Chap­ter 30: Rhys feels the full weight of his addic­tion, but it isn’t to any­thing he can eas­i­ly avoid—it’s Brid­get her­self. Through­out his life, Rhys had prid­ed him­self on steer­ing clear of sub­stances that could trap him, whether it be drugs, alco­hol, or even an overindul­gence in sug­ar. Yet here he was, com­plete­ly con­sumed by a woman whose resilience, ele­gance, and hid­den fire drew him in deep­er with each pass­ing day. For once, he did­n’t want to resist the pull. Spend­ing the after­noon togeth­er in a qui­et hotel on the out­skirts of Athen­berg, away from the pry­ing eyes of the pub­lic, gave them the rare chance to expe­ri­ence some­thing that almost resem­bled a nor­mal date. Between the shared meals, ten­der moments, and hours tan­gled togeth­er in bed, they cre­at­ed a bub­ble where noth­ing else mat­tered. In those fleet­ing hours, Rhys allowed him­self to for­get the real­i­ty they would soon have to face.

As Rhys sketched Brid­get, he rev­eled in the sheer sim­plic­i­ty of the moment. She teased him play­ful­ly, and he respond­ed with mock threats of adding sil­ly imper­fec­tions to his draw­ing. Bridget’s real smile—so dif­fer­ent from the pol­ished ones she wore in public—struck him hard­er than any phys­i­cal blow could. To Rhys, her beau­ty was­n’t just in her appear­ance but in the way she let her guard down with him. Their ban­ter came eas­i­ly, a tes­ta­ment to the inti­ma­cy they had built out­side the pub­lic eye. Despite know­ing that dan­ger loomed, with increas­ing secu­ri­ty con­cerns around his guest­house, Rhys chose to hold on to this after­noon. These peace­ful moments were rare jew­els in their tur­bu­lent world, and he cher­ished them with an inten­si­ty that sur­prised even him. In those qui­et hours, he could almost believe they had a future untouched by roy­al expec­ta­tions or soci­etal scruti­ny.

Their con­ver­sa­tion turned deep­er as Brid­get asked whether Rhys ever shared his art with any­one else. When he admit­ted she was the only one, the mag­ni­tude of that con­fes­sion hung heav­i­ly between them. Bridget’s reac­tion was ten­der, teas­ing at first, but full of an under­stand­ing that few oth­ers could offer him. Rhys knew he didn’t trust eas­i­ly, but with Brid­get, open­ing up was less a con­scious choice and more a nat­ur­al response. When she called him over with a mis­chie­vous glint in her eye, the play­ful mood returned. The con­nec­tion between them wasn’t just physical—it was emo­tion­al, intri­cate, and root­ed in a lev­el of trust that nei­ther of them had shared with many oth­ers before. Their inti­ma­cy deep­ened in ways that went beyond lust, reveal­ing a vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty Rhys rarely allowed any­one to see.

Lat­er, as they lay togeth­er, Brid­get gen­tly touched the scar on Rhys’s eye­brow, lead­ing him to share a piece of his painful past. Her sim­ple ges­ture of affection—pressing a kiss to the scar—spoke loud­er than any words. For Rhys, these small acts chipped away at the armor he had built over years of hard­ship. Brid­get had a way of mak­ing him feel human again, some­one wor­thy of love, rather than a shad­ow weighed down by his child­hood. Their talk shift­ed to the top­ic of his absent father, a man Rhys had no inter­est in find­ing. Despite the ease with which Chris­t­ian could uncov­er the truth, Rhys knew there was noth­ing he want­ed from the man who had aban­doned him. He car­ried enough wounds with­out reopen­ing that chap­ter. Yet, hav­ing Brid­get there, lis­ten­ing with­out judg­ment, made the pain of those mem­o­ries eas­i­er to bear.

Bridget’s own fears and inse­cu­ri­ties sur­faced, shed­ding light on the heavy expec­ta­tions she car­ried. Haunt­ed by the lega­cy of a moth­er she had nev­er known, Brid­get con­fessed her deep­est fear: that she would some­how fail the mem­o­ry of the per­fect queen her moth­er was sup­posed to be. Worse, she blamed her­self for her moth­er’s death—a bur­den no child should have to car­ry. Rhys lis­tened, his heart break­ing for her, and respond­ed with fierce, unwa­ver­ing love. He made sure Brid­get knew that her life was not a mis­take, and her mother’s death was not her fault. His words were an anchor in the storm of her grief, pulling her back from the self-imposed guilt she had car­ried for so long.

Their exchange under­scored a pow­er­ful truth about their rela­tion­ship: beyond the phys­i­cal attrac­tion, beyond the pub­lic per­sonas they were forced to main­tain, they saw each oth­er in a way no one else did. In a world that demand­ed per­fec­tion from them both, Brid­get and Rhys found solace in each oth­er’s imper­fec­tions. They were each oth­er’s safe har­bor, a place to rest and heal, even as the world around them grew increas­ing­ly chaot­ic. With every shared secret, every moment of vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty, their bond deep­ened, becom­ing some­thing too strong to be eas­i­ly sev­ered. As night crept in and they lay in the qui­et after­math of love and con­fes­sions, one thing became certain—no mat­ter what bat­tles await­ed them beyond the hotel walls, they would fight for each oth­er with every­thing they had.