Her crown? But wasn't she giving her crown to Ian? Her son?

"Isn't Ian the rightful heir to your throne though?" I asked, confused.

"He is. But technically there are two crowns. The Kings, and Queens. I am guaranteeing you my crown, as queen. Ian might never get his, depending on how he is, and on how his father drags this out."

My mouth moved in random forms as I tried to come up with some words. "But..... but...." I rapidly shook my head and grabbed the handle. "I don't know. I can't think right now. Besides, you need to talk to Ian as well, since this includes him."

She nodded once. "I'll talk to him. But please..... don't tell him anything about our conversation. I don't want him to hate me even more than he already does."

With a tight nod, I walked out the room, and headed back towards mine, to get my thoughts together.

A guarantee. A guarantee at the crown, if I just did this one thing. Kid or no kid, I would get the crown.

"Do I want to?" I whispered to myself as I closed the door behind me. I walked out to the patio, and sat down, not even bothering to look at the view. The only view that were catching my eyes attention were my hands on my lap.

Do I really want to try this? What about my crown. My birth crown? What would happen to that one?

I rubbed my face and sighed, finally looking up. The skies were a pretty light blue, and Cumulus clouds adorn them. There was not a bird in sight, and no planes were heard -as if they could anyways. No plane was allowed to fly over Royal grounds unless it was one of ours.

Someone softly knocking on the glass doors brought me out of my staring, and I jumped up, twirling around to see them.

"Ian. Hi."

"I'm guessing by the sound of your voice, you've been thinking long and hard about it."

"Long? I've only been out here for a few minutes."

He shook his head and got out his phone. He then turned on the screen and showed me the time, making me blanch at what it said. I quickly looked back at the sky, and sure enough, the colors were darkening a bit, but not enough to call it a sunset.

"I've been out here for hours? It has only felt like minutes!"

He just chuckled at my reaction. "Well you must be starving. I brought dinner over because I know you want to talk to me, and I you."

I stretched and groaned as he walked back in, rolling the trolley filled with our dinner. My stomach snarled at the smell of the chicken, and I heard another slight chuckle fro him.

We dug in peacefully, and right when we were about to get started with dessert, that's when he dropped the question.

"So, what have you decided upon?"

I sighed, dropped my spoon, and picked up my glass of water. I took a gulp of it to clear my throat, and once I was good, I gave him a small shrug and whispered, "I don't know yet. What do you think about it?"

He leaned back in his chair, and gave me a small smile as he crossed his arms. "Well I think you should know better by now to not rub your stomach, and look down at it happily when you think of food."

I blushed furiously, and rubbed the back of my neck in embarrassment. "How was I supposed to know that the paparazzi we kicked out seconds later took that picture. Do I even look pregnant?"

His eyes traveled to my abdomen, and he gave me a small smirk. "Well you do have a small-"

I gasped, grabbed the pillow that was supporting my back, and threw it at him. He didn't even attempt to block himself as I jumped up, grabbed another one, and began to hit him with it.

"You. Jerk! You. Are. Not. Supposed. To. Say. That!" I screeched with each hit. He just kept on laughing, and covering his face as I kept on delivering my blows.

"I'm sorry!" He laughed. "Can you please stop hitting me?"

I huffed, hit him one more time, and then stood there, the pillow on my hip as I glared at him. He relaxed, looked at me, and before I could even move, he snapped his arms up in my direction as he stood up. In seconds, the pillow was out of my arms, and my form was pressed to his so tightly, I was forced to look up at him. The gasp that escaped my lips didn't stop him from caressing my face, and stare deeply into my eyes as he spoke.

"You are beautiful, just the way you are." His pupils dilated as he spoke, and my eyes were widening in shock. "Don't you ever change for a man. If he doesn't like you for who you are, then he doesn't deserve you."

I couldn't make a sound. His face was so close to mine, and his body heat felt wonderful with the small wind that was blowing around us. I didn't even mind as his face slowly began to get closer to mine, his eyes quickly flicking to my lips before they went back to my eyes. We were millimeters away, when a small knock echoed into the patio, snapping us back into reality and making us take a couple steps back.

I cleared my head, and looked away from him as Margaret spoke from the main door. "I'm sorry for the interruption princess, but the queen is on the phone. She wishes to speak to you."

My mother? Confused, I walked to the phone besides my bed, and picked it up, pressing the little light that was flashing. "Thank you Margaret." I called out to her. Then to the receiver, "Mom?"

"What have you decided?" I rolled my eyes at her blunt question, and began to twirl my fingers through the loops of the cord.

"Why do the palaces still have these old time phones, when technology has better ones. I mean look at this mom, the stupid cord is tangling-"

"That was not the answer I was expecting Charlotte. I'm guessing you haven't decided yet."

I sighed. "No mom. I haven't decided yet. Why do you care anyways? It's not like you're helping."

I heard her sharp intake of breath and if she was right next to me, her eyes would be shooting daggers at me. "How dare-"

"Look mom. I don't have the time to speak to you right now. I'll call you tomorrow, ok? Bye." I hung up before she could even answer. I knew I would have to pay for what I had just done in the future, but at the moment, I didn't care. She was butting her butt in a situation that didn't need her.

"I'm sorry about that Ian. Look, about that-" I stopped short when I realized he wasn't in the patio. He wasn't even in my room. The mess from our dinner was still sitting there, but he was gone.

With a small groan, I opened my eyes and shook my head. "Whatever."

~

"Hey...." Something poked my face, and I groaned. "Hey."

"Stop it," I mumbled as I pulled the sheets over my face.

"Fine then. Just say yes or no so....." I didn't hear the rest since I went back to dreamland, but another poke to the side had me yelling out an answer.

"Yes! Geesh, can't a girl sleep?"

There was a slight chuckle as I threw the pillow over my head, and tried to drown out the sounds with it. "Alright. Just don't complain later on. They want to start as soon as possible."

It took my brain a couple seconds to comprehend what he had just said. I was confused by his words, and with a groan, I sat up and stopped him just as he was about to close the door.

"Wait." A small yawn escaped my lips, and he looked at me as he fought hard to not smile. "What did I just agree to?"

He gave me a small wink, and a dazzling smile before he shrugged. "You should have paid attention. Now you doomed us both."

"Ian! IAN GET YOUR ASS BACK IN HERE!" When he poked his head, I wiggled my pointer finger back and forth, gesturing for him to get closer. His eyes narrowed a millimeter, but he stood at the threshold, his arms crossed. "What. Did. I. Just. Agree. On?"

"Remember what happened yesterday?" It took me another couple seconds to remember, but when I did, I nodded and he continued. "Well your mother keeps on calling. Like every five minutes calling. It's annoying." I rolled my eyes as he kept talking. "My mom sent me up here to get an answer from you, since I told her I would do whatever you said." He now narrowed his eyes completely at me and spoke. "Since you just said yes, well congratulations. You may just have turned us into parents."

"No! I thought I had more time! Do you even want to do this?"

He just stared at me and shrugged after a few minutes. His blue gaze went down to the floor as he kicked the carpet. His hands were concealed in his pockets as he mumbled out his words. "I don't know. I mean like you said, I'll do practically anything for the throne, but this is too much. We aren't ready to be parents." He took a deep breath, and took a short peek at me before he looked back down. "Besides, I don't really like the idea of me...... well, you get the point. There's no way we are doing this the natural way, so that only leaves one other solution."

I bit my lip to stop myself from laughing and I nodded. "I know exactly how you feel. But, your mom did tell me something."

"What?"

"She said that if we agree, we only have to try it out four times. No more. She was going to talk to my mom about making another deal." I hated lying to him for some reason. It just felt.... wrong.

"Four times? Don't you think that's a lot of trying?"

"Well a pregnancy almost never happens the first time," I laughed as I pulled up my hair with a scrunchy I had found next to me. "Besides, there's only one time each month that it can happen. And my body can reject it as well. Yeah, four times does seem like a lot, but if you think about it, that's four months. We are already four months in, and in another four months, we will only have four months left of this marriage." I scratched my head as he just laughed at my explanation. "Wow. Did I even make sense?"

"Sort of. But I get your point." There was some short awkward silence before he cleared his throat. "So.... what do you say?"

"I want you to answer as well. We are in this together for now, and if by some bad luck, for the rest of our lives."

His eyebrows crunched down in a frown, but he nodded silently. "In the count of three?" With my nod, he began to count down, and then we both blurted out a single word. My eyebrows shot up in surprise, and he just shrugged.

"It's official. Do you want me to go tell them, or do you want to do the honors?"

I climbed off the bed, cursing when my feet tangled with the sheets. "Wait for me. Let me just freshen up a bit, and then we can go tell them together."

"Ok."

Ten minutes later, we both stood in front of the main study. I looked up at him, he looked down at me, and I took a deep breath. He gave our entwined hands a small squeeze of encouragement, and then released them before we walked in, making his parents look up from some paperwork.

"We have decided."

"On?" His dad looked confused while she looked surprised and excited at the same time.

"Oh be quiet dear. You'll hear about it soon." She chastised her husband. She quickly diverted her gaze to us, and with a shine in her eyes, she breathed, "So what have you decided on?"

I could feel Ian's eyes on me, as a gesture for me to tell them. With a small shake of my head, her face fell and I gave her a small smile.

"You have yourself a deal."

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Hope y'all don't hate me.

Am I going too fast?

I need comments my lovely people!

But here's another chapter! A double update in a week! Yay! 😄 hope I don't disappear again 🙈

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