His Heir, Her Honor

by Catherine Mann

  “Shhh,” Carlos whispered in her ear. His hands skimmed around to her rib cage and pulled her back against him. “Whatever you’re thinking about. Don’t. You’re tensing up again. As much as I’m enjoying having my hands on you, I hate to think my efforts here have been for nothing.”

  His hands rested right below her breasts, so close her nipples peaked against her bra, tight and needy. As he stepped closer, his body against her back, the rigid length of him pressed to her spine with unmistakable arousal. She longed to writhe against him and tempt him higher, harder. How she burned to lift his palms to cover her breasts, to ease the ache with the warm pressure of him.

  It was just physical, she reminded herself. Heaven knew she wasn’t too happy with the man himself right now. But her willpower was beginning to wane.

  She cuffed her fingers around his wrists and shifted his touch an inch lower. “I think it’s time to call a halt to this.”

  Just that fast, his hands slid away. Not a word, not even a hint of a protest from him. However, her body shouted loud and clear over the loss of his touch. Her skin tightened, tingly and hot with awareness. Dragging in breaths that did nothing to steady her racing heart, she held her dress in place and faced him.

  His features were taut, his eyes as molten as his dark cable sweater.

  “We both—” Her voice shook and she steadied the betraying tremble before continuing, “We both know I’m attracted to you, and it’s a safe bet to say you’re attracted to me as well. I also know I can want you while not liking you very much. However, I’m not so sure that jumping each other is the wisest move—”

  “Whoa, hold on there.” He held up his hands while keeping them well off her. “I have no intention of seducing you.”

  “Oh.” The guy sure knew how to take the wind out of a girl’s sails. “Then what the hell was that erotic massage all about?”

  He lowered his hands, still not so much as brushing her, while outlining her shape, her breasts, waist, hips, around and stopping an inch away from curving her bottom. “To put you at ease and reassure you of my self-control. You can enjoy what I’m about to do because you don’t have to keep up your guard.”

  His confidence was unmistakable, the luxury cabin echoing with the regal sense of surety in his every word. Even in casual jeans and a sweater, this man was royal born, destined to lead, and right now she very much wanted to follow wherever he led.

  A simple sway would bring her flush against him. Breathe, she reminded herself. Breathe. “And what exactly are you about to do?”

  He grinned ever so slightly at her words, his predatory look lifting the hairs on her arms.

  “I’m going to kiss you.”

  Six

  The luscious feel of Lilah still tattooed in his memory, burned in his brain, seared in his soul, Carlos lowered his mouth to hers. No subtle skim of lips over lips. He simply took her.

  He’d warned her, giving her a chance to pull away. Still she had not uttered a syllable of protest, no request to stop. Perhaps that pushed the boundary of his promise to her, but he needed her to know how much he wanted her. It would hurt like hell to pull away, but he would honor his word.

  He angled his mouth over hers more firmly, exploring, plundering, and wondered how she felt so familiar after only a few kisses. He would have recognized her taste, her scent, her fingers gliding along his jaw. Her touch was so exact, she could have been a surgeon herself, thoroughly dissecting his restraint and leaving him bare to the powerful draw of pure, undiluted Lilah.

  She peeled away layers of his reserve as fully as she inched up his sweater and T-shirt to explore his chest with her cool, soft hands.

  As smoothly as he’d eased the zipper down her dress earlier.

  Sliding inside her open dress, he palmed her bottom. With only her silky panties between his fingers and her flesh, he fit her against him, his arousal. He’d told her they would use this time to find level ground but the floor beneath his feet felt more unsteady than ever.

  She gripped fists full of his sweater, anchoring herself to him. So fast, so perfectly, she seduced him right back with a simple stroke of her hands, her tongue, her body brushing against his.

  Already rock hard from wanting her, still he throbbed harder. Nobody turned him inside out the way Lilah did, until he forgot about the ever-present pain in his back, the persistent ghosts of his past. In her arms, he could even let go of his driving need to erase loss and agony from the endless stream of children who needed him, children who he too often failed….

  And for all those reasons, he needed to keep himself carefully guarded around this woman. The one woman who could make him lose sight of his only path to redemption for his own failure.

  Drawing in a shuddering breath that did little to sweep away the sense of Lilah invading every niche inside him, Carlos pulled away. Full of regret, he withdrew his hands and slipped her zipper up inch by inch until he cupped the back of her neck. He took in her passion-dazed emerald eyes, her kissed moist mouth, all signs of his effect on her.

  She flattened her hands to his chest, her fingers plucking at his T-shirt peeking from the V-neck of his sweater. “I thought you weren’t going to seduce me.”

  “You were seduced by just a kiss?” He took small comfort in that much.

  “Don’t be a jerk.” Her smile went wobbly. “You know what you did.”

  “I also know what else I would like to do to you, but I promised not to take things further unless you asked.” He tipped his ear toward the whine of jet engines. “Besides, I believe we are beginning our descent.”

  As if on cue, the intercom crackled a second ahead of the captain’s voice. “This is your captain. Please return to your seats and buckle in for landing in Eagle-Vail, Colorado. On behalf of myself and my copilot, I hope you’ve had a pleasant flight.”

  They had arrived. And shortly, he would have Lilah all to himself in a house with eight empty bedrooms. He couldn’t decide if he was a genius or a moron.

  If there was even a remote chance that Lilah proved to be the mother of his child, they needed the chance to get to know each other better outside of the workplace. So this trip made sense. And the heat blasting over him even now from that kiss reminded him how good it could be between them.

  But—baby or no baby—he needed to find a way to clear Lilah from his system before the need for her leveled all his defenses.

  Permanently.

  A few days alone in Vail, Colorado, with Carlos suddenly felt like an eternity.

  As their SUV climbed the icy driveway winding up a hill, Lilah studied the house ahead of them and crossed her fingers for a large staff. Not because she wanted or expected to be waited on, rather she hoped for some human buffers between herself and the increasing need to jump the man beside her. She searched the looming structure for signs of life as Carlos spoke softly beside her, detailing enticing factoids about the area.

  Of course he could make a hut in the woods sound amazing with that luscious accent.

  The house, she reminded herself. Check out the house.

  Three stories tall at the center, the cedar home sported varying heights and levels on either side in a sort of art deco Swiss Alps style that instantly charmed her. Built with logs that could only have come from the fattest, most ancient trees, the size of the structure seemed about right for the mammoth mountain it was perched on. Generous windows shone a welcoming yellow glow into the night, a positive sign there might be people inside.

  Carlos guided the four-wheel drive past towering pines, branches still wearing heavy snowcaps. She hugged her coat tighter around her, which only served to remind her how much warmer his arms had been earlier in the airplane. Since the pilot had announced their approach, Carlos had shifted from seductive lover to considerate tour guide.

  Finishing his spiel about amenities in Vail, he pulled the SUV into the six-car garage that appeared to be nearly two thousand square feet on its own. She’d grown up with affluence around her, but even she w
as taken aback a bit by the scope of vehicles surrounding her, everything from a Lamborghini to a Mercedes sedan to top-of-the-line snowmobiles.

  Carlos might live a Spartan lifestyle in Tacoma, but apparently his family spared no expense when it came to their “toys.”

  Before she could unbuckle her seat belt, he’d come around to open her door, his shoulders broad in a black sweater and open ski jacket. His limp was more pronounced, reminding her what a long day this had to have been for him as well, yet he didn’t complain. She’d noticed a cane in his office once, although she’d never seen him use it. He was a prideful man, no doubt. Offering him her arm would be out of the question.

  What would it be like to have the freedom to slide her arm around his waist, intimately touching and helping without bruising his pride? No matter how well this time together went for them, she would never know that kind of closeness with Carlos. That stung her more than she could have foreseen a few short months ago.

  Lilah followed him through the garage and into a narrow hall, pausing each time he stopped to disarm yet another security system, like peeling away layers of an onion. A very protected, paranoid onion. Hanging up her coat alongside his on a cast-iron coat tree, she eyed the massive floor-to-ceiling windows with new perception, suddenly certain the glass was bulletproof.

  Trees had been thinned away from the house, giving a clear view of the empty snow-covered ground and walkways laid out with the precision of an English garden. Or a well-thought-out security plan…

  Now she was becoming paranoid.

  Focus on the perks of being here. Both indoor and outdoor pools loomed large, each with a breathtaking view of a distant snowcapped mountain range apparent even in the dark thanks to the last bit of twilight flaring along the peaks. She still hadn’t seen any staff in the quiet house, only the sound of her footsteps and Carlos’s on thick Aubusson rugs cutting the silence.

  Walls were dotted with oil paintings of mountains, keeping with the chalet appeal. She had to admit it. He’d picked the perfect retreat.

  “The Pyrenees,” he filled in simply, referring to the range between Spain and France depicted in the paintings. “My family used to ski there.”

  Before the coup that destroyed San Rinaldo.

  Before his birthright to be king had been stolen.

  Before he lost his home, his mother.

  She trailed her fingers along a carved mahogany frame. How many other hints of European heritage did he incorporate into his life that she must have missed over the years? How bittersweet those reminders must be of a home that had been ripped from him just as he stood on the brink of manhood.

  He swept open the next door to an enormous gourmet kitchen, top-of-the-line appliances with stone and stainless steel decor. Dark green granite glowed under the heavy black iron pendant lamps illuminating the breakfast bar. A temperature-controlled wine refrigerator took up the entire base of a massive island, the exotic labels of the expensive vintages apparent through the lit glass doors.

  Carlos leaned against the breakfast bar, feet crossed at the ankles. “The staff has been sent on vacation, but they left everything we should need to eat and a cleaning service will come in when needed.”

  Well, that answered the question about chaperones and buffers. She needed to put on her big girl hat and decide on her own whether or not she would sleep alone tonight. Or in his bed.

  A whisper of longing huffed over her skin, and she loosened her hold on the coat she’d been clutching so tightly. Suddenly, she felt plenty warm. “I can wash my own dishes, thank you.”

  He pulled open the industrial-size refrigerator, dark blue denim hugging his hips. “Then what do you say to some food before we settle in for the night?”

  Fifteen minutes later, she was curled up in the corner of an overstuffed sofa with Carlos sprawled on the couch across from her in the main living room. A roaring blaze crackled in the fireplace, warming her bare toes; her boots were resting beside the sofa. The polished stone hearth stretched up to the vaulted ceiling, the same as the stone fire pit outdoors on the sprawling rustic veranda that overlooked the mountain view. The whole place smelled like pine and cedar, right down to the fragrant wood crackling in the fireplace.

  Still edgy from the kiss on the plane and woefully in need of something to ease the tension crackling through her veins, she cupped her mug of warmed cider, a plate of assorted finger foods on the end table beside her. Carlos devoured a larger, more substantial sandwich on pumpernickel. Not that he seemed to even notice how someone had gone to a lot of trouble to make even deli food look like a masterful creation, all the way down to the lettuce curling artfully around the edges.

  He ate as he always did, efficiently, regarding the food as nothing more than fuel for his body. The meal was nothing more than a necessary regimen, much like how he must wash his hands before surgery. She couldn’t help but admire him in this moment. He had all of this wealth and privilege at his fingertips, yet he chose to live out his life serving others. There was an unmistakable honor in that.

  Although she’d also seen in her job how easy it was for the driven humanitarians to burn themselves out. Perhaps he needed this time away for reasons he hadn’t even begun to recognize.

  Lilah sipped her cider, the stoneware warming her hands. “This place is…beyond words.”

  And it was exactly what she needed after the way work had overwhelmed her these last few months. The stress of finding out about the baby and not being able to share it with Carlos had taken its toll in ways she was only starting to appreciate. Right now, she couldn’t help but feel grateful for this time out from real life to sort out her future. Somehow the secluded mountain mansion felt warm and welcoming. A safe haven in a crazy time.

  At least she hoped it was the house making her feel that way and not the magnetism of the man.

  Wiping his mouth with a linen napkin, he finished chewing. “Once my father accepted that his sons were not going to live their adult lives in hiding with him on his island, he tried to make sure our other properties were set up to have everything at our fingertips.” Mug in hand, he gestured round the room with a semicircle sweep. “Less reason to step out into everyday society.”

  She shivered to think of all the worries a parent carried around in a normal world—to shoulder all the fears for his sons’ safety that Enrique Medina faced seemed overwhelming.

  Her hand slid protectively over her stomach. “He had reason to be fearful for your safety.”

  “Understood. But a life in hiding is no life at all.” He polished off the last corner of his sandwich.

  “Even if that life is spent in pampered luxury,” she said, trying to inject a tone of levity into a suddenly too dark conversation.

  “Especially so.” He tossed his napkin on his empty stoneware plate and swung his legs up onto the sofa, almost managing to disguise his wince of discomfort. “All that said, however, this does make for one helluva vacation. It’s even equipped with a golf room with a full swing simulator. Although we’ll have to bypass the wine cellar this time since you’re expecting.”

  This time? There would be more visits here?

  Of course, once he realized this was his child there would be so many reasons for their paths to intersect. Whether or not he appreciated it yet, she knew her life was unequivocally intertwined with his forever. So many new concerns had come her way of late, it seemed impossible to absorb them all before another came rocketing through her brain. She struggled to follow his words.

  He scratched the back of his neck, stretching the sweater taut across his broad shoulders. “The personal sauna is probably a no go too. I seem to recall from med school that pregnant women should use caution when it comes to saunas and hot tubs.”

  Heat flooded her face as she thought of their encounter in the hot tub at his place, the night they’d made the baby. His home had been starkly utilitarian except for the mammoth jetted bath, large enough for two. Intellectually, she knew he likely had the luxury inst
alled for practical purposes because of his back, but they’d most certainly put the spa bathroom to totally impractical, indulgent good use that night.

  The air between them snapped with awareness as she saw in his heavy-lidded eyes that he was remembering that night as well. And it affected him. Not surprising given their out-of-control kiss earlier on the plane.

  But since that evening at the party when he’d really touched her for the first time, she hadn’t been able to think of much else except the feel of his hands on her skin….

  From the hospital rooftop garden, Lilah stared out at the Christmas lights twinkling through Tacoma’s skyline. So intent on taking a breather from the overloud band and press of patrons at the party inside, she almost missed the sound of footsteps approaching behind her.

  She stiffened in alarm, then heard the uneven gait she recognized well after four years of working with Carlos. And quite honestly, she could use the distraction of his company tonight after the disturbing call with her mother, in tears over finding the receipt for a nightie—red and not her size. Lilah gripped the icy rail tighter.

  A second later, Carlos’s hand skimmed her bare arms as he eased a velvet wrap around her shoulders. “Wouldn’t want you to catch a cold out here.”

  “Thank you.” She hugged her wrap closer as snow sprinkled from the sky. “You were especially nice to the board of directors tonight. I’m not going to grouse if you want to cut out early.”

  He stuffed his hands in his tuxedo pockets, dark eyes reflecting the string of tiny white lights strung around a potted evergreen. “Are you insinuating I’ve been less than polite in the past?”

  “I know these sorts of gatherings aren’t your thing.” She scrunched her icy toes inside her pumps. “You usually have that vaguely tolerant look that lets us all know you’ve got one eye on your watch so you can get back to work.”

  “It’s impossible to look at any watch when there’s someone as beautiful as you to admire instead.”

  Her jaw dropped then snapped shut quickly. They’d been work friends for a long time, always careful never to cross that line. She’d accepted her attraction to him but never guessed he’d noticed her. “Uh, thank you?”