The Billionaires' Brides Bundle

by Sandra Marton

  He dressed quickly. Jeans, a cashmere sweater, mocs and a leather bomber jacket. Then he snatched his keys from the dresser and took the elevator to the basement garage where he kept the big Mercedes as well as a black Porsche Carrera. He’d bought the car because he loved it, even though he rarely had the chance to use it.

  The Carrera was a finely honed mass of energy and power.

  Right now, so was he.

  He’d felt that way since he first laid eyes on Ivy Madison. Who in hell was she to come out of nowhere and turn his existence upside down?

  The streets were all but deserted. He made the fifteen-minute drive in half that time, pulled into a space marked No Parking on the corner of her block. The front door to her brownstone was not locked. Even if it had been, that wouldn’t have stopped him.

  Not tonight.

  He took the three flights of steps in seconds, rang her doorbell, banged his fist on the door.

  “Ivy!” He pounded the door again, called her name even louder. “Damn you, let me in!”

  The door opened the inch the antitheft chain allowed. Damian saw a sliver of dimly lighted room, a darkly lashed eye, a swath of gold-streaked hair.

  “Are you crazy?” she snarled. “You’ll wake the entire building!”

  “Open the damned door!”

  The door closed, locks and chain rattled and then the door swung open. Damian stepped inside and slammed it behind him. Ivy stared at him, hair disheveled, silk robe untied, feet bare.

  She looked frightened, sleep-tossed and sexy.

  The combination sent his already-racing heart into higher gear.

  “Do you know what time it is?”

  “The real question,” he said roughly, “is, do you?”

  He heard the flat challenge in his voice, saw her awareness of it reflected in the sudden catch of her breath.

  “Have you been drinking?”

  “Not enough.”

  He took a step forward. She took one back. “Your Highness…”

  “I think it’s time we stopped being so formal.” Another step. His, followed by hers. “My name is Damian.”

  “Your Highness. Damian.” The tip of her tongue swept across her bottom lip. He felt his entire body clench at the sight. “Damian, it’s very late. Why don’t we—why don’t we talk tomorrow?”

  One more step. Like that. And then her shoulders hit the wall.

  “I’m done talking,” he said, reaching for her. “And so are you.”

  “No! Get out. Damian! Get—”

  “Isn’t it amazing,” he said softly, his eyes hot and locked to hers, “that I’ve seen a piece of paper that says you’re pregnant with my child, I’ve had my hand on your belly.” He caught a fistful of her robe, tugged her closer. “But I’ve never seen you.”

  “Of course you—”

  “You,” he said thickly. “Your body. How your breasts look, how your belly looks as your body readies itself for my son.”

  “Damian! I swear, I’ll scream—”

  Slowly he drew the robe open. Her eyes widened. Her lips parted. But she didn’t scream. No. Oh, no. She didn’t scream as he dropped his gaze and looked down at her.

  She was wearing a cream-silk nightgown. Thin straps. Silk cups. Shirring over her midriff, then a long, slender fall of silk that ended just above her toes.

  Damian’s gaze lifted. His eyes swept her face. Her lips were still parted, her eyes still wide…

  “Don’t,” she whispered.

  But he did.

  Slowly he hooked his fingers under the thin silk straps, Drew them down her arms.

  Bared her breasts. Her beautiful breasts. Small. Round. Tipped with pale pink nipples that were already beading. Praxiteles, who had sculpted Aphrodite’s beauty in marble, would have wept.

  “Damian…”

  “Shh,” he whispered and cupped her breasts. Thumbed the delicate nipples. Ivy swayed unsteadily as he bent his head and touched his mouth to her nipples. Licked them. Sucked them. Felt his erection strain against his jeans.

  “Damian,” she said, the word a sigh. A moan.

  A plea.

  He lifted his head. Her lashes had drooped against her cheeks. Her breasts rose and fell with her quickened breath.

  Her eyes opened, locked on his face as he pulled the gown down, down, down her torso. Her hips. Her legs. Those long, long legs.

  The gown was a chrysalis at her feet.

  And she—she was more than beautiful. She was Aphrodite rising from the sea. She was every dream a man could have, and more.

  And yes, her body was readying for his child.

  He could see the delicate swell of her belly. The exquisite rounding. The burgeoning fullness.

  Slowly he cupped her belly.

  Felt the smoothness of her skin. The heat of it. The perfect arc of it beneath his palms.

  He stroked one hand lower. Lower still. Watched her face, heard her moan as he slipped it between her thighs and God, God, she was hot, wet, sweetly swollen with need…

  “Don’t,” she sighed, but her hands were on his chest. On his shoulders. She was on her toes, lifting herself to him, her mouth a breath from his.

  She wanted this. Wanted him.

  It was all he could do to keep from taking her down to the floor, unzipping his jeans, parting her thighs and burying himself deep inside her warmth…

  Except, Lucas was right. It was all an act.

  Damian let go of her. Picked up her robe, wrapped it around her shoulders. Trembling, panting, she clutched it to her.

  “Do you remember what I told you this afternoon?”

  The tip of her tongue slid along the seam of her mouth.

  “You said—you said you were taking me to Greece.”

  He nodded, reminded himself of Lucas’s advice and stepped back. “I’ve changed my mind.”

  “You mean, you’ll let me stay here?” Her breath caught. If he hadn’t known better, he’d have thought it was with relief.

  Of course, that was what he meant. Certainly it was what he meant…

  The hell it was, he thought, and pulled her into his arms.

  “I mean,” he said roughly, “that I’d be a fool to pay for your upkeep without getting anything in return.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “You will share my bed. You will give birth to my son. And if, in the intervening months, you have proven yourself sufficiently accomplished as my mistress, I will marry you, give you my name, my title…and permit you to be a mother to this child you claim to want for your own.” He drew her closer. “If you haven’t pleased me, I will keep my son, send you back to New York and you can fight me in the courts.”

  Time seemed to stand still. Then Ivy looked unflinchingly into his eyes.

  “I hate you,” she said, “hate you, hate you—”

  Damian kissed her again and again mercilessly, fiercely, until, finally, she gave a little sob and melted against him.

  Was that, too, part of the act?

  It didn’t matter.

  “Hate me all you like, glyka mou. From this moment on, I own you.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  A WOMAN identifying herself as Damian’s personal assistant phoned at six and offered no apology for calling at such an early hour.

  “Do you have a passport, Miss Madison?”

  Ivy was tempted to say she didn’t but what was the point? For all she knew, traveling with royalty meant doing away with passports.

  “Yes. I have.”

  “In that case, please be ready to leave for Greece at eight-thirty. Promptly at eight-thirty,” the P.A. said emphatically. “His Highness does not like to be kept waiting.”

  “Shall I stand at attention until he arrives?” Ivy said, trying to mask a sudden wave of fear with sarcasm.

  It was a wasted effort. Ivy could almost see the woman’s raised eyebrows.

  “His driver will come for you, Miss Madison, not the prince himself.”

  “Of course he won’t,�
� Ivy said, and hung up the phone.

  Damian Aristedes was not a man who would sully his hands with work. Not even when it came to making arrangements about a woman.

  His assistant probably did this kind of thing all the time. Fly one woman to Greece, fly another to Timbuktu…The prince would expect a mistress to be available on demand.

  He was in for a big surprise.

  She would never become his mistress. She would never agree to become his anything, much less his wife—although that, obviously, had been a lie. A little bait to lure her into his bed.

  Not that he’d need bait for most women.

  Put him in a room with a dozen women, all beautiful enough to get any man they wanted, he’d have to fight them off. All that macho. The aura of power. The beautiful, masculine face; the hard-bodied good looks…

  The prince would collect lovers with disquieting ease.

  But she would not be one of them.

  Getting sexually involved with a man was not on the list of things Ivy wanted to do with her life. And if that ever changed—and she couldn’t imagine that it would—she would choose someone who was Damian’s opposite.

  She’d want a lover who was gentle, not authoritative. Caring, not commanding. A man whose touch would be nonthreatening.

  The prince’s touch was not like that.

  Each caress left her shaken. Trembling. Feeling as if she were standing on the edge of a precipice and one more step would send her plunging to the rocks below…

  Or soaring into a hot, sun-bleached sky.

  Ivy let out a breath. Enough of this. There was more than an hour to go until the prince’s driver came for her.

  Plenty of time to get ready. Too much time, really. The last thing she wanted was to think about what lay ahead.

  Ivy brewed a cup of ginger tea. She sat in a corner of the wide windowsill, shivering a little in the cool dawn hours as she sipped her tea and wondered how long it would be until she sat here again.

  Soon, she promised herself. Soon.

  At seven, she packed, showered and dressed. She was ready long before Damian’s driver rang the bell.

  He was polite.

  So was she.

  The big Mercedes rolled silently through the busy Manhattan streets. Ivy looked out through the dark glass at people going about their everyday lives and wondered why she’d let this happen. She didn’t have the money for a good attorney but she knew lots of people in high places. Surely someone could help her…

  Then she remembered what had started all this. She had agreed to have this baby and Damian Aristedes was the child’s father.

  She had no choice but to do as he wished.

  It was the right thing, for Kay’s memory, for the baby…

  “Miss?”

  Ivy looked up. The car had stopped; the driver stood beside her open door.

  “We’re here, miss.”

  “Here” was a place she’d been before. Kennedy Airport, a part of it that was home to private jets.

  She’d been a passenger in private planes going to and from photo shoots in exotic locations. The planes were often big, but she’d never seen a noncommercial aircraft the size of the one ahead of her.

  Sunlight glinted off the shiny aluminum wings, danced on the fuselage and the discreet logo emblazoned there. A shield. A lance. An animal of some kind, bulky and somehow dangerous, even in repose.

  “Miss Madison?”

  A courteous steward led her to the plane. He had that same logo on the pocket of his dark blue jacket and she realized it was a crest. A royal crest, for the royal house of Aristedes.

  What are you doing, Ivy? What in the world are you doing?

  She stumbled to a halt. The steward looked at her. So did Damian’s driver, who was carrying her suitcase to the plane.

  Someone else was looking at her, too, from inside the cabin. She couldn’t see him but she knew he was there, watching her through cool eyes, seeing her hesitate, assessing it as a sign of weakness.

  She would never show weakness to him!

  Ivy took a breath and walked briskly up the steps that led into the plane.

  It was cool inside the cabin. Luxurious, too. The walls were pale cream; the seats and small sofas soft-looking tan leather. Thick cream carpet stretched the length of the fuselage to a closed door in the rear.

  And, yes, Damian was already there, sitting in one of the leather chairs, not looking at her but, instead, reading a page from the sheaf of papers stacked on the table in front of him.

  “Miss Madison, sir,” the steward said.

  Damian raised his head.

  Ivy stood straighter, automatically taking on the cool look she’d made famous in myriad ads and magazine covers.

  She had deliberately taken time with her appearance this morning. At first, she’d thought she’d wear jeans and a ratty jacket she kept for solitary walks on chill winter mornings, just to show the prince how little all his wealth and grandeur meant.

  She’d known, instinctively, he’d have a private plane. Men like him wouldn’t fly in commercial jets.

  Then she’d thought, no, far better to make it clear nothing he owned, nothing he was, could intimidate her. So she’d dressed in cashmere and silk under a glove-leather black jacket she’d picked up after a shoot in Milan the prior year.

  She needn’t have bothered.

  Damian barely glanced at her, nodded curtly and went back to work.

  It angered her, which was ridiculous. It was good, wasn’t it, that he had no intention of pretending this was a social occasion?

  She nodded back and started past him. His arm shot out, blocking her way.

  “You will sit here,” he said.

  “Here” was the leather chair next to his.

  “I prefer a seat further back.”

  “I don’t recall asking your preference.”

  His tone was frigid. It made her want to slap his face but she wasn’t fool enough to do that again. Far better to save her energy for the battles ahead, instead of wasting it on minor skirmishes.

  Ivy sat down. The hovering steward cleared his throat.

  “May I bring you something after we reach cruising altitude, madam? Coffee, perhaps, or tea?”

  “No coffee,” Damian said, without lifting his head. “No tea. No alcohol. Ms. Madison may have mineral water or juice, as she prefers.”

  Ivy felt her face flame. Why didn’t he simply announce her pregnancy to the world? But if he was trying to lure her into all-out war, he was going to be disappointed.

  “How nice,” she said calmly, “to be given a choice, even if it’s a minor one.”

  Damian looked up. Waited. His mouth gave a perfunctory twitch. “Should Thomas take that to mean you don’t want anything?”

  “What I want,” she said matter-of-factly, “is my freedom, but I doubt if Thomas can provide that.”

  The steward’s eyes widened. Damian’s face darkened. For a second, no one moved or spoke. Then Damian broke the silence.

  “That will be all, Thomas.” He waited until the steward was gone. Then he turned to Ivy. “That is the last time I will tolerate that,” he said in a low voice.

  “Tolerate what, Your Highness? The truth?”

  His hand closed on her wrist, exerting just enough pressure to make her gasp.

  “You will show me the proper respect in front of people or—”

  “Or what?”

  His eyes narrowed. “Try me and find out.”

  A shudder went through her but she kept her gaze steadily on his until he finally let go of her, turned away and began reading through the papers spread in front of him again.

  Ivy drew a deep, almost painful breath.

  She would get through this. She’d survived worse. Far worse. Things that had happened long ago, that she wanted to forget but couldn’t…

  That had made her strong.

  The mighty prince didn’t know it, but he would learn just how strong she was.

  When they were
airborne, the steward, brave man, appeared with both juice and water as well as a stack of current magazines. Ivy thanked him, leafed through one and then another, blind to the glossy pages, thinking only about what lay ahead.

  And about what Damian had said last night.

  She’d refused to dwell on it then but now, after this display of power, his words haunted her.

  From now on, he’d said, I own you.

  She thought—she really thought he might believe it. That he had bought her. That she would go to his bed. That she would do whatever he commanded, become the perfect sex slave.

  Let him kiss her breasts, as he had so shockingly done yesterday.

  Let him undress her. Stand her, naked, before him.

  Let him take her in his arms, gather her tightly against him while his aroused flesh pulsed against her.

  Let him do all the things men did to women, things men wanted and women surely despised…except, she hadn’t despised what Damian did last night.

  When he’d touched her. Held her. Kissed her. Parted her lips with his…

  Tasted her, let her taste him.

  Ivy turned blindly to the window.

  The baby. She had to think about the baby. That was all that mattered.

  It grew dark outside the plane.

  The cabin lights dimmed.

  She yawned. Yawned again. Tumbled into darkness…And shot awake to see Damian leaning over her.

  “What—what are you doing?”

  His mouth twitched. She’d seen that little movement of his lips enough to know he was trying not to smile.

  “Did you think I was going to ravish you while you slept?” This time, the smile he’d repressed broke through. “I’m not a fool, glyka mou. When I make love to you, I want you fully awake in my arms.”

  She was too tired to think of a clever response. Or maybe he was too close, his fallen angel’s face an inch from hers.

  “I was going to adjust your seat,” he said softly. “So that you could lie back while you were sleeping.”

  “I wasn’t sleeping.”

  “While you were resting, then,” he said, with another of those heart-stopping little smiles. “Here. Let me—”

  He leaned closer. All she had to do was turn her face a fraction of an inch and her mouth would find his.