Page 22 of A Throne for the Taking

‘And marrying me?’ he demanded roughly.

A small flick of her head might have been an answer. It might just as well have been a dismissal of the question as one she refused to answer. Her lips were pressed tight against each other, as if refusing to let any real response out. The problem was the deep gut-instinct that wrenched at him, seeing that. He wanted to lean forward, to stroke his thumb along the line of her mouth, ease those rose-tinted lips apart, cover her mouth with his, taste her, invade the moist warmth.

His heart thudded so hard against his rib cage that he felt sure she must hear it and his body hardened in hunger that made him want to groan aloud. When he had chosen that blue nightdress and robe he had imagined how she might look in it, the pale silk and darker blue lace contrasting with the creamy softness of her skin; the deep vee neckline plunging over the smooth curves of her breasts, the rich tumble of her hair along her shoulders. The reality far overshadowed his imaginings and his senses were even further besieged by the perfume of some floral shampoo as she moved her head, the scent of her skin driving him half-crazy with sexual need.

‘That’s a fait accompli.’ Ria’s cool voice sliced into his heated imaginings, making him fight to pay attention to what she was actually saying. ‘But don’t you think our “romance” will be more convincing if we spend more time together—as a man and a woman, not just as king and queen? I appreciate that you have many commitments—duties. Though I would have thought that when those duties were done...’

‘You’d have liked me to come to your room, to snatch an hour—maybe less?’ he challenged. ‘You would have thought that was worth it?’

If he’d gone to her room then he wouldn’t have stayed just for an hour, that was the truth. If he’d visited her there once, they would never have emerged until both of them were sated and exhausted. And he would have been totally in her power, sexually enslaved as never before in his life. He wasn’t ready to risk that yet. He had the disturbing feeling that it would not be enough. That he would never be free again.

‘I would have liked some attention—other than these gifts!’

‘You don’t like presents?’

‘Presents are not...’

Ria almost choked on the realisation of what she had been about to say. Presents are not feelings. Presents are not love. Just where had that word come from?

Love. She didn’t want to think that. She most definitely didn’t want to feel that. But, now that the word had slipped into her thoughts, there was no way she was going to get it back into its box.

‘Presents are not...?’ Alexei prompted when she found her tongue frozen, unable to continue.

‘Not important.’ She bit the words out.

‘A pity.’ It actually sounded genuine. ‘I had hoped you would enjoy them. So perhaps I should cancel tomorrow’s sessions with the couturier?’

‘What would I need more dresses for? I have more than—’

‘For the Black and White Ball,’ Alexei inserted smoothly, cutting her off. There was a new glint in his eyes and his mouth seemed to have softened unexpectedly. ‘You didn’t think I would go ahead with that?’ he asked as he saw the astonishment she couldn’t hide. ‘It is tradition. And you always wanted to attend such an event.’

She’d told him that when she was thirteen. Ten years ago. And he’d remembered?

‘With the masks and everything?’

She couldn’t stop the excitement from creeping into her voice. She had always been fascinated by the black and white masked ball that was traditionally held to mark the start of the coronation celebrations. The last time it had happened she had been too young to attend, and the sudden and unexpected death of the new king had come before there had been time to organise it.

‘With the masks,’ Alexei confirmed.

‘I never expected that you of all people would be interested.’

‘Me of all people?’

Another mistake. His mood had changed totally, taking with it the lighter atmosphere that had touched the room.

‘And why is that, my dear duchess? Did you think that a commoner like me would not be able to cope with a formal ball?’

‘I never...’ She had been thinking of his wild past, the stories in the papers of long sessions in nightclubs, the images of him emerging, bleary-eyed and dishevelled, in the early hours of the morning. That terrible photo of him battered and bruised, his face bloody. ‘I didn’t think it would be your sort of thing.’

‘I can dance. My father insisted that I had lessons—it’s not something I’m likely to forget.’

There was such a wealth of memory in that statement that it woke echoes in Ria’s mind.

‘Madame Herone?’ she questioned, recalling the hours she had spent being drilled in ballroom dancing by the stern disciplinarian.

Alexei nodded, that gleam deepening in the darkness of his eyes.

‘I’m surprised we didn’t end up having lessons together.’

No, she’d overstepped some mark there, she realised, feeling a painful twist of regret as the warmth faded like an ebbing tide.

‘Your father was determined that we should never spend time together.’

She hadn’t known that. Had simply believed that the dance lessons, like so many other things, were something that Alexei had rebelled against. How many other stories had she been told that had been just that—lies told to prevent her getting too close to him, getting to know him properly?

‘It might have made everything so much more bearable. Do you remember that cane she had?’

Ria shuddered as she remembered how the dance teacher had wielded the cane like a weapon, rapping it sharply and painfully against her pupils’ ankles if they made a mistake.

‘I used to come out of lessons with my legs a mass of bruises.’

‘No Huh-Honoria...’ Alexei’s tone mimicked the teacher’s delivery perfectly, with a strange half-breath before her name. ‘On your toes, if you please... And one, two, three—one, two, three...’

He was holding out his arms to Ria as he spoke and she found herself moving into them, picking up the rhythm.

‘One, two, three...’

The speed was building. She was being swung around, whirled about the room, faster and faster. And she was being held so close, his arm at her back, clamped against the base of her spine, crushing her against him so that she could feel the heat of his body through the fine silk of her nightdress. Not just the heat; crushed this close, she couldn’t be unaware of the hardness and power of his erection that spoke of a deeper, more primitive need than the light-hearted dance he had lead her into. Her feet barely seemed to touch the floor, her toes lifting from the carpet as she was steered across the room.

But it wasn’t just the speed of the dance or the whirling turns that made her head spin. It was the sensation of being held in his arms, their strength supporting her, the burn of his palm at her back where the nightgown dipped low over her spine. His heartbeat, heavy, powerful, strong just under her cheek, seemed to take her pulse and lift it, make it throb in an unconscious echo of his, her breathing quickening, become shallow.

‘One, two, three...’

She would never know if it was an accident or deliberate but at that moment it seemed that his foot caught on the edge of a rug, throwing them off-balance, stumbling, falling. Somehow Alexei twisted so that she landed safely on to the huge soft bed, crushed a heartbeat later by the heavy weight of Alexei’s long body.

‘Alex!’ His name escaped on a rush of air, gasping in a mix of complicated reactions.

With her face buried against the strong column of his neck, nose against the warm satin of his skin, she could inhale the personal scent of his body, feel the effect of it slide through her like warm smoke. If she just pushed her lips forward a centimetre or less she would taste him, be able to press her tongue against the lean muscles, the heavy pulse.

Above her Alexei went totally still, freezing into an immobility that caught the breath in her throat and held it there, tightly knotted.

‘Ria,’ he said, rough and raw as if dragged from a painfully sore throat. ‘Ria, look at me...’

Half-fearful, half-excited, she made herself look up at him, meeting the gleaming onyx blaze of his eyes and feeling it burning up inside her. His face was set and raw, skin stretched tight across his broad cheekbones where a flash of red stained them darkly. She knew what that meant, knew her own face must bear a similar mark. Her blood was molten in her veins, her heartbeat thundering at her temples so that she couldn’t think straight.

‘This is why I never came to you before now. I knew that if I came to you it would be like this.’

He moved slightly, stroking a warm palm over her exposed skin, shifting against her so that she felt the heated swell of his erection. The heady mix of excitement and hunger drove her to make a soft mewling sound that had him drawing in a raw, unsteady breath.

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