Page 13 of Incognito

“I’m no prince,” Dante said, his hand tightening on her waist.

Natasha stiffened, knowing how much Dante’s privacy meant and what a prick like Clay could do with the information if he found out. Guys like Clay did everything for a reason, usually involving getting ahead in the world and looking out for number one, themselves.

“Instead, you’re Natasha’s new boyfriend. How sweet.” There was nothing remotely sweet about Clay’s false saccharine or the nasty leer he turned on her. “I should’ve known. There’s no way a prince would be remotely interested in someone like you.”

Natasha flinched despite the shield she’d built around her ego after ending the relationship with Clay.

Damn him for still having the power to hurt her.

Damn him for being here and potentially ruining her plan to use the prince to salvage something from the mess Clay had lumbered her family with.

“Apologise to the lady,” Dante said, his voice a low growl. “Now.”

Dante’s arm slipped from her waist as he took a step forward and crazily, she missed his solid warmth.

Clay’s sneer turned sinister, the same expression she’d seen when she told him what he could do with his two carat baguette diamond the night she’d come to her senses.

“Who the hell are you to tell me what to do?” Clay matched Dante’s step forward until the two were almost toe to toe.

Natasha laid a steadying hand on Dante’s arm, shocked how hot his bare skin felt under her palm and how much she liked it.

“He’s someone you’ll never be,” she said, wishing she’d had the guts to inject this much scorn into her voice the last time they spoke, when Clay threatened her family yet again. “Now get lost.”

It didn’t pack the same punch as ‘fuck off’ but she didn’t want to appear uncouth in front of Dante, not when she hoped to get him onside for her plan.

Clay’s eyes narrowed to slits, reminding her of a snake she’d once seen at Australia’s biggest reptile park: dangerous, slimy, lethal.

“You’ll be sorry,” he said, so softly she could’ve imagined it.

However, Dante’s bunched forearm muscles under her hand told her she hadn’t. Wound tighter than a spring, Dante looked ready to defend her honour whether she needed it or not.

As much as she liked Dante’s chivalry, she didn’t need an international incident on her hotel’s doorstep. Besides, Clay wasn’t worth it. He wasn’t worth anything.

Not anymore.

“First you don’t apologise, now you’re threatening the lady?” Dante shrugged off her restraining hand and now stood inches away from Clay’s face, while Natasha struggled between wanting to leap on Dante’s back to distract him and slug Clay herself. “Who the hell do you think you are?”

“I was the fool going to marry her,” Clay said, casting one last malevolent glare her way before turning on his heel and striding away.

Clay’s cowardice shouldn’t surprise her. Nothing about him surprised her, considering what he’d put her through, what he’d put her family through.

Dante turned to face her, incredulous. “You were engaged to that dick?”

“Don’t remind me.” She held up her hand as if trying to ward off further talk of Clay. Needless to say, a smart guy like Dante didn’t buy it for a second.

“You can do so much better than him.” Dante spoke softly, his blue eyes warm, a tentative smile flirting around his mouth as he reached out and captured her hands.

Natasha had expected him to interrogate her, to question her lousy judgement, rather than hold her hands with a gentle tenderness that brought a lump to her throat.

She stared at their linked hands, enjoying the solid warmth they provided, a comfort she never got from the few times Clay would deign to be touched in public.

But she shouldn’t be enjoying Dante’s comforting touch. He was a prince, a prince she needed to save her business, a prince who needed his identity protected, yet here she was, turning to mush over his chivalry out the front of her hotel.

Disengaging her hands from his, she folded her arms over her chest. “What was the urgent business?”

And what was all that scintillating kissing about, though she wisely kept that question to herself for now. She needed to focus before she tackled him over his kisses, considering her resistance was at an all time low following his knight-in-shining-armour impersonation.

“That idiot was following me. He called out ‘Prince’ several times but I ignored him. I wanted you to meet me out the front so you could pretend to be my girlfriend and throw him off track.”

---