by Millie Adams
“You are not for me.”
Then he turned, leaving her there. She would find her way back. Follow the path.
But he had to do them both a favor and remove himself from her. Because if he did not, he would do something that they would both come to bitterly regret.
* * *
He was familiar with the sting of failure. The process of deprogramming himself from his father’s rule had been a difficult one when he had been sixteen years old and he had wanted to believe with intensity that his father was a benevolent ruler. And he had seen otherwise. The way that it had hurt his soul, torn him in two, to begin to look differently at the world, at his life and at himself, had been the last time he had truly felt pain. Because after that it was over. After that, the numbness had sunk in, had pervaded all that he was.
It was Matteo who had seen him through it. Matteo, who had been struggling with the exact same thing, who made Javier feel like he wasn’t losing his mind.
His brother had been his anchor in the most difficult moment of his life.
And now there was another wrenching happening in his soul. It was all because of the luminous, dark eyes of Violet King.
In that alleyway, when she had put her hand over his, when she had tempted him with a bite of ice cream like she was Eve in the garden offering him an apple, he had not been able to think of anything but casting the frozen treat aside and claiming her mouth with his own.
In the water he had longed to drag her to the shore, cover her body with his own. Claim her.
And that was a violation of all that he had become.
He was a man of honor because he had chosen it.
None of it was bred into him. None of it was part of his blood.
He and Matteo knew that, so they were always on guard.
And this woman... This woman enticed him to betray that.
To betray his brother.
The one man to whom he owed his absolute loyalty.
The man he had promised to destroy should that man ever abuse his power. Such was their bond.
Such was his dedication.
But now... Lusting after his brother’s fiancée made him compromised.
It compromised that promise. Compromised what he was. What he claimed to be.
His phone rang.
It was Matteo. As if his brother could feel his betrayal from across the continent.
“Yes?”
“We have been successful,” Matteo said. “Monte Blanco will now be included in the United Council. My mouse has proven herself indispensable yet again.”
“Is she in the room with you?”
“Of course she is.”
Javier didn’t even have the right to scold his brother for that. Not at this point. He had lost his right to a moral high ground of any kind.
“When do you return?” he said, his voice heavy.
“Two days. We have to make a stop in Paris for a diplomatic meeting.”
“I suppose, then, that it is good you spent all those years studying business.”
“Yes. Not the way our father did it, but there are similarities to diplomacy in business and when it comes to running a country. Of course, the bottom line is not filling your own pockets in the situation.”
“No indeed.”
The bottom line was not about satisfying themselves at all.
It stung particularly now. As he thought of Violet. As he thought of the deep, gut-wrenching longing to touch her.
And the anger that crept in beneath his skin. Anger that was not at himself, though it should have been. Anger at the cruelty of fate. That he should want this woman above all others when she was perhaps the only woman in the world who was truly off-limits to him.
He was a prince. He could snap his fingers and demand that which he wished.
Except her.
The insidious doubt inside of him asked the question. Was that why he wanted her? Was that why she presented a particular appeal? Because she was forbidden.
Because she was forbidden to him and no matter how hard he tried to pretend otherwise, he was born a man with a massive ego who didn’t feel that a single thing on the earth should be barred from him should he take to it.
No. He would not allow it.
He would not allow that to be true.
“I look forward to your return.”
“How is my fiancée?”
“Not exactly amenable to the idea of being your fiancée,” he said.
It was the truth. Everything else could be ignored. For now.
“I must say, the connection between myself and her is one of the things that made our meetings the most interesting. She is well liked, world-renowned for her business mind. Such a fantastic asset to me she will be.”
“You don’t know her.”
“And I suppose you do now. I will look forward to hearing how you think I might best manage her.”
His brother hung up then. And left Javier standing there with his hand curled so tightly around the phone he thought he might break. Either his bones or the device, he didn’t know. Neither did he care.
He gritted his teeth and walked out of his office. Something compelled him down to the ballroom where he had the dance lesson with Violet. Where he held her in his arms and first began to question all that he was. It was unconscionable. That this woman he had known for a scant number of days could undo twenty years’ worth of restraint.
And when he flung open the doors to the ballroom... There she was.
Curled up in one of the tufted chairs that sat in the corner of the room, next to the floor-to-ceiling windows, sunlight bathing her beauty in gold.
Her legs were tucked up underneath her, and he could see the edges of her bare toes peeking out from beneath her shapely rear. She was wearing simple, soft-looking clothes, nothing fancy. Neither did she have on any of her makeup. She was reading.
Not on her phone.
And it made him want to dig deeper. To question all that she presented of herself to the world, all that she tried to tell him about who she was and who she actually might be.
She looked up when she heard his footsteps. “Oh,” she said. “I didn’t expect you to be lurking around the ballroom.”
“I didn’t expect you to be lurking around at all. Much less away from the computer.”
“I found this book in the library,” she said. “And the library’s beautiful, but it doesn’t have the natural lighting of this room.”
“Protecting the books,” he said.
“Makes sense.”
“What is it you’re reading?”
“It’s a book of fairy tales. Monte Blancan fairy tales. It’s very interesting. We all have our versions of these same stories. I guess because they speak to something human inside of us. I think my favorite one that I’ve read so far is about the Princess who was taken captive by a beast.”
“Is that what you think me? A beast?”
She closed the book slowly and set it down on the table beside the chair. “Possibly. Are you under some kind of enchantment?”
“No.”
“That’s something I found interesting in your version of the story. The Prince was not a beast because of his own sins. He was transformed into one as punishment for something his father had done. And then, much like the story I’m familiar with, the woman is taken captive because of the sins of her father. It feels shockingly close to home, doesn’t it?”
“Except I believe in the story my brother would be that enchanted Prince.”
Her gaze was too frank. Too direct. “If you say so.”
“You were shocked by your father’s deal?”
She nodded slowly. “I was. Because I thought that we... I knew he wasn’t perfect. I did. But it’s not like he was a raving villain like your father.”
; “You know, I didn’t realize my father was a raving villain until I started to see, really see the things that he had done to our country. And I don’t know that your father is a villain so much as he was made a desperate man in a desperate moment. And my brother took advantage of that. My brother does his best to act with honor. But like me, he is not afraid to be ruthless when he must be. I do not envy the man who had to go up against his will.”
“He should have protected me. He should never have used me as currency. I can’t get over that. I won’t.”
“Is that why you came? To teach him a lesson?”
Her lips twitched. “Maybe. And I won’t lie, I did think that perhaps my notoriety would keep me safe. You know, because people will miss me if I’m not around. But I sort of like not being around. It’s been an interesting vacation.”
“Except you’re going to marry my brother.”
“Yes. I know you think so.”
“You can take it up with him when he returns. He tells me he’ll be back in two days.”
Shock flared in the depths of her eyes. “Two days?”
“Yes. Don’t look so dismayed.”
“I can’t help it. I am dismayed.”
“Why exactly?”
“I just thought there was more time.”
There was something wild in the depths of her eyes then, and he wanted to move closer to it. But he knew that would be a mistake. Still, when she stood, it was to draw closer to him.
“I know that you feel it,” she said. “It’s crazy, isn’t it? I shouldn’t feel anything for you. But you... I mean, look, I know it’s chemistry, or whatever, I know it’s not feelings. But...” She bit her full lower lip and looked up at him from beneath her lashes, the expression both innocent and coquettish. “Don’t you think that maybe we should have a chance to taste it before I’m sold into marriage?”
“I thought you were intent on resisting that,” he said, his voice rough.
“With everything I have in me.”
“I cannot. I owe my brother my undying loyalty. And I will not compromise that over something as basic as sex. You mistake me, querida, if you think that I can be so easily shaken.”
“I know that you’re a man of honor. A man of loyalty. But I feel no such loyalty to your brother. And it is nothing to me to violate it.”
She planted her hand on his chest. And he knew that she could feel it then. Feel his heart raging against the muscle and blood and bone there. Feel it raging against everything that was good and right and real, that which he had placed his faith in all these years.
She let out a shaking breath, and he could feel the heat of it brush his mouth, so close was she. So close was his destruction.
He was iron. He was rock. He had been forced to become so. A man of no emotion. A man of nothing more than allegiance to an ideal. Knowing with absolute certainty that if he should ever turn away from that, he might become lost. That corruption might take hold of him in the way that it had done his father. Because he considered himself immune to nothing.
And so, he had made himself immune to everything.
Except for this. Except for her.
So small and fragile, delicate.
Powerful.
Not because of her success or her money. But because of the light contained in her beauty. A storm wrapped in soft, exquisite skin that he ached to put his hands on.
And when she stretched up on her toes and pressed her mouth to his, no finesse or skill present in the motion at all, he broke.
He wrapped his arms around her, cupping her head in one of his hands, shifting things, taking control. And he consumed her.
What she had intended to be a tasting, a test, he turned into a feast. If he was going to be destroyed, then he would bring the palace down with him. Then he would crack the very foundations of where they stood. Of all that he had built his life upon. Of all that he was. If he would be a ruined man, then the world would be ruined as a result. As would she.
He nipped her lower lip, slid his tongue against hers, kissed her deep and hard and long until she whimpered with it. Until she had arched against him, going soft and pliant. Until there was no question now who was in charge. Until there was no question now who was driving them to the brink of calamity. It was him.
He had made his choice. He had not fallen into temptation; he had wrapped his arms around it. He had not slid into sin; he had gathered it against his body and made it his air. His oxygen.
And she surrendered to it. Surrendered to him.
The white flag of her desire was present in the way her body molded against his, in the way that she opened for him, the small, sweet sounds of pleasure that she made as he allowed his hands to move, skimming over her curves, then going still, holding her against him so that she could feel the insistence of his desire pressing against her stomach.
He was a man of extremes.
And if she wanted a storm, he would give her a hurricane.
If he could not be a man of honor, then he would be a man of the basest betrayal.
It was the sight of that book sitting on the side table that brought him back to himself. Just a flash of normality. A familiarity. A reminder of who he was supposed to be, that caused him to release his hold on her and set her back on her feet.
She looked dazed. Her lips were swollen. Utterly wrecked.
Just like he was.
“Never,” he said. “It will never happen between us.”
“But... It already did.”
He chuckled, dark and without humor just like the very center of his soul. “If you think that was an example of what could be between us, then you are much more inexperienced than I would have given you credit for.”
“I...”
“The things I could do to you. The things I could do to us both. I could ruin you not just for other men, but for sleep. Wearing clothes. Walking down the street. Everything would remind you of me. The slide of fabric against your skin. The warmth of the sun on your body. All of it would make you think of my hands on you. My mouth. And you would try... You would try to use your own hand to bring yourself the kind of satisfaction that I could show you, but you would fail.”
“And what about your brother? Would he fail?”
“It is why I won’t do it. Because yes. After me. After this... Even he would fail to satisfy you.”
And he turned and walked out of the room, leaving her behind. Leaving his broken honor behind, held in her delicate hands. And he knew it. He only hoped that she did not.
The sooner Matteo returned, the sooner Javier could leave this place. Could leave her. Matteo needed to do what he thought was best for the country.
But Javier would not stand by and see it done.
CHAPTER NINE
SHE HAD FAILED. It kept her awake that night. The sting of that failure. She was supposed to seduce him. It had been her one job. Granted, it had all gotten taken out of her hands, and she had a feeling that her own inexperience had been played against her.
Her heart hadn’t stopped thundering like it might gallop out of her chest since.
She hadn’t expected him to find her in the ballroom. That was the real reason she had been in there. Who hung out in an empty ballroom? But then he had appeared. And she had realized it was her chance.
She hadn’t actually been sitting there scheming. She had been avoiding her scheme.
After her failure at the waterfall, and after...
The problem was, he had shared something of his past with her there, and she felt like she knew him better. Felt guilty for her seduction plan even though it felt like the perfect solution to her problem.
Because she knew on some level that if Javier were to sleep with her, Matteo would not want her anymore.
And she had been... She had been excited about it, perversely, because for the first ti
me in her life she was attracted to a man, so why not take advantage of it? She didn’t want to marry him. He was... He was an unyielding rock face, and she had no desire to be stuck with a man like that for any length of time.
But then she had been sitting there reading that fairy tale. And not only had she—through those stories—come into a greater understanding of his culture, there was something about the particular story of the beast she’d been reading that had made her understand him.
Transformed into something due to the sins of his father and so convinced that the transformation was a necessity.
That he had to sit in the sins, in the consequence, to avoid becoming a monster on the inside as well as a monster on the outside.
She had been so caught up in that line of thinking that when he had appeared, she had clumsily made an effort at seduction, and she had been carried away in it.
That was the problem with all of this.
She was a reasonable girl. A practical one. A businesswoman. Thoroughly modern and independent in so many ways, but she had been swept up in a fairy tale, and nothing that she knew, nothing that she had ever achieved, had prepared her for the effect that it was having on her.
For the effect that he was having on her.
She had been kissed before.
Every single time it had been easy to turn away. Every single time she had been relieved that it was over. When she could extricate herself from the man’s hold and go on with her day, untouched below the neck and very happy about it thank you.
But she wanted Javier to touch her. And she feared very much that the vow he had made to her before he had stormed out of the ballroom was true.
That if it were to become more, she would never, ever be able to forget. That she would be ruined. That she would be altered for all time.
“That’s ridiculous,” she scolded herself. It’s the kind of ridiculous thing that men think about themselves, but it’s never true. You know that. It can’t be.
The idea that she might fail in her objective to avoid marrying Matteo terrified her. But somehow, even more, the idea that she might leave here without... Without knowing what it was like to be with Javier was even more terrifying. And she despised herself for that. For that weakness. Because it was a weakness. It had to be.