His Princess in the Making (6 page)

She took a step towards him, her face wise, lovely and so uncertain. “All I did was to show him the truth. Your plan was wonderful, Toby.
You
showed the King you care about Hellenia.”

Her hair was tumbling to her shoulders, as she always had it when she was off the princess leash. Her eyes were locked on his mouth, deep, sleepy pools he wanted to lie down in. Her sweet mouth trembled.

She wants me.
And even though he’d known that truth for days, every time he saw it again his body ached and throbbed, and a streak of white-hot heat ran through him like jagged lightning.
She still wants me after all these years. I didn’t destroy it…

“Both are the truth, my Giulia. I do care about Hellenia—and I want you.” He didn’t move, but willed her closer with smile, eyes and heart.
Come to me, my beloved girl. Come to me and touch me.

Her lush mouth parted. Her tongue ran over her top lip, slightly fuller than the bottom one; delicious. Edible. He’d ached to nibble on that lip for years.

Soon. Soon…

“Princess Giulia, the King would like to see you at your earliest convenience.”

As if she’d awakened from a dream, she blinked, and her head snapped round to where her new PA, Lady Olga Kanakarides, had spoken. “I’ll come now.”

As she passed him, he willed himself to be still, to let her go. He had to wait, even though it felt like that was all he ever did.

His patience was rewarded this time. At the door, she turned and gave him a slumberous smile. The smile of a woman almost ready to understand that the man she was smiling for wanted her.

Then the smile faltered; she turned back to the world out
side this room and the delicate magic of one moment in time faded as a star at sunrise.

Whatever secrets were inside her remained locked there. For now.

The Wedding of His Royal Highness, Crown Prince
Kyriacos to Her Royal Highness, Princess Jazmine

“I’d like to ask the bride and groom to take the floor for the traditional bridal waltz. Prince Kyriacos personally chose the song, and wishes to dedicate it to his bride.” In his combined duties of best man and master of ceremonies, Toby smiled and made a sweeping motion with his hand. He had the knack of royal behaviour down pat, despite not having the bloodline. He seemed to fit in with the beautiful people of Europe with no apparent effort.

Did nothing faze him, ever?

Lia smiled as she watched her brother Charlie take his bride’s hand and lead her to the dance floor. Beneath her outward serenity, though, her heart was beating hard and fast. As maid of honour, she naturally must waltz with the best man.

She’d be in his arms for the first time in weeks, since the first day he’d arrived.

Though he’d touched her and told her how much he wanted her, she didn’t know what to believe; how could she believe it? So she hadn’t touched him at all, apart from taking his arm back down the aisle four hours ago. And she hadn’t been alone with him since that family conference in the tea room: Theo Angelis had made certain of it, and for once she’d been grateful for the King’s interference.

Yet all the contrived avoidance in the world hadn’t stopped her
thinking.
She couldn’t stop reliving the bare few moments when she’d been in his arms, not as friend but lover, and she still felt his lips on hers.

Her entire body pounded with excitement whenever she thought about it. And tonight, even the King couldn’t stop them touching.

“Shall we?” Before she was ready, a hand she knew as well as her own was in front of her, strong and bronzed as the rest of him.

“Of course.” So excited she was afraid to look up, she rose to her feet.

Toby kept her hand in his as he led her to the dance floor, and took her in his arms, positioning her beautifully for the Viennese Waltz.

Nine years ago, Papou had thought it a good idea if she learned ballroom dancing, and had arranged for Toby to learn with her. Of course he’d come; she’d rarely gone anywhere without him back then. He’d always picked her up for dancing lessons once she’d finished with the kids.

She’d never have learned if he hadn’t taken her. His being six-five to her five-ten, they fit well together—and at seventeen, shy, awkward and uncomfortable with her imperfect, still-recovering body, the thought of facing a stranger, touching someone she didn’t know, had been a major issue.

Now, as a woman, touching Toby was the issue.

He danced with a grace rare in such a big man, and he had no problems with the exaggerated movements of the dance that embarrassed so many Aussie guys. He held her close, and guided her into dips and swirls, with the strong arms and back that was his firefighting legacy.

Not too close, but not close enough, and nowhere near far enough away.

She could feel the envious glances by the glittering array of women in the room. To be held by this big, tough brute of a man…

They didn’t know the truth: that the tough exterior held a heart so big and giving, he’d saved her life. He’d moved in
when his parents had divorced because he’d needed her family, but he hadn’t run when they’d needed help nursing their dying Yiayia. He’d stayed when, lost in grief after Yiayia’s death, none of them had known what to do, and Papou had lost interest in life. Toby had become the glue that held her family together when it had almost fallen apart.

“Are you going to talk to me, Giulia, or are you pretending I don’t exist for the benefit of our watchers?”

Startled, she looked up at him with a tiny frown. “I didn’t think you were in the mood for conversation.”

“You’re right, I’m not.” Slowly he dipped her and brought her back up, close to his face. She saw the sensuous intent in his intense, sky-blue eyes as he growled, “I want to kiss you.”

Heat flashed through her, a wave of colour filling her cheeks.

He whirled her out, again with a slowness that felt like a seduction. He brought her back to his taut, hot body, beautifully clad in a tuxedo that cost more than she’d earned in a year back home.

He looked magnificent. Like a prince on fire. Like a man with every right to touch a princess in front of three hundred important onlookers.

Trouble was, she felt like anything
but
a princess when he touched her.

“Can we talk about something…anything?” she murmured, when the tension, the
need,
in her was a thin thread about to snap.

He smiled down at her, warm, intimate. “I’m at your service, for whatever you need, my Giulia.”

A quiver streaked through her body; liquid heat pooled through her, hearing the soft possessive:
my
Giulia. “We’ve never discussed how it all happened, that first day when Charlie and I found out who we are.”

His face softened. “You sounded frightened on the phone.”

And though she’d started the conversation, the strangest
flash of annoyance ran through her. She moistened her lip with her tongue over a smile in an attempt to cover it. “It was more of a life-changing shock than anything—and you know how Charlie reacts to shocks.”

A dimple came into play as he smiled back; his eyes were warm, like summer at the beach. “He turned ballistic, I gather, and you were exhausting all reserves to keep him under containment?”

She laughed, relieved to be finding a friendly footing with him. “Something like that.” Actually, it had been exhilarating, liberating in a way she couldn’t explain. Coming here had changed more than her name. She’d found out what she was capable of on her own.

Another dip, but this time he kept it under strict terms of dancing, and she breathed a sigh of cheated relief. “It can’t have been easy for you.”

After thinking about it, she said, “It was good practice for what lay ahead. Charlie and Theo Angelis needed almost constant mediation at first.” The funny thing was that here, for the first time, she’d felt truly
needed.
It had taken all her negotiating skills and learned wisdom to keep things under control between the King and her brother. Max, while pretending he was the gallant knight ready to help her, had been more of a charming lone wolf with a chip on his shoulder, and Jazmine had needed a friend, a sister, as she’d fallen in love with Charlie almost at a glance.

Lia had risen to the occasion far better than she’d have believed. Instead of being the one everyone worried about, now she was the one everyone turned to.

“Not all of it has been bad for Charlie, obviously. He and Jazmine seem to have worked things out.”

She turned to look at her brother and laughed. Charlie was kissing Jazmine again. He had a bad habit of kissing her no matter where they were. “Yes, they have.”

“I saw several pictures of him in the papers with Jazmine on the way over here. None of them exactly portrayed a reluctant prince.”

Indulgent, so happy for her brother, she said, “It’s not the position that made this work, it was the woman. I think he’d sacrifice anything for Jazmine.”

“Yes.” Toby’s voice turned softer, but not gentle; it was hotter, lush, like a heavy night. “There are some things worth making sacrifices for. When she touches him and he touches her, when he holds her close and they kiss, it’s beautiful to behold. That kind of love only comes once in a lifetime to each man and woman.”

Lia gulped and tried to breathe, but that thick, deep thudding of her blood took over again. “Yes.”

As other couples drifted onto the dance floor, Toby looked down at her, his rough-handsome, just-craggy face smiling, his head slightly tilted. “Are you feeling well, Giulia, beloved? You sound a bit on the croaky side.”

Beloved.

Hearing it again for the first time in weeks, and the sensual way he said her name—
Yoolya
—she shivered. He felt it, she knew he did, because he pulled her a little closer. “The night air is a touch chilly for you?”

“I’m fine.” The words were abrupt; she didn’t know what to say to him, or how to say it. She didn’t want him to fuss; not that he sounded concerned, exactly, more like…

“You sound—I hesitate to say it, but—a little angry, all of a sudden,” he murmured close to her ear. The tender growl of his rough voice moved under her skin. “Care to discuss the whys and wherefores?”

He only used polysyllabic words when he felt in control. She wanted to hit him for doing this to her, for making her feel too warm, too close, too confused. Her head was spinning like the movement of the dance. “Stop it, Toby,” she
said when he reeled her back in to his body, again an inch too close.

“What would you like me to stop?” he asked, his voice rough, sexual, velvet over gravel, seducing her. “Tell me and it’s done. I’m at your service, Your Highness, as I’ve always been.”

“Don’t call me that,” she snapped, weak and craving. “I have enough people putting me at a distance without you doing it too.”

He grinned down at her, a brow lifted. “Pardon me, Giulia. I thought you
wanted
to put me at a distance.”

“Yes—no—oh, just
stop,
” she whispered, anguished. “We’re in public, and there are a hundred eyes on me. I’m too new at this. I have to be seen to be doing everything right. It’s been frightening and lonely and—and, oh, hard enough here. I wanted you here with me, but you’ve changed.” Hot colour flooded her face, and she didn’t know how to go on.

“How have I changed?” he whispered back, his face so close the chocolate, minted breath caressed her skin, her lips.

She closed her eyes, barely noticing her hands had clenched, holding hard to his hand and shoulder. “You’re—you keep acting as if—”

“As if…?” His hand at her back drew her to him, until the current of his warmth filled all the chilled, lonely places of the past few months, of feeling so alone.

“Why are you doing this?” She was weary of trying to work him out. “I don’t understand. You never wanted me. I accepted that. I got over you. We’re—friends.”

“If you’re alluding to that miserable New Year’s Eve almost eleven years ago, I’ve spent more than ten years paying penance for it.” His thumb slipped between their linked hands, caressing her palm, until the thrumming heat in her became pounding desire. “Ten years yearning to turn the clock back and change my response when you kissed me, to
unsay what hurt you so badly you couldn’t look me in the face for weeks. Wishing I hadn’t been so damned scared that the only family I had left, the only family I wanted, would kick me out if I touched you. I made you pay the price for my fear.”

Strangely, the first time they discussed the thing that had happened eleven years before—the kiss—didn’t break the mood, but escalated it. She saw the girl she’d been, who’d spent the whole night in a corner gathering up the courage to go to him at midnight and kiss not his cheek but his lips…and when she had, he’d kissed her back for ten beautiful seconds. “But—but you laughed at me, asked me if I was drunk, and then walked off and kissed that girl.”

“All that that piece of male denial accomplished was to awaken me to the truth,” he muttered roughly. “I closed my eyes and saw your face. I touched her and felt you. When she talked to me I heard you whispering ‘kiss me for New Year’s,’ turning your face as I went to kiss your cheek, and all I wanted was to kiss you again. Then the words I’d said replayed over in my head, and I wished to God I could unsay them. When I came home and you avoided me for days, I knew how much I’d hurt you, and hated myself for it. I was given a trust, to look out for you that night, and I couldn’t break it. But you’ll never know how much I wanted to.”

She shook her head, aching, wishing. “Why are you telling me now? It’s years too late for this conversation. I want my friend back.”

“Is it? Do you?” The words were so soft she barely heard, so close they touched her soul. So like the Toby she’d always had with her; the boy who’d saved her life and the man who’d devoted a decade to their friendship. So like the man who’d lived and danced, cooked and worked beside her for so many years. So like…and so unlike. “Do you want my friendship, Giulia? Only that?”