Temporarily His Princess - By Olivia Gates Page 0,38
them grab for the ludicrous lesser evil.”
“You’re not an opponent.”
At her raised eyebrow, though it was mocking and not cynical, he felt that nip of regret again. One that made him wish he could erase the past, both distant and recent. What he’d give to restart everything from this point, with them who they were today, with no yesterdays to muddy their enjoyment of each other, and no tomorrows to cast shadows over it.
He caressed that elegant, dense eyebrow. “Put that down before someone gets hurt. Namely me. At least more than I’m already hurting.” He ground his beyond-pain hardness into her, showing her she should have mercy on him. The eyes that rivaled Castaldini’s skies darkened, her body yielding, shaping itself to his seeking. Her response, as always, heightened his distress, his delight. He groaned with them both. “So you want to postpone the wedding till next week.”
A choppy laugh shook those globes of perfection against his chest. How he didn’t have them free of their restraints and in his hands and mouth already, he had no idea. “And then he makes it all sound like his opponent’s decision.”
“‘He’ has no opponents here. He’s just negotiating.”
“I can sniff out the faintest scent of negotiating a mile away. I can’t even detect a trace now.”
“It must be because I learned the undetectable negotiation method at the hands of a mistress of the art.”
“Seems I didn’t teach you but transferred it to you. That skill has been nowhere to be found when I most needed it.”
He tugged a loose glossy lock from the satin hair that shone in his homeland’s sun like burnished copper. “But ‘your’ decision to postpone is well-advised. Next week’s forecast says it will be a perfect day for a wedding.”
She curled that dewy, edible lip. “Every day is a perfect day on Castaldini. But…” Something like panic spurted in her eyes. “You’re serious, aren’t you?” At his nod, she grabbed his lapels. “And what do you mean wedding?”
It was his eyebrows’ turn to shoot up. “The word has more meanings than the one agreed on since the dawn of humanity?”
She shook her head, something frantic creeping into her eyes. “I thought we were just going to get a ring, sign a marriage certificate and report to the king so he can officially send you to your UN post.”
It pained him that she expected only a cold ritual to befit the barren deal he’d proposed forty-eight hours ago.
Sorrow filled him for what should have been with this woman his heart and body had chosen, but wasn’t and wouldn’t be.
Suddenly, all levity drained from him, loosening his embrace.
Unable to remain in such intimate contact with her anymore, he stepped away. And saw it. A quiver of insecurity. A crack in the veneer of confidence and cheek.
He should have felt that was the least she deserved. To suffer some uncertainty and trepidation. But he didn’t. It hurt him to see her looking so…bereft. He hated to see vulnerability in those indomitable eyes.
He forced himself to smile at her, to reach a soothing hand to her cheek. “If you didn’t think I was talking about a wedding with all the trimmings, why were you surprised at all when I said next week? Or today? The ceremony you describe could have been concluded in a couple of hours.”
“Forgive me if I’m boggled by the idea of any brand of ceremony. I was never married before, you know, for real or for pretense, and a date, let alone one so soon, makes me feel this is actually happening.”
He watched her lips shaking, attempting a smile of bravado and failing, and could no longer deny it.
His gut was having a fit, sanctioning no evidence but what it sensed. It insisted she wasn’t the hardened manipulator he’d once thought her. That person would have grabbed his deal, would now be working his evident eagerness to milk more from him. But she wasn’t. She was really shaken.
And for the first time, he put himself in her place. Taken away from everything she knew to a strange land, her choice stripped away, her family not only unable to come to her aid, but the reason for her predicament. Her only company and precarious support was the man behind it all. And he kept blowing hot and cold, to boot. She must be feeling lost, helpless. And to a woman who’d been mistress of her own fate for so long, that must be the scariest thing she’d ever