In the Royal's Bed

‘You’re sending me to bed?’

‘I’m sending you away,’ he said, exasperated. ‘I need you to go away.’

‘Like Kass.’

‘No!’ And, before she knew what he was about, he’d seized her hands and tugged her close. ‘That’s just it. Don’t you see—I’m not the least like Kass. Kass represented everything about this place that I hate. Royalty. The perfection of it… Do you know my father was thrown from his horse and maimed? He was crippled but as well as that he had a massive scar running down the side of his face. He lost the sight of one eye. Until then, he’d worked like a navvy in this place—that the Principality hasn’t bankrupted itself until now is solely down to my father’s economic acumen and the fact that the old prince never bothered to interfere. But as soon as my father was injured he wasn’t permitted any part of the running of the place. He was simply struck off. It just killed him—his injuries, but more—the fact that he was useless. My mother and I could do nothing. And here I am, being useful again. Useful. And here you are and you’re Kass’s bride…’

‘Hey…’

‘And the last thing I want is to feel sorry for you,’ he said. ‘And I don’t and that’s just the trouble. Sympathy is something I could deal with. But you’re standing here looking so damned sexy it’s melting the soles of my boots, and the way I feel…I just…’

‘You just?’ She was trying to pull away but he was having none of it.

‘I just,’ he said and he tugged her tight against him.

And he kissed her.

The shock made her freeze.

For the first couple of seconds—those vital seconds when she should have pulled away, before his mouth even touched hers—shock didn’t let her move. His hands were holding hers with a warmth and a strength that locked her to him. She’d been tugging back—sort of—but not with real desperation. But now…

His hands tugged her tight and his mouth lowered on to hers. In shock she looked up at him, and then his lips claimed hers and it was a done deal. She was being kissed, whether she willed it or not.

Rafael…

He felt…He felt…

She stopped trying to figure what he felt. She stopped trying to figure what she felt. She just…was.

She hadn’t touched a man for six years. She’d sworn to never…

So much for swearing, for there was no way any mere resolution could get in the way of this.

Her mouth met his, merged, and her body simply went into meltdown. She had no will to do anything but simply be—to let him take her as he willed, to let his hands create their magic, to let the sensations sweeping over her take their course, transform her as they willed, lift her out of her dreary yesterdays and turn her into a woman desired.

For that was what she was. There was no mistaking the urgency of how he felt about her. His hands had her firmly round the waist, tugging her into him so her breasts were flattened against his chest. She could feel his heart beating under hers. She opened her lips and felt his tongue begin a slow, delicious plunder that would have made her moan in pleasure if in doing so she might not have risked breaking the moment.

She was risking nothing. She was doing her own holding, taking what she needed from this man, soaking in the warmth and strength and arrant male desire.

It had been too long. Far too long.

Rafael…

She was kissing him back, as fiercely as he was kissing her, taking as well as giving, quenching her own desperate needs.

Needs she’d told herself didn’t exist.

Only, of course, they did. Six long years of nothing. Isolation and loneliness and betrayal.

Rafael…

The kiss went on and on. Neither wanted it to end. Neither could conceive of it ending. The night was still and warm. There was no movement in the forecourt—the castle staff had long gone to bed. There was only this man and this woman, taking what they both desperately needed.

And when the kiss finally ended, as even the best kiss must inevitably do, Kelly took a step back and put her fingers to her lips and knew that her world had changed.

‘N…no,’ she whispered and she saw her own shock mirrored in Rafael’s eyes.

‘No,’ he agreed, sounding as if he didn’t know what the word meant.

‘I didn’t want to kiss you,’ she whispered.

‘You’re Kass’s woman,’ he said blankly and that brought reality crashing back around the pair of them.

Kass’s woman…

The feeling of unreality dissipated. Here and now crashed right back.

‘How dare you?’

‘I don’t dare,’ he said. ‘That was dumb.’

She stared at him, confounded. The kiss had been dumb. Of course it had been dumb. But to say it…

‘Don’t you touch me,’ she stammered and the confusion in his eyes faded.

‘You don’t want it?’

‘Of course not.’

‘Of course not. We’re birds of a feather, Kelly. We want nothing to do with this.’

‘But it’s not this we’re talking about,’ she managed. ‘Not royalty. Not now. No, I don’t want any more contact than I’m forced to have with royalty to be a good mother to Matty. But as far as kissing you…’

‘You looked at me,’ he said as if that explained everything and she glared.

‘So you’re saying I goaded you into it. Like wearing red patent shoes.’

‘Pardon?’ he said, startled.

‘You don’t wear red patent shoes,’ she said patiently. ‘Everyone knows they incite the senses and reflect your knickers.’

‘Really?’

‘Not that it has anything to do with the here and now,’ she said, fighting to get a grip. ‘And I should never have worn this dress. When’s Anna coming?’

‘I told you. Tomorrow.’

‘Then starting tomorrow, let’s get this on a sensible footing,’ she snapped. ‘You and me…we see each other in terms of official duties. That’s all.’

‘That’s all I want, too.’

‘Because, of course, I’m Kass’s woman.’

‘I didn’t mean to say that.’

‘You did say it,’ she snapped. ‘And it hurt. I was dumb enough to fall for a good royal come-on, and if you think I’d be dumb enough to fall twice… Kass’s woman or not…you’d be out of your mind. So you needn’t look at me as if I’m trying to jump you or, heaven forbid, put another wedding ring on my finger…’

‘I’m not.’

‘Because I’m not,’ she snapped, refusing to let him interrupt. ‘I’m going to bed.’

‘Good.’

‘And Kass’s…the royal suite is round the far side of the castle,’ she said. ‘As far from my attics as it’s possible to get. And I can lock my doors.’

‘Kelly, I’m not trying to seduce you.’

‘You kissed me and that’s enough. More than enough. I don’t even want a handshake from a prince of the blood.’

‘I’m not…’

‘A prince of the blood. Yes, you are.’

‘As you’re Kass’s bride,’ Rafael said, sounding goaded. ‘Princess Royal. You represent everything I don’t want about this place.’

‘Well, it’s good we have that cleared up,’ she snapped. ‘Just so we’re clear. You dragged me back here and now you tell me I’m part of your problem. Sorry, Rafael, I have problems of my own to sort.’

She should stalk away. She should just turn and leave. Instead, she stood in the moonlight and watched him try to think of something else to say—something that would make sense of this crazy situation they’d landed in.

He couldn’t. He didn’t. And finally there was no choice. She turned away. ‘Goodnight,’ she said stiffly.

‘Kelly?’

She didn’t turn round. She simply stood still and waited for him to say what he needed to say.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said at last. ‘That should never have happened. It won’t happen again. I promise.’

‘Just as well,’ she muttered.

And went to bed.

But not to sleep.

What had she been thinking of—to let him kiss her and to kiss him back?

It was because he was…gorgeous?

Rafael de Boutaine, Prince Regent of Alp de Ciel. He’d kissed her senseless.

As Kass had.

No. He was as different from Kass as it was possible to be. Kelly lay in the lovely double bed Rafael had organized to be delivered into her attic room and watched the moonbeams play on the ceiling. She shouldn’t have the new bed, she thought. She wanted to be like a forgotten relation, left to penury while on the other side of the castle, on the royal side, Rafael swanned round in luxury, enjoying his magnificent suite of rooms, being…Prince Regent.

‘I’d hate it,’ she muttered.

She didn’t hate Rafael. She’d loved it tonight, she conceded. She’d loved feeling beautiful. She’d loved standing side by side with Rafael while he’d organized affairs of state. She’d loved the way he’d gasped as she’d walked into the room. And the way the warmth had stayed in his eyes.

In fact, the way she was feeling about Rafael…had to be suppressed. The part of her that had been wounded to the core five years ago clenched into horror.

To fall in love with another prince…

What was she thinking? How could she be falling in love? Just because the man had kissed her…

‘The man’s seriously fabulous,’ she told the ceiling and closed her eyes, as if she could block out the thought of him.

His partner would be here tomorrow—a woman called Anna. They’d get on with the ruling Laura told them was needed and she’d retire to her books. For the next twenty years.

‘Which is what I want,’ she whispered into the dark, ‘isn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ her mind screamed but there was a tiny part of her that was stubbornly refusing to agree.

Why had he kissed her? Did he have no sense at all?

Yes, he’d agreed to take on the Regency, but that was as far as it went. He didn’t want to get any more fond of Matty than he already was, and he sure as hell didn’t want to get any more fond of Matty’s mother.

But he’d kissed her.

The thought shocked him. He hadn’t known what he intended to do until it happened and then…then it was too late. It was lucky that Kelly had sense for the pair of them.

It’s like quicksand, he thought savagely, the royal quagmire hauling him in.

He thought back to the days after his father’s accident. Up until then, Rafael had been cool with being royal. Kass, his older cousin, had been an arrogant, egotistical bore. Worried about the influence Kass might have, his parents had sent Rafael to boarding school. He’d thoroughly enjoyed it, but he’d loved coming back in the holidays. He’d lived on horseback, roaming this beautiful little country with an ever-growing appreciation.

But then his father had been injured, and over the course of one summer life had changed. Kass and his father had simply cut off the brother and uncle who’d once been useful to them, but whose use-by date had been the moment he’d become uncomfortable to look at.

The last time he’d come outside… It had been just before Rafael was due to go back to school. Laura had convinced her husband to get some sun, so she and Rafael had pushed him into the garden.

Kass had walked past and had stopped dead. ‘He’s not to stay here,’ he’d said harshly, speaking to Laura and not directly to his uncle. ‘It upsets the staff. It makes me feel sick. He’s not to come within sight of the castle.’

That one vicious order had been enough to make Rafael’s father return to the house. He’d died two months later, without having set foot in the garden again.

Rafael had made that vow as well. There was no way he ever intended to be of use to royalty. He wouldn’t set foot in the castle. He’d hoped his mother would move. She hadn’t and their access to each other had become confined to Laura’s visits to the States.

And now, like it or not, here he was—of use to royalty as his father had once been of use to the old Prince and to Kass. It made him feel ill.

And tonight he’d kissed Kass’s wife.

Why?

It was a web, he thought, a fine, gossamer web drawing him in tighter and tighter. Conscience and duty had him stuck here.

Like Kelly was stuck.

She wasn’t stuck, he thought savagely. She could stay up in her attic and be an academic and not do anything, not be a part of it. Or do as she’d done tonight, emerge from her attic for a moment and then retreat the moment things got intense.

So why had he kissed her?

‘Because I’m a fool,’ he told the darkness and he rolled over in the royal bed and thought he could roll over six or seven times and not reach the edge.

‘It’s ludicrous.

‘It’s life as you’ll know it for the next twenty years,’ he said grimly. ‘So get used to it. And keep your hands off that woman!’

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