Romy Sommer - Waking up in Vegas - A Royal Romance to Remember!

She struggled up from the sofa, but Max was quicker. He caught her up in his arms and, ignoring her protest, carried her back to the bedroom. “Second time I get to carry you across the threshold.” His voice was low and husky, right by her ear.

“Please tell me we didn’t follow every cheesy wedding custom? If we were married at a drive-through or by Elvis, I think I might throw up.”

“Pink Cadillac, Elvis in a white suit, and everything.”

She must have turned green, because he laughed, a deep rumble against her chest. “That was a joke. Except for the glitter guns, it was classy and intimate. And very, very private.”

“I don’t suppose you have pictures?” Not that she planned to keep a scrapbook of the occasion, but maybe they’d trigger a memory…

“No pictures.” He smiled, and this time she had the distinct impression he was smiling at some secret. Almost gloating.

She narrowed her eyes. There was something she was missing here.

“Shall I tell you a bedtime story?” An odd way to divert her, but she nodded. No-one had told her a bedtime story since she was ten and her mother died. Since Dad almost always worked nights, she’d usually been tucked away to sleep in some dingy dressing room, or in the corner of a brightly-lit green room. Dad always said it was her greatest accomplishment: the ability to sleep anywhere at any time.

His death had robbed her of that gift. Sleep eluded her most nights now.

Max laid her down on the bed and pulled the covers over her, tucking her in. It was certainly nice to be taken care of, and made for a pleasant change. And maybe, if she was really lucky, she’d wake up and find this was all nothing more than a strange dream.

She closed her eyes and didn’t open them when Max climbed onto the bed next to her. He stayed above the covers but looped an arm across her hip. The weight of it was strangely comforting, in spite of the flutter in her heartbeat that accompanied it.

“A long time ago, in a kingdom far away,” Max began. “There was a king who lived in a big stone castle. Since his kingdom controlled access to the river, he was a very rich and powerful king. Like all kings of that time, he married a wealthy princess from another land. It was, of course, an arranged marriage, and the king never bothered to make any effort to know his bride, or to love her. Instead he flaunted his mistress for the entire kingdom to see, giving his bastard children great honours, and carving up the kingdom between them. His subjects grew to hate him, and they hated his mistress even more, and when he announced that he was divorcing his rightful queen to marry his mistress, the people revolted. They appealed to the queen’s family who sent an army, and for many years the little kingdom was torn apart by civil war.

“When the war finally ended, the kingdom was never again as prosperous as it had been. The new king who took the throne, after his uncle was brutally and publicly executed, made a vow to his people: never again would any member of the royal family divorce. They would love their spouses and live quietly without scandal for as long as the kingdom remained.

“A powerful sorceress witnessed his vow and cast a spell on his family, a blessing on their marriages. Ever since, every marriage in the royal family has been a happy one, and the couples have always found true love with the one they married.”

It was a very strange bedtime story. She’d never heard anything like it. But his voice was hypnotic, and his hand stroking down her hip was soothing. Phoenix sank back into sleep, the deepest sleep she’d had in months without the aid of sedatives.

Max lay beside Phoenix and watched her sleep. Awake, she had a vibrancy about her that made it hard to see the real woman behind the façade, but asleep the fragility beneath the surface was more apparent. Her slender face, with high, pronounced cheekbones and pointed chin, looked almost elfin.

After the restlessness driving him these last couple of weeks and the jet lag from all the travelling he’d done, it was an unexpected joy to do nothing. And to do nothing with the woman who turned him inside out every time he looked at her.

He hadn’t truly believed all those stories he’d been raised on about falling in love at first sight until the moment it happened to him. It had been that way for his parents, and his grandparents, but he hadn’t given his own marriage much thought.

But the moment he’d walked into that dive of a bar and seen Phoenix leaning over the pool table, concentration focussed on lining up her next shot, he’d been a believer. ‘Moth to a flame’ and all those other clichés had nothing on the instant attraction he’d felt for her. And it wasn’t all due to the sexy, slender figure wrapped in tight jeans. Her appeal had been more than physical. She’d laughed as she’d lifted her head and caught his eye, and he’d been dazzled.

He still felt dazzled.

And she still hadn’t removed his ring from her finger.

He stroked his finger lightly down her cheek, and Phoenix stirred in her sleep, full, pink lips curving in a brief smile as she sank deeper into sleep. She smiled a lot when she was awake, but that smile was nothing like this one. She seemed to have a public smile, a wide, bright one, and this smile, her more intimate, sexier one. Fitting. He knew all about the difference between the public persona and the private one, and it would make life easier on his wife if she did too.

He fluffed the pillow beneath his head and rolled on his back to look up at the ceiling. For the first time since he’d received the tearful midnight phone call from his mother, he felt at peace.

The big state funeral in the gothic cathedral in Neustadt had been more than he could bear. All that ritual and pomp for someone who was no longer there to appreciate it. It was life that should be celebrated, not death. So he’d said the right words, shaken the right hands, and got on the first plane back to the States.

He’d stood in the vast concourse at JFK and watched the flight announcements flashing on the large screens, and for a moment he’d wondered what life was really all about. He’d felt as if he stood at a crossroads, between a life only half lived and all those things he still wanted to do. Then the Las Vegas flight had shown up and he’d known that’s where he wanted to be.

Destiny had called and here he was.

He traced a finger over Phoenix’s lips. She’d met death up close and personal too. And she too had chosen to celebrate being alive. He’d never met a woman so full of life and energy, so dedicated to making the most of every moment, that in the space of an hour she’d made him feel more alive than he ever had before. It had taken even less time than that to lose his heart to her.

He had no intention of letting her go now that he’d found her. All he had to do was talk her out of this nonsense about a divorce.

By the time she finally woke, Max had dressed, phoned his grandfather to check all was well at the vineyard, and glanced through the evening papers. He breathed a sigh of relief to see Westerwald’s grief hadn’t made the US press. The death of an unknown European Archduke was already old news and Max’s anonymity was still safe.

Phoenix padded into the living room, rubbing her eyes, blonde, sun-streaked hair rumpled. Her hair was darker underneath, he noticed, and curlier where the strands touched her collar bone.

“What time is it?”

He folded the paper and set it aside. “Lunchtime. Shall we go out?”

“I’d rather not.” She began to collect her clothes that still lay scattered across the floor, a vivid reminder of the passion that had overtaken them the night before.