A Ring to Secure His Crown

by Kim Lawrence

‘You startled me. I thought you were Walter.’

  So the smile was for Walter. ‘You look...good.’

  No smile came with the compliment, which was delivered in an expressionless voice.

  ‘So, should I?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Go away and come back.’

  Sabrina flushed and moved her head slightly to look past his shoulder willing someone, anyone, to appear.

  They didn’t.

  ‘If you were expecting Luis he’s waiting on an important call.’

  She firmed her shoulders and reminded herself that being pleasant to people she didn’t like was part of her future job. She could not allow personal feelings to enter into it. ‘No, of course not. You just took me by surprise and this is a bit...awkward.’

  ‘Why?’

  She tightened her lips and glared at him. ‘I have no pleasant memories of our last encounter.’

  ‘I can think of one,’ he teased, looking at her mouth.

  The longer their glances held, the thicker the atmosphere in the air became. Sabrina was the first to look away, fixing her eyes on a point over his shoulder as she fiddled with the pearls. ‘I had assumed you were drunk but I can see now that you’re always...’ Her words faded as the vivid memory resurfaced. His breath the other day had not actually tasted of booze, just mint and... No, she was not going to go there!

  ‘Irresistible?’

  Before she could react to the suggestion the antique string of pearls she was playing with snapped.

  Sabrina immediately fell to her knees, trying to grab the pearls, which were bouncing across the polished wooden floor in all directions. ‘Oh, no! No, no, no.’

  ‘Relax, they’re not the crown jewels...’ He stopped, his teasing look vanishing from his face as she lifted her head and he saw that she was close to tears.

  ‘Just go away!’ she hissed. ‘I don’t give a damn about the crown jewels. They were my grandmother’s pearls.’

  With a frown he dropped down, squatting on his heels beside her. He saw the little tremors that shook her shoulders and felt something twist hard in his chest. He did his best to ignore it, telling himself it was either indigestion or the threat of tears that had caused it. He’d never liked seeing women crying.

  ‘She left them to me. She always wore them and now they’re ruined! Everything is ruined...’ Dignity forgotten, on all fours now, she stretched to retrieve a pearl that had slipped under a chair, but as her finger touched it it bounced away. ‘I can’t do this! It’s so, so... No, I just can’t!’

  ‘What we need is a system. An inch-by-inch search. What do they call it—a fingertip search?’

  The image that drifted into her head involved his fingertips moving very slowly, but the surface they were exploring, the secret crevices they were discovering, had nothing to do with the wooden floor! What was happening to her?

  ‘You count and I’ll retrieve.’

  She struggled to drag her thoughts back to the present. The process felt like swimming through warm honey. There was a horrible temptation to taste it.

  ‘That really isn’t necessary,’ she managed finally, her voice carrying nowhere near the level of conviction she was hoping for. ‘I’m really not that sentimental.’

  He had already lifted the heavy starched linen tablecloth; at her comment he glanced back over his shoulder. ‘Yes, you are, which is fine. Make yourself useful and hold this up. There are some under here.’

  After a pause she did as he requested and lifted the heavy starched linen cloth while he reached under. A moment later several more pearls were dropped into her open hand.

  She glanced at him from under her lashes. His dark hair was ruffled and there was a dusty smudge on the dark lapel of his jacket. Without thinking she reached out to brush it away. ‘You don’t have to do this, you know.’

  ‘I know.’

  She had never seen anything as blue as his eyes; they were compellingly hypnotic. She fought a short internal battle and dropped her hand away, escaping the full impact of his eyes by looking up through the mesh of her lashes. ‘Well, thank you, I think that’s all of them,’ she said at last, closing her hand that was now full of the smooth pearls.

  Sebastian rose to his feet before her and reached out a hand. After a pause Sabrina took it and allowed him to pull her to her feet. Her stomach made an unscheduled dive as her quivering nostrils picked up the scent of his warm body, the clean fragrance, the maleness.

  He immediately released her hand but she could still feel the warmth of his fingers as she rubbed her hand along her silk-covered thigh. The stab of sexual desire that pierced her was so tangible it seemed to her guilty mind that it echoed off the walls like an accusation.

  ‘I’ve been meaning to get them restrung for ages.’ She began to babble. What was he trying to do to her? Nothing, came the depressing and shaming answer, he didn’t have to do a thing.

  ‘Lady Sabrina?’

  She responded with relief to the sound of her name and the familiar respectful voice. ‘Yes, Walter?’ she said, moving towards the door where the major-domo stood.

  ‘I just wanted to let you know that the Duke and Duchess are in the small salon.’ He turned towards Sebastian and bent forward at the waist. ‘Sir, I believe that the royal party will be joining them there directly.’

  ‘I’ll be right there, Walter,’ Sabrina said, shifting the pearls from one slightly sticky hand to the other.

  ‘May I help?’

  ‘These are my—’

  ‘The late Duchess’s pearls.’ The major-domo gave one of his rare smiles and held out a hand. ‘I never saw her without them,’ he added when Sabrina looked reluctant. ‘They will be safe with me.’

  Sabrina acknowledged the reassurance with a smile and tipped the pearls into his hand. ‘Thank you.’ She stood there, hopefully not looking as awkward as she felt as she turned back to Sebastian, who had watched the interchange in silence. Not quite meeting his eyes—some might call it cowardly but she called it sensible—she gestured towards the door. ‘I’ll show you the way, shall I?’ Without waiting to see if he accepted the invitation, she left the room, not caring if she gave the impression of running away. Any woman with an ounce of common sense would run in the opposite direction when they saw Sebastian Zorzi, though she doubted there were many who did. Luckily she had never been one of the number who were drawn to danger, even when it wore a suit as well as he did. He probably looked even better without the suit!

  Face flushed with shame, she speeded up, but she had only gone a few yards before he fell into step beside her.

  ‘I never met your grandmother. But I’ve heard a lot about her. She sounds like quite a character.’

  ‘She always said exactly what she thought.’ And her outspoken grandparent had thought that the plan to marry her granddaughter off to seal the reunification deal was an appalling plan and she had said so, often. ‘Chloe is very like her. Not in looks obviously.’ Her grandmother had been tiny and delicate while her sister would not have looked out of place in an Olympic rowing team.

  ‘But not you?’

  ‘Gran was a rebel,’ Sabrina said, aware of the emotional ache in her throat but not of the wistful quality to her observation as she thought of the old lady who had been such a big part of her early years. ‘So, no, we are not alike. I’m a good girl, remember?’ she said, forgetting her intention not to look at him and angling a resentful look up at his dark, lean, insanely handsome face.

  Sebastian intercepted the glare and held her eyes as he raised a dark sardonic brow before allowing his stare to sink to her mouth, heat sparking in his heavy-lidded eyes as they moved across the full soft curves. ‘Not always,’ he purred throatily.

  She looked away quickly, feeling the heat climb to her cheeks as the volume of the background hum of sexu
al awareness that she had been successfully dealing with up until now became a deafening clamour.

  ‘We all make mistakes. I think the trick is in not repeating them,’ she said. Two could play the innuendo game! ‘Here we are,’ she added, as a young maid carrying a tray bobbed a little curtsy. The younger woman’s wide appreciative eyes stayed firmly on Sebastian as she almost bumped into the full suit of armour that was positioned beside the door they had reached before walking through, head down now to hide her burning cheeks.

  Sabrina angled a sideways look at Sebastian, who didn’t even seem to have noticed. Presumably, she thought bitterly, he was used to women falling over when they saw him.

  Glass houses, Brina?

  Ignoring the sly contribution of the voice in her head, she walked ahead of him into the room, where her parents greeted her with an exchange of relieved looks before glaring at Chloe, who sat twirling an olive on a stick in her drink.

  ‘I only said she might have had second thoughts,’ her sister defended, opening her eyes innocently wide. Her eyes widened further, only not so innocently this time, as Sebastian appeared behind her sister.

  Her father, his hand extended, immediately moved to greet the younger man, assuring him how delighted they were that he was able to join them.

  ‘And I must tell you how grateful we were that you were able to extract Sabrina here from that unpleasant situation earlier in the week.’

  ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, Dad, you make it sound as though he led a black ops rescue mission. He merely gave me a lift in his car!’

  Her horrified parents turned, twin expressions of embarrassed disapproval on both their faces.

  ‘Sabrina!’

  Wishing she had kept her mouth shut but equally unable to back down, she shrugged. ‘Well, it’s true. I could have got a taxi and there would have been less fuss.’ And no guilty secrets.

  ‘What has come over you, Sabrina?’ her mother asked, regarding her elder daughter with horror. ‘I apologise, Sebastian, for—’

  ‘No need at all. Sabrina is right—it was no bother. I was in the area.’

  ‘You mean you were falling out of a nightclub!’

  That’s the way to go, Brina, because the hole you had dug was not deep enough.

  ‘Oh, the new one that everyone is talking about? Is it really as gloriously debauched as everyone said, and did Laura really dance topless on the table?’ Chloe asked, winking at Sabrina as she drew the parental fire onto her own head. But before she got a response to any of her questions Luis entered the room ahead of his parents.

  * * *

  Sabrina, her eyes lowered, performed a curtsy when her turn came.

  The Queen, enveloped in a cloud of perfume, put a hand under her chin and while Sabrina fought the urge to snatch it away she turned her chin to the light.

  ‘She is so pretty. Isn’t she pretty, Ricard?’

  She appealed to her husband who, after raising a brow at the presence of his younger son, was accepting the glass of champagne that had been offered him. ‘Lovely cheekbones.’

  ‘Delightful,’ the King responded, not looking at Sabrina or her cheekbones or, to her relief, her child-bearing hips, which were probably the only attribute in his future daughter-in-law that interested him, but staring at the glass of champagne he held.

  He wasn’t holding it for long. The Queen released Sabrina and promptly removed it from his hand.

  ‘Doctor’s orders,’ she explained, and handed him an orange-juice-filled flute.

  Aware that Luis had come to stand beside her, Sabrina turned with a smile.

  ‘Did you have a good journey?’ she asked, hearing the fake bright note in her voice. If she couldn’t think of something to say to him now, what would it be like in twenty years’ time? She let her eyes drift to where Sebastian stood talking to her sister, knowing there was no logic to it but blaming him for the horrid sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach anyway.

  ‘Pretty good considering.’

  Chloe had moved away but she could still hear her sister’s laughter as Sebastian, who followed her, spoke in a low rumble, his words inaudible.

  ‘And did your call go well, Luis?’

  ‘Call?’ Luis repeated, his expression suddenly guarded, even, weirdly, suspicious...

  ‘Your brother said that you were waiting on an important call.’

  Luis seemed to relax a little and Sabrina decided she had misread his veiled expression. ‘Oh, yes, sure, it was not really important. Sebastian must have got the wrong idea.’

  When five minutes later dinner was announced the small gathering left the room. Protocol demanded that the King, with the Duchess on his arm, led the party, followed by the Queen and the Duke. Before Luis could take her own arm and fall into place behind them, Chloe slid between them, taking Luis’s arm.

  ‘Your bad brother has been telling me some things—’ she flung a laughing glance over her shoulder ‘—and I really don’t know if they’re true. Tell me, how do you know if he’s lying?’

  ‘I’m hurt at the accusation I would ever tell an untruth,’ Sebastian protested as Chloe led his brother away.

  Watching the little interchange Sabrina felt a stab of something that resembled jealousy, enough to increase the level of conflict swirling in her head by several uncomfortable, confusing notches.

  ‘Shall we?’

  Looking from the arm presented to her to his face, she gave a quick nod and placed her hand lightly on it. While the couples ahead made light conversation, in contrast they walked in silence down the hallway until they reached the dining-room doorway.

  ‘What is it?’ Sebastian asked, refusing to acknowledge the stab of sympathy as she stood there, her slim body in an attitude that made him think of a scared animal trying to work up the courage to move out of the headlights. Or in Sabrina’s case, he supposed, to step into the spotlight.

  ‘Nothing,’ she said, forcing the word through pale lips. ‘Just...just give me a minute, would you?’

  The sympathy he’d held in check turned into anger as he watched her.

  ‘Is it worth it?’

  The harsh scorn in his voice forced her gaze upwards. She felt her anger rise, hot and resentful. ‘Financial stability, a reduction in the unemployment rate, an education system that is fit for purpose...funding for—’ She took a deep breath, her expression hard with contempt when she finished. ‘Is that worth me marrying a man I respect and like? Yes, I think so.’ She let go of his arm and, chin up, shoulders firm, she walked in ahead of him.

  Sebastian watched her queenly progress and felt a stab of something that he refused to recognise as respect.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  TAKING HER OWN SEAT, Sabrina watched as Chloe, already seated, said something to make the normally severe guest of honour laugh. Sabrina felt a stab of envy for the social ease that came so naturally to her sister, who tonight looked particularly stunning in a slim-fitting flame-red shift. Sabrina could work the room with the best of them when required, but it had been a learnt process. With Chloe it came naturally.

  As the waiting staff began to circulate the table Sabrina struggled to force her mind back to Luis, seated to her right, responding with an ambiguous nod because she didn’t have a clue as to what he’d just said before. Her eyes were drawn across the table where Chloe was now talking to Sebastian.

  Then, as a waiter moved between them, Sebastian’s gaze shifted. Caught staring, Sabrina looked away quickly and grabbed Luis’s hand.

  She ignored the mortifying fact that Luis’s first instinct was to pull away and she couldn’t ignore the look of alarm in his eyes when she’d laughed quite inanely, as though he’d just said something desperately amusing.

  ‘Sabrina dear,’ her mother said. ‘They are trying to serve the soup. If you must hold hands...�
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  Everyone looked and Sabrina let go of Luis’s hand, keeping the blush at bay by sheer force of will. Rather to her surprise he kept hold of it. He actually turned it over, then she realised what he was looking at.

  She should either have put on some make-up to cover the bruises on the inside of her forearm or worn long sleeves.

  ‘How did that happen?’ Luis said, directing a concerned frown at the darkening patches either side of her arm.

  ‘I bruise easily,’ she said quickly, putting her hand across her middle.

  ‘Since when?’ Chloe asked.

  ‘Let me see that, Sabrina.’

  ‘It’s fine, Mum, it probably happened when I was jostled by the press.’

  ‘Those animals!’ her protective father rumbled, his face dark with anger as he surged awkwardly to his feet.

  ‘Arnica,’ her mother said, her eyes on her husband, who after a moment subsided in his seat. ‘It really helps bruising. I wonder if we have any...’

  ‘I’m fine!’ Sabrina said, her smile strained. ‘Just fine, it’s nothing and—’ She took a deep breath and addressed the rest of her comment directly to Sebastian. ‘I’d like to put what happened behind me, to forget about it and move on.’

  A three-year-old could have read the coded message but she found it frustratingly impossible to tell from his expression if he had understood.

  It was the King, who was seated at the head of the table, who picked up her theme. ‘We’d all like to move on,’ he pronounced suddenly.

  It was rare that he and his father were on the same page but on this occasion moving on seemed an excellent idea and one Sebastian realised he needed to put into action at the first possible opportunity.

  He felt as if a protective layer had been stripped from his skin. It wasn’t just what he felt, it was how much he felt.

  He’d made the connection between those finger marks on Sabrina’s arm and his rough and ready extraction method the moment Luis had drawn everyone’s attention to them. Knowing he was responsible had shaken loose this painful cascade of emotions he could not identify, emotions he had never come close to feeling in his life before. The depth of the self-loathing he felt was visceral in its intensity.