The Virgin's Proposition

by Anne McAllister

  “Well, not exactly,” she admitted. She shoved a tendril of hair that had escaped her ponytail away from her ear. “He said all brides have jitters. That I should think things over. Take some time. Get to know my own mind.” She snorted—a ladylike snort. “I do know my own mind.”

  Did she? Demetrios doubted it. She’d agreed to marry Gerard, hadn’t she? She must have thought it was a good idea at one point. And Gerard obviously expected her to come to her senses.

  “And your father?” Demetrios demanded. “What did he say?” When she didn’t answer at once, he narrowed his gaze. “You did tell him?”

  Anny tossed her ponytail. “I sent him an e-mail.”

  Demetrios gaped. “You sent your father—the king—an e-mail?”

  She shrugged, then squared her shoulders and lifted her chin defiantly. “He might be everyone else’s king, but he’s my father. And I didn’t want to talk to him.”

  “I’ll bet you didn’t.”

  “He’ll understand. He loves me.”

  No doubt he did. But he was also king of a country. A man who was used to ruling, commanding, telling everyone—especially his daughter—what to do. And he had told her to marry Gerard.

  “He’ll get used to it.” But Demetrios thought Anny’s words were more to convince herself, not him. “It will just take a little time. He might be…upset…at first, but—” another shrug “—that’s why I’m leaving.”

  He looked up at her. “What do you mean, leaving?”

  Anny turned and hopped back down onto the deck, and for the first time Demetrios noticed the backpack and the suitcase sitting on the far side of the dock.

  As he watched, she shouldered the pack, then picked up the suitcase. “I’m going away for a while.”

  He came to rest his elbows on the back of the cockpit and stare at her. “You’re leaving Cannes?”

  She nodded grimly. “Papa will be on my doorstep as soon as he gets the e-mail, finds his pilot, and fuels the jet. I don’t intend to be here when he comes.” She shrugged. “He will need time to come to terms. So I’m off. I just—” she smiled at him “—didn’t want to leave without telling you, saying thank you.”

  Frankly, he thought she was carrying the etiquette a bit too far. And You’re welcome didn’t seem much of an answer. Whatever advice he’d given her had been based on his messed-up marriage and might have nothing to do with hers. What the hell had he thought he was doing?

  “Maybe you should give it some time,” he said now. “Don’t be too hasty. Think for a while, like Gerard said. Then decide.”

  She stared at him as if he’d lost his mind. “I’m not being hasty. And I have thought! We’ve been engaged three years. First I wanted to finish grad school. Then I wanted to finish my dissertation. ” She paused, then met his gaze squarely. “I did decide, Demetrios. I think I decided—in my gut—a long time ago, which is why I kept putting it off. You’re just the one who gave me the courage to say it.”

  They stared at each other until finally, abruptly, Anny stepped back and gave him a small salute. She smiled. “‘Bye, Demetrios. Thanks for the courage.” The smile broadened. “And the memories.”

  Then she squared her slender shoulders, shifted the backpack slightly, picked up the suitcase, and marched back up the dock toward La Croisette.

  Demetrios stared after her, unmoving, while his brain whirled with fifty thousand sane reasons to turn around and start getting the boat ready to sail.

  But not one of them was proof against the fear of what could happen to her if he did.

  Damn it!

  “Anny!” He vaulted out of the cockpit, then scrambled off the boat onto the dock. “Where are you going?”

  A small figure halfway down the dock turned back. She shrugged. “I don’t know yet.”

  She didn’t sound as if it mattered.

  Demetrios knew it did. His stomach clenched. Scowling now, annoyed that she could be so blasé about something that important, he stalked down the dock after her. “What do you mean, you don’t know?”

  He knew the hard edge to his voice made her eyes widen, but she didn’t shrink away from him.

  She simply set the suitcase down and faced him. “Exactly what I said. I haven’t a clue. I just need to go somewhere Papa won’t expect me to be. He’ll look in all the places, the likely places,” she allowed. “So I’ll just go someplace else. It’s not like I made plans, you know.”

  He knew. And he didn’t like it one bit. She was a young woman alone. Kind, trusting. Not to mention rich—and a princess, besides. She’d be prey for more unsavory characters than he wanted to think about.

  “I thought I might hitchhike,” she said blithely in the face of his ominous silence.

  “Hitchhike!” He spat the word, furious.

  She burst out laughing. “I’m not going to hitchhike, Demetrios,” she assured him. “I was joking. You looked so intense. I’ll be fine. Don’t get so worked up.”

  “I’m not worked up!” He was very calmly going to strangle her.

  She was still smiling. “Right. Okay. You’re not worked up.” She gave him a sideways assessing look. Then she tried more reassurance. “You don’t need to worry. You are worrying,” she pointed out in case he hadn’t noticed.

  “Because you’re acting like an idiot! You don’t just pack up and head out at the drop of a hat. You need plans. A place to go. Bodyguards!”

  She blinked. “Bodyguards?”

  “You’re a princess!”

  “I haven’t had a bodyguard since I left university. I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself.” She smiled again. It was a regal smile. It made Demetrios’s teeth ache they were grinding together so hard.

  “But thank you for your concern,” she added, in that proper bloody well-brought-up royal tone of voice she could put on when she wanted to. Then, as if he were some mere peasant she’d just dismissed, she picked up the suitcase and started away again.

  Demetrios muttered something unprintable under his breath, then stalked after her and grabbed her by the arm, hauling her to a stop. “Then you’re coming with me.”

  Her head whipped around. She stared at him, eyes wide, mouth agape. “With you? To Greece?”

  “Why not?” he demanded. “You don’t have a plan of your own. You can’t just wander around Europe. It’s not safe.”

  “I’m not a fool, Demetrios. I went to Oxford by myself. I went to Berkeley!”

  “With watchdogs,” he reminded her.

  “I was young then. Almost a child. I’m not a child now.”

  “No. You’re a raving beauty and any man with hormones can see that!”

  “I meant I’m not going to be anyone’s prey.”

  “Right. You’re big and strong and tough. That’s why I practically kidnapped you right in the middle of a hotel lobby!”

  “You did not!”

  “I walked off with you!”

  “Because I let you. I knew who you were. I could have screamed,” she told him haughtily.

  He snorted. “Everyone would have thought you were an overexcited fan.”

  “I can take care of myself. I don’t get into cars with strangers. I don’t make foolish decisions.”

  “Really?” He gave her a sardonic look. “You were going to marry Gerard. You propositioned me. You went to bed with me.”

  She glared at him. “Up until now, I didn’t consider that a foolish decision.”

  “Think again.” He dragged a hand through his hair. “Look. You’re a damned appealing woman, princess. You swept me off my feet, didn’t you?” he said.

  She made a face at him. “I promise you, you were the one and only. Besides, I’ve got my memories now.”

  He didn’t let himself think about that. “What if someone else wants a few of his own? If anything happens to you out in the big bad world, it will be my fault!”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. You have an outrageous sense of your own importance. What I do is my responsibility, not yours.”


  “But you owe it to me,” he reminded her. “You said you did. That’s what you came down here for—to thank me!”

  Anny folded her arms across her breasts and glowered at him. “Obviously a mistake. So much for etiquette.”

  “Next time don’t be so damn polite.” He picked up her suitcase, then hung on determinedly as she tried to grab it out of his hand. “This is going to look great on all the paparazzi shots,” he reminded her silkily.

  Abruptly, she let go and glanced around, looking hunted, then annoyed. “There are no photographers!”

  He shrugged, unrepentant. “There could be. You want them following you all over Europe? Bet Papa can ask them where you’re hiding.” He gave her a mocking look over his shoulder and kept walking.

  For a long moment he was afraid she’d just let him go off with her suitcase while she went in the other direction. But finally he heard her footsteps coming after him.

  “This is insane,” she told him. “You don’t want me with you.”

  “More than I want you dead in the gutter.” He heard the explosion of breath that meant she was gearing up for another round, so he turned and forestalled her. “Look, blame it on my mother. It wouldn’t matter if it was really my fault or not, I’d think it was. She’d think it was.”

  “You’d tell her?”

  “I wouldn’t have to. She’d know.”

  Malena Savas had eyes in the back of her head and she knew what all of her children were thinking before they ever thought it. Demetrios knew his mother had a far greater understanding of what he’d been through these past three years than he’d ever told her. Or ever would tell her. She understood at least a part of what he’d gone through—and she didn’t blame him, which he considered a miracle.

  But if he left Anny alone now, she’d have his head.

  “She doesn’t know about me,” Anny protested.

  “Not yet.”

  Anny muttered under her breath. He just kept walking. Every step took them closer to the boat.

  “I suppose it will be safer for you if I come along,” she said at last.

  “Safer?”

  “The boat will be easier to sail if there are two of us. Although I’m sure you could do it on your own.”

  “I could. But, you’re right,” he added. If that convinced her, who was he to argue?

  “Still, you said you wanted solitude,” she reminded him.

  “Maybe you won’t talk all the time,” he retorted in exasperation.

  She smirked. “And maybe I will.”

  “Then I’ll put you off on Elba.”

  “Like Napoleon?” Her lips twitched.

  “Exactly.” Their gazes met. Locked. Dueled.

  “Napoleon escaped,” Anny said loftily.

  “You won’t.”

  “How do you know?”

  “When I leave you, I’ll tell your father where you are.”

  They were joking. But they weren’t joking at the same time. He meant it—and he could tell from the look on her face that Anny knew it. Stalemate.

  At long last she let out a sigh. “You’re serious, aren’t you? You’re going to stand here and argue with me for as long as it takes.”

  “Not that long. I might just throw you over my shoulder and dump you in the boat.”

  “You wouldn’t.”

  “Want to try me?” He gave her his best Luke St. Angier hardass hero look.

  She narrowed her gaze at him, then she said finally, “If I come, you won’t think it’s because I want to go to bed with you again?”

  “What?” He stared at her.

  “Because I don’t want you thinking I’m stalking you.”

  “Wouldn’t matter if you did,” he told her flatly. “I’m immune.”

  “Yes, I could tell,” she said drily.

  He scowled. “I didn’t say I didn’t enjoy sex with a beautiful woman. I said, I don’t want anything more than that.”

  That made her blink. “Ever?”

  “Never.” No compromise there.

  Anny cocked her head and studied him carefully, as if her scrutiny might detect cracks in his armor. He could have told her there were no cracks. Not after Lissa.

  He didn’t. But he stood firm and unyielding under her gaze.

  “You shouldn’t say ‘never’ like that,” she told him, her tone gentle, as if she intended to comfort him. “Never is a long time and you might meet someone you love as much. Differently,” she added quickly. “But as much.”

  Demetrios stared, jolted. But he didn’t correct her misunderstanding. She only knew what the press had printed, after all. She’d got the story of their marriage that Lissa had wanted read. And after Lissa’s death, he’d had nothing to gain from airing their private problems.

  Saying something wouldn’t change things now, either. So he just waited, let her think what she liked.

  “What about sex?” she said abruptly

  His mouth fell open. He couldn’t help it. “What?”

  “I’m not asking you for sex,” she assured him quickly. “I just want to know what’s expected.”

  So do I, Demetrios felt like saying because God’s own truth was, if he lived to be a hundred, he doubted he would be able to predict the next words out of Princess Adriana’s mouth.

  “It’s up to you, princess,” he told her gruffly. “I can’t say I didn’t enjoy it. I can’t say I’m not willing. But I’m not falling in love with you. So don’t get your hopes up.”

  Color flared in her cheeks. “As if!”

  He grinned, then shrugged. “Just saying. You brought it up. Fine. If this is going to work, we need some plain speaking. I’m telling you right now I’m not getting involved. I’m bringing you along to keep you safe. Period.”

  “Whether I like it or not,” she said in a mocking tone of her own.

  “Whether you like it or not,” he agreed. “As for sex—” he shrugged “—I have no expectations. Whatever happens on board, princess, is entirely up to you.”

  She blinked. Then she seemed to consider that. Her brow actually furrowed and she thought about it for long enough that Demetrios had time to wonder what the hell she could possibly be thinking.

  But then she smiled, nodded and stuck out her hand. “Deal.”

  Out of the frying pan.

  Into the fire.

  Her life was turning into one big cliché.

  Anny knew she should have said no. She should have turned and walked away and kept right on walking.

  More to the point, she should never have come down to the harbor to find Demetrios in the first place.

  She had because…because, she forced herself to admit, he was the only one she knew who would understand. He was, as she’d told him, the one who had given her the courage to do it.

  He and Franck.

  But she could hardly talk to Franck about this. She was supposed to be his support, not the other way around. She hadn’t been expecting support, per se, from Demetrios, either. Well, nothing beyond a “good for you,” which in fact he’d given her.

  That was all she was hoping for. All! She had definitely not expected Demetrios to insist that she come with him.

  She ventured a glance at him now as he prepared to leave the harbor. He was paying her no attention at all. He was stowing gear and checking charts and going over things that Anny knew were important and knew equally well she would be in the way of if she tried to help.

  So she kept out of the way and waited until he gave her directions. She was by no means a solo sailor. But she’d been on boats since she was a child. And while Mont Chamion’s royal yacht had a very competent crew, she had taken orders from her father when he and she and her mother had gone sailing. She was sure she could help Demetrios here.

  That wasn’t going to be the problem.

  She wasn’t a fool, Anny had been at pains to assure him. But what else could you call a woman who went from a three-year engagement to a man she didn’t love to a two-week solo boat tr
ip with a man who would never love her?

  Not, Anny assured herself, that she was in love with him.

  But she wasn’t indifferent to him.

  She…liked him. Had once had a crush on him. He had, as she’d told him in somewhat vague terms, been the dream of her youth.

  And even now she respected him for his career. She admired him for coming back from the devastating personal tragedy that had been his wife’s death. She certainly esteemed him for his kindness to Franck over the past couple of weeks, and—let’s be honest—for his generosity to her. In and out of bed.

  But she didn’t love him. Not yet.

  Not ever, Anny told herself sharply.

  She was, despite what her dutiful engagement to Gerard might say about her, basically a sensible woman. She didn’t dare fate or walk in front of buses.

  Now she considered herself warned. It was more than a little humbling to hear him spell out his indifference in such blunt terms. As if there were no way on earth he might ever fall in love with the likes of her.

  Fine. So be it.

  Right now she was looking for a respite—some peace and quiet and a chance to learn the desires of her own heart.

  So she would take what he offered: two weeks of solitude during which her father would never be able to find her. Two weeks to formulate plans that would allow her to make her own way in her adult life.

  Yes, marriage, she was sure, would be a part of it. But not marriage to Gerard. Despite his suggestion that she take some time and reconsider, Anny knew she’d made the right decision. She only regretted that it had taken her so long to come to her senses and realize she needed more than duty and responsibility to get her to the altar.

  She’d suspected it, of course. But it had taken her night with Demetrios to show her that passion, too, had to play a part.

  The passion, the desire, hadn’t dissipated since that night.

  How she was going to handle that for the next two weeks, she wasn’t sure. Had he meant it when he said it was up to her?

  Demetrios started the engine. The boat’s motor made the deck vibrate beneath Anny’s feet.

  “Hey, princess, cast off.” Demetrios was at the wheel, but he jerked his head toward the line still wrapped around the cleat at the stern.