The Prince She Had to Marry Read online

  He realized he really needed to get ahead of her fury at him, somehow. So he went for the painful truth. “I was wrong, all right? I was completely in the wrong.”

  She sat very still. And then she swallowed and spoke in a small voice. “Would you say that again, please?”

  Twice wasn’t enough? Apparently not. He forged ahead. “I was wrong. I should never have lied to you. That was wrong. I had no right to make an agreement I didn’t intend to keep.” Even if I needed to do it to get you to marry me.

  “You were wrong,” she said again, slowly and much too deliberately.

  “Yes, I believe I said that. More than twice.”

  “But still, in your heart, you feel that you had to do it.”

  “I didn’t say that,” he hedged.

  “No, but you were thinking it. I know you were. I know you, Alex. I know you all too well.”

  That news hit him rather hard, because she happened to be right that he was thinking it. And if she was right about that, was she right that she knew him?

  Couldn’t be. Nobody knew him. Not really.

  He made his apology outright. “I’m sorry that I tricked you.”

  She made a humphing sound. “But you would do it again if you felt that you had to.”

  He considered strangling her, but it wouldn’t be right. There was the child to think of, after all. “Look at it this way. You wanted more time with me. Now you’re going to get it. We’re joined at the hip for weeks to come.”

  “Yes, and now you’ve ruined everything. Now even I don’t want to try to make a real marriage of this mess we’re in together.”

  Strangely, he didn’t believe that. Not for a second. Lili might be a royal pain, but she never gave up on the things she believed in. “Interesting. I thought you said you believed that marriage was forever.”

  “I’m discouraged, Alex. Very, very discouraged.”

  “Yes, I can see that. I’ll tell you what...”

  She sent him a sideways look that spoke of pure suspicion. “What?”

  “Take off your shoes, settle back on the pillows. Have a nap.”

  “Will you please stop telling me to have a nap?”

  “Things will look brighter after you’ve rested.” He dropped to his knees on the carpet.

  She let out a tiny shriek of surprise and craned back away from him. “What are you doing?”

  “Here. Give me your foot.”

  She tucked both feet to the side, tight against the bedspread. “Why?”

  “I’ll help you off with your shoes.”

  The Delft-blue eyes narrowed. “You are being altogether too solicitous. I have to ask. Who are you and what have you done with Alex?”

  “Perhaps I’m...” He paused. He truly did not want to say the word. But then he gathered his determination and made himself do it. “...trying.”

  She stared at him, hard, her soft lips a thin line. And then, with clear reluctance, she offered him her right foot. He took it gently. It was soft and small and perfect and delicate.

  Like the rest of her.

  He undid the clasp at her ankle and slid the shoe off, all too aware of the slim, sculpted shape of her ankle, the beautiful, high arch of that foot, of her slim, smooth little toes that were painted the same deep blue as her eyes.

  She offered the other foot without being asked. He removed the sandal, sharp images suddenly popping and flashing in his brain.

  Lili, naked.

  Lili, laughing.

  Lili, when he came back from Princeton after his sophomore year. She was sixteen years old and suddenly way too grown up. Stunningly so. He’d said something cruel to her, hadn’t he?

  And she had slapped his face and run away.

  He eased his hand from around her ankle, set the left sandal neatly aside next to its mate. And then he tipped his head back and made himself look in her wide, waiting eyes. “Come on, then. Let’s pull the covers back.” He rose and held out his hand.

  For a moment, she considered. Then she gave in and laid her hand in his. He cradled her delicate fingers and she rose. He thought about pulling her close and kissing her, even though there was no one there to see them, no one to impress with how much in love they supposedly were.

  Because really, why not? If they were forced to be constantly together, to try and make everyone think that they were shagging their brains out every chance they got, why not just go ahead and do what everyone was supposed to think they were doing?

  Because she’s dangerous, said the warning voice inside his head. She wanted more than he could give. She wanted to...open his heart and have a long look inside. That was not a good idea. He was getting along now, getting by. There was a certain equilibrium now. The night sweats and vivid, brutal dreams no longer tortured him. He wanted to keep it that way. Some things were simply better left unexamined.

  “Alex?” She was searching his face.

  He still wanted to kiss her. He made a questioning sound and reminded himself again that kissing her when no one was watching was completely unnecessary and would only lead to trouble.

  “That time...” She seemed suddenly breathless. “That one time, in April, you know, when we...”

  If kissing her wasn’t a good idea, talking about that one time in April was a really, really bad idea. He let go of her hand and stepped sideways to get around her and pull the covers down. “Rest for a while. You’ll feel—”

  She caught his hand. “Alex. Please. I...have a question. Something I very much need to ask you.”

  Don’t ask, Lili. Please. Don’t ask....

  But he was trapped and he knew it. He’d said he was sorry for the way he’d behaved. They were getting along marginally better. If he wanted to keep it that way, he was going to have to put in some effort. “Yes, Lili. What is it?”

  Her face flooded with charming color. “I...well, for me, that, what happened in April, was good. It was very good. Excellent, even.” She looked up at him, so earnest, so hopeful. “Was it that way for you, too?”

  He told the truth. “Yes.”

  Her eyes were indigo, deep as night. “I was...so surprised. I always thought the first time was, you know, not so good?”

  He found he had to clear his throat before he could answer. “Often it can be difficult,” he said, after which he felt like a complete bonehead.

  She kept scanning his face, as though she might find the secrets of the universe hidden somewhere between his eyebrows and his chin. “I have another question.”

  Of course you do. “Yes?”

  “Why were you so angry with me afterward?”

  He supposed he’d known that was coming. “I wasn’t angry.”

  “You didn’t say anything, except that I should go. You wouldn’t even look at me.”

  “It was best, that you left. I thought...we could put it behind us, forget that it had ever happened.”

  “That’s called denial, Alex,” she chided. “You know that, don’t you? Denial doesn’t work. Don’t you know that?”

  “You’re probably right,” he gave out grudgingly. “In this case, it certainly didn’t.”

  “Are you still writing, Alex?”

  He frowned down at her. “How did we get from sex and denial to my writing?”

  She lifted an arm and waved it in a circular motion. “It’s all connected. It’s all part of the greater whole.”

  He wisely did not release the scoffing sound that was trying so hard to escape from his throat. “I have no interest in writing. Not anymore.”

  “You should. Everyone needs a form of expression, I think. I don’t know where I would be without my painting.”

  As far as he was concerned, the world could get along perfectly well without another watercolor of a frolicking unicorn. But he decided not to share that. “There’s no point in my writing anything anymore, Lili. I have nothing whatsoever to say.”

  “Try, why don’t you? You might surprise yourself.”

  “I have altogether too mu
ch trying to do already, simply in dealing with you.”

  She reached up then and put her cool, smooth hand on the side of his cheek. Her tender touch stunned him like a blow. Heat flared in his groin and his breath caught. She...seduced him, with a touch.

  It occurred to him that she had been seducing him all his life. He’d kept up a workable defense against her innocent wiles for decades. Recently, however, she’d been breaching the battlements, digging defiant little tunnels under the walls....

  One kiss, he found himself thinking. One kiss unobserved by a single paparazzo. What could it hurt?

  And then she went on tiptoe, the way she had done before dawn on their wedding day. She went on tiptoe and pressed her lips to his.

  A butterfly-brush of a kiss, too brief. Too beautiful for words.

  She sank back to her bare heels. “All right, then. I’ll have a nap.”

  He wanted to laugh. And groan. And drag her close again.

  But he only turned to the bed and pulled down the covers as she padded over to the dressing room, vanishing inside. A moment later, she emerged with an enormous pink T-shirt and went into the bath. He sank to his chair and waited until she came out dressed in the T-shirt, which had a giant-sized picture of Minnie Mouse making a telephone call on the front.

  “I actually do feel a little better about everything,” she announced as she climbed up into the bed, revealing an altogether too-tempting length of perfect, smooth thigh.

  “Good.” He rose and pulled the gold sheet up over her.

  She gazed up at him from the pillows, her expression angelic. “I know you’re going to leave the moment I fall asleep.”

  He didn’t deny it. “By then, we’ll have been in here together long enough to allay suspicion. They’ll believe we’ve made passionate love.”

  “After which I fell asleep? How callous of me.”

  He sat in the chair again. “Shh. Close your eyes.”

  She surprised him by doing what he told her to do. He sat there and watched her. It was no hardship looking at Lili. Within minutes, her breathing evened out and she slept.

  He could have risen then and quietly left the stateroom. But instead, he stayed where he was. He watched Lili sleep and thought how he really did need to be careful. It was one thing to find a way to get along with her.

  And another altogether to let her get too close.

  He wasn’t a whole man anymore, and he knew that. He was a cobbled-together sort of creature now. He’d found a certain balance.

  Letting Lili get too close could cast him into chaos. He couldn’t afford that.

  Still, he remained in the chair, watching her. Feeling strangely peaceful, almost daring to imagine what it could be between them.

  And then catching himself, reminding himself that he was only going to learn to get along with her, to live in peace with her. They were never going to have the kind of marriage she dreamed of.

  And he needed to remember that.

  Chapter Six

  In the long, sunny days that followed, they got along well enough, Lili thought.

  They spent time every day lazing on deck, acting like newlyweds for the world to see. They stood at the rail, shoulders pressed together, and gazed out over the endless blue sea. They shopped and dined and danced together in a number of exotic and beautiful ports of call.

  Alone in their stateroom, though, Alex had put his walls back up. And he kept them up. There was none of that easy sharing and conversation that had happened that first day of their honeymoon. He slept on the carpet at the foot of the bed. He was...kind to her. Even thoughtful.

  But there was a definite distance between them that set her nerves on edge.

  She hated it. It wasn’t real. Emotionally he continued to hold himself apart from her. His public kisses were torture. They made her yearn for what they might have together if he would only give them a chance.

  Alex hated it, too, although he never confessed that hatred to Lili. Every day, every hour, every moment of their endless cruise, he discovered new things he liked about his wife. Being with her constantly, sleeping in the same cabin with her, he could no longer deny the truth about her. She was good and kind and gentle. He even began to find her endless chatter charming.

  And worst of all was how much he wanted her.

  It was the bane of his existence, this longing to have her again, to take off all her clothes and lie with her naked. To bury himself in her softness, to lose himself in her arms.

  But he knew her. She was one of those women. The kind who enjoyed sex, but insisted that their pleasure be accompanied by a healthy dose of intimacy. If the two of them became lovers, she wouldn’t be satisfied until she held his heart and his soul in her hands.

  Unfortunately, his heart was in tatters and his soul was missing in action, so there would be no satisfying her. It was a tightrope he walked with her. He dreaded the day he stumbled. And he had a clear sense that that day was coming.

  They made their slow, luxurious way down the coast of Italy. Livorno, Rome, Naples. They explored them together. They spent two days in Sicily, strolling along the Via Vittorio Emanuele in Palermo, soaking up the sun on Mortelle Beach, with what seemed to Alex to be the entire population of the town of Messina. Among the crowds they would be sure to be seen and photographed. And Alex’s specially trained bodyguards kept the locals from getting too close.

  After Sicily, they proceeded north along the eastern Italian coast. In Venice, they spent an evening with Damien and his current lady love, an actress named Vesuvia.

  Damien was in Venice to meet with a certain race car manufacturer. His lover, Vesuvia, was over six feet tall, with acres of tawny hair and cat-slanted green eyes. She behaved like her namesake, the volcano, erupting during dinner, spewing a barrage of angry Italian, gesturing wildly with her long, slim hands. At some thoughtless remark from Damien, the woman jumped up from the table in a fury and stormed out, leaving Damien chuckling and Alex and Lili pretty much speechless.

  “I’m so sorry,” Damien said, hiding a yawn. “Artistic temperament, you know.”

  Lili gazed at him with fond indulgence. She’d always been easy and affectionate with Alex’s twin. And then she said, “Go on, Dami. Go after her.”

  Damien gave a lazy shrug. “It will only encourage her and she already exhausts me.”

  Alex read the look on his twin’s face—and heard the note of boredom in his voice. Vesuvia would soon be old news.

  Lili warned, “Dami, you will lose her...”

  Damien only shrugged again and ordered more champagne.

  “You are thoroughly impossible,” Lili scolded. And then she turned her indigo gaze on Alex. “Almost as bad as you.” With that, she tossed her napkin on the table, pushed back her chair and went after Vesuvia.

  Damien watched her go with real admiration. “Lili. One in a million.” He leaned close and spoke sotto voce. “I still have no idea why she ever agreed to marry you.”

  Given that Damien had been there that morning in the breakfast room and barely escaped being impaled by Leo’s trusty scimitar, he knew very well why Lili had agreed to marry him.

  Not that Alex had any intention of discussing his marriage to Lili at dinner—or at all, for that matter. “I’m a very lucky man,” he replied without inflection.

  “You are indeed. I only hope someday you’ll come to realize how lucky.” Damien actually sounded sincere for once—and sincerity had never been his strong suit.

  “Are you lecturing me, little brother?” Alex was his twin’s senior by twenty-five minutes.

  Damien leaned even closer. He whispered, “She looks sad.”

  Alex whispered back, “Stay out of it.”

  “So superior,” muttered Dami. “So much better than the rest of us.”

  Alex looked into the face that was a mirror of his own and wondered as he often did why they’d never been like other twins: sharing a secret language, inseparable. Having to learn to live in the world as two distinct be
ings. From the day they were born, they were set on different paths. “Not better,” he confessed softly. “Not the least superior. Trust me, Dami. I know that now.”

  For a moment, his twin met his eyes directly. “I would call that progress—if only our Lili didn’t look so sad.” Dami’s gaze shifted to a point over Alex’s shoulder and his usual expression of lighthearted indifference returned. “Your beautiful bride returns. Alone.”

  A moment later, in a rustle of cobalt-blue silk, Lili reclaimed the chair beside him. “She wasn’t in the ladies’.” She put her hand over her champagne flute as the waiter attempted to fill it. “I hope she’s all right.”

  “Trust me,” said Damien. “Vesuvia always lands on her feet, spewing fire.”

  “Oh, Dami,” she chided. “When are you going to get serious about your life?”

  Damien laughed. “As serious as my twin brother, you mean?”

  Lili turned to him. Her eyes met his. He thought about drowning in those eyes. He wished that he dared.

  She faced his brother again. “No, not that serious. Absolutely not.”

  * * *

  Lili was getting nowhere with Alex.

  Oh, he was kind enough. And thoughtful. He listened when she spoke and actually replied without irony or meanness. On deck and on land—anytime they were in public—he touched her often. He kissed her with tenderness and desire. They even laughed together now and then, when other people were around.

  But the moment the door to their stateroom was shut and he was alone with her, he retreated. He remained scrupulously kind and gentle with her, but he put up a wall between them. And he guarded that wall diligently. He never let her past it, never stepped out from behind it and joined her on the other side.

  After Venice, there was Trieste. They received updates from the Prince’s Palace. Their honeymoon was working out exactly as planned. The paparazzi were getting lots of pictures of Lili and Alex looking so much in love. They were seen embracing on the front pages of any number of scandal sheets. The headlines were all about how perfect they were for each other, a real-life prince and princess, living the dream of happily ever after and doing it in grand style.

  Looking at those tabloid photos, Lili wanted to cry. The happiness, the true togetherness that those pictures seemed to show only made the reality of her life with Alex all the more unbearable.