She must have. Because in the space of two seconds, she’d fled.
Just who was she? Why so afraid of someone finding her? Foreboding filled him. He didn’t trust women. He didn’t trust anyone.
If only he’d peeled off that mask and seen her face properly. How could he have made such a reckless, risky decision?
Anger simmered, but voices sounded outside the other door again, forcing him to move. He glanced in the mirror at his passion-swept reflection. Frowning, he swiftly buttoned his shirt and fixed his trousers properly. Thank heavens he’d retained enough sense to use protection. But as he sorted himself out he realised something he’d missed in his haste to ensure that door was secure. The damn condom was torn. And more than that? It was marked with a trace of something that shouldn’t have been there. He remembered when she’d first pushed down on him. When she’d inhaled sharply and tears had sprung to her eyes.
Uncertainty. Pain.
Grimly he fastened his belt. He’d been too lost to lust to absorb the implications of her reaction. Now his gut tensed as he struggled to believe the evidence. Had she given him her virginity? Had she truly never had another lover and yet let him, a total stranger, have her in a ten-minute tryst in a private powder room?
Impossible. But the stain of her purity was on his skin. His pulse thundered in his ears. Why would she have done something so wild? What was her motivation?
Hell, what had he been thinking? To have had sex with a woman he’d barely met as fast and as furiously as possible? Almost in public?
But her expressive response had swept all sensible thought from his head. She’d wanted him and heaven knew he’d wanted her. He was appalled by his recklessness; his anger roared. But a twist of Machiavellian satisfaction brewed beneath, because he was going to have to find her. He was going to have to warn her about the condom. The instinct to hunt her pressed like the blade of a knife. She owed him answers.
Find her. Find her. Find her.
His pulse banged like a pagan’s drum, marching him back to the busy ballroom. He even took to the balcony to scan the braying crowd, determined to find that blue hair and swan-like neck. But he knew it was futile. The midnight hour had struck and that sizzling Cinderella had run away, never wanting to be seen again.
Least of all by him.
‘YOU LOOK PEAKY.’
Eleni forced a reassuring smile and faced her brother across the aisle in his jet.
‘I have a bit of a headache but it’s getting better,’ she lied.
She felt rotten. Sleeplessness and guilt made her queasy.
‘The next few weeks will be frantic. You’ll need to stay in top form. They want the pretty Princess, not the pale one,’ King Giorgos turned back to the tablet he’d been staring at for the duration of the flight.
‘Yes.’
She glanced out of the small window. Crowds had gathered with flags and celebratory signs. She quickly dug into her bag to do a touch-up on her blush, thankful that the jet had landed them back on Palisades.
Giorgos had escorted her on a three-day celebration visit of Santa Chiara to meet again with Prince Xander and his family. Not so long ago she’d have inwardly grimaced at her brother’s smothering protectiveness, but she’d been glad of his presence. It had meant she’d not been left alone with Prince Xander.
The Shy Princess captures the Playboy Prince...
Their engagement had captured the imaginations of both nations. Her schedule and the resulting media interest had been beyond intense these last few weeks. At least all the appearances had kept her too busy to think. But late at night when she was alone in her private suite?
That was when she processed everything, reassuring herself she was safe. She would never tell anyone and that man from the ball would never tell anyone. He didn’t even know who she was. She didn’t know his name either. Only his face. Only his body.
She shivered but forced another smile when her brother glanced at her again. ‘I’m going to go to my hospital visit this morning,’ she said brightly.
Giorgos frowned. ‘You don’t wish to rest?’
Always protective. And also, always frowning.
She shook her head.
It had been nothing more than a sordid physical transaction. A ten-minute encounter between strangers. And surely, please, please, please, she would soon forget it. Because right now the memories were too real. She relived every moment, every word, every touch. And the worst thing? She wanted it again, wanted more, wanted it so much she burned with it. And then she burned with shame. Tears stung at the enormity of her betrayal. She was now engaged to another man yet all she could think of was him, that arrogant, intense stranger at the ball.
Thankfully displays of physical affection weren’t ‘done’ between royals so the few ‘kisses for the camera’ on her tour with Prince Xander had been brief—her coolness read by the media as shyness. In private her fiancé had seemed happy to give her the time and space to adjust.
It was Giorgos who had asked if she was going to be happy with Xander and who’d reassured her that her fiancé’s ‘playboy’ status was more media speculation than solid truth. For a moment she was tempted to confess her dreadful affair, but then she saw the tiredness in the back of her brother’s eyes. He worked so hard for his people.
And she couldn’t bear to see his crushing disappointment. She remembered how Giorgos had teased her with big-brother ruthlessness and laughter. But how he’d aged a decade overnight when their father died. Under the burden of all that responsibility he’d become serious, distant and more ruthless, without that humour. She understood he was wretchedly busy, but he’d tried his best for her—sending people to educate her, protect her, guide her. He just hadn’t had the time himself. And she could not let him down.
He believed Xander to be the right fit for her—from a limited pool of options—and perhaps he was. So she’d make the best of it.
For Giorgos.
But the thought of her wedding night repulsed her. As crazy as it was, that brief conversation with that stranger at the ball had engendered far more trust in her than any of the discussions she’d had with polite, well-educated, aiming-to-please but ultimately careless Prince Xander. She simply didn’t want him like that. She shivered again as that cold, sick feeling swept over her.
‘I don’t want to miss a visit,’ she finally answered as she rose to disembark the jet.
She needed to do something slightly worthwhile because the guilt was eating her up. Her brother nodded and said nothing more. If anyone understood duty before all else, it was he.
An hour later, as she walked the corridor towards her favourite ward, that cold queasiness returned.
‘Princess Eleni?’ Kassie, the physiotherapist escorting her to the ward, stopped.
From a distance Eleni registered the woman was frowning and her voice sounded distanced too.
‘Are you feeling okay?’
* * *
Damon Gale was barely existing in a state of perpetual anger. He hadn’t left Palisades without trying to find and warn his mystery lover there might be consequences from their time together. He’d described her to his half-sister Kassie, but she’d not been able to identify the woman either. No one could. None of his subtle queries had given any answers. Where had she disappeared to so quickly? Heaven knew, when he found her he was giving her a piece of his mind. But at night she came to him in dream after dream. He woke, hard, hungry and irritable as hell. There was so much more they