glance at the clock showed it was a quarter past eleven. The lunchtime rush hour wouldn’t start for another half hour. ‘Jim, can I take my break now? I’ll make it up later.’
The head chef, who also happened to be the café’s owner, glanced from her to Prince Remirez and then, barely hiding his irritation, nodded. ‘I s’pose so.’
She flashed him a grateful smile, then dived into the small cubicle that doubled up as a changing and break room to get her bag. Slinging it crossways over her shoulder, she hurried through the café and out onto the pavement.
Where a small crowd had gathered, their camera phones ready to capture the image of the most captivating man on earth.
‘We’ll have more privacy in the car,’ Prince Remirez pronounced smoothly, a second before his hand arrived at her waist and nudged her firmly in the direction of the open back door of a limo.
Maddie entered, immediately noting the different configuration of the seats from last night’s car. There was no bench seat on the far side behind the driver. Which left her no choice but shuffle along the seat as Prince Remirez slid in after her.
The door shut behind him and instantly the atmosphere closed in around them. The push of air wrapped his scent around her, triggering that insane urge to bury her face in his neck and drown herself in his scent.
Whether it came from a bottle or it was a specially branded scent, it was lethal enough to be seriously addictive to women.
Addictive.
The word brought her up short, flinging her foolish ruminations into harsh reality. ‘Okay, Your Highness. You have fifteen minutes.’
He adjusted his cuffs, rested his elegant hands on his thighs before fixing his ferocious eyes on her. ‘Your business with Jules is over,’ he stated bluntly.
Maddie tried not to panic, but fear raced up her spine and threatened to paralyse her all the same.
After forcing herself to take a few slow, rib-bruising breaths, she pulled her phone from her pocket. ‘With all due respect, I want to hear it from him.’
Prince Remirez glanced at her phone. ‘He’s already on a plane to Montegova. You won’t see him or talk to him again. Your number has been blocked from his phone permanently so save yourself the trouble.’
A cold shiver ploughed through her. ‘Why are you doing this?’
He reached into his breast pocket and extracted a dark burgundy card with sleek gold numbers embossed on the front and back. ‘I came here to tell you that if you wish to salvage anything from this I am prepared to hear you out.’ He nodded at the card. ‘My address and private number are on the back. You have twenty-four hours to use it. Then I too will be out of your reach.’
LAST NIGHT, SEEING her in real life for the first time, Remi had thought her beauty exceptional.
Right now, watching the muted light from the sun-roof bathe her in a soft glow, she was even more exquisite.
Maddie Myers’s beauty was like nothing he’d ever seen. For starters, he couldn’t put his finger on why she would look so magnificent in a cheap, drab waitress’s uniform when last night she’d been dressed in finer, albeit more risqué, attire.
The other puzzling thing was that Remi had dated women who were equally beautiful. And yet something about this woman, whose beauty oozed from her very pores, triggered a stark, cloying hunger within him that he hadn’t quite been able to get a handle on.
That hunger had roared to life the moment he’d walked into that dismal café, and intensified when she’d dropped to her knees before him. Even now base images reeled through his mind. Images he had no business accommodating in public.
Years spent perfecting the art of schooling his expression had saved him from blatantly telegraphing his reaction. But those images were etched clearly in his brain, gaining lurid purchase as her plump lips part in shock.
‘Jules is really gone?’ she demanded huskily.
Remi gritted his teeth, finding the chore of discussing his half-brother with this woman intensely unsatisfactory. ‘Yes.’
Brows two shades darker than her honey-gold hair bunched together in confusion. ‘But... I don’t understand.’
‘What’s there to understand? He’s finally decided to grow up and make a meaningful contribution to the kingdom.’
‘Just like that?’ she asked sceptically.
‘Of course not. It’s taken a considerable amount of time to make him accept his responsibilities.’
‘And you came here to get him to do that?’
Remi shrugged. ‘It was past time someone did.’ He watched her carefully for signs that whatever had been going on between her and Jules was more than a light dalliance.
Her eyelashes swept down, shielding her expression from him. He fisted his hand on his thigh to curb the urge to cup her chin and expose her gaze to him.
After a moment, she swiped the tip of her tongue over her bottom lip. ‘Did he...did he say anything about me?’ she enquired gruffly.
His irritation grew. ‘Should he have?’
Her long lashes flew up, jade-green eyes flashing at him before she turned to stare blindly out of the window.
Remi continued to study her. Although her fingers twisted the handle of her bag in agitation, her expression didn’t reflect the forlorn anguish of a discarded lover. No, Maddie Myers’s demeanour betrayed a different sort of torment. One of panicked frustration.
Jules had been an important cog in the wheel of her plans. A thwarted plan she was now furiously reassessing.
Still, he needed to be sure. ‘You didn’t kiss him back.’
Her head whipped towards him, her eyes widening. ‘What?’
‘Last night your supposed lover kissed you goodnight. You didn’t kiss him back. In fact you seemed disturbingly apathetic.’
Remi was certain that had been one of the reasons he hadn’t acted on his visceral need to separate them. The other had been because he hadn’t wanted to attract even more attention than his presence in that seedy nightclub had already garnered.
Maddie Myers schooled her features in a way that would have made his childhood deportment instructors proud. ‘Didn’t I? You must be mistaken.’
‘I was not. Why were you with Jules?’ The question was beginning to grate, like a tiny stone in his shoe.
‘According to you, he’s several thousand miles away. Therefore why we were together no longer matters, does it?’
Her gaze dropped to her phone, and there was a contemplative look in her eyes.
‘It matters if you’re planning to contact him the moment you’re out of my sight. If you are, I seriously advise against it.’
Defiant eyes met his. ‘I fail to see how you’re going to stop me, since the minute I step out of this vehicle I intend never to see you again.’
‘You delude yourself if you think you’ll be free of me that easily.’
‘And you delude yourself with...with whatever you think this interrogation is. I owe you nothing. Getting into this car with you was a courtesy. One you’ve outworn. So, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going back to work now before I annoy my boss.’
She reached for the handle to the door that would open onto the street.
He darted forward and seized her wrist, quiet fury laced with something that felt alarmingly close to dread fizzing