Princess in the Iron Mask - By Victoria Parker Page 0,14

from dangerous to critical.

He only prayed her apartment on the Thames had separate floors. Or at least a fifty-foot distance between bedrooms. Fighting with bloodthirsty night demons would be child’s play in comparison to the blistering temptation that would be down the hall.

* * *

Lucas didn’t look happy, Claudia mused. Waves of dark fury poured from his tight shoulders, much like the rain streaming in rivulets down the black bodywork of his Aston Martin Vanquish.

The engine of his Aston Martin Vanquish roared like a sleek panther as he revved his displeasure, and she wiggled on the cream cowhide in an attempt to cover her quivering reaction. She’d never thought of a car as arousing before. Well, she’d never thought of anything as arousing before. Today seemed to be a day for firsts. Even the heady smell of leather and damp clothing couldn’t douse the warm, woodsy scent of Lucas lingering in the air.

With the exception of his barking request for her to enter her address into the sat nav, their drive to her apartment had been deadly silent. Now, parked at the kerb, she was desperate to be away from his fiercely primal aura. She was so tired she no longer had the strength to argue, and her legs throbbed so viciously she’d be lucky if she made it inside the building, let alone up the stairs.

‘Erm...thanks for the lift, Mr Garcia. Unless the gods grace me with a reprieve, I’ll see you tomorrow.’ Without further ado, she yanked hard on the door handle. After a third kerthunk, she surrendered, directing her voice to be sweet. ‘Could you open the door, pleeease?’

‘Claudia,’ he growled, nostrils flaring, his chest heaving with barely suppressed anger. Staring out of his window at the three-storey townhouse where she lived on the second floor, he twisted his long fingers around the dark wood steering wheel. Maybe he was imagining it was her neck. ‘Have you ever once acknowledged who you actually are?’

‘Who I am?’ she asked wearily, not entirely sure what he was getting at and unable to summon the energy to care.

‘Yes, Claudia,’ he said slowly, as if speaking to a child. ‘A member of the Arunthian Royal Family.’

Never. ‘Not really. Can I go now?’ She gave the handle another tug. Kerthunk. A long sigh poured from her lungs.

‘How long have you lived in this...this place?’ The way he said place, as if the word was rat poison on his tongue, was like taking a grater to her nerves. Without bothering to look out of the window, her mind’s eye recalled a picture of the tired frontage of this Victorian townhouse on a less than stellar street. What was he getting into a funk about? He didn’t have to live here.

Claudia bit her tongue and thumped her head off the rest. ‘Oh, about eighteen months, I think.’ She slept most nights in the lab—more for convenience than because of the emptiness that shrouded her body when she lay between cold damp sheets, she was sure—but she kept that titbit to herself.

Lucas continued to fume, steam blowing from his nose as he stared out of the front windscreen. ‘You could’ve been abducted fifty times over,’ he growled, and she lifted her head from the buttery soft leather to see him scrub his face with rough hands. ‘Burgled, raped, assaulted,’ he went on. ‘What the hell were you thinking, Claudia?’

Pushing down on the froth of fury bubbling up her throat, she pursed her lips. He’d turned from blackmailer to over-protective bore!

‘You’re overreacting, Mr Garcia,’ she said calmly. ‘This is a decent area and I have an excellent alarm system. Anyway, who would look at...?’ The words died on her tongue as she realised how pitiful she would sound if she said me. She knew she wasn’t pretty, and she’d given up wishing she looked like one of her famed-for-their-beauty sisters long ago. Right now, faced with the most astoundingly handsome man she’d ever seen, she couldn’t face the prospect of his sympathy or his averment.

‘Who would look at what?’

For the first time in thirty minutes he turned to look at her. The intensity in his sapphire blues acted like a laser beam and, as if locked on target, she couldn’t tear her gaze away.

Choosing her words carefully, she said, ‘Who would look twice at a normal person? The problems start when people appear moneyed and pampered. I bring no attention to myself. No one would give me a second glance.’

Jaw dropping open, Lucas slowly shook his