Carole Mortimer - Prince's Passion

‘But so do I,’ she snapped. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me…? I must just go over and say hello to Susan’s parents.’ Thank goodness she had just spotted their familiar faces across the room.

Nik Prince moved his hand, but only to take a proprietorial hold of her elbow instead. ‘How about you introduce me? I can say hello to them too, and then I’ll finally know your name.’

She met his gaze unblinkingly. ‘My name is Juliet.’

His eyes widened momentarily, as if that wasn’t quite what he had expected to hear—as, indeed, it probably wasn’t!—and then his considerable acting skills took over and he gave an acknowledging inclination of his head. ‘Now that’s more like it.’

‘That hardly makes you my Romeo, Mr Prince.’

‘Pity,’ he drawled. ‘And it’s Nik.’

‘Nik,’ she accepted shortly.

‘Okay.’ He smiled his satisfaction with her compliance. ‘And what do you do, Juliet?’

‘Do?’ she delayed warily.

‘Careerwise. Or have I committed some sort of social gaffe and you don’t do anything?’

The amusement in his tone annoyed her intensely. ‘What I do, Mr—Nik,’ she corrected irritably as he gave her a reproving look, ‘is teach. History. At Cambridge University.’ She tried to keep that slight tone of pride out of her voice when she said the latter, knowing she had failed miserably as his firmly sculptured mouth twisted mockingly. ‘Although I’m in the middle of taking a year’s sabbatical at the moment,’ she enlarged.

‘And does that make you a Dr Something?’

‘It does. Now if you will excuse me? I know I may have arrived on my own this evening, but that really doesn’t mean that I am on my own,’ she pointed out.

‘Well, of course you aren’t—I’m here now.’

Jinx gave him an exasperated frown. ‘That isn’t what I meant and you know it!’

‘Do I?’

‘Yes,’ she easily dismissed his too-innocent expression.

‘I see.’ He glanced around the room. ‘And which one of the twenty or so men here tonight is going to come over and claim you?’

Jinx felt the colour warm her cheeks. No one was going to ‘come over and claim her’, because at twenty-eight she was single, had never been married, and probably never would be.

She straightened her shoulders, at the same time shrugging off his hand under her elbow. ‘I really don’t think that is any of your concern, Mr Prince,’ she told him quietly, stepping completely away from him now as she turned and walked across the room.

But she was totally aware, with every step that she took, that Nik Prince was watching the sensuous sway of her hips!

* * *

Nik stood and watched the redhead’s departure with narrowed, enigmatic eyes.

Damn. He hadn’t made too good a job of that, now had he? He really must be rusty when it came to the art of seduction. Because Juliet ‘Jinx’ Nixon certainly hadn’t been seduced!

He’d had to wait days for the man he had hired to watch the post office box to confirm that a girl came to collect the mail at twelve-thirty every day. Nik had then taken over himself, only to realize, on closer inspection, when she had arrived, that she wasn’t a girl at all, just a very petite woman. The denims, tee shirt and baseball cap she’d worn had served to disguise her age. Deliberately so? He had thought so.

In fact he’d been totally convinced of it when she’d gone outside to the adjacent car park, unlocked a Volkswagen Golf, and thrown her mail in the back of the car before removing the baseball cap and shaking out the long length of her fiery red hair. Then she’d thrown the cap in the back with her letters before taking out a tailored jacket and pulling it on over the tee shirt.

The transformation from a teenager like almost every other teenager Nik had been able to see walking down the street, to a beautifully elegant older woman, had taken only a little adjustment of the clothing and an application of a deep peach lipgloss.

Nik had followed her as she’d taken a shoulder bag from the back of the car and set off down the street, standing well back when she’d gone into a busy Italian bistro and met a beautiful blonde woman for lunch. Susan Fellows, he had learnt afterwards after quizzing one of the busy waitresses. When, incidentally, his seductive tone had been more than successful!

A couple of conversations with his sister Stazy later—a young lady residing in London herself with her husband and baby son, and more intimately acquainted with the London social scene than he was—and he’d known exactly who Susan Fellows was. Even more interesting than that, he had quickly discovered that her luncheon companion was a very good friend of Susan’s called Jinx Nixon.

It hadn’t taken too many more enquiries to learn that Jinx’s father was Jackson Ivor Nixon, also a university professor who taught history, and an authority on the Jacobite uprisings, author of several prestigious books on the subject. Nik had put two and two together and realized that Jackson Ivor Nixon also had to be J. I. Watson, the author of No Ordinary Boy…

Nik had also figured out why he preferred to remain anonymous; Jackson I. Nixon was an extremely well-respected author of several historical tomes. No Ordinary Boy, while being a runaway success, was actually a book written for children, but which had been taken up and read by adults and children alike, about a young boy of twelve confined to a wheelchair who suddenly became a superhero. Not exactly Jackson I. Nixon material!

And following Jinx, having her checked out, wasn’t the most scrupulously honest thing he had ever done, Nik allowed ruefully, but a necessary evil as far as he was concerned. As had been the seduction scene when Jinx had arrived at her friend’s party a few minutes ago.

Not that it had been too much of a hardship; Juliet ‘Jinx’ Nixon was an extremely beautiful woman.

She hadn’t seemed too impressed with him, though! Nik winced inwardly. Never mind, it was early days yet. He wasn’t known for his patience when it came to directing temperamental actors and actresses, but when it came to something he wanted, then he could be extremely patient, indeed. And he wanted the movie rights to J. I. Watson’s book. Jinx Nixon’s father’s book…

‘Exactly what are you up to, big brother of mine?’ Stazy linked her arm through his as she looked up at him knowingly. ‘And don’t say nothing,’ she warned mischievously. ‘I know you far too well for that. And I saw you make a beeline for that beautiful redhead the moment she came in the door.’

He never had been able to put too much over on Stazy. At twenty-two she was seventeen years his junior, and had been the single constant weakness in his life from the moment she was born. Her marriage to Jordan Hunter just over a year ago, and the birth of her son Sam three months ago, had given her a confidence that brooked no refusal.

‘In fact,’ Stazy continued thoughtfully, a beautiful redhead herself, although at five feet nine inches tall she would completely dwarf the petite Jinx Nixon, ‘now that I think about it, it was almost as if you were waiting for her to arrive. Nik, what—?’

‘Don’t worry about it, honey,’ he advised with a pat on the hand she rested on his arm.

‘But I do worry about it, Nik,’ she persisted.

He gave a resigned sigh. When Stazy got her teeth into something, she was apt not to let go. Since her successful marriage to Jordan she had been more than a little obvious in her marriage-making plans for her three older brothers. And as all three of the Prince brothers were in England at the moment in preparation for baby Sam’s christening tomorrow, she was taking full advantage of this opportunity to play matchmaker…!

‘I shouldn’t,’ he murmured softly, his gaze warning her off the subject.