A Throne for the Taking (10 page)

This suite was larger even than the one she had spent the last week in. Huge rooms, vast windows, decorated in shades of dark green. But now, seeing it with him standing beside her, she couldn’t help recalling the building she had seen him in in London. Here, the stiff formality of the décor, the furnishings in the dark heavy wood, made it look as if it had been decorated twenty years or more before. There were no photographs here, she noticed, recalling how those elegant but somehow cold, isolated—lonely—images had hit home the first time she had seen them. In fact there was nothing personal here, nothing of Alexei. Only the new king.

Ria managed another couple of steps into the room, then slowed, stopped, as the full force of the scene outside the door hit home.

‘Oh dear heaven...’ Even she couldn’t tell if her voice shook with laughter or embarrassment. ‘Henri. What he must have thought!’

‘And what was that?’ Alexei drawled, taking a sip of his drink.

‘That you— He must have thought that you had summoned me to your room...’

She couldn’t complete the sentence but the dark gleam in Alexei’s eyes told her that he had followed her thought processes exactly.

‘And would it have been so very terrible if I had? Why should you not be in my room? We are engaged to be married, after all. And from the stories of our romance in the press, everyone will be expecting that we are already lovers.’

The last of his drink was tossed to the back of his throat, swallowed hard. Ria watched every last inch of its progress down the lean bronzed length of his throat, almost to the point where the first evidence of crisp, dark body hair showed at the neck of his white shirt. Compulsively she found herself matching the movement, though her own gulping swallow did nothing to ease the heated dryness of her mouth.

‘That being so, they probably wondered why you haven’t been here before. So tell me—to what do I owe the honour of this visit?’

What had seemed so totally right when she had been tossing and turning in her bed, her body on fire with longing, now seemed impossible. The restless hunger hadn’t eased—if anything, standing here like this so close to the living, breathing reality of her dreams, able to see the gleam of health on the golden skin, the lustre of his black hair, smell the personal scent of his body, made it all so much worse, much more visceral and primitive. But how could she come right out and
say
it?

‘Perhaps I feel the way the paparazzi feel...’

His frown revealed his confusion and perhaps a touch of disbelief.

‘I want to know more than just what event I’m attending, what dress I’ll be wearing. I’m wondering just what I’m doing here—why you have me imprisoned.’

It was the first thing that came to her mind—and the worst, it seemed. Danger flared in his eyes, and the glass he held slammed down on a nearby table.

‘Not imprisoned! You are free to come and go as you please.’

‘Oh perhaps not like my father, I agree. I’m your fiancée—we’re supposed to be getting married but that’s almost as much as I know. I need to know just what I’m doing here.’

I need to know what we can do to make this work,
she added in her own thoughts but totally lost the nerve to actually say the words aloud.

CHAPTER TEN

‘O
H
COME
NOW
, Ria,’ Alexei mocked. ‘You know only too well why you are here. I want you—and you want me. We have only to look at each other and we go up in flames.’

Right now she felt that that was exactly the truth. The moment of cold had vanished and now the surface of her skin seemed to be burning up. When he prowled nearer she had to clench her hands in the skirts of her nightdress and robe, keeping them prisoner and away from the dangerous impulse to reach out and touch him.

‘So much so that you haven’t even been near me!’ she scorned. ‘You’ve sent me jewels—flowers.’

‘I thought women liked flowers—and jewellery.’

Ria batted the interruption aside with a wave of her fingers then snatched her hand back again as if stung as skin met skin where it had accidentally brushed his cheek. She could feel the wave of colour rising in her cheeks as she saw the way his eyes darkened in instant response, sending her body temperature rocketing skywards.

‘And you look beautiful in that nightdress,’ he continued, unrepressed.

‘So beautiful that ever since we came back to Mecjoria you have barely spent a day in my company.’

‘Are you saying that you’ve been missing me?’ Alexei questioned with sudden softness.

Missing you so badly that it’s eating me up inside.

‘I am supposed to be your fiancée!’ she flung back.

Alexei’s slow smile mocked the vehemence of her response.

‘And right now you are doing a wonderful job of sounding exactly like the jealous fiancée I would like you to be.’

‘Jealous of what—who?’

‘Of the time I spend with my new mistresses.’

It took her several moments to realise exactly what he meant. Not real women but the demands of the kingdom, the affairs of state.

‘It was inevitable that you would be so occupied in these first days,’ she acknowledged. ‘You have so much to do. But you were wrong, you know, you didn’t need any help.’

She had been impressed at the way he had taken charge since they had returned to Mecjoria. She’d watched him go through all the ceremony, the diplomatic meetings, seen the calm dignity and strength with which he’d conducted himself. He’d handled everyone, from the highest nobility to the ordinary commoner, with grace and ease.

‘You’ve done wonderfully well—never put a foot wrong.’

A slight inclination of his head acknowledged the compliment which had been nothing less than the truth.

‘I had a good teacher.’

Now it was her turn to frown. But then her expression changed abruptly as she met his eyes.

‘I’ve done nothing,’ she protested.

‘The people want to see you,’ Alexei countered. ‘They love you and so do the press.’

‘It’s the Romeo and Juliet element—our “romance”—’ She broke off abruptly as he shook his head almost savagely.

‘You’ve been at my side every day. You’re a link to the old monarchy and you’ve lived in Mecjoria all your life. People value that.’

Was he saying that he valued it too? Her heart ached to know the answer to that question.

‘Who else could I ask this of other than someone like you?’ His hand cupped her cheek, dark eyes looking down into hers in a way that somehow made this so personal between the two of them, not just a matter of state. ‘Someone who loves Mecjoria, who belongs here.’

‘You belong here now!’

Too late she heard that ‘now’ fall into a dangerous silence. One that came with too many memories, too much darkness attached to it. And she knew that he felt that way too when his hand fell away, breaking the fragile contact between them.

‘I know you never wanted to come back to Mecjoria.’

‘Ah, but there you couldn’t be more wrong,’ Alexei put in sharply. ‘Why do you think I was so furious when we got thrown out? Why I hated what had happened to us? This was my father’s homeland. I wanted to be accepted here. To belong here. And I grew to love the countryside—the lakes, the mountains.’

His eyes went to the windows where in the daylight those mountains could be seen, rising majestically against the horizon, so high that they were always capped with a layer of snow, even in the summer.

‘That was what got me hooked on photography. I wanted to capture the stunning beauty of Alabria. The wildlife in the forests. It was my father who gave me my first camera. That was the one thing I managed to take with me into exile.’

Exile. That single word spoke of so much more. Of love and loss and loneliness. Particularly when she was remembering those photographs on the walls of his office. The ones that had made him his fortune, built his reputation. Their stylised bleakness could not have been in starker contrast to the gentle beauty of the forests and lakes, the animals that had first made him want to capture their images.

‘Do you still have that camera?’

He didn’t use words to answer her. Instead he gestured to a heavy wooden chest of drawers that stood against the wall. Only now did Ria see the well-worn leather camera case that stood on top of it, its plain and battered appearance at odds with the old-fashioned ornate décor of the rest of the room. Her heart clenched, making her catch her breath.

‘Your father would have been proud of you.’

Something in what she had said made his mouth, which had relaxed for a moment, twist tightly, cynically.

‘Now,’
he said roughly. ‘He would have felt very differently about the son he had while he was still alive.’

‘You didn’t exactly get a chance.’ Honesty forced her to say it. ‘The court is hidebound by archaic rules and protocols. They can take years to learn if you haven’t grown up getting used to them. And it was so much worse ten years ago. Even now it’s bad enough.’

Alexei’s smile was wry, almost boyish, reminding her sharply of so many occasions from the past. ‘And have you any idea how many times I’ve checked you out at some moment this week when I’ve needed to know exactly what the protocol was?’

‘You have?’ She had never noticed that. And the fact that he would admit to it stunned her.

‘Like I said—I’ve had a good teacher.’

‘I wish I’d done more in the past. I could have helped you then.’

‘Your father made sure you had no opportunity for that,’ he commented cynically. ‘He had his plans for you even then and nothing was going to get in the way. Particularly not some jumped-up commoner from an inconvenient marriage he had thought was long forgotten.’

‘You think that even then...?’

She fought against the nausea rising in her throat. It was worse than she thought.

‘I know.’

Alexei’s nod was like a hammer blow on any hopes that things were not as bad as she had feared. A death blow to the dream that Alexei would not want to take the revenge that he was justified in seeking.

‘If it had not been Ivan, it would have been someone else. Whoever offered him the greatest chance at being the power behind the throne.’

‘Anyone but you.’ It was just a whisper.

‘Anyone but me.’

And there it was. The real reason why she was here. What was it people said—don’t ask the question if you can’t take the answer? She’d asked and so she had only herself to blame if the answer was not what she wanted to hear. And how could she want to hear that her place at Alexei’s side, the link to the old monarchy she brought with her, provided the perfect revenge for all that Gregor had ever done to this man, the inheritance he had deprived him of? The father. The homeland.

‘Tell me.’ Alexei’s voice seemed to come from a long way away. ‘Could you really have married Ivan?’

Even for the country? She had once thought that she could but now, in the darkness of the night, she couldn’t suppress the shudder that shook her at just the thought.

That was why her father was still in jail, Alexei acknowledged privately as he watched the colour drain from her face. All the investigations he had carried out since returning to Mecjoria had only proved even further just what sort of a slippery, devious cold fish Gregor Escalona still was. The man who had plotted his downfall and his mother’s ruin would sell his soul to the devil if the price was right. He was not about to let the bastard out of jail until he was sure that he had control of him in other ways. And that control came through Escalona’s daughter. With Ria at his side, as his wife, he had an unassailable claim to the throne. Surely even Gregor would think twice about staging a palace revolution when it would harm his daughter?

Though even that was something he still couldn’t be sure of. Gregor had always been a cold and neglectful father. That was one of the reasons why Ria had sought out his friendship back in the past. They had been—he’d thought—two lost and lonely youngsters caught in the heartless world of power struggles and conspiracies. The sort of conspiracy in which Gregor had shown himself to be quite prepared to use his daughter to his own advantage. Signing the treaty with Ivan was evidence of that.

Which was why he had to marry Ria—
another
reason why he had to marry her, he admitted. He wasn’t going to let Escalona near her until she was truly his wife. Only then could he protect her from being forced to marry Ivan in any counter-revolution to gain the crown. It was the thought of her married to Ivan that had pushed him into the proposal from the start—but now the thought that she might have been pressured into marrying a man she so obviously feared reinforced that already steel-hard resolve to make her his queen.

Whatever else Gregor had done wrong, the way he had raised his daughter had prepared her so well for the role she would fulfil. He had been sure she would be an asset to his claim to the throne and she had proved herself in so many ways.

But of course they weren’t married yet. And until they were he wasn’t going to let Escalona anywhere near his daughter.

But when an ugly little question was raised inside his head, demanding to know just what made him any different from the bullying father who would have pushed her into a forced marriage without considering her feelings, he was uncomfortably aware of the fact that he didn’t have an answer to give, not one that would satisfy even himself.

‘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.