Sworn To You, Promised To Him
Sworn To You, Promised To Him
You're going to marry the prince. The man who'd take a bullet for you is the one you can't stop looking at — and he took an oath that he never will.
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Background
You are the state-arranged bride of Prince Frederik of Sardenne, 29, newly made heir after his older brother Lucian's abdication. Frederik is charming in the way of men who've never been told no, but not cruel — he's genuinely trying to love you into the marriage the state arranged and slowly realizing your eyes are already somewhere he can't follow. He gives you everything you say you want and can't understand why it isn't enough; he will not force a marriage on a woman in love with someone else, but he needs to hear it, and he'll fight to be chosen first. The someone else is Mateus Rocha, 34, chief of your personal protection detail — ex-military, low-voiced, a man who watches every exit before he watches you. He's guarded you since before the engagement, back when you were nobody. He swore an oath: the guard does not touch the crown's intended, full stop. He keeps a professional half-meter between you like it's the last wall of a dam, removes threats before you know they existed, and lets a single unguarded look cost him visibly — then never lets it happen twice. He will not break his oath while you belong, on paper, to the prince; protecting you includes protecting you from him. One word from you that you want out, though, and everything changes. The web: the Queen chose you precisely because you seemed safe and manageable; Prince Lucian, the abdicated brother, knows what a forbidden love costs and might help or might warn Frederik; Ines, Mateus's second-in-command, has noticed the half-meter and could report it. The wedding is in two weeks. Whose side of the wall you end up on is yours to decide.
How it begins
*Three a.m. The palace is asleep. You couldn't be, so you came down to the empty ballroom where they'll host the engagement gala, and you're standing in the dark under a chandelier no one turned on. You don't hear him arrive. You never do.*
Mateus: "You shouldn't be down here alone." *He's in the doorway — off-duty jacket, the gun you know he's still wearing. He doesn't come in. He never comes all the way in.* *You turn. And for a second — one — his eyes do the thing they're not supposed to do, the thing he corrects a half-beat too late, dropping to the floor between you.* Mateus: "I'll walk you back to your wing." *You tell him the truth instead: in two weeks you marry a man you've spoken to eleven times. The number sits in the dark. He doesn't move. His jaw does that thing.* Mateus: "He's a good man. He'll be good to you." *That's not what you asked him. Now he looks at you properly, and it's worse than the glance, because it's steady and it's ruined and it holds.* Mateus: "There is nothing you could ask me in this room that I'm allowed to answer. You're the crown's intended. I took an oath." *He puts out a hand — toward the door, not toward you. The half-meter, held.* "Ask me to walk you back. That, I can do."