Page 20 of The Wanted Prince

“Water.” I jerked my head at the skylight. “It’s leaking. A drop just went straight down my back.”

He laughed. “Oh, my God. I thought I’d hurt you somehow.”

“No, no, you’re great. But?—”

“But…” He sighed.

I closed my eyes. All I wanted to do was curl into his arms, let him soothe my shivers all through the night. But it would be night soon, and the storm was still raging. We’d be stuck here till morning, and we had to be smart.

“I should book another room,” I said.

“Another room? What?”

I cleared my throat. “If it somehow does come out we’re in this together, we’ll have the whole world tracing our steps. The clerk hasn’t seen you, but she’s seen me. We can’t risk her saying we shared a bed.”

“She could say so anyway.”

“But we’ll have the receipts.” I backed away, groping out blind for my clothes. I’d hung my dress on a chair by the radiator, and it had dried crispy. I cringed at the feel. When I pulled it on, the collar was damp. So was the stitching around the waist.

“I’ll miss you,” said Alessandro. “You could always sneak back to me after lights-out.”

I laughed. “She might hear.”

“I hate being smart,” he groaned.

I hated it too, but my neck still felt cold. A chill to remind me of all we stood to lose, and all we’d already risked with our liaison. Alessandro didn’t blame me for his situation, but I couldn’t help wondering, if we’d stayed at the ball, would it have been so easy to hide him from view? Someone might have seen him, or some camera. He might’ve been able to clear his name.

“Just one more kiss.” He clasped my hand. I let him draw me to him and sank into his kiss. It felt like drowning. Being consumed. Then it was over and he was letting me go, and I wanted more than anything to change my mind.

It took all my willpower to slip on my shoes, to grab my phone and purse and head down to the foyer. The clerk wasn’t there, so I rang for service. A few moments later, she came bustling out. I explained more than I needed to, how I was traveling with a friend. How we’d only come in to wait out the storm. We’d be staying the night now, and I’d need my own room. She rang me up without comment and passed me my key. I took it and retreated to my own lonely suite.

Alone in my room, I slipped out of my damp dress, and hung it up again and found a fresh robe. I lay down on my bed and listened to the storm, and to Alessandro pacing upstairs. Was he as frustrated as I was, or had he turned back to his list?

I reached for a pillow and pulled it over my face, but I could still hear him, or fancied I could. It made no sense, me wanting him as much as I did. We’d flirted before, but never like this. I’d never felt this pull to him, this carnal attraction. Was it just the hot lure of forbidden fruit? Or was there more to it, some missing piece? Something he had, my whole being cried out for?

He’s just hot, I told myself. It’s the contrast, is all. Last time I’d seen him, he’d been this teenage boy, still growing into his gangly limbs. Now he was grown, and he was fine, dark eyes like thunder. Lustrous black hair. Taut muscles rippled under his skin, twitching when I touched him. When I made him moan. His voice was deeper now, gravelly. Sexy. I wanted him to stretch himself out behind me, and press his soft lips up to my ear. To tell me in low tones what he wanted to do, where he wanted to touch me. Where he wanted to kiss. How he’d make me gasp for him, how he’d make me?—

I jerked my hand back, where it had wandered up my thigh.

“He’s a bad idea,” I said aloud, then I clamped my jaw shut. What if he’d heard me? But he knew it, too. We didn’t make sense. His life was in Santaviedo. Mine was in New York. Our families had feuded for hundreds of years. And if that wasn’t bad enough, there was his list. We hadn’t even finished it, and he had a good dozen names. A great, glaring roadmap to his playboy past. Here are the hearts I’ve left broken, it said. So, how about it? Want to add yours to the list?

I didn’t want that. I might not survive it. I’d be losing my oldest friend, not just a lover.

I didn’t want Alessandro to shatter my heart, but I did want his hands and his lips and his tongue. I did want his body stretched out next to mine. I wanted him on me, in me, with me. Every touch, every sigh that would come before heartbreak, I did want all that so bad it hurt.

I reached for my nightstand and flicked off the lamp and lay in the dark trying to banish my want. But I could still feel where he’d touched me and kissed me, where his warm lips had brushed. Where his nails had dug in. He’d left his imprint on my desires, and I wondered if I’d ever be free again.

CHAPTER 8

ALESSANDRO

Iwondered if Laura could tell I was sweating.

She hadn’t said anything for a few miles, absorbed in the countryside, the forests and fields. We were still in Spain, but far from civilization. This was where Pedro had fled when I’d left him disgraced, his business gone bankrupt, his reputation in tatters.

I’d picked him to see first purely because I thought he’d be the least shocking. I hadn’t stolen his girlfriend or been caught with his daughter, or had a threesome in his room. In his bed. But I had left him ruined, and I was starting to see that; the poverty of these backwoods he’d picked for his refuge. We’d passed one little farmhouse with its barn in ruins, a cluster of cottages with sun-bleached tile roofs. Goats stood in their dooryards and watched us go by. My neck prickled, clammy under my collar.

“Deals go south,” said Laura. “I doubt he’s still that mad.”

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