Arranged Marriage, Bedroom Secrets

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“I’m not exactly dressed for it,” Angel said doubtfully.

“You look beautiful. I’ve heard of a quiet place not far from here. It’s not big and brash like a lot of the clubs. More intimate, I suppose, and you can dance or talk or just sit and watch the other patrons if that’s all you want to do.”

“It sounds perfect.”

“So, shall we?”

She grinned back. “Okay, I’d like that.”

“Good.” He took her hand in his, again struck by the delicacy of her fingers and the fine texture of her skin.

What would it feel like if she touched him intimately? Would her fingers be firm or soft like a feather? Would she trace the contours of his body with a tantalizing subtlety, or would her touch be more definite, more demanding? He slammed the door on his wayward thoughts. It seemed he had more of his mother in him than he’d suspected. Still, there was nothing wrong with dancing with a woman other than his betrothed, was there? He had to do it at state functions all the time.

He tugged her in the direction of a club he’d visited on his last trip to New York and sent Armaund ahead to ensure they’d gain entry. The night was still young and he wasn’t ready for it to end yet.

Drawing her into his arms on the dance floor was everything he’d hoped for and more. The only problem was that it made him want more—and that was something he’d forbidden himself until marriage. He was determined to hold sacred the act of love and making love. It was something he would share with his wife and his wife alone. He hadn’t remained celibate purely for the hell of it. Sometimes it had been sheer torment refusing to acknowledge the demands of his flesh. But he’d promised himself from a very young age that he would not be that person. He would not allow physical need to cloud all else. Over the centuries his family had almost lost everything several times over because of a lack of physical control.

He’d always believed his forebears’ susceptibility to fleshly pursuits to be a mark of weakness, and nothing had happened in his thirty-one years to change his mind. Except perhaps the young woman dancing with him right now. Even so, he denied himself any more than the sensation of her in his arms—the brush of her breasts against his chest as he held her close, the skim of her warm breath on his throat—they were torments and teases he could overcome. When he boarded the plane a few short hours from now, to return to Sylvain, he would do so with the full knowledge that he had honored his vow to both himself and to the woman he was to marry.

But until then, he’d enjoy this stolen night as much as his duty and honor would allow.

* * *

The night had been magical—something even her wildest imagination could never have dreamed up. In fact, Mila doubted even Sally, with all her romantic ideas, could have come up with something like the night she’d just had. She felt like Cinderella, except in her fairy tale the prince was seeing her home and it was well past midnight. As the limousine, which had been waiting outside the club when they’d left it, pulled up outside her hotel she turned in her seat to face the prince. Tonight, she’d seen a side of him she’d never anticipated—and she was utterly captivated by him.

Maybe it was the champagne they’d drunk at the club, or maybe it was simply the knowledge that at month’s end she’d be standing next to him beneath the ancient vaulted ceilings of the Sylvano palace cathedral and pledging her life to him, but right now she felt as if she was floating on air.

At least now she knew what Thierry was like away from the pomp and ceremony that was attached to his position in the world. Once they were married and had the chance to spend time together alone, without all the trappings and formality of their official lives, she believed that they could become important to one another beyond what their marriage would gain for their respective nations. Tonight she’d had a chance to get to know the man beneath the crown. The man who would be her husband—who would share her days and her nights. And, given the fierce attraction between them, she looked forward to getting to know him even better. In every way.

He’d been the consummate gentleman tonight and, for the first time in her life, she’d felt like a desirable woman—one who could be confident that she would be able to make him happy in their marriage, too.

She turned to face him in the seat of the limo. “Thank you, Hawk. Tonight was incredible. I will never forget it.”

He took her hand and lifted it to his lips, brushing them across her knuckles in a caress that sent a bolt of longing straight to her center.

“Nor I.”

Thierry leaned forward, his intention to kiss her cheek obvious, but at the last minute Mila turned her head, allowing their lips to brush one another. It was the merest touch, sweet and innocent, and yet in that moment she felt something expand in her chest and threaten to consume her. It shook Mila to her core.

Words failed her and she pulled away, blindly reaching for the door handle and stumbling slightly as she left the private cavern of the vehicle. She didn’t look back. She couldn’t. If she did she might ask for more and it wasn’t the time or the place to do that.

She moved swiftly through the hotel lobby and to the elevator and swiped her key card to head for the penthouse. In the elevator car she reached up and tugged the blond wig loose and locked her gaze with her reflection in the mirrored walls. She’d been a stranger to Thierry tonight and he’d enjoyed her company. But would he enjoy it quite so much when he met the real Angel, or would he remember the gauche and chubby girl for whom he’d shown a moment of disdain? Only time would tell.

Four (#u7a4b7c57-f7f6-5967-9709-57393905521e)

“Of all the stupid, irresponsible, brainless things to do! What if the media catches wind of this? Did you even stop to think about that? You’ll be crucified and all of Sylvania will reject you before you even cross their border.”

Mila sat back in her chair waiting for her brother’s tirade to subside. It didn’t look as if it would be soon, though. He was working up another head of steam as he paced the priceless Persian carpet on his office floor. She kept her head bowed, her tongue still in her mouth. It was no easy task when she’d become used to offering her opinion—and having it respected.

“You were raised to behave better than this. What made you sneak out like nothing more than a common tramp? Was this idea concocted by that friend of yours in America? Sally what’s-her-name?” Anger and disgust pervaded his tone.

That got her riled. “Now wait a minute—!” she protested, but Rocco cut her off with a glare.

“You are a princess of Erminia. Princesses do not sneak out of hotel rooms in the dead of night and stay out until dawn with strangers.”

Unless you live in a fairy tale, Mila amended silently, remembering her favorite bedtime story about the twelve dancing princesses. But this, her life, was no fairy tale. Besides, Prince—no, King, she reminded herself—Thierry wasn’t a stranger to her anymore. At least, not completely. But she’d endure Rocco’s lecture. For now, it suited her not to tell her brother whom she’d spent her night with. The secret was hers to hold safely in her heart. She didn’t want to share it with her brother who would no doubt worry about the political ramifications of her and Thierry’s impromptu date. Ramifications that would sully her memory of that wonderful, magical night.

Rocco strode to the large arched window set deep into the palace wall, which offered a view of the countryside beyond it. Mila looked past him to the outside—to freedom. A freedom she’d never truly taste again. The anonymity of life in the United States had been a blessing, but now that she was back home for good she was expected to kowtow to protocol—and that meant doing whatever it was her brother decreed. She began to wonder if perhaps it might not have been better not to have known the freedom she’d experienced after all. The comparison made coming home this time so very much harder.

“So, Rocco, what are you going to do? Throw me in the dungeons?”

Her brother turned and she was struck by how much he’d aged since she’d last seen him a year ago. As if stress and worry had become his constant companions, leaving lines of strain on his face and threads of gray at his temples. And some of that strain, and no doubt several of those gray hairs, were due to her, she acknowledged with a pang. She loved her brother dearly, and had no desire to hurt him or cause him distress, but she just wished he’d listen to her once in a while—really listen as if she and what she had to say had value.

“Don’t think I won’t do it,” he growled. “Such flippancy is probably all I can expect from you after allowing you so much leeway these past seven years. I should never have been so lenient. Our advisers recommended that you marry the prince immediately when you turned eighteen but no, I had to allow you to persuade me to send you away—for an education, not so you could bring our family name into disrepute.” He pinched the bridge of his aquiline nose and drew in a deep breath before continuing. “I felt sorry for you back then, Mila. You were no more than a schoolgirl, entering into an engagement with an older man—someone you had barely met, yet alone knew. I understood that you felt stifled by that and, I hazard to say, somewhat terrified at the prospect of what came next. You were so much younger than your years, so innocent.”

He sighed and turned away for a moment. Mila bristled at his description of her. Innocent? Yes, of course she’d been innocent. Given her strict and restrictive upbringing there had been little opportunity to learn anything of the ways of the world and the people within it. It was part of why she’d begged her brother for the chance to study abroad. What kind of ruler could she be if she couldn’t understand her people and the struggles and challenges they lived with every day? Rocco continued to speak.

“And so I agreed when you asked me for time until your twenty-fifth birthday. I thought it was the best thing to do for you and that it might help to make your eventual union a happier one. I should have known it would come to this—that the lack of structure in your life overseas would corrupt you and deviate you from your true path.”

Lack of structure? Mila bit her tongue to keep herself from saying the words out loud. While her life in Boston had not been like her life here in the castle, how on earth did Rocco think she’d attained the measure of academic recognition she’d achieved without structure? And even aside from her scholastic successes—won through hard work and discipline—she’d also dealt with the social restrictions of a team of bodyguards, not to mention a chaperone who vetoed nearly every opportunity to relax or try to make friends. She had barely even socialized with any of the other students on campus.

But her brother was on a roll now. If she tried to explain, he would not listen, and she knew it. To say anything while he was still so angry with her would be a complete waste of time. Instead, she let his words flow over her, like the water that, during a heavy downpour, spouted from the gargoyles positioned around the castle gutters.

“Even I cannot turn back time. You are home now and you will prepare for your marriage. Your wedding takes place four weeks from today. And there will not be one wrong move, one misstep, or one breath of scandal from you. Do you understand me? Too much rides on this, Mila. The stability of our entire nation depends on your ability to do the job you were raised to do.”

The job she was raised to do. There it was—the millstone around her neck. The surety that she had no value as a human being beyond that of being a suitable wife for a powerful man.

“And the late king’s funeral this week? Am I not to attend that with you as a mark of respect?”

“No. You will stay here.”

She wanted to argue, to say she had every right to be there at her fiancé’s side as he bid a final farewell to his father, but she knew the plea would fall on deaf ears. Mila shifted her gaze to look her brother straight in the eyes. She hated seeing him like this—so angry and distraught—so she said the words he was expecting to hear.

“I understand you, brother. I will do as you ask.”

But he hadn’t asked, had he? He’d ordered it from her. Not once, at any stage during this audience with him—for it couldn’t be deemed anything else—had Mila felt as if he was pleased to welcome his baby sister home. Instead she’d felt like nothing more than a disappointment. A burden to be off-loaded. A problem to be corrected.

There hadn’t been a single word of congratulations on her achievements while she’d been away. No mention of her honors degree or the publication of her treatise on Equal Opportunity and Sustainable Development in European Nations. Her only value was in her ability to play the role of a proper fiancée and wife. She was merely a pawn on her brother’s chessboard.

She kept her eyes fixed on Rocco and she saw the minute the tension that held his body began to ease from his shoulders. His eyes, amber like her own, but several shades deeper, softened.

“Thank you. You understand, don’t you? I don’t ask you to do this for myself, but for our people. And for your sake as well, since I couldn’t bear to see you do anything to jeopardize your chance at winning your husband’s trust and respect.”

And there it was. The glimpse of the brother she’d grown up loving more than life itself—the brother who had been her protector and defender all throughout her childhood. But that was all she was permitted to see because the veil of command he perpetually bore took up residence once again on his visage.

“I understand,” she answered with an inclination of her head.

And she did. Even though, inside, her emotions spun in turmoil. It was entirely clear that her value—to her brother and her future husband—came from her chastity and unimpeachable honor. Her knowledge, her insight, her plans to better society and improve conditions for her people, and even the grace, poise and confidence she had gained in her years abroad mattered little to their society compared to her reputation.

Nothing had changed in all the time she’d been away. She didn’t even know why she would have expected it to. Erminia was still locked in the old days where a woman’s place was not beside, but behind her husband, or her father or brother or whichever male figure led her household—her thoughts and ideas to be tolerated but not celebrated or given any respect.

Even in the Erminian parliament women were a rare breed. Mila wanted to see that change, and for their government to acknowledge women’s intelligence and their value as vital members of the very fabric of Erminian society as a whole. But she knew that change would be very slow to come...if it came at all.

“You don’t sound excited about your wedding,” Rocco prompted. “I thought you would be full of chatter about it.”

Mila sighed. “Rocco, I’m not a little girl about to go to a tea party in her favorite dress. I am a full-grown woman with a mind and thoughts of her own, about to enter into a marriage with a man I barely know.”

He stepped closer to her and placed a finger under her chin, lifting her face up to his. “You’ve changed.”

“Of course I’ve changed. I’ve grown up.”

“No, it’s more than that.” A frown furrowed his brow and his eyes narrowed. “Are you still...? Did you...?”

Mila held on to her temper by a thread. “What? You’re actually asking me if I’ve kept myself chaste? Do you really think I’d compromise the crown by throwing my virginity away on a one-night stand?”

Her brother paled. “You will not speak to me in that tone. I might be your brother but, first and foremost, I am your king.”

Mila swept down into a curtsey. “Sire, I beg your forgiveness.”

“Mila, don’t mock me.”

She rose again but did not look directly in his eyes. “I do not mock you, Your Majesty. I am well aware of my position in this world. I will do my duty and you can rest assured that by my wedding day no man will have touched me, with even so much as a kiss, before my future husband does. But, just in case you don’t believe me, please feel free to have the royal physician examine me to ensure that I am indeed a woman of my word.”

“Mila—”

“I believe I have an appointment for a dress fitting now. If you’ll excuse me?” she said, turning before his reaching hand could touch her.

She knew that, deep down, he probably hated the exchange they’d just shared even more than she did. But duty drove him now, and that meant the needs of the country always came first. He couldn’t be the doting older brother who had sheltered her for so many of her younger years. Ten years her senior, Rocco had been forced to prematurely take the crown after their father’s assassination when Rocco had been only nineteen. Mila could barely remember a time since when his shoulders hadn’t borne the weight of responsibility that had descended with the crown. Almost overnight, he’d gone from the teasing and protective older brother she’d adored, to the domineering sovereign she knew today. The man who showed no signs of weakness, no chink in the armor that shrouded his emotions.

As she let herself out of his office and barely held herself back from storming down the ornately decorated corridor of the castle to her suite of rooms, a part of her still mourned the boy he’d been while another continued to rail internally at how he’d spoken to her just now. He still saw her as a silly, empty-headed child; that much was clear. And no matter what she did or said, that would probably never change. She had to learn to accept it as she’d had to learn to accept so much about her life. But maybe, just maybe, she would be in a position to effect change once she was married.

Later, as she fidgeted under the weight of the elegant silk-dupion-and-lace gown that was being fitted to her gentle curves she couldn’t help but think back to that moment when she and Thierry had kissed good-night—or perhaps it had been good morning, she thought. She couldn’t hold back a smile as she remembered the exquisitely gentle pressure of his lips upon hers. If she closed her eyes and concentrated she could almost feel him again, smell the subtle scent of his cologne—a blend of wood and spice that had done crazy things to her inside—and sense the yearning that there could be more. A tiny thrill of excitement rippled through her—a ripple that was rapidly chased away by the sensation of a pin in her thigh.

“I’m so sorry, Your Highness, but if you’d just keep still for me a moment longer...” The couturier’s frustration was evident in her tone.

“No, it is I who should apologize,” Mila hastily assured the woman. “I wasn’t concentrating. It is not your fault.”

She focused on a corner of a picture frame on the wall and kept her body still, turning or lifting and dropping her arms when asked—like a marionette. And that, essentially, was all she was to her brother, she realized with a pang. A puppet to be manipulated for the benefit of all of Erminia. There wouldn’t have been such pressure on her if he had married by now himself. But, when faced with a royal proposal, the girl he’d loved through his late teens and early twenties had decided royal life was not for her, and since then he’d steered clear of romantic entanglements.

Rocco’s crown might sit heavily on his dark curls, Mila thought with a sad sigh, but hers was equally burdensome. But, there was a silver lining, she reminded herself. Her night with Thierry showed they were intellectual equals and he had at least appeared to respect her opinion during their discussions.

If he could give a total stranger his ear, why wouldn’t he extend the same courtesy to his wife?

* * *

It was 2:00 a.m. and Mila was still wide awake. Never a good traveler, she struggled to adjust to the change in time zones. While most of the good people of Erminia would be fast asleep in their beds about now, Mila’s body was on Boston time and for her it was only seven in the evening. Granted, it had been an exhausting day with the hours of travel followed by that awful meeting with her brother. Given how she always suffered severe motion sickness, which left her physically wrung out, logically she should be more than ready to sleep. Sadly, logic was lacking tonight, she accepted with a sigh as she pushed back the covers on her pedestal bed and reached for the light robe she’d cast over the end of her mattress before retiring.

Maybe some warm milk, the way Cookie used to make it for her back when she was a child, would help. After donning her robe, Mila headed for the servants’ stairs toward the back of the castle. Sure, she knew that all she had to do was press a button and someone would bring the milk to her, but a part of her craved the inviting warmth and aromas that permeated the castle kitchens and that were such an intrinsic part of her happier childhood memories.

Her slippers barely made a sound on the old stone stairs and, as opposed to the usual daily busyness that made the castle hum with activity during normal waking hours, the air was still and serene. She could do with some of that serenity right now.

To her surprise, the sound of voices traveled up the corridor toward her. Obviously some staff was on duty around the clock, but it was unusual for the senior household steward to still be afoot at this time of night. Mila recognized Gregor’s voice as it rumbled along the ancient stone walls. For a second she was prepared to ignore it, and the younger female voice she could barely hear murmuring in response, but her ears pricked up when she caught Thierry’s name mentioned.

Mila slowed her steps as she approached the open door of the steward’s office and listened carefully.

“And you’re certain of this?” the steward asked.

Mila was surprised Gregor’s voice sounded so stern. While the man held a position of extreme responsibility, he was well-known for his warm heart and caring nature—it was part of why the royal household ran so smoothly. His brusque tone right now seemed at odds with the person she remembered.

“Yes, sir. My second cousin assists the king of Sylvain’s private secretary. He saw the document soliciting the woman’s—” the young woman hesitated a bit before continuing “—services.”

“What does your cousin plan to do with this information he so willingly shared with you?”

“Oh, sir, he didn’t do so willingly. I mean, it wasn’t meant as gossip.”

“Then what did he mean by it?”

Mila heard the younger woman make a sound, as if holding back tears. “Oh, please, sir. I don’t want him to get into any trouble. It troubled him that the king would seek the services of a courtesan so close to his marriage, especially when it is known within the Sylvano palace that the prince is—was—saving himself for marriage.”

A courtesan? Mila’s ears buzzed, blocking out any other sound as the word reverberated in her skull. Her stomach lurched uncomfortably and she fought the nausea that swirled with a vicious and sudden twist.

A sound from the steward’s office alerted her to the movement of the people inside. She couldn’t be caught here, not like this. Mila turned back down the corridor and slipped into another office, this one dark and unoccupied. With her arms bound tight around her middle, she stared at the closed door framed by a limning of light. Her mind whirled.

Thierry had procured a professional mistress? Why would he even do such a thing? How had she misjudged him so badly? Their time together that night in New York had been wonderful, magical—and entirely chaste, without the slightest hint that he was seeking physical intimacy. It had thrilled her to think that he was staying untouched for her, just as she had done for him. None of what she’d learned about him in the hours they’d spent together made sense against what she’d just overheard.

Mila stiffened as she heard a light pair of footsteps walk briskly down the hallway—the maid, leaving Gregor’s office by the sound of it. She waited, wondering if she’d hear Gregor leaving the same way, and as she waited her mind spun again. What should she do now she had this knowledge? She couldn’t refuse to marry Thierry. That would cause upheaval on both sides of the border. And she didn’t want to, not really. But how could she consider a future with a man who was already in the process of installing a mistress in a home they were meant to share? She had toiled long and hard to make herself into a worthy wife for the man she thought he was. Had she been wrong about him all along? Was he just another ruler who treated marriage as nothing more than a facade—like so many royal marriages that had taken place in the past? Had he already given up on the idea that Mila could possibly make him happy?

Was their marriage really to be nothing more than a peace treaty between neighboring nations? Were they not to share the communion of two adults with shared hopes and dreams for the future? Tears burned her eyes, but she blinked them back furiously. She would not succumb to weakness in this. There had to be a way to stop him from taking a mistress, a way to somehow circumvent this. Think! she commanded herself. Here she was, well educated, astute about women’s issues and keen to do something about them, and yet, when faced with a problem all she could do was hide and then fight back tears? How clichéd, she scolded silently. Mila loosened her arms and let them drop to her sides and lifted her chin. She was a princess, it was about time she started to think and act like one.