Page 11 of His Royal Bride Replacement

‘I haven’t felt as though you were a stranger from the first moment I met you,’ Alessio told her truthfully. ‘But that’s not a reproach or an argument. We should’ve had this conversationbeforethe wedding but I was in too much of a rush to win your agreement.’

‘To be fair, you didn’t have the luxury of time or space with that announcement about Graziana to make.’ Rosy shook her head and turned away, still scarcely able to credit that he had simply assumed sex would be included in their agreement.

But were his expectations so far removed from reality? a little voice chimed inside her head. In a world where men and women could meet once and have sex and never meet again? Suddenly she was quite sure that she had come across as a terrible prude but she wasn’t about to apologise for it. There were limits to what she was prepared to do on her family’s behalf and casual sex was a hard limit for her.

She had stayed a virgin to the age of twenty-two not because she was a moralist, not by any specific choice but mostly by an awareness of her own nature. She was a romantic, she was cautious, and she was cynical about attachments based on sex because she had seen so many of those fail around her. She didn’t want to risk falling for some loser who wanted her only for the fleeting release her body could give him. She valued herself a little higher than that. Undoubtedly, she had been helped by the simple fact that she had never met anyone she truly craved a closer physical connection with.

And then Alessio had appeared on that bridge and raw, visceral attraction had flared through every inch of her being the instant she’d met his stunning eyes. Ever since then she had been determined to protect herself and not yield to that shocking physical chemistry. Alessio would forget her existence the day the ink was dry on their divorce papers. He would remarry some lofty, titled lady similar to Graziana, have children and probably never think about the Cinderella who had briefly dug him out of a difficult predicament ever again. That was just a hard fact of life.

‘We’ll discuss it…some other time. Not while I’m wondering where I can sleep tonight,’ Alessio murmured with wry humour.

So, he wasn’t about to dispute her stance. Relief filled Rosy. ‘I’ll look for bed linen and you can pick a sofa in that nightmare-inducing drawing room. When was this house last checked by the palace?’

‘I have no idea.’

‘It must’ve been years ago. The roof is leaking like a sieve upstairs. You can’t leave a property like this untended for so long. Whoever is responsible for property on your staff dropped the ball, and, if I were you, that would make me ask for a check on any other properties you have in your portfolio.’

‘You’re cooking… I am so grateful that youcancook,’ Alessio groaned, appreciating her point. ‘I’ll check out the bed linen, take a look upstairs. I’mnothelpless.’

He strode out, leaving her at the stove, engaged in making one of Patrick’s signature quick pasta dishes. She listened to him hefting cases up from the hall and she smiled, deciding that she might even be kind enough to make up the chosen sofa for his benefit.

* * *

Alessio wandered round the upper floor in a daze. It was a dump on the brink of extinction, and he was inclined to let it self-destruct. He walked into the single habitable bedroom and immediately recognised his mother’s signature colour scheme of white with touches of blue. His stomach churned and he no longer wanted to argue about sleeping downstairs on a sofa. But the sharing of the singledryfull-functioning bathroom in the house still had to be negotiated. He might be willing to sleep on a sofa but he wasn’t willing to do it unwashed.

And what about that? A wife who wasn’t a wife? He had made an unbelievably naïve assumption. He had imagined that Rosy understood what he intended with their marriage. He had never, not for one moment, planned onfake. She believed that he had married her to be a figurehead, presumably, a last-minute replacement and no more for Graziana. It hadn’t occurred to Rosy that he found her far more attractive and appealing than his former fiancée, that he wasn’t a man who had ever expected to have much say in who he married or much genuine liking or desire for his bride. But Rosy had broken the mould of his expectations, giving him a glimpse of brighter possibilities in his future…and he had simply reached for her and grabbed.

Withoutexplanation.

That was where he had gone wrong. He was a man who from adolescence had been surrounded by women who would give him anything he wanted without question. He had never ever had to explain his wants, needs or wishes. Everything had come to him without him even asking for it. All those women had wanted one or more of three things from him. Sex. Luxury. Status. Only it seemed Rosy didn’t crave any of those benefits. And yet when he had kissed her, he had fully believed she desired him as much as he desired her. So, what else hadhegot wrong aside from the horror-movie wedding night in a hopefully un-haunted house?

He located a linen cupboard for the first time in his life, ridiculously relieved that the dripping water hadn’t accessed its contents. He yanked out musty sheets and a pillow and returned to the drawing room. It creeped him out too, all those moth-eaten trophies with their glassy eyes staring down. He shook out a sheet and draped it over a sofa, dropped the pillow into place.

‘Alessio!’ Rosy called.

He appeared in the kitchen doorway. ‘Is there time for me to take a shower before we eat?’

‘If you can accomplish it within twenty minutes,’ she warned him. ‘Is there any wine here that you know of?’

‘I’ll check the drawing room.’

He returned with a dusty bottle and two glasses. ‘There’s a fully stocked wine cellar under the house. I remember that.’

‘You’re not going down into a basement in this place,’ Rosy told him firmly. ‘Not on my watch. There could be rotten wooden steps,rats…who knows?’

Alessio laughed, green eyes glimmering with appreciation. ‘I hear you.’

‘Do you mind if we eat in here? I know it’s a kitchen but it’s clean and the dining room isn’t.’

‘That’s fine with me.’

As he departed, Rosy sighed and set the farmhouse table. He had cooled off quickly, travelling from angry frustration to laid-back acceptance, and that relieved her. Her father had been an angry, offensive drunk whom they had all carefully avoided to the best of their ability when he’d been under the weather.

Alessio returned just as she was putting out the meal. She took a single glance at him, sheathed in jeans and a white tee, and her tongue cleaved to the roof of her suddenly dry mouth. Black hair still damp from the shower and tousled, falling round his lean, sculpted features, green eyes crystalline with clarity and vigour. She snatched a sudden breath and turned away quickly. He had gone through the same day she had and he had not had the chance to sleep and yet he wasstillbuzzing with energy. How could that be?

‘I laid out fresh towels for you from the linen press.’

‘My goodness, you’re very well house-trained,’ Rosy quipped as she set the plates down on the table and he opened the wine. ‘Where are your security team staying?’

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