To Dance with a Prince (9 page)

He was so close to her she could see the dark beginning of stubble on his cheeks, and his chin. He was so close to her his breath stirred across her cheek, featherlight, as intimate as his thumb which remained on her lips. He was so close to her she could smell the scent of him, wild and clean as the forest, over the scent of the minerals in the mud that covered them.

She closed her eyes against the delicious agony of wanting a moment to last forever.

To escalate.

“I warned you there would be consequences if I took you prisoner,” he said, the words playful, while his tone was anything but.

Was he going to kiss her? Even as a rational part of her knew they could never pull back from that again, a less rational part of her wanted the taste of his lips on hers, wanted to feel them.

She took her hand, as if it didn't matter it was mud-covered, and traced a possessive line down the hard plane of his jaw. She touched it to the fullness of his lip.

As if it didn't matter to him that it was mud-covered, he teased her finger gently, nibbled it with his teeth.

She felt the featherlight touch of his lip against the skin of her finger. Was it possible to die of sensation?

If this—the merest touch of his lips to something as inconsequential as her finger—could cause this unbelievable rise of sensation within her, what would it be like if he took her lips with his own?

She felt as if it would be a death of sorts.

The death of all she had been before, the rising up of something new, the rising up within her of a spirit that was stronger and more resilient than she had ever imagined, similar to that spirit that rose in her when she danced.

A place that was without thought, and without history.

Heaven.

Brazen with wanting, she slipped her muddy hands around the column of his neck, and pulled him down to her.

His weight settled on her more fully, chest to the soft curve of breast, hard stomach to delicate swell, muscled legs to slender ones, fused.

A whisper of sanity called her back from the brink.

And then called louder,
stop.

It reminded her of the price of such a heated moment, lives changed forever.

But in that moment, she didn't care if there was a price.

And apparently neither did he.

Because his lips touched hers. The fact they were both mud-slicked only increased the danger, the sensuality, the delicious sense of being swept away, of not caring about what happened next, of being pulled by forces greater than themselves.

His very essence was in the way he kissed her.
Kiernan tasted, not of mud, but of rain in a storm, pure, clean, elemental. His kiss was tender, welcoming, and yet the strength and leashed passion were sizzling just below the surface.

It had been so long since Meredith had allowed anything or anyone to touch her, emotionally or physically.

She had not even known the hunger grew in her, waiting for something, someone to touch it off, to show her she was ravenous.

She was ravenous, and Kiernan was a feast of sensation.

Everything about him swirled around her—the light in his sapphire eyes, the line of his hard body against hers, the taste of his lips, the hollow of his mouth—all those broken places within her were being touched by sensation that was fulfilling and healing and exhilarating.

It was madness. Exquisite, delicious, compelling mad ness.

And she had to stop it. She had to.

Except that she was powerless, in the grip of something so amazing and wondrous she could not have stopped it if her very life depended on it. She was just not that strong.

But he was.

He pulled back from her, she saw strength and temptation war in his eyes, and she was astounded—and saddened—when his strength won. He pulled himself away from her, hesitated, dropped back down and placed one more tiny kiss on the corner of her lip, and then pulled his weight completely off her and stood gazing down at her.

Meredith saw control replace the heat in his eyes.

She watched awareness dawn in his eyes, saw his reluctant acquiescence to the guard he always surrounded himself with.

She knew, with a desperate sadness, this moment was over.

K
IERNAN COMPOSED HIMSELF,
held his hand to her. She took it, and her body made an unattractive slurping sound as he tugged, and then yanked hard to free her from the mud.

If he said he was sorry, she felt she would die.

But he did not say that, and she felt a strange sense of relief that she could tell he was not sorry. Not even a little bit.

And neither was she, even though the consequences of what had just happened hung over her.

Neither of them spoke, looking at each other, aware with an awareness that could not be denied once it had been acknowledged.

He dropped her hand, but not her gaze.

“Thank you,” he said softly.

She knew exactly what he meant. That moment of being so alive, so incredibly vibrantly alive had been a gift to both of them.

She had not even been aware how much she lived in a state of numbness until she had experienced this wonderful hour with him. It had been carefree, and laughter-filled, wondrous. Meredith felt as if she had been exquisitely and fully alive in a way she had not been for a long, long time.

If she ever had been that alive, that fully engaged, that spontaneous, that filled with wonder for the simple, unexpected miracle of life.

Still, leaving the utter and absolute magic of the moment, Meredith felt as if she was going to cry.

She covered the intensity of the moment by pasting a smile on her face. “You're welcome. People pay big money for the mud treatment at the spa.”

“Yes,” he said, watching her closely, as if he knew she was covering, as if he knew exactly how fake that smile was. “I know.”

And of course he would know. Because that was his world. Spas and yachts and polo ponies.

His world. He had playfully said he would take her prisoner, but the truth was his world was a prison in many ways.

And he could not invite her into it.

She did not have the pedigree of a woman he would ever be allowed to love.

Love
. How had that word, absolutely taboo in her relationship with him, slipped past all her guards and come into her mind?

But now that it had come, Meredith was so aware how this moment was going to have a tremendous cost to her. Because, she had ever so briefly glimpsed his heart. Because she had seen the coolness leave his eyes and be replaced with tenderness. Yes, this moment had come at a tremendous price to her. Because she had let her guard down, too.

For a moment she had wanted things she could not have. Ached for them.

Still, if she had this choice to make over, how would she do it? Would she play it safe and stay in the ball-
room, tolerating his wooden performance, allowing his mask to remain impenetrable?

No, she would change nothing. She would forever be grateful she had risked so much to let him out of his world, and his prison. Even if it had only been a brief reprieve.

And in return, hadn't she been let out of hers?

He turned from her, but not before she caught the deeply thoughtful look on his face, as if every realization she was having was also occurring to him.

He walked back through the fern barrier, leapt into the hot springs completely clothed. She watched his easy strength, as he did a powerful crawl that carried him across the pool to the cascading water of the falls. She quelled the primitive awareness that tried to rise in her.

Instead, she dove into the pool, too. Her skin had never felt so open to sensation. He had climbed up on a ledge underneath the falls, and she saw the remnants of their day falling off of him as if it had never happened.

It was time to clean herself of the residue of the day, too. She swam across the pool and pulled herself up on the ledge beside him.

The fresh, cold water was shocking on her heated skin. It pummeled her, was nearly punishing in its intensity.

Though she and Kiernan stood side by side, Meredith was painfully aware some distance now separated them, keeping their worlds separate even in the glorious intimacy of the cascading water world that they shared.

She slid him a look and felt her breath catch in her throat.

His face was raised to the water, his eyes closed as
what was left of the mud melted out of his hair and dissolved off his face, revealing each perfect feature: the cut of high cheekbones, the straight line of his nose, the faint cleft of his chin.

The white of Andy's shirt had reemerged, but the shirt had turned transparent under the water, and clung to the hard lines of Kiernan's chest. She could see the dark pebble of his nipple, the slight indent of each rib, the hollow of a taut, hard belly. It made her mouth go dry with a powerful sense of craving.

To touch. To taste. To have. To hold.

Impossible thoughts. Ones that would only bring more grief to her if she allowed them any power at all. Hadn't her life held quite enough grief?

Was it the coldness of the water after all that heat, or her awareness of him that was making her quiver?

Meredith felt herself wanting to save this moment, to remember the absolute beauty of it—and of him—forever.

He finally turned and dove cleanly off the ledge, cutting the water with his body. With that same swift, sure stroke, Kiernan made his way back across the mineral pond to where he had set the baskets. How long ago? An hour? A little longer than an hour?

How could so much change in such a short amount of time?

She dove in, too, emerged from the pond, dripping, and flinging back the wetness of her hair. She saw, from the brief heat in his eyes before he turned away, that Molly's shirt must have become as transparent as Andy's.

She glanced down. And she had accused him of boring underwear? Her bra—a utilitarian sports model made for athletic support while dancing—showed
clearly through the wet fabric. But from the look on his face you would have thought she was wearing a bra made out of silk and lace!

She shoved by him, and rummaged through the baskets, tucked a towel quickly around herself and then silently handed him a towel and a change of clothing.

Was there the faintest smirk on his face from how quickly she had wrapped herself up?

“You're prepared,” he said.

Yes. And no. There were some things you could not prepare for. Like the fact you hoped a man would tease you about being a prude, like the fact it was so hard to let go of a perfect day.

But he didn't tease her, or linger. He ducked behind a rock on one side of the glade and she on the other. She did not want to think of him naked in a garden, but she knew the temptation of Eve in that moment, and fought it with her small amount of remaining strength.

The trip back was eerily silent, as if they were both contemplating what had happened and how to go forward—or back—from that place.

Meredith drove back through the same service entrance to Chatam Palace. On the way in she had to stop and show ID, and her palace pass. She did not miss the stunned look on the face of the guard as he recognized the prince squished in the seat beside her. He practically tossed her ID back through her window, drew himself to attention and saluted rigidly.

It could not have been a better reminder of who the man beside her
really
was.

And the look of shock on the guard's face to see the prince in such a humble vehicle with a member of the palace staff, could not have been a better reminder of who she really was, too.

He was not Andy. She was not Molly.

He was a prince, born to position, power and prestige. She was a servant's daughter, a woman who had given birth to an illegitimate child, a person with so much history and so much baggage.

She let the prince out, barely looking at him. He barely looked at her.

They did not say goodbye.

Meredith wondered if he would show up for their scheduled dance session tomorrow. Would she?

The whole thing had become fraught with a danger that she did not know how to handle.

And yet, even that tingling sensation of danger as she drove away from the palace after dropping Kiernan off there, served as a reminder.

She was alive.

She was alive, and for the first time in a long, long time, she was aware of being deeply grateful that she was alive. The pain. The glory. The potential to be hurt. The potential to love. It was all part of the most incredible dance.

There was that word again.

Love.

“Forbidden to me,” Meredith said. Because of who he was. Because of who she was, and especially because of where she had already been in the name of love.

But of course, what had more power than forbidden fruit?

When Prince Kiernan walked through the doors of the ballroom the next morning, Meredith did not know whether she was relieved he had come, or sorry that she had to be tested some more.

He was right on time as always.

They exchanged perfunctory greetings. She put on the music. He took her hand, placed his other with care on her waist.

The trip to the hot springs had obviously been an error in every way it was possible for something to be an error.

This was turning out to be just like the day she had ridden his horse and they had danced in the courtyard to the chamber music spilling out the palace windows.

Prince Kiernan's guard came down, but only temporarily!

And when it went back up, it went way up!

After half an hour of tolerating a wooden performance from him, Meredith was not tingling with awareness of being alive at all! She was tingling with frustration. Was he dancing this badly just to put her off? Maybe he was hoping she would cancel the whole thing. And maybe she should.

Except she couldn't. It was too late now to start over with someone else. The girls, rehearsing separately, at her studio, had practiced to perfection. They were there night and day, putting heart and soul into this.

She wasn't letting them down because Prince Kiernan was the most confoundedly stubborn man in the world.

But really, enough was enough!

“This is excruciating,” she said, pulling away from him, folding her arms across her chest and glaring at him.

Somewhere under that cool, composed mask was the man who had chased her, laughter-filled, through the mud.

“I warned you I had no talent.”

“Call somebody,” she snapped at him. “It's like a
game show where you have a lifeline. Call somebody, and use your princely powers. Have them find us the movie
Dancing with Heaven
. And deliver it. Right here. Right now.”

It was an impossible request. The movie was old. It would probably be extremely difficult if not impossible to find.

For a moment he looked like he might argue, but then he chose not to, probably because he wanted to do just about anything rather than dance.

With her.

With some new tension in the air between them. Harnessed, it would make for an absolutely electrical dance performance.

Resisted, it would make for a disastrous dance performance.

He took a cell phone out of his pocket, and placed a call.

“Tell them not to forget the popcorn,” she said darkly. “And I'd like something to drink, too.”

“You're being very bossy,” he said. “As usual.”

Within minutes his cell phone rang back. “It's set up in the theater room,” he said.

“Can't we watch it here?”

“No, we can't. I'm not sitting on an icy cold floor to watch a movie. Not even for you.”

Not even for you.
She heard something there that she knew instantly he had not intended for her to hear. Something that implied he would do anything for her, up to and including going to the ends of the earth.

She deliberately quelled the beating of her heart and followed the prince to where he held open the ballroom doors for her.

It was the first time Meredith had been in the private
areas of the interior of the palace. The ballroom, along with the throne room, and a gallery of collected art was in the public wing of the palace, open to anyone who went there on a tour day.

Now, Prince Kiernan led her through an arched door flanked by two palace guards who saluted him smartly. The door led into the private family quarters of the palace.

They were in a grand entranceway, a formal living room on one side, a curving staircase on the other. The richness of it was startling: original old masters paintings, Persian rugs, priceless antiques, draperies and furniture upholstered in heavy brocaded silks. A chandelier that put the ones in the ballroom to shame spattered light over the staircase and entry.

Kiernan noticed none of it as he marched her up the wide stairs, under the portraits of his ancestors, many of whom looked just like him, and all of whom looked disapproving.

“What a happy looking lot,” she muttered. “They have aloofness down to a fine art.”

He glanced at the portraits. “Don't they?” With
approval.

So
that's
where he got his rigidity!

“Maybe I'm wasting my time trying to break past something that has been bred into each Chatam for hundreds of years.” And that they were proud of to
boot
.

“I've been trying to tell you.”

And maybe if she hadn't been stupid enough to take him on that excursion yesterday, she would have believed him.

“This floor is where guests stay,” he said, exiting the staircase that still spiraled magnificently upward. He led her down a wide corridor.

Bedroom doors were open along either side of the hallway and she peeked in without trying to appear too interested. The bedrooms, six in all, three on either side of the hallway were done in muted, tasteful colors. The décor had the flavor and feel of pictures Meredith had seen of very upscale boutique hotels.

It occurred to Meredith that princes and presidents, prime ministers, princesses and prima donnas had all walked down these corridors.

It reminded her who the man beside her
really
was, and she felt a whisper of awe. He opened the door to a room at the end of the long hallway.