, couples dancing nearby bowed their heads, stepping in wider circles to give us room, as if I were some kind of royal entity or something. I smiled up at Arthur, so grateful he’d come along when he did. I wouldn’t challenge David in a room full of people: he’d only make more of an effort to hold strong and put me in my place, and that would just create a massive scene, degrading David’s pride even more in the process and hindering any hope I had of sorting things out with him. But Arthur, I could tell, was more than up for that challenge. Except, David wouldn’t dare challenge his uncle. I wondered what it was about him that the boys feared and respected so much.
“Ow.” Arthur laughed, looking down at his foot.
“Oh my God. I’m so sorry, Arthur.” I smiled sheepishly.
“Never mind, my dear. I imagine your centre of gravity has shifted slightly with the being you now grow inside you.”
I looked down at the gap between Arthur and I where our bodies remained apart because of my bump. “No, it’s just that I can’t really concentrate on the steps tonight.” I glanced over my shoulder. “I can feel David’s eyes on me.”
Arthur’s lips and brow crinkled as he looked over at his nephew, and the feeling, the energy of David, faded.
“Did he look away?”
“He did.”
“Thank you,” I said, exhaling the breath I didn’t know I was holding.
“I will talk to him about this, Amara. It won’t go unaddressed.”
“What won’t?”
“His behaviour toward you tonight.”
“It wasn’t that bad.” I shrugged.
“It was. He was cruel, Amara. And I’ve heard several people mutter the same thing.”
“You did?”
He nodded, tilting his head then as if listening to something. “If you can spare a moment, Jason wants to see you.”
“He does?”
“He’s waiting for you on the balcony.”
“Oh, I . . . I can’t. David will have him arrested if we keep seeing each other.”
“Worry not, my dear. I’ll distract David. You need to hear what Jason has to say.”
We circled the dance floor again, my feet finally obeying my brain, but I stayed quiet, wondering what Jason wanted. When we reached to doors to the balcony, Arthur made a cheeky turn and swept us out of the room, twirling me straight into Jason’s arms.
“All my prayers answered in one twirl,” Jase said, both arms gently wrapping me up.
I stood on my toes for a second and touched my nose to his. “I’m sorry about what happened before.”
“Don’t apologise for anything, Ara.” He kissed my nose. “David was the jerk.”
My heels touched the ground again and I turned to thank Arthur, but he was gone. “Where’d he—”
“He’s playing Distraction with the king.”
“How will he keep him away?”
“Don’t you worry your pretty little head about that.” He tucked a curl behind my ear. “I need to talk to you about something.”
“What?”
“I can protect you,” he said, his eyes round and so dark with hope. “I could have legal right to step in when he’s mistreating you.”
“How?”
“Marry me.”
I laughed. “Jase—”
“Ara, the queen is allowed more than one husband. Make me your second. Let me protect you, love you, be there every time you’re hurt or sick.”
“You are now.”
“No. I get shut out—told I have no right to comfort you or make decisions for you. I am the one person here who cares more about you than myself, and I—”
“Jase, I know, okay,” I cut in, pressing my hand flat to his chest. “But I’m not marrying you just so you can be my bodyguard.”
“Do you think that’s the only reason I’m asking you?”
My smile copied his.
“Ara, that’s my convincing argument to make you say yes.”
I laughed through my nose again, wiping under it after.
“See, I love you even if you snot on yourself every time you laugh.”
This time I blew the laughter out through my lips, and stepped into him, slowly sliding both arms along his waist. “I said I didn’t want to love you, Jase, because I needed to make a decision. I needed to choose and commit to one guy, for once in my life. And I know it’s too late for David and I, but this is my commitment, whether he wants me or not. I won’t marry another while he’s still breathing, even if I legally can have two husbands.”
“I understand that.”
“See, I don’t think you do. I think you know that you and I make a much better couple and that you’re better for me in so many ways but, Jase—” I looked through the doors at David, distracted by a group of Lower House members. “You have so much heart and you’re so easy to love. And, David . . . he’s got a darker side that I worry for—that I don’t think anybody else in this world understands. I just feel like. . .” I looked at Jase again, moving my shoulders up once. “If I don’t love him, who will?”
Jase let out a hot breath across the night sky and twirled me gracefully into his arms, cradling my spine to his chest, both of us just watching the candlelight from inside flicker shadows around the garden below us. “You're going to be okay, you know.”
“How do you know?”
He pressed his lips to the top of my head, his warm breath making me hold mine. “Because I'm going to make sure of it.”
“And how will you do that?”
“One day, things will be different for us, Ara. I believe that somewhere out there under those stars is a future for us, and maybe it’s decades away into eternity, but I love you. I’ve loved you under the most insane conditions, and I won't ever give up hope for us.” He turned me to face him again. “Things are going to get worse before they get better, but I'm here, and I just need you to know that you’ll always have a home to come to in my heart, Ara. It belongs to you eternally.” He touched his chest. “Just hold onto that when things get dark.”