by Various
‘No, Luciana’s fine.’ He put the cup back on the saucer with a clatter and ran his hand over his unshaven jaw. He felt tense and edgy with unfamiliar emotions that he was sickeningly aware of but couldn’t bear to examine. The feeling reminded him of when he’d come off a motorbike a few years ago—those few moments of watching the blood seeping through his shirt, feeling the pain but not wanting to look at the wound. ‘I just came from visiting my father.’
‘Is he…getting worse?’
‘No. On the contrary, he was better than I’d seen him for a while. Certainly more talkative.’
Her eyes were full of compassion. ‘That’s good, isn’t it?’
‘Maybe,’ he said tersely, picking up a sugar cube and crumbling it between his fingers. ‘But weird. As I told you, in our family we don’t go in for talking much.’ It was good that he knew, good that he finally understood the shadow that had hung over his childhood, but it had unsettled him more than he cared to admit. That’s why he’d gone to find Emily. He wanted the reassurance of her normality and straightforwardness. Brushing the sugar from his fingers he leaned restlessly back in his seat. ‘So, how was the rehearsal?’
She shrugged, a shadow passing over her open face. ‘As you saw. I have the passion nailed and now I need to work on precision.’
‘You certainly do have the passion nailed,’ Luis drawled acidly. ‘What do you and Adriano do for an encore? Have sex in the middle of the stage?’
He had a sudden dizzying flashback to that night in England, when he’d so arrogantly, so bloody calculatingly begun to seduce her in the hotel. Jealousy is a nasty disease to which, thankfully, I’m completely immune. His cold, complacent words came back to him and he recognized the devastating justice of the situation he now found himself in. Turned inside out by jealousy for a dancer, for pity’s sake.
‘I have enough sex at the moment, thank you,’ she said softly, and for a moment her eyes met his across the table and he was gripped by a strong urge to pick her up and haul her back to his bed. I don’t, he wanted to say. It felt like he could never have enough of her.
‘Anyway—’ a flush of pink had spread across her cheekbones and she dropped her gaze ‘—I wanted to talk to you about Luciana. It’s her birthday next week.’
Luis was relieved at the change of subject. ‘Of course,’ he said tersely. And almost a year since Rico and Christiana died.
‘Well, since she doesn’t really have any friends her own age I wondered if we could do something with her, instead of a party. Something fun.’ She looked at him under her eyelashes. ‘Something normal.’
‘Do you have something in mind?’
‘I do, but you’re not going to like it…’ With a rueful smile she stooped down, reaching beneath the table and wincing slightly. ‘Sorry, my feet are killing me.’
Frowning, Luis glanced down. Under the table he could see that she had slipped her shoes off and was rubbing her toes. A bolt of pure, blinding lust shot through him. ‘Go on,’ he rasped.
‘Well, I thought…’ As she uncrossed her legs her bare foot brushed his knee and he caught hold of it under the table. She smiled, a slow, spreading smile that made the sun rise in her clear blue eyes and heated his blood. ‘I thought…’ she repeated, her voice throaty with undisguised desire as his fingers gently massaged her instep, ‘that we could…’
He raised his eyebrows, enjoying her unraveling. ‘Yes…’
She hesitated. ‘I don’t want you to say no,’ she whispered, sliding down in her chair a little, pushing back her loose, silken hair with her fingers, her eyes not leaving his. There was a wicked glitter in them, and suddenly he wasn’t holding her foot any more. She had twisted it neatly from his grasp with a flick of her ankle and slid it between his thighs.
He tensed, instantly rock hard as her strong, supple toes flexed against him.
‘Promise you won’t say no,’ she breathed, her eyes laughing, burning into his.
‘Atrevido,’ he murmured hoarsely. Light-headed with want he glanced across at the oblivious bodyguards who were sprawled at their table, chatting desultorily. He looked back at Emily. Her perfect heart-shaped face was composed and serene. Only her eyes, which had darkened to the colour of sapphires and were sparkling feverishly, gave her away. ‘I can’t imagine,’ he said in a voice like honey and gravel, ‘saying no to anything you could suggest right now. So tell me.’
She smiled, wickedly and delightfully, and he swallowed back a groan as he felt her other foot slip between his thighs. ‘Camping. I want to take her camping. In a tent. On the beach.’
Chapter Thirteen
‘OK, NOW both of you, close your eyes.’
Emily and Luciana looked at each other, excitement shimmering between them on the soft late-afternoon heat. ‘Go on.’ Emily grinned. ‘You first, and then I will.’
Luciana screwed her eyes up very tightly as if she was afraid they might accidentally spring open. Emily glanced up at Luis.
‘You too, Miss Balfour,’ he said sternly, taking her face between his hands and brushing his thumbs down over her eyelids. ‘And keep them shut until I say so.’
The sand was soft beneath her feet as Luis took each of their hands and pulled them up the last steep bit of the dune. The incline levelled off as they reached the summit and Emily felt the breeze lift her hair and the sun warm her face, and she heard the sigh of the waves and breathed in the evocative salt and ozone scents of the sea.
‘Now,’ he said quietly. ‘Open.’
It was the Arabian Nights, or Camelot, laid out below them on the beach. A number of round white canvas tents were clustered together on the sand, pink pennants flying from their turrets, bunting and balloons strung between them. Luciana was standing transfixed, her hands pressed to her mouth, her eyes brilliant with tears of astonishment and delight.
Emily knew exactly how she felt.
‘Is it real?’ Luciana whispered. ‘Am I really sleeping there tonight?’
‘You bet,’ Luis said, and Emily’s throat constricted as she heard the note of gravelly emotion in his voice. ‘Because you’re the birthday girl. Go and look at your bedroom—you might find some people you know down there.’
And she was off, running down the slope of the dune in the little red shorts and striped T-shirt Emily had bought her as part of her birthday present, her hair flying out behind her. Only then did Emily turn to Luis, laughing as the sentimental tears that shimmered in her eyes spilled over. ‘It’s incredible. Absolutely perfect. Thank you.’
‘I’m glad it meets with your approval,’ he said drily.
‘Oh, it does. Very much.’
She rose up on her tiptoes to press a kiss to his mouth, but instantly he stepped away. A tiny beat of disappointment went through her. ‘Careful.’ He gestured down the beach with a nod of his head. ‘We have an audience.’
From out of the tents Tomás had emerged, looking almost unrecognisable out of his ubiquitous suit and tie. With him was a pretty, plump blonde woman who she assumed was Valentina holding a chubby baby on one hip, and Elena and Paloma, two of the junior nannies from the palace. Senhora Costa, mercifully, did not seem to be in evidence, but there were several young men in shorts and T-shirts whom Emily couldn’t place.
‘Inviting half of the security force was the only way I could get Tomás and the chief of security to agree to this,’ Luis said, following her gaze, and she realised that the tanned, relaxed boys down there were the bodyguards she was used to seeing in headsets and uniforms, opening doors for her and following Luis like shadows. Now, here in the fading afternoon sun as they went forward to greet Luciana they looked human for the first time.
‘Was it very difficult?’ she asked guiltily.
‘Put it this way, it’ll make any future diplomatic dealings I may have with fascist dictators and volatile despots look like schoolboy stuff.’ He gave her a crooked smile. ‘Come on. Let me show you to your boudoir, your ladyship. And let’s get this party started.’
&n
bsp; They played rounders and had piggyback races, with the pretty young nannies shrieking excitedly on the backs of the younger bodyguards. Emily stood on the finish line taking photographs as Luis charged across it with Luciana clinging to him like a little monkey, her face alight with happiness.
He had long since discarded his T-shirt and, wearing only faded surf shorts, his tawny hair glinting gold in the sun it was hard to imagine the responsibility that rested on his beautiful, butterscotch-brown shoulders. And yet, Emily thought with a wrench of visceral yearning, it was also impossible to forget that he was what he was. Royal. Special. Separate. It was in every powerful inch of him, every self-assured move and graceful gesture.
She thought back to the night in the restaurant, when they’d played that silly game about animals—the bitterness in his voice when he’d said he wasn’t regal enough to be a lion—but looking at him now in the low, syrupy sunlight, that was exactly what he reminded her of. The wolf had emerged from the shadows, and he was stronger, prouder and even more compelling.
After the games Tomás lit a fire and Valentina cooked sausages and steaks while Luciana played with baby Gracia. One of the tents had been set up as a bar and kitchen, and Matheus, Luciana’s favourite bodyguard, made her a cola float which he embellished with a tiny pink paper umbrella and presented to her with a flourish. He’d also brought an iPod, and as the sun changed from primrose yellow to deep blush pink music filled the warm evening and Luis opened champagne.
Instinctively Emily had kept a distance from him, but suddenly he was standing in front of her, holding out a slim glass. Their eyes locked as she took it from him, her stomach disappearing with longing as their fingers touched.
‘Thank you.’
‘Thank you’, he said ironically. ‘This is all your idea.’
‘But this is more than I ever could have dreamed up…’ She waved her glass in an arc that took in the tents, the deserted beach, the rose-petal sun sliding down towards the glittering sea. ‘You’ve taken my idea and made it magical. Luciana’s having the time of her life.’
His face was very still, and very, very beautiful, as he looked out across the ocean. ‘I hope so,’ he said, and his voice was low and raw.
Behind them someone turned up the music and Luciana was calling her name. Reluctantly tearing her gaze from his she turned round.
‘Emily, listen!’ Luciana squealed, ‘Matheus has the music for our dance! Let’s do it! Let’s do it now!’
Sure enough the Waltz of the Flowers from The Nutcracker, with its associations of home and Christmas, was floating incongruously over the tropical white sand. Smiling, Emily took a mouthful of champagne and then handed her glass back to Luis before knotting her faded checked shirt over her midriff and going to join Luciana.
Luciana’s face was set in a frown of concentration as she went through her carefully rehearsed routine, and Emily danced around her, the silken sand flying from her bare feet with each fouetté. At the end everyone clapped madly, and Luciana glowed with pride.
‘Now you,’ she begged Emily. ‘Do yours!’
‘No, no.’ Laughing, Emily dropped a kiss on her head and went back over to Luis to reclaim her champagne. ‘This is a party—we should all dance. Matheus, do you have any party music?’
‘Of course!’ A moment later the low pulsing beat of the samba filled the warm evening, and Matheus went back to Luciana and took both her hands. ‘I show Your Highness,’ he joked. ‘And then you can teach Senhora Balfour how we dance in Santosa.’
‘Uh-uh,’ said Luis, very close to her ear. ‘That’s definitely going to be my privilege.’
Elena and Paloma had been claimed by their bodyguards, and Tomás was drawing a laughing, protesting Valentina forwards. The music was insistent, infectious, and Emily couldn’t have resisted its persuasive beat, even if it hadn’t been for Luis’s hands on her waist.
He was, she discovered with a debilitating kick of desire, a brilliant dancer. Pushing his fingers into the back pockets of her tight denim shorts he pulled her hips close to his so that they were swaying and undulating in unison, their upper bodies almost motionless, their gazes locked smokily together. For a long time they danced like that as the sun flamed lower, a blood orange dripping into the sea, turning his bare chest to beaten bronze, his eyes to liquid gold.
‘You’re a natural samba dancer,’ Luis murmured, his voice warm and husky with approval.
‘Perhaps I’ve found my niche.’ She smiled straight into his eyes. ‘I’m rubbish at ballet these days. No precision. No control.’
‘I love your lack of control.’
Instantly her smile faded and her body turned fluid with desire.
‘Luis, I—’
‘Shhh.’ His eyes were hooded as he placed a finger on her lips. ‘Not here. Not now.’ Around them the party continued, and he let her go and took a step back. ‘I think I should go and dance with the birthday girl for a little while, don’t you?’
Emily nodded mutely, half relieved at the respite from the exhausting onslaught of desire, half desolate at his abrupt withdrawal. She should be used to it by now, she told herself despairingly, watching him go over to Luciana. She should be used to wanting him—all of him—and having him always elude her.
Because that was the great flaw in the centre of her joy. He had awoken her, introduced her to pleasure and excitement she had never even previously imagined, and she had opened herself up to him completely, heart and mind and body and soul. While he…he remained as distant and unknowable as the moon.
Luciana’s delighted laughter rose into the soft apricot evening as Luis picked her up and twirled her round, her hands small on his muscular shoulders. Emily swallowed the lump in her throat, trying to summon a smile, like everyone else. Even though she’d just realised she was in love with the Crown Prince of Santosa and there wasn’t a chance that he loved her back.
Meaningless sex, that’s all it was for him.
Gorgeous, mind-blowing, life altering. But not enough.
Later, after Luciana’s birthday candles and the orange glow of the sun had both been extinguished and the dancing had given way to stories around the campfire, a yawning Luciana was put to bed in her silken-draped tent. Ducking through the doorway, Luis went in to say goodnight to her. She was almost asleep, and as he bent down beside the little camp bed he was hit by a rush of emotion so powerful it made it hard to breathe for a second.
Guilt. Always guilt, but now so much more.
‘Thank you for a lovely party,’ she whispered, the soft glow of the lantern beside her reflected in her shining eyes.
He smiled. ‘It’s my pleasure. Did you have a nice birthday?’
‘The best,’ she said fiercely. ‘The best birthday ever.’
Her answer, and the emphasis with which she spoke, took him by surprise. ‘Good,’ he said quietly, straightening up. ‘I’m glad.’
For a moment he hovered, the pressure of things he wanted to say but didn’t know how swelling in his throat, and then there was a rustle of canvas as Emily came in. She looked at him. In the cool, clear pools of her eyes he felt all his troubles could be washed away, and as she came towards the bed she brushed his arm with her fingertips and his throat closed and words deserted him anyway.
With a last smile at Luciana he went out. Everyone was sitting around the campfire a little distance away from the tents, but Luis didn’t go over. Picking up a bottle of beer he headed instead in the other direction, towards the cliffs at the far end of the cove. Ever since they arrived he had been aware of their dark bulk and had tried to ignore it, but he knew now that he could put it off no longer. He had to go down there, today of all days. Luciana’s birthday.
Her best birthday ever, he thought with a fresh burst of surprise. He was ashamed to remember how in previous years the date hadn’t really meant much to him, but he’d assumed that Rico and Christiana would have done something to make it special. But then maybe he didn’t know his brother as well as he’d tho
ught. He’d always been in awe of Rico for his absolute dedication to duty, but maybe that had been incompatible with being a hands-on, loving father.
Without thinking he had headed down to the water’s edge, walking along the hard sand with the lacy edges of the waves flapping gently over the tops of his feet. Ahead of him the cliffs rose up, huge and black and menacing. As he got closer to them the air got distinctly cooler, as if Rico’s restless spirit was lurking there.
Taking a mouthful of beer he turned away from the sea and headed up the beach, his feet sinking into the powdery sand as his eyes scanned the gloom for the huge mound of rock that he had privately marked out as Rico’s monument. Locating it he made his way towards it and lowered himself down onto the sand at its foot.
It was surprisingly warm against his bare back. He took another swig of beer from the bottle and looked back along the darkening beach. The glow of the campfire seemed a long, long way away, the figures around it just indistinguishable shapes, but inevitably he found himself automatically searching for Emily amongst them.
Emily. Just saying her name inside his head made his pulse quicken and his body harden. Deus, it was like being under some kind of spell. She had got inside him, and if he had found it hard to resist her before, now he had touched and tasted and possessed her it was almost impossible.
What had started as a relationship he had been ordered to fake for the sake of his public image had become something that was fundamental to the most private, personal part of himself. That was why he wanted to keep it secret, in some kind of attempt to protect it. And her. Because the moment anyone suspected that it was genuine, it would be over. As vividly as if she had been there, whispering it to him in the gathering gloom, he recalled Josefina’s comment about his private life It’s now a political matter rather than simply a personal one.
A movement a little distance away caught his eye. Someone was walking along the sand through the veils of milky twilight towards him, and he turned away facing out to sea, resentment and bitterness sweeping through him. It would be Tomás or one of the bodyguards, come to find him in their constant quest to protect him from bands of drug-crazed terrorists, rabid republicans, mentally unstable fanatics. What they couldn’t seem to grasp was that he wasn’t remotely bothered about any of those, but what terrified him was the very real danger of being locked into a lifetime of lies and emptiness.