Prince of Scandal

by Annie West

  Luisa stared, horrified. But his cool tone signalled an end to the subject and he picked up his pace, leading her swiftly towards the lift.

  ‘But when you were little you must have played.’

  He shrugged, the movement brushing his arm against her. She breathed in the subtle scent of warm male skin.

  ‘I don’t recall. I had tutors and lessons from the age of four. Playtime wasn’t scheduled, though later sports were included in the curriculum.’

  ‘That sounds … regimented.’ She smothered her outrage and distress. Surely they could have allowed him some time to be a child! It reinforced her resolve not to risk having a baby. No child of hers would be treated so.

  Raul punched the button for the lift. ‘My days were busy.’

  Busy, not happy. The ancient castle was perfect for hide and seek and the fantasy games young children revelled in. Had he ever played them? Her heart went out to the little boy he’d been, so lonely, she suspected now.

  Did that loneliness explain his aloof attitude? His formidable self-possession?

  ‘Did you see much of your father?’ She recalled him saying his father had been impatient with children. How had that impacted? She had no idea how royal households worked but she guessed no man became as ferociously self-sufficient as Raul without reason.

  Her husband shot a warning look that shivered her skin. Luisa looked straight back.

  The lift rose smoothly, so smoothly she knew it hadn’t caused the dropping sensation in her stomach that came with the word husband.

  ‘My father was busy. He had a country to run.’

  Luisa bit down hard rather than blurt out her sympathy. The doors slid open but Luisa didn’t move.

  ‘Do you mean he didn’t have time for you?’

  She could almost see the shutters come down over Raul’s face, blanking out all expression. The suddenness of it chilled her. Yet, far from blanking her out, it made her want to wrap her arms around him. The image of Peter, the little boy in the market square, so quaintly formal, tugged at her heart. Had Raul been like that as a child?

  Her own glorious childhood, filled with laughter and love, happy days on the river or riding the tractor with her dad, running riot with a couple of dogs and even a pet lizard were halcyon by comparison.

  ‘Why do you want to know?’

  ‘Why don’t you want to tell me? I’m your wife.’ She didn’t even stumble over the word. ‘It’s right I know you better.’ Yet it was like pulling teeth, trying to get him to open up even a little.

  Raul stood still, his face taut and unreadable. Then she caught a flicker in his eyes that made her thighs quiver and her stomach tighten.

  ‘Just what I had in mind.’ His voice lowered to a deep resonance that caressed her skin. ‘Getting to know each other better.’ Raul tugged her into the carpeted hallway and she realised they stood in front of his suite.

  The glint in his eyes was unmistakable. Desire, raw and hungry. Something feral and dangerous sent delicious excitement skimming through her.

  Her eyes widened. No mistaking what he meant.

  Sex.

  It was in his knowing look. In the deep shuddering breath that expanded his wide chest, as if he had trouble filling oxygen starved lungs.

  Luisa waited for outrage to take hold. For pride to give her the strength to shove him away. Indignation didn’t come. It was excitement that knotted her stomach. Desire that clogged her throat.

  He’d introduced her to pleasure and she was too inexperienced to hide the fact that she craved more.

  Raul must have read her feelings for his lips curved in a smile that made her pulse jitter. Wordlessly he shoved open the door, pulled her in and against him as he leaned back, closing the door with his body.

  Fire exploded in her blood. Last night she’d loved the heavy burden of him above her. Now she wanted to arch into him and revel in the hard solidity of his big frame. It was weak of her but she couldn’t get enough of him.

  She shoved aside the memory of this morning’s desolation, and the suspicion that his desire now masked a determination to stop her prying into his past.

  At this moment it was Raul’s passion she wanted. Perhaps because of the emptiness she’d glimpsed in his eyes when he’d spoken so casually about a childhood that to her sounded frighteningly cold. Did she doom herself to a similar loneliness, marrying him?

  Yet it wasn’t fear that drove her. Or simple lust.

  Her heart twisted as she realised she wanted to give herself to her husband in the hope of healing some of the deep hurt she’d seen flicker for a moment in his eyes.

  ‘Luisa? Do you want this?’

  ‘Yes.’ She didn’t try to hide from his searching gaze.

  When he lowered his head to graze the side of her neck with his teeth the air sucked straight out of her lungs. Thought disintegrated as she sank into pleasure.

  She opened her eyes and groaned as he bit into the sensitive flesh at the base of her throat. Her hands clenched at his shoulders as his hands skimmed her jacket, undoing it and her shirt and spreading the open sides wide.

  ‘You were magnificent this morning.’ His voice was a low, throaty purr as he stripped off her jacket then kissed the upper slope of her breasts as he shoved her blouse off. Her skirt followed moments later and she shivered in sensual delight as he ran his big hands over her hips.

  ‘I just did what was expected.’ Yet she felt a tiny burst of pleasure at his words. Having accepted her new role, she was determined to do it well.

  She sighed as he fastened his mouth on her lacy bra, sucking hard till the nipple stood erect and darts of liquid fire shot to her core.

  Convulsively she shuddered, cradling him close, overwhelmed by the sudden need to embrace him and comfort him. This big man who needed no one.

  He lifted his head and met her eyes. His own were shadowed, as if he veiled his thoughts. The knowledge pained her. He worked so hard to maintain his distance. Had he never learned to share anything? Was she crazy to think they could make this work?

  Then his mouth descended and he swung her up in his embrace. Heat surrounded her. Hard-packed muscle. The steady beat of his heart.

  By the time he lowered her to the bed and stripped both their clothes with a deftness that spoke of practice and urgency, Luisa’s thoughts had almost scrambled.

  ‘Contraception!’ she blurted out as she sank beneath him. ‘I don’t want to get pregnant.’

  His brows rose. ‘We’re married, Luisa. Having a child is a natural outcome.’

  She shook her head. Despite the wonderful weighted feeling of his lower body on hers, this was too important.

  ‘No. I’m not ready.’ She gulped down air and tried to order her thoughts. ‘It’s been too fast.’

  For what seemed an eternity Raul stared, as if seeing her for the first time. Finally he nodded and rolled away, reaching for the bedside table.

  When he turned back he didn’t immediately cover her body with his.

  For a man who’d married her out of necessity he had a way of making her feel the absolute focus of his world. As if nothing existed but her. His total concentration, the intensity of his gaze, the knowing, deliberately seductive touch of his hands on her body, were exhilarating.

  Raul’s gaze softened with each circling stroke and she felt something shift deep inside. She arched into his touch and her pulse pounded in her ears. When he leaned close his breath was an erotic caress of her sensitive ear lobe that sent sparks of heat showering through her.

  ‘Come for me, Luisa.’ His fingers delved and a ripple of sensation caught her. ‘Give yourself up to it.’

  Gasping, she focused on him, feeling the dip and wheel of excitement while the intense connection sparked between them. His set face, his mouth, no longer smiling but stretched taut in concentration. The furrow on his brow, his eyes …

  Out of nowhere the orgasm hit, jerking her body and stealing her breath. Heat flared under her skin as he dipped his head to take he
r mouth in a long, languorous kiss that somehow intensified the echoing spasms.

  Spent at last, she sank back into the bed.

  Now he’d come to her. Dreamily she smiled, her inner muscles pulsing in readiness. Despite her exhaustion, it was Raul she wanted. The hollow ache inside was proof of that.

  He moved, but not as she’d expected. Shocked, she saw him settling himself low, nuzzling her inner thighs.

  ‘No! I want—’

  His kiss silenced her. She shouldn’t want more after the ecstasy that still echoed through her, but the caress of Raul’s tongue, his lips, sent need jolting through her.

  That was only the beginning.

  Dazed, Luisa gave herself up to new caresses, new sensations that built one on the other till all she knew was Raul and the pleasure he wrought in her malleable, ever eager body. The taste of him was on her tongue, his scent in her nostrils as she grew attuned to his touch and the deep approving rumble of his voice.

  Blindly she turned to him as finally he took her for himself, his rampant hardness a contrast to her lush satiation. She breathed deep, taking his shuddering, powerful body into hers as she seemed to absorb his essence into her pores.

  Raul cried out and pleasure drenched her at the sound of her name in that raw needy voice. Instinctively she clutched him protectively close.

  Raul lay completely spent, only enough strength in his body to pull Luisa close, her body sprawled over him.

  He told himself the post-coital glow was always this intense, but he knew he lied. From the moment he’d bedded his wife he’d known the sex was different.

  Why? His brain wouldn’t leave the question alone.

  Because she didn’t meekly comply with his wishes? Because, despite agreeing to marry, she was still her own woman, not like the compliant lovers who gave whatever he wanted because of what he could provide in return?

  With Luisa he had the thrilling, faintly disturbing sense that he held a precious gift in his arms.

  She was far more than a warm body to sate his lust.

  This was unknown territory. Or, if he were honest with himself, a little too like the feelings he’d discovered in his youth, when he’d believed in love. The thought should terrify him. He was well past believing in such things.

  His lips quirked ruefully. That was why he’d seduced his wife as soon as they’d got back from the civic ceremony. Not just because he wanted her, but to stop himself puzzling over what she made him feel.

  And to stop her questions. His hand clenched in the silk of her hair and she shifted delectably, soft flesh against his. Was it possible he’d used sex to avoid talking about his past? Even something as simple as his childhood?

  Was he really such a coward?

  His life was an open book. It had been pored over and dissected by the media for years. Yet the discomfort he’d felt answering Luisa’s questions surprised him.

  As did the unfamiliar need to open up to her. To share a little of himself.

  He frowned. It was absurd. He didn’t need a confessor or a confidante. There was no need for conversation. Yet deep down he knew he lied.

  Perhaps because of the sense that he owed her for agreeing to marry?

  Whatever the reason, when she shifted as if to move away, he slipped a restraining arm around the curve of her waist and cleared his throat.

  ‘My father was interested in me only as heir to the throne.’ His voice sounded husky. Raul told himself it was the aftermath of that stunning climax.

  ‘That’s awful.’ Her words were murmured against his chest. She didn’t look up. Somehow that made it easier.

  He shrugged. ‘Staff raised me. That’s the way it’s always been in the royal household. He dropped by just enough to remind me I had to excel to be ready to wear the crown one day.’

  ‘And you wonder why I’m not ready for children!’

  Shock smote him. He’d spoken blithely about the possibility of pregnancy, but the reality hadn’t sunk in. Luisa, pregnant with his child …

  ‘No child of ours would be raised like that.’ Certainty firmed on the words.

  ‘Really?’

  Raul nodded. He’d spent years adhering to tradition as he fought to stabilise the monarchy and the nation, working behind the scenes as his father’s focus narrowed to pleasing his capricious young wife. It had been Raul who’d tried to redress the damage after the fiasco with Ana.

  But some traditions needed change.

  ‘You have my word.’

  He might not be a success as a father. Certainly his father’s model of paternal love had been distant and unemotional. He thought of Peter, the boy with his dog. At least Raul knew what not to do. And Luisa would make up for his shortcomings. She’d be a natural.

  He smiled, satisfied at the prospect.

  ‘Tell me …’ She hesitated.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Yesterday at the reception. Why did everyone watch you and your stepmother as if they expected a scene?’

  Raul drew a heavy breath, satisfaction dissipating in an instant. But Luisa had a right to know. As she’d pointed out, she was his wife. Better to learn the facts from him than from some gossip sheet.

  ‘Because they know I don’t like her.’ He stroked Luisa’s hair then down her back, distracting himself just a little by the way she arched into his caress.

  ‘Why not?’ Luisa’s question was a breath of sound. ‘Why don’t you like her?’

  Raul clenched his jaw, forcing himself to answer.

  ‘She pretended to marry him for love. He was proud and arrogant and he’d never been in love before, but he didn’t deserve what he got.’ Even though at first Raul had wished them both to the devil. He’d found no satisfaction seeing his father, weighed down by regret, dwindle into a shadow of the man he’d been.

  ‘He was duped by a gold-digger half his age who wanted wealth and royal prestige. She spent most of her time with other men. His last years were hell.’

  Even in his anger Raul felt a weight slide off his chest. He’d kept his views to himself so long, knowing an unguarded word would inflame the gossip and speculation he’d tried so hard to quash. The truth of his father’s marriage had been guessed by many but never proven.

  He’d worked tirelessly to protect his family’s reputation, covering for his father as he grew erratic and less able to control his kingdom. Overcoming a desire to expose Ana for the witch she was. His country needed faith in the monarchy that kept it stable.

  ‘There’s more, isn’t there? More you’re not telling?’

  Raul felt movement and looked down to see Luisa’s bright eyes surveying him. She looked troubled.

  Briefly he hesitated. But there was no point refusing to tell her. She could find out easily enough. He looked up at the wood-panelled ceiling, away from her searching gaze.

  ‘I met Ana in my early twenties. She was my age but unlike any of the girls I knew. She wasn’t aristocratic. She didn’t simper or talk in platitudes. She didn’t talk politics and she didn’t care about court gossip.’

  His lips twisted at the memory.

  ‘She was a breath of fresh air. Vibrant, outspoken, fun. She wasn’t afraid to get her hair messed riding in a convertible, or enjoy a picnic out in the open instead of dinner at a chic restaurant.’ Or so it had seemed.

  ‘I was smitten.’ Raul halted, drawing a searing breath. It was the first time he’d admitted it. Strange how the memory seemed less shattering. Maybe because he saw his youthful folly clearly since he no longer believed in love.

  ‘Oh, Raul!’ No mistaking Luisa’s distress. Or the tension in her body. The story wasn’t a pretty one. Suddenly he wanted it over as quickly as possible.

  ‘It turned out I was wrong about her. She seemed fresh and innocent, uncomplicated and appealing. But she wasn’t what she appeared.’ His mouth twisted.

  ‘I wasn’t the only one taken in. I introduced her to my father and he fell for her with all the force of an old fool for a very beautiful, very clever
young woman.’

  Raul remembered those days vividly. Ana had played him, holding him at arm’s length once she got his father in her sights. After all, what price a prince when a king was available, with a kingdom’s wealth at his disposal?

  ‘My father married her four months later.’

  Raul had thought his world had ended. He’d retreated into duty, throwing himself into anything that would dull the pain of betrayal. It had become habit to direct all his passion, all his energies into his royal obligations.

  It had worked. Over the years he’d dispensed with the need for emotional ties.

  ‘Raul, I’m so sorry. That must have been souldestroying.’

  Luisa didn’t know the half of it. But it had made him stronger. He was self-sufficient and glad of it.

  So why did he feel stripped naked in a way that had nothing to do with his lack of clothes?

  ‘Do you still … care for her?’

  Blindly Raul turned towards Luisa’s voice, finally focusing on her troubled gaze.

  ‘Care?’ He almost spat the word. ‘For the woman who deceived me and incited my own father to betray me?’ A laugh tore, savage and rough, from his throat. ‘For the woman who made me a laughing stock? She damned near destroyed the monarchy with her scandalous behaviour. She did destroy my father’s pride and honour with her affairs.’

  Raul shook his head. ‘I learned a valuable lesson from her. Never to trust. Never to be gullible again. Love is a trap for the unwary.’

  It struck him that what had drawn him to Ana all those years ago was what attracted him to Luisa. Her innocence in a world of political machinations. Her directness and honesty. Her beauty. Except in Luisa it was real. In Ana it had been false, designed to snare.

  Ana had come to this apartment one morning just months after her wedding. She’d worn sheer black lace and even sheerer audacity and she’d expected Raul to satisfy her as his father hadn’t been able to.

  Rancid distaste filled his mouth. It had taken him a long time to banish the taint of that memory, even though he’d spurned her, avoiding her whenever he could.

  In the long run Ana had done him a favour. Never again would he fall for the fantasy of love.