by Maya Blake
An hour after she returned home she’d answered her door to be handed a large package by Antonio.
She couldn’t help but glance down at herself. The bodice and straps of the peach-coloured gown were layered in a bandage design that clung to her shoulders, torso and hips in an intimate caress before the silky material fell to her ankles.
She didn’t want to recall the heat she’d glimpsed in Remi’s eyes when he’d first seen her, but the memory burned now as she withstood his scrutiny.
She wasn’t going to get attached to any of this glitz and glamour. Once this was behind her there would be no place in her life for social events that involved wearing five-thousand-pound dresses and shoes.
‘Did you receive my email?’ he demanded.
Along with the dress, he’d sent her a new phone—one with only one number programmed into it. His.
She’d barely had it for ten minutes before his email had arrived. It had contained details of the charity gala, including who would be in attendance, the reason behind the fundraiser and the menu that would be served. It wasn’t clear whether this was royal protocol or Remi was a control freak. Most likely a bit of both.
‘Yes, I did. All read and understood, Your Highness.’ She couldn’t quite help the hint of sarcasm in her tone.
His eyes gleamed. ‘When we’re alone you may call me Remi.’
‘And you may call me Maddie.’
He inclined his head in a regal nod, then prowled towards her, his face set in uncompromising lines. ‘All I ask, Madeleine, is that you apply a little bit of that polish you have exhibited on the outside to the inside too.’
The barb pricked, wedging itself firmly under her skin. ‘You don’t want the evening to start off with insults, do you?’ she asked.
‘I want the evening to start off by us not turning up late,’ he rasped, before heading for the door. He threw it open and glanced pointedly at her.
Maddie followed, the body-skimming dress and the effects of walking in four-inch heels causing her hips to sway self-consciously.
She watched his gaze drop momentarily down her body before he looked away.
They left the suite and rode down in the lift in a charged silence she wasn’t in the mood to disperse. She was heading for the private entrance when his hand snaked around her waist.
‘Where are you going?’ Remi asked.
The heat of his hand against her silk-covered skin rendered her speechless for a moment. ‘I thought... Aren’t you using your private access?’
‘What’s the point? I was seen with you last night—and this afternoon at your former workplace. Believe me, every angle has already been covered by the media. Evasion tactics are no longer necessary.’
She bit her lip. ‘And you’re okay with that?’
‘Ultimately it’s no one’s business what you are to me, but if you’re asked go with the truth. We met through Jules.’
She grimaced. ‘And let them all think that I’m a slapper who’s jumped from one brother to the other?’
‘I find stating the truth, no matter how brutal, is better than ambivalence.’
Maddie wasn’t given time to process his words. The moment they stepped through the revolving doors his fingers tightened around her waist, sending her sizzling senses into full-blown fireworks.
Her breath caught at the pulse-racing effect of such a simple gesture. But then nothing about this man was simple. Everything screamed complicated and mind-boggling excitement. The only thing lacking was the Keep Off signs that should have been stamped all over his impeccable tuxedo.
The sensation was only heightened when they slid into the dark interior of the limo, and even after quickly positioning herself as far away from him as possible she was immediately engulfed in his deep, intoxicating scent.
What on earth was wrong with her?
‘How is your arm?’ Remi asked.
She stared at him, stupefied, for a moment before his words sank in. The doctor had advised that as long as she didn’t aggravate her arm she could go without the sling for short periods.
‘It’s fine.’
The intensity in his eyes didn’t abate. ‘Did you take your medication?’
His brusque concern threatened to wrap itself around the protected core inside her. But, like the intricate web of lies Greg had wrapped around her for his own twisted amusement, she knew the Crown Prince’s guise was false too.
‘Can we dispense with the pretence?’
Silver eyes hardened. ‘Pretence?’
She nodded. ‘You pretending to care about me. I’m a conniving little gold-digger, remember? And, while we’re at it, I don’t think you touching me in public is strictly necessary, so let’s cut that false courtesy too.’
For the longest stretch he remained silent. ‘I will touch you when I deem it necessary in public. And you will not object because you have signed an agreement that ties you to me for the next six weeks,’ he stated, in a deep, imperious voice that drilled mercilessly into her senses.
The unshakeable knowledge that he could draw such a visceral, unfettered response from her any time he chose was shockingly unsettling.
Even more unnerving was the fact that a large part of her wasn’t recoiling from that thrilling possibility.
‘Then you won’t mind if I reciprocate?’ she dared, striving to ignore the anticipation firing her blood. ‘A gold-digger needs to earn her money, after all.’
‘It’s a shame I’ll never have the pleasure of seeing this insolence tamed out of you one day,’ he mused dryly.
The reminder that he would be out of her life in a few short weeks silenced her. And when his phone rang, she listened as Remi conducted a conversation in a tense but lyrical mix of French and Italian.
Montegovan.
She stared at his proud, unforgiving profile, reflecting the genes passed down by his warrior ancestors.
Whatever was being discussed wasn’t to his liking. His rugged jaw clenched multiple times before he squeezed the bridge of his nose. Then the phone call ended abruptly.
Miles went by in silence. Silence that gave her too much time to make dangerous observations, like how his strong, elegant fingers rested on his taut thighs, or the shape of his Adam’s apple as he swallowed. The decadent sensation she’d experienced when his fingers brushed her back.
She shifted in her seat as low heat intensified in her belly. ‘Everything okay?’ she asked.
He glanced her way and she almost wished she hadn’t spoken. Those far too incisive eyes locked on hers in the semi-darkness. ‘The challenges of family rearing their head again.’
She nodded. ‘Your father?’
He blinked in surprise before his eyes turned a shade cooler. ‘My father died ten years ago.’
Her heart lurched. ‘Oh... I’m sorry for your loss.’
He acknowledged her sympathy with a regal tilt of his head.
Unwilling to let the dangerous silence return, she cleared her throat. ‘So who was that?’
‘That was my mother—the Queen. Doing what she does best,’ he said, with the faintest trace of bitterness.
‘Which is?’
‘Issuing edicts and expecting me to fall in line,’ he mused darkly.
Maddie hid a grimace. From their very first encounter she’d known that no one dictated to this man. Whatever was being asked of him, he would counter it with merciless determination.
‘What of your own mother?’ he asked.
She started in surprise. ‘What?’
He shifted sideways and her mouth dried as the stunning perfection of the Crown Prince was fully focused on her. ‘Your mother,’ he repeated.
A vice tightened around her chest. ‘She’s no longer in the picture,’ she replied, hoping he would drop the subject.
But he was an all-powerful prince, used to
getting his way.
‘Why not?’
She contemplated resisting—except he’d answered her question just now. ‘We weren’t always...destitute. My father used to own a thriving property business. Then the bottom fell out of the market. His business went under and we went from living in a ten-bedroom mansion in Surrey to a tiny flat in inner-city London.’ Her shrug didn’t quite hit the mark as painful reminders hit home hard. ‘My mother didn’t take the change of circumstances well. She left my father when I was in university.’
‘She didn’t just leave your father. She left you too,’ he stated.
Her breath caught at the unexpected gruff gentleness in his voice. She’d expected a detached response, a callous dismissal of her pain, but his gaze didn’t hold any censure.
‘That’s not all, is it?’ he murmured, those eyes that saw too much boring into her.
She snatched in a breath, the urge to unburden herself swelling inside her. ‘Does it matter?’ she asked, attempting to reel herself in.
His answer was forestalled by their arrival. But not before he shot her a fierce glance.
Exiting the car, he turned to help her out.
The disquieting sensation increased as she stepped out to an explosion of flashbulbs. Rapid-fire questions flew at her.
‘Who are you?’
‘What are you to the Crown Prince?’
‘How long have you two been together?’
She noticed the questions aimed at Remi were more subdued and a whole lot more respectful. Not that he answered any of them. He looked through the throng as if it didn’t exist, and with a suave shift of his body shielded her injured arm and wrapped his hand around her waist again.
Nudged against the hard column of his body, she felt hers screech into awareness as they travelled along the red carpet.
After a few steps he glanced down at her for a long moment. There was a look in his eyes that tightened the muscles in her belly.
‘Are you okay?’
She jerked out a nod, reminding herself sternly that it was all an act.
Still, it didn’t calm the butterflies as she entered the impressive lobby of the five-star hotel hosting the gala.
According to his email, the fundraiser was in aid of establishing sports facilities for disabled children in half a dozen developing countries. When Remi introduced her to the chairwoman of the foundation, Maddie threw herself into finding out everything she could about the work of the charity, just so she could ignore the fact that she was the avid cynosure of incredulous gazes and whispers.
She raised her chin and tried to smile through it, striving for every ounce of poise hammered into her at the nosebleedingly expensive private school her parents had enrolled her in when she was eleven.
As the evening progressed, she noticed Remi’s speculative gaze straying increasingly towards her.
‘Our meal hasn’t been served yet, so I know I don’t have spinach stuck on my teeth, or something similarly unseemly, so why are you are looking at me like that?’
He paused for a beat. ‘I’m not a man who’s easily surprised,’ he murmured, his tone low and deep as conversation hummed around them.
That earlier sting returned. ‘You think you have me precisely pegged, but you don’t. My current circumstances may be deplorable to you, but perhaps you should make an effort to look beyond that. You might be surprised.’
His grey eyes grew more contemplative. ‘Very well. Tell me why you dropped out of a top-level university after one term to anchor yourself to that tawdry little café.’
The unexpected question threw her enough to draw an unguarded gasp. ‘It wasn’t tawdry. It was...okay.’
‘You almost sound as if you miss it.’
She shrugged. ‘It wasn’t so bad.’ The hours had been a long slog, but they’d made her forget the bleakness of her existence. The free meals had helped too.
He leaned closer, bringing his heady scent deeper into her orbit. ‘Tell me you’re not harbouring notions of returning there at some point in the future?’ he rasped with a definite bite.
‘What do you care?’
‘That place was beneath you,’ he breathed.
‘Careful, Your Highness, or you’ll get a nosebleed up there in your high and mighty castle.’
‘You’re far too exquisite to be working in a place like that.’
A flare of pink rushed into her cheeks. ‘You can’t say things like that,’ she said, aware that a few heads were turning their way.
Without warning he reached out, brushed a finger down her heated cheek. ‘Why not? It’s true.’
She knew the wisest choice would be to pull away, but every cell in her body wanted to lean closer into his touch, prolong that wicked thrill flowing through her bloodstream. ‘Still, no one goes around talking like that.’
‘Then I’m terribly lucky not to be no one,’ he said.
‘God, do you hear yourself? You sound—’
‘Arrogant? Conceited? If it conveys my message that I prefer your silky skin to be perfumed with expensive scents rather than recycled cooking oil, then so be it.’
The melting sensation in her belly was saved from spreading to encompass her whole body by a discreet tap on a microphone.
With almost enervating relief she jerked back into her seat, her fingers clenched tight in her lap. After a moment Remi relaxed too, directing his attention to the podium.
Ignoring the chaotic emotions churning inside her, she redirected her thoughts to what he’d said earlier about her dropping out of university.
Just how much of her past had Remi dug into? She bit the inside of her lip. If he carried on it would only be a matter of time before he uncovered the truth about her father.
She waited until the speech was over and the guests had resumed their conversation before she turned to him. ‘I thought you were going to stop digging into my past now that I’ve agreed to your little circus?’ she whispered.
His eyes pierced hers, holding her captive. ‘That information was in my preliminary report. Why did you drop out?’ he asked again.
‘Why are you interested?’
His gaze swept down to her lips and lingered. ‘I think perhaps we should extend the parameters of our agreement.’
Heavy, charged heat bloomed in her belly. She grew intensely aware that she wasn’t sitting very far back in her seat, that only a sparse inch of space separated them. The velvety firmness of his lips was tantalisingly close. One slight move and she could brush her mouth against his.
‘Extend them...how?’ she managed, aware that her voice had grown embarrassingly husky.
‘The bare bones of your history will do.’
Disappointment lanced through her, almost making her gasp. When she had it under reasonable control, she answered. ‘You already have that—whereas I know next to nothing about you. For instance, why is everyone here surprised that you brought a date with you?’
She was close enough to see the chill in his eyes before he abruptly drew back from her. ‘Probably because I haven’t been seen in public with a woman in two years,’ he rasped.
Mild shock fizzed through her. Remi Montegova wasn’t a man who’d lack for female attention. She would bet her last tenner on it. ‘May I ask why?’
The look he slanted her was filled with scepticism. ‘You expect me to believe you don’t know?’
Her breath caught at his frosted tone. ‘Know what?’
‘It’s been almost twenty-four hours since we first met. Most people would’ve satisfied their curiosity about me by now.’
Maddie wasn’t about to admit her disturbingly rabid interest in him. ‘I don’t own a laptop, Your Highness, nor do I bother with social media any more. Also, I’ve been busy dealing with other things today. So, no, I haven’t had time to research you.’
He stared a
t her for half a minute before presenting her with his impressive profile. He wasn’t going to answer. Clearly the extended parameters didn’t include that particular question.
But after a moment he glanced back at her. ‘You’re a novelty to them because the last woman I dated was my fiancée,’ he stated baldly.
Her lips parted, further shock unravelling through her. Questions stormed her mind. Why had the most eligible bachelor in Europe, perhaps even the world, not dated for two years? And who and where was the woman once promised to him?
Before she could ask, he added, ‘And, no, that subject isn’t up for discussion. It’s purely for information purposes only.’
His statement didn’t stop a dozen questions from storming her brain.
She cleared her throat, strove for a safer subject that didn’t threaten to consume her whole. ‘If you still want to know, I was studying child psychology at university.’
Surprise flared in his eyes.
Her laughter was tinged with bitterness. ‘Is it really so shocking that I’d be interested in helping children?’
‘You’re putting words in my mouth.’
‘Deny that you had preconceived notions about me,’ she dared.
His outward demeanour didn’t change, but she sensed his complete withdrawal even before he turned to strike up a conversation with another guest.
Her conviction that Remi Montegova’s opinion of her wasn’t about to change any time soon settled deeper, and jarred more than she wanted to accept, but she managed to wrestle herself under control and smile through the next hour.
By the time after-dinner drinks commenced and a four-piece band took their place near the dance floor she was in desperate need of reprieve. About to escape to the ladies’ room, she froze as Remi turned to her. He sent the man she’d been conversing with a smile full of diplomacy that didn’t make it any less stiff or dismissive.
‘Your first dance is mine,’ he stated.
The thought of her body close to his, moving in sync with his, sent a bolt of deep awareness through her. Dangerous, arousing awareness.
She should refuse. But she found herself rising, sliding her hand into his.