think it, she knew it. Hadn’t he just said what amounted to that? Even if he hadn’t, she knew that when there’d been more glamorous options, she hadn’t featured as one at all. She’d made sure of that.
Pathetic wretch that she was, she’d sought Luci’s version of what had happened that night, hoping she’d misinterpreted what she’d witnessed. Luci had only confirmed her worst suspicions.
Ferruccio had come on hot and heavy, expressed interest in both Luci and Stella. At the same time. Luci had said he’d been so overpowering that she’d found herself wondering whether she could share a man, and with the dreaded Stella, of all women, too. She’d said she thought Stella herself had been tempted. That was, for the fleeting moments before he suddenly moved on without a look back.
Throughout the years, Clarissa had seen him acting as if he’d never said a word in private to either woman, let alone propositioned them so outrageously. That had reaffirmed her belief that he went through life making sure all women were his for the taking, but not actually taking up with anyone whose connections might cause him trouble. Her only lure had been that she was the king’s daughter, and later on that she was the only woman who’d told him no. And if she thought she’d seen something in his eyes every time he caught her gaze—something that told her what he’d do with her if he ever got her alone—she reminded herself of the facts, concluded that she’d been superimposing her fantasies on his expression. As she must be now.
“No more contentiousness, Principessa? Hmm, I think I know why.” His gaze dropped to her lips, clung, until she felt his mouth was there, drawing hard on her flesh until it swelled, ached, until she ached for him to do it for real. “You’re…hungry.”
Alarm erupted, followed by a flood of mortification. He knew. Or was he guessing, based on universal female response to him?
Before she could say anything, he took her elbow in a phantom grip. “Come. Let me feed you, get you back in fighting form.”
Food. He’d meant hungry for food.
She was so relieved she let him guide her without a word.
She lost all sense of direction as he led her through his mansion, until they reached another huge oak door. She followed him through it, her every movement feeling controlled by his will.
Minutes later, they came to an elevated, open-air deck overlooking a stunning, symmetrical landscaped scene. Its centerpiece was a gigantic rectangular pool with a semicircular protrusion at its near end, glittering pure aquamarine in the declining sun. Its lava stone and mosaic periphery segued at its far end into a cleared passage between olive groves that continued until it melted into the vegetation-covered mountain in the distance. To the left, the groves gave way to dunes of pure gold, leading down to the serpentine shore and the azure and emerald waters.
She stopped, paralyzed by the magnificence of the sight.
She’d been raised on this island, but she never knew it still had such pristine natural places. The contrast with such lavish human design was breathtaking. But it was the seclusion that intensified that otherworldly feel. She’d never been anywhere so totally devoid of people. It felt as if they were the only man and woman on Earth.
The side of her face felt as if it were burning. She tore her eyes away from the scene, blinked up at him. She found him brooding down at her, his eyes heavy with so much emotion she didn’t understand. Didn’t want to understand.
He reached out a hand as if he was going to cup her cheek. At the last moment, he swept a lock of her long hair from her flaming face, tucked it with extreme care behind her ear. “You like?”
She swallowed, her heart spiraling in a nosedive like a shot-down plane. “I’m alive, am I not? I have to like.”
His lips twitched. His eyes didn’t change expression, seemed bent on liquefying her. Then he reached for her hand.
She felt as if he’d electrocuted her as he strode ahead, had her almost running behind him. She gurgled something about his legs being longer than hers. He turned as he slowed down, his smile riddling her vision in spots of blindness.
He had them circumventing the pool before taking one of the passageways that ran parallel to the groves and ended up at the edge of the beach. He suddenly stopped.
She rocked on her heels as he dropped to his haunches. Before she could process his action, he took her hands, placed them on his shoulders. She gaped as he lifted her right foot off the ground. Breath deserted her as he so slowly, so gently slid off her high-heeled sandal strap. The sandal fell off her suddenly stinging foot into his hand. Her toes curled, a gasp tearing from her. He looked up, noted her distress. Then he closed his hand over her foot, raised it, his lips parting, filling with sensuality.
He was going to…to…She couldn’t let him or she’d…she’d…
She lost her balance, forced him to let her regain her footing. She leaned heavily on his shoulders so she wouldn’t keel over him, electricity roaring from where her fingertips clutched their daunting power to zap incapacitation throughout her nervous system. He pressed her hands harder to his shoulders before repeating the de-sandaling ritual on her other foot.
When she was sure she would faint, he let her foot down, rose, bent and took his own sneakers off, placed them at the sand’s edge with her sandals and spread his arm, inviting her to walk on.
She stumbled forward a few steps before she gasped, stopped.
The feeling of the powdered gold beneath her feet, its warmth and complex texture, its gritty softness, its resilient malleability heightened her sensory tumult.
He turned her toward him, his gaze solicitous. “Did you step on something? Are you hurt?”
Before she could answer he swooped down again, inspected one foot then the other, feeling for injuries or foreign bodies.
An uproar swept through her at his action, at the sight of his eyebrows drawn and his head bent in such concentration, the severely trimmed raven luxury of his mane gleaming copper in the sun as his perfectly formed fingers traced over her soles.
She was about to cry out that she was fine, when he heaved up to his feet, and in the same movement swept her up in his arms.
She went limp with shock.
He’d never touched her before. She hadn’t even let him shake her hand. She thought she knew how dangerous it would be to have any physical contact with him. She’d known nothing. Feeling his flesh pressed on hers, his heat and scent invading her senses…it was too much.
She choked out, “Put me down—I’m OK.”
He frowned. “Then why did you jerk to a stop like that? Why did you look so…distressed?”
“I was just…surprised. I—I’ve never felt anything like this.”
His eyes narrowed. “You’ve never felt sand beneath your feet?”
She gulped, shook her head. “I…no.”
“You’ve lived most of your life on a Mediterranean island legendary for its sea and shores. How is it possible you never ran barefoot on the beach? Never swam in the sea?”
“I…uh…just didn’t. The sea hasn’t been part of my life.”
“How was it even avoidable? Going to the beach is part of most people’s childhoods, especially in seaside countries.”
Her discomfort rose with every word. She wanted this conversation, and what it made her think of, what it could reveal, to be over. “I’m not ‘most people.’”
“You mean because you’re royal? That doesn’t make sense. Durante and Paolo have both told me they spent much of their childhoods soaking in the sea and baking in the sun. And on Castaldini, royals aren’t pursued and encroached on as they are in other countries. Even if you had been, your father could have provided a private beach for your use.”
“I—I