She served Mrs. Humphreys’s cold lobster salad, then on impulse, she arched her back, thrust her chest forward, and said in a southern drawl, “Would you rather have that little ol’ lobster or little ol’ me?”
Her excellent imitation of Dolly made him smile.
She sat down across from him. “What do American couples do when they’re alone?”
“Outside of bed I have no idea.”
She blinked a few times at that. “Don’t American women find this life somewhat boring? Do they really enjoy cleaning even if it is for their families?”
J.T. smiled again. “Maybe ‘enjoy’ isn’t the right word. What did you do as a princess?”
“I always got a great deal of exercise. My sister and I rode horses, fenced, had dancing classes.”
“That’s why you look—” He broke off.
“I look what?”
He grinned. “Look so good in a bathing suit.”
“Thank you,” she said.
“The first time I’ve heard those words.”
“The first time you’ve deserved them,” she shot back.
“Oh? Saving your life didn’t rate a thank-you?”
“For all I knew you were worse than the kidnappers. ‘Breathe for Daddy Montgomery,’ ” she mocked.
He started to say something then stopped. “Maybe you’d like to see the blueprints for the new distillation ship. Maybe that’ll help relieve the boredom.”
“Yes, please,” she said.
It was very pleasant sitting on the couch together leaning over the blueprints. The war needed ships that could distill fresh water from seawater and deliver it to troops. J.T. was in charge of converting the first of these ships.
Her mind was hungry for something of interest, something of the present instead of the past.
“Could a plant like this be made on land?” she asked.
“It would be easier on land than on a ship. Why?”
“At home in Lanconia our major crop is grapes for wine, but in the last five years we’ve had a drought. We are losing our grapes. But seeing this I wonder if such a plant could be made and we could irrigate the grapes. The young people are leaving my country because we are losing a major source of income.”
“You’d have to have some engineers look at it but I imagine something could be done.”
“You’d look at it? I mean, when we go home, you’d help my country?”
“I don’t know what I can do but I’ll try.”
She smiled at him. “It would mean a great deal to my people if you did. Dolly says you know as much about shipbuilding as anyone alive today.”
J.T. laughed. “Not by a long shot, but my family knows a lot.” He looked at his watch. “You ready to go to bed, baby?” He caught himself. “I mean—”
She smiled at him. “I’m beginning to like the ‘honeys’ and ‘babies,’ although I’m not sure about ‘Princess.’ ”
“It fits you,” he said, yawning. “Cool, stiff, unbending, not quite human. The name means someone untouchable and that’s what you are.”
“Oh,” she said softly, and turned away. “Someone not quite human.” She went upstairs, and as she was creaming her face and putting a net over her hair she thought about his words. Was she like he described? Two nights ago he had kissed her and she had felt such passion that she had been afraid. Hadn’t he felt anything? Maybe when he kissed Heather she was warmer. Maybe Heather knew a great deal about kissing.
Aria went to her narrow bed on the other side of the partition from J.T. and lay awake. It was hot, as always, and she wore a thin peach-colored nylon nightgown, more a slip than a gown. “Rita Hayworth style,” Dolly had said when they bought it.
It began to storm around midnight and the wind lashed at the thin-walled little house. The thunder cracked and the lightning lit the room. Aria threw off the covers, the nightgown feeling heavy and confining. It grew hotter and closer in the room and she began to perspire.
Another crack of thunder made the windows pop. Aria tried to get comfortable but she couldn’t. Images floated through her mind: J.T. on the island standing over her, his big body nearly nude; J.T. in his swim trunks. She remembered the look in his eyes as he had entered the clearing and seen her bathing in the pool. She remembered his two kisses.
She started and pulled the sheet over her body as she heard the floor creak behind her. In the dim light she saw J.T. walk past her bed and close a window.
He turned back, glanced at her, then stopped. “Are you awake?” he whispered.
She nodded.
He came closer to the bed. “The storm wake you?”
She shook her head.
Frowning, he sat down on the edge of the bed. “Are you all right?” He put his hand on her forehead.
Aria caught his hand and held it in both of hers.
“What’s wrong, baby, have a bad dream?” He pulled her into his arms as if she were a child who needed comforting.
But what Aria needed wasn’t comfort. She held on to him, pressed her body against his, feeling her breasts against his bare chest.
J.T. understood instantly. “I am lost,” he murmured in the tone of a man going down for the third time, then he pulled her face to his and began to kiss her hungrily. “Oh, baby,” he said, “my sweet beautiful princess. You’re mine, you know that?” He was kissing her neck as a man who was dying of hunger. “I saved your life and you’re mine. You wouldn’t be alive now if it weren’t for me.”
“Yes,” she gasped. “Yes. Make me alive. Make me glad to be alive.” She said more but it was in Lanconian and J.T. didn’t understand her, but words weren’t needed.
He hadn’t realized how much he had been wanting her. Ever since he had seen her nude on the island, her big-breasted, slim-hipped body had haunted him. And seeing her every day, her back straight, her chest thrust forward, made him sweat.
He tore the nightgown off of her, hungry to get at those breasts he had dreamed of so many times. He buried his face in them, made them cover his ears while his hands held them.
Aria groaned, her head back.
J.T. tried to tell himself to go slowly, that she was a virgin and probably frightened, but he couldn’t control himself any more than he could have stopped a freight train.
He began kissing her body, her arms, her breasts, her shoulders, back up again to her neck, briefly touching her lips, then down again. It was as if in the past few weeks he had memorized her skin. There was a mole on her collarbone and he kissed it.
His head moved downward, kissing whatever he came in contact with: her hips, her belly, her thighs. She made not a sound but her skin grew hotter and hotter as if her temperature were rising by degrees.
“Jarl,” she whispered.
“Right here, baby,” he answered, and climbed on top of her.
He had to guide her since she had no idea what to do, but she was a quick learner. Oh, heavens yes, she was quick. And after his first slow entry, he was beginning to believe she was possessed of a very natural talent.
He kissed her lips and he kissed her breasts as he made long, slow strokes. She was right: she had exercised a great deal in her life and her body was strong and agile and she followed his lead easily. Once he even had to hold her back, but then he could no longer hold himself back.
He finished in a satisfying explosion that shuddered through his body and he collapsed on her, pulling her into a tight little roll in the tangle of his arms and legs.
It took him quite a while to recover. “Are you okay?”
He felt her nod under his chest and he smiled. “Can you breathe?”
She shook her head and he chuckled, then moved just a bit so she could get some air. He held their sweaty bodies close together as outside the rain began to fall.
“Did I hurt you?” he asked softly.
“A little sore,” she said, “but not terribly. I…I liked that.”
He had been a little afraid to look at her, afraid of what would be in her eyes
, but now he pulled back to see her face. She was more beautiful than he remembered. Her hair was soft about her head, with sweaty tendrils clinging to her cheeks. Softly, he kissed her mouth.
“How about a bath?” he asked. “Together. The two of us in a tub.”
She opened her eyes wide. “Is that…done? Do men and women do that?”
“This man and woman are about to.” He stood and she turned away modestly from his nudity. She searched for her nightgown while holding a sheet over her breasts.
J.T. pulled her out of bed. “No coverings. I want to look at you.”
“Oh,” she said, blushing, eyes downcast.
He stepped back, still holding her hand, and gave a low whistle. “You, lady, are a sight to behold. No, not lady, I mean, Your Royal—”
She stepped forward so the tips of her breasts were touching his chest and put her finger to his lips. “You may call me baby or honey or lady or whatever you want tonight.”
“Keep talking to me like that and we’ll never get bathed. Come on, sweetheart, let me wash you.”
Chapter Eleven
WELL, you’ve done it now,” Bill Frazier said. He and J.T. were sitting in one of the many sleazy beer joints on Duval Street, working their way through their fourth beer. “How are you going to hand her over to her prince?”
“He’s not a prince, merely a count, and he doesn’t have any money, and he also happens to be shorter than she is.”
“I can tell you weren’t interested enough to do any research on the man.”
J.T. downed the beer and held up his hand to the waitress for a fifth one.
“The SPs will have your hide if you’re drunk.”
“I’m not drunk,” J.T. snapped. “Although I’d like to get drunk. How could I possibly involve myself with an overbearing woman who keeps ordering me from her presence?”
“You get those circles under your eyes from her being overbearing last night?”
J.T. smiled. “She isn’t useless after all.” He stopped smiling. “That isn’t the problem. Look, she’s been raised to marry somebody she’s never met, so she’ll do fine with her Count Julie. Besides, I hear that all those royals take lovers.”
“So stay around and be her lover.”
J.T. slammed the beer mug down so hard half of it sloshed onto the table. “Like hell I will. She may regard this marriage as a lark but it’s not that way to an American.”
“That’s not what you said when you called from Washington. You said you were marrying her to help America and you’d be glad to get rid of her when the time came. You said no man could love such an idiot of a dame. You said—”
“What are you? A wire recorder? I know what I said. Now the problem is, this marriage is getting a little too intimate. I’m sure this would have happened with any woman. You can’t put two young healthy people together like the army’s done to us and not expect something to happen. I just need some perspective, that’s all. I’ve been around her so much I’m beginning to like her.”
“Not difficult to do.”
“Yes it is,” J.T. said. “You don’t know her like I do. She argues about everything. Acts like housework is a death sentence. And she spends money like there’s no tomorrow. Do you have any idea what last week’s bill from Ethel’s Beauty Parlor was?”
“I bet it wasn’t any more than Dolly’s and your wife sounds just like mine.”
“That’s just it—she’s not my wife. I guess it’s like the difference between borrowing a car and owning one. It’s not the same. You can use the borrowed car but someday you have to give it back.”
“You sure borrowed one hell of a car in that little lady.”
J.T. finished his beer. “Yeah, I borrowed a Rolls, but, unfortunately, I’ll have to spend my life with some Buick.”
Bill laughed. “So what do you do now? You got another week before she goes back, right?”
“One more week and then I take her to her country, slip her back into her castle, and turn her over to her scrawny little count. They deserve each other.”
Bill looked at his watch. “We better go. Dolly said to meet her at the pool at seven and it’s quarter after now.”
They walked from Duval Street to the swimming pool opened by the navy for the officers.
“You two smell like a brewery,” Dolly said. “J.T., what did you do to Aria? She looks positively radiant.”
Before J.T. could answer he saw Aria, wearing only her swimsuit, walking away from the concession stand beside Mitch, who was in uniform, both of them laughing. J.T. didn’t think; he just acted. He strode the few steps around the edge of the pool, grabbed the smaller Mitch by the back of his collar and the seat of his pants, and threw him into the water.
“Stay away from my wife, you understand me?” he yelled down when Mitch came up for air.
“Of all the primitive displays I have seen, this is the worst,” Aria said, then bent to offer her hand to Mitch.
J.T. grabbed her shoulders and pulled her around so that Mitch fell back into the water. “We’re going home.”
Their little house wasn’t too far away, and when Aria was dressed, he started walking home, Aria barely able to keep up with him. She didn’t say a word to him on the way because she didn’t want a public scene but she meant to speak to him once they were home.
How could he be so disagreeable after last night? She could still feel his soapy hands on her body, still feel his lips on her skin. They had bathed each other last night, except that she had been too shy to fully explore his body. He had laughed and said, “There’s time for that.” After their bath he had dried her then carried her to his bed and made love to her again. She had felt no pain the second time and they had fallen asleep in each other’s arms.
When she woke, it was morning and he was gone. There was no note, no message left for her. All day she had hoped the phone would ring but it hadn’t. At two she made an emergency trip to Ethel’s to have her hair done so it would look nice when he got home. She again set the table with candles.
At 5:30 Dolly had come by and told her they were to meet the boys at the officers’ swimming pool. She was surprised J.T. hadn’t told Aria.
The next thing she knew J.T. was throwing Mitch in the pool.
When they arrived at the house, he unlocked the door for her but he didn’t enter. “I got to go somewhere,” he muttered, and turned toward the gate.
She ran after him and put her hand on his arm. “Jarl, is something wrong? Did something bad happen today?”
He moved his arm from her touch. “No one calls me Jarl except my mother and she’s not borrowed. It’s J.T. Got that?”
She stepped back. “Certainly, Lieutenant Montgomery. I will not make that error again. Should I keep supper warm for you? I believe that is an American wifely custom.”
“I’ll get something somewhere else. And sleep in your own bed tonight.”
She schooled her face not to betray her feelings. “Yes, Your Sublime Highness. Will there be anything else you desire of this poor concubine?”
He glared at her then slammed out the gate.
“I will not cry,” Aria whispered. “He will not make me cry.”
* * *
J.T. buried himself in his work. He felt as if he were fighting for his life, that he was the one drowning—but there was no one to save him. She was getting under his skin like no one ever had before. Every day she changed dramatically. She laughed; she danced; she made jokes. He had shown her plans for the ships and she had understood everything he told her. She was smart and sexy and funny. And she was not his. He tried to remember that but then he would make a fool of himself when another man so much as looked at her.
He just wanted to stay away from her and try to get her out of his mind, so he stayed at work and slept on the ratty couch outside the officers’ mess. But it didn’t help much. He dreamed about her.
As if he didn’t have enough trouble in life, he received a telegram saying his mother was coming to visi
t. J.T. knew Amanda Montgomery had hundreds of friends, and no doubt she had heard of her son’s marriage from one of them. It was not going to be pleasant because he knew she was going to tell her son what she thought of his marrying and not telling his family.
“Women!” J.T. muttered. He wished he could row out to an island and spend some time alone. He groaned at that thought when he remembered his last time “alone” on an island.
He braced himself before he went to see Aria to tell her about his mother. Aria was wearing a sundress with little bows on her shoulders, her neck and arms bare, and she was as delicious looking as a peach. He tried to explain to her that he would like her to not request his mother to kiss her royal hand, but Aria stuck her nose in the air in that way that only she could do, and it made him so mad he ended up slamming from the house.
* * *
Aria hadn’t counted on two whole days of J.T.’s absence. He didn’t come home at all that first night and the next night he stayed less than an hour—only long enough to lecture her.
“My mother sent me a telegram and she’ll be here Saturday. She’ll come to the house first, then the three of us will attend the Commander’s Ball. Do you have anything proper to wear? Do you know how to ballroom-dance? Do you know the proper forms of address to navy officers?”
Aria was too astonished to answer. She was a royal princess and he was treating her as if she had just come in from the fields. “I believe I can manage to not disgrace myself,” she murmured. But her sarcasm didn’t reach him.
He went on to tell her about his mother, this woman who was a cross between Attila the Hun and Florence Nightingale. She was a Daughter of the American Revolution and a Daughter of the Mayflower.
“And she married a Montgomery,” J.T. said as if that explained everything else.
“Perhaps we should send her my family tree for approval. I am descended from every royal house in Europe thanks to the English Queen Victoria. Or do foreign kings not matter when pitted against your American heroines?”
J.T. glared at her then left the house.
He came back the next morning to change clothes, barely said anything to her except to remind her that his mother was arriving and he wanted the house spotlessly clean, then left for work.
The Princess Page 14
