‘That you must marry me—and quickly.’
His words were issued so calmly, with a matter-of-factness that almost seemed to present them as afait accompli, implying she had no say in the matter, that there was no room to negotiate. But of course that wasn’t the case. Of course she could choose what she wanted.
‘I won’t marry you.’ She was pleased to have spoken so emphatically.
‘That is no longer a choice for either of us.’
‘Don’t be absurd. Last time I checked, I had free will…’
‘But you are pregnant with my twins, and I am the King.’
In the back of her mind, Phoebe wondered how many shocks she could endure in one day. ‘So? You might be a king but you cannot force me to marry you.’
‘That is true, but there is no court in this land that would award you parental rights over me.’
She gasped.
‘Are you saying you’d actually fight me for our babies?’
His nostrils flared. ‘That is the very last thing I would want to do.’
‘But you’d do it.’
‘If you refuse to be reasonable.’
Her eyes swept shut. ‘Are you hearing yourself? What you’re suggesting is the definition of unreasonable.’
‘It’s the definition of necessary,’ he corrected. ‘I know it is far from what either of us wants, Phoebe. I know that. But from the moment you conceived our twins, any other path was closed to us.’
She shook her head, wanting with all her heart for that not to be true.
‘I can’t marry you,’ she groaned, dropping her head into her palm. ‘I can’t.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because we’re not—we don’t know each other. We don’t love each other. I don’t evenlikeyou. Scratch that, I loathe you. What kind of marriage would that be?’
‘A perfect one, in my book.’
Her jaw dropped.
‘Loathing me is not ideal, but I have never sought a typical marriage. My role as King is everything to me—my marriage was always going to be about an heir. That is what I need most right now, and here you are, almost halfway to giving me not one buttwo.’
‘Not giving you two,’ she snapped. ‘Giving birth to them.’
‘Unimportant semantics.’
‘Not to me.’
‘Our marriage can be whatever you wish,’ he continued in the same vein, as though she had no say in this. ‘You would have some official duties but on the whole you could carve out a role for yourself that was as visible or not as you choose.’
‘Gosh, how accommodating you’re being,’ she muttered sarcastically. ‘You’re a paragon of reason.’
He expelled a rough breath. ‘What do you want me to say, Phoebe?’
‘I don’t want you to say anything. I don’t wantanythingfrom you.’ Her nostrils flared. ‘Six weeks ago you walked out of my apartment and as far as I was concerned, I never wanted to see you again.’
‘So this pregnancy changed nothing for you?’
