Robyn Donald - Royals - Wed To The Prince - By Royal Command / The Princess and the Outlaw / The Prince's Secret Bride

Her heart picked up speed, the pulse at her wrist fluttering under his fingers.

Of course he noticed. After a charged second he said on a raw note, ‘I promised myself I wouldn’t touch you.’

Lauren had to force herself to return, ‘Then don’t. It’s not necessary.’

He lifted his hand, but as the car left the main road and began to climb, he said deliberately, ‘I don’t seem to be able to forget that for a few days we were lovers. Can you?’

Her bones melted as images from those few days flashed across her mind with full sensory impact. Attacked by a bitter regret, she said doggedly, ‘It was a time out of time—a lovely tropical fantasy, but now we’re in the real world, and it’s over.’

His ironic laughter stunned her. She flashed a sideways glance and shivered at the compelling determination of his expression. ‘Liar,’ he said calmly.

When Lauren opened her mouth to object he sealed her indignant response with his fingertip. Mutely, her body struggling with an overload of sensation, she stared at his arrogant, handsome face.

With that fascinating hint of an accent underlying each forceful word, he said, ‘No matter how hard we try to pretend, when I touch you we both feel that electricity. Don’t try to convince me—or yourself—that it doesn’t exist. What we need to talk about is how we’re going to deal with it.’

He removed his finger from her lips and sat back in the seat, his profile an angular, uncompromising statement against the silver-grey foliage of the olive trees lining the road.

With stubborn precision Lauren said, ‘We don’t do anything about it.’

Still quivering inside, she dragged her head around to stare blindly out of the window, fuming when Guy made no answer. Instead she heard him speak in Dacian through the intercom to the driver. His voice, easy and relaxed, told her that he wasn’t suffering any inner turmoil.

Lauren clawed back the tattered remnants of her control. Her father had once told her that the tone of a man’s servants told much about the master; listening to the driver, she decided that his respectful reply was entirely free from servility, and that he liked Guy.

Who said no more about the attraction that smouldered between them. Instead, with infuriating self-possession he turned into a tour guide, explaining the age and the reason for various interesting ruins along the way, and discoursing on his cousin’s plans for the island.

The villa in the hills was a tall, square house, redeemed from severity by blush-pink walls and shutters in a muted dark green. Gardens stretched around it, the trees and arbours melding inconspicuously into olive groves.

Delighted by its faded charm, Lauren leaned forward a little as the car swung up the drive.

From beside her Guy observed, ‘According to family tradition the house was built for the Venetian mistress of one of the nineteenth-century princes. She had an embarrassment of children, but he spent most of his time here.’

Lauren stiffened. ‘Why didn’t he marry her?’

‘He was already married to a very stern woman who never, so the story goes, smiled.’

‘I wouldn’t smile either if my husband flaunted a mistress in my face,’ Lauren said astringently, reaching for her bag as the car slowed down.

The second the words left her mouth she realised she’d made a mistake. Guy’s brow lifted and he surveyed her with a twisted smile. ‘Is it the infidelity or the flaunting that you disapprove of?’

‘Both,’ she said shortly, wishing that she could tell him about her relationship with Marc. She couldn’t, of course, because it wasn’t her secret.

Her mother came out of the shadows beneath the portico, graceful and composed as always, the grey eyes she’d bestowed on her daughter serene and limpid. Nevertheless her smile was a little too set, her movements too careful to be natural.

Hurrying out of the car, Lauren gave her a quick hug. ‘How’s Dad?’

Isabel smiled at Guy. ‘Fine. He’s waiting inside for you.’

As Lauren ran up the steps she heard her mother say, ‘Guy, thank you so much for organising this— I don’t know what we’d have done without you.’

Her tone revealed that she liked him. So did every other woman, Lauren thought with crisp cynicism as she walked into the coolness of the house and found her father waiting in a big drawing room decorated in a subdued palette of cream and ochre and the same silvery green as the olive leaves.

Nothing lushly tropical about this place!

‘Hello,’ she said and hugged him tightly. He returned it with vigour. Relieved, she pulled back and regarded him. ‘So now we know that you can travel by air without any problems,’ she observed severely, ‘you’ve no excuse to stay at home in future.’

He smiled at her. ‘It seems I need a nurse to keep an eye on me, but I got here in one piece. How are you, darling?’

‘A bit groggy from lack of sleep.’ Her rapid description of the exchange students’ antics made him laugh.

When she finished Guy said from behind, ‘I have an appointment in a few minutes, so I must leave now. I hope you enjoy your stay here.’

Flushing, Lauren remembered her manners. ‘I’ll come out with you.’

He stood back to let her through the door. Once it had closed behind them he said, ‘Walk in the garden with me for a few minutes.’

‘Why?’

His brow lifted. ‘Because it’s cooler than standing out on the gravel in the sun. Dacia is not as hot as Sant’Rosa or Valanu, but the sun will burn your white skin.’

Feeling foolish, she said, ‘Oh. Yes, all right.’

The garden, throbbing with cicadas, was certainly cooler. In the shade of a dark, dome-shaped tree, Guy remarked with disconcerting shrewdness, ‘Satisfied that your father hasn’t taken any harm from flying?’

She blinked back tears and gave him a strained smile. ‘He looks great. They both do. Guy—oh, in public, should I call you Your Highness?’

‘No,’ he said tersely, his voice quick and hard and cold.

‘I don’t want to break any rules,’ she said.

He showed his teeth in a smile that held little humour. ‘Between us,’ he said sardonically, ‘we’ve broken so many that it doesn’t matter. The first time you meet Luka, call him Your Royal Highness. After that it’s sir, until he tells you not to bother with formality. The same applies to Alexa, although she has a tendency to giggle when anyone calls her ma’am.’

He sounded fed up. Lauren said, ‘Thanks. In fact, thank you for everything. I imagine that between us we’ve made a huge mess of your schedule, and I’m sorry—’

He interrupted with curt impatience, ‘Don’t be foolish. Naturally I feel responsible for this situation; I shall do what I can to make it easier for you. Now go inside, have a meal, talk to your parents and go to bed as soon as it gets dark. Do you ride?’

She blinked. ‘Yes, I do. Well, Pony Club level.’

‘Then I’ll call for you after breakfast tomorrow morning with a suitable mount,’ he said and flicked her cheek with a casual finger. ‘Sleep well.’

‘No— Guy—that’s not a good idea.’

His black brows lifted. ‘What? Sleeping? I think it’s an excellent idea.’

The lazy, caressing note in his voice set fires smouldering deep inside her. Gritting her teeth, she said, ‘I don’t want to fuel more media furore. Shouldn’t we keep as far away from each other as possible in case the marriage has to be annulled?’

‘Discovering that the marriage might be valid hasn’t turned me into a serial rapist,’ he drawled in a voice like chipped ice.

Her eyes widened as she searched his hard face. ‘I know that, but—’

He cut her off with a total lack of finesse. Every word sharp-edged, he said, ‘My cousin Luka is as close to being an absolute ruler as you can get nowadays without aspiring to dictatorship. He’s slowly organising a democratic system of government—against the wishes of most of his subjects so far—but at the moment he can ban anyone he doesn’t want on the island, and if anyone does sneak in, he can see that they get shown politely off.’ He frowned, but his voice softened as he said, ‘Why do you think I brought you here?’