Total pages in book: 85
Estimated words: 79938 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 400(@200wpm)___ 320(@250wpm)___ 266(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 79938 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 400(@200wpm)___ 320(@250wpm)___ 266(@300wpm)
Galen shook his head. “You should have told me that you looped in that idiot. There’s got to be a less roundabout way to protect her.”
“Her is standing right here.” Meg stepped back enough that she could look at both of them. “This isn’t a decision you get to make without me.”
“This is what you wanted, princess. To go home, back to your life. To follow your plan.” She’d already sacrificed enough just by being with them. He still hadn’t gotten around to telling her about the money, but to be fair, he hadn’t told Galen, either.
Meg sighed. “This is so screwed up. I had a plan. It was a very good plan, and now…”
“It can’t matter.” Galen’s dark eyes held the same emotion squeezing Theo’s chest until he felt like he’d never draw a full breath again. Love. He loves her, too. Galen couldn’t tell her any more than Theo could. It would be unspeakably cruel to say those three little words before they launched her back into the life she’d claimed for her own. She’d grown up at the mercy of others’ whims, and she’d fought tooth and nail to free herself.
He wouldn’t be the one to wrap her in chains again.
Neither of them would.
Galen stroked her hair back from her face. “There’s not a way through this where our shit stays intact. No matter which way it plays out, compromises will be made that will break us. Better for you to go back now and resume your life. Get your degree. Be the best fucking accountant out there until you figure out what you really want to do with your life.”
He knew what came next. Find a man who worships the ground you walk on. Let him love you. Marry him. Make a family with him.
Fuck. He swallowed, his insides turning to shattered glass at the thought of Meg settling down with some asshole. Except he wouldn’t be an asshole. She was too smart for that. She’d find a nice guy with a little edge, one who wouldn’t bore her to death. It would take him a while to get past the many walls around her heart, but if he was worthy, he’d manage.
She’d be happy.
Happier than she could be in some compromised semi-secret bullshit of a relationship with him and Galen.
Meg stepped away from Galen’s touch. “Rationally, I know you’re right. This just sucks.”
“Yeah,” Theo ground out.
She pressed her lips together and squared her shoulders. “No use in arguing about it. Let’s just…” She gave herself a shake. “Let’s get another look at that birth certificate. You need a plan for when you go back there or you really will be walking into a trap.”
God, he loved her so much, it made his heart feel like it could beat itself right out of his chest. Theo cleared his throat. “Yeah. Sure. Let’s do that.” He walked to where they’d stashed their stuff and pulled out the folder where he’d kept the various documents they’d painstakingly collected over the last few months.
They laid them out on the kitchen island. Theo read over them for the millionth time, but nothing had changed. No secrets jumped out and smacked him in the face. No path forward revealed itself.
Useless.
“Hold on a minute,” Meg murmured. She picked up the birth certificate and held it next to the first marriage certificate. “These are both correct?”
“The marriage certificate is a copy we got from the courthouse in Las Vegas, so it’s official. Safe enough to assume the one Alexis gave us is, too.” It had the right marks, at least.
Meg pointed at the birthdate listed on the marriage certificate. “This is wrong, then.”
Theo frowned and moved closer. The marriage certificate listed Mary’s birth year as 1969. He lifted the birth certificate. It was so old and faded in places, he hadn’t even noticed that the last digit was different. It had just looked like a faded out nine. It wasn’t.
It was a seven.
He did some quick math in his head. “But that would mean she was—”
“Sixteen when she married her first husband. Which is technically legal if she had at least one parent’s written consent.”
“She didn’t.” That much, he knew. Mary had run away from home. Her parents didn’t even know she was in the States until she was already married.
Galen leaned forward to look. “Not to mention they would have the right birth year if she had parental permission. They didn’t. She lied.” He held Theo’s gaze. “She lied. It didn’t matter that she never got divorced because the first marriage wasn’t legal in the first place.”
Meg gave him a smile that barely wavered at the edges. “Congratulations, Theo. Or should I say, Your Highness? You were right. You’re the rightful King of Thalania.”
17
They drove Meg to the airport.
Galen stood next to Theo as they watched her work her way through the line to the ticket counter. In a few short hours, she’d be safe on a plane headed back to New York. On a plane out of their lives for good. “You sure about this?”