And as though his thoughts had pushed into hers, she moved in her sleep, her eyes blinking open and landing straight on him. Breath that had been slow suddenly stopped altogether as she stared at him.
It was just after midnight, and magic was thick in the air—magic with the power to bring the past into the present.
‘Matt?’ She blinked, frowning, pushing up so that the sheet dropped to reveal the soft swell of her cleavage. There was nothing sexy about the singlet she was wearing or at least it shouldn’t have been. But somehow it was, and he was groaning with side-splitting need.
He swallowed—hard—and he was hard all over, his body wound tighter than a spring.
‘I was... You were just...’ In the soft milky moonlight he saw her cheeks flush pink and he took a step deeper into the room despite every bone in his body telling him it was wrong.
‘Yes?’ The word came out thick and gravelled. He cleared his throat, watching her intently.
‘I thought I was dreaming.’
His body fired. Desires he’d already been battling surged inside him. ‘Was it a good dream?’ he asked, taking the rest of the steps necessary to bring him level with the bed. His own side yawned empty and cold. Duty and responsibility were on his side of the bed, but temptation lay here, and he was oh, so tempted.
‘I...’ She frowned and lifted a hand to the strap of her top. His eyes followed the action and at the sight of the outline of her nipples, straining hard against the fabric of her shirt, he suppressed a groan.
There was the right thing to do, and there was what they both wanted and needed.
Ignoring common sense, he caught her hand on her shoulder, holding it low, and then, his eyes locked onto hers, loaded with challenge, he oh-so-slowly traced his fingertips over her flesh, easing the strap lower, not higher. Her skin lifted with fine goosebumps and her breath stalled in her throat. Her eyes were pleading and he watched her, challenge in every line of his face.
‘What did you dream?’ he asked, his other hand reaching for the strap that still sat on her shoulder. He didn’t push it downwards though. He simply looped his fingers beneath it, his eyes on her face, waiting, still, frozen in time, impatient to know what she was going to say.
‘I dreamed... I was... It was years ago,’ she said huskily, her beautiful face clouded with uncertainty.
‘And do you dream of me often?’
Her slender throat moved visibly as she swallowed and her eyes swept shut, perhaps in an attempt to block him from seeing her thoughts in that expressive face of hers. ‘No,’ she whispered.
‘Liar.’ His laugh was without humour. ‘I think you dream of me frequently. Perhaps every night, even.’
At her harsh intake of breath he bent lower and, knowing he should stop this madness, he crushed his lips to hers, swallowing the little moan she made, tasting her sweetness, and memories and feelings rushed back at him because she tasted, she felt exactly as she had done then and his whole body rejoiced at that familiarity and rightness.
Her mouth was parted and he slipped his tongue inside, duelling with hers, reminding her of this need, and she whimpered into the kiss before her hands lifted and her fingers tangled in the hair at the nape of his neck, just as she had then. Her body lifted, her breasts crushed to his chest and he swore in his own language as impatience threatened to burst him wide open.
‘Tell me you dreamed of this,’ he demanded, his fingers pushing the straps down now, so her breasts were free of the flimsy garment, and he cupped them greedily in his palms, feeling their weight, their generous roundness tightening his body so his arousal strained against his pants and his whole body ached for her in a way that defied sense and reason.
* * *
She had! Oh, she’d dreamed of this again and again and in the groggy half-awake state she was in it was almost impossible to believe this wasn’t just a dream. But his hands on her were real—everything about this was real. She arched her back hungrily and pulled him with her hands, pulling him down on top of her, ignoring the voice in her head that was shouting at her to see reason and make this stop.
It was the witching hour and she was bewitched. He was strong, and big, and though she pulled him he came at his own pace, slowly easing his body weight on top of hers then rolling his hips so his arousal pressed to her womanhood. A sharp dagger of need perforated her senses. It was achingly, perfectly familiar. She needed him.
‘Please,’ she whimpered, knowing she was stranded on this wave of desire, that she was stranded on an island of sexual craving from which there was no other relief.
He rolled his hips again and his body, so hard and heavy, pressed to her feminine core, stoking her pulse, her needs, her wants. Pleasure was a cloud carrying her away, but reality was gravity, dragging her back to earth.
It had all been so easy for him that weekend three years ago. He’d looked at her and wanted her and she’d fallen into bed with him, despite having intended to save her virginity for the man she was going to marry. She’d had no defences for someone like him, no experience with men at all, really.
And now? She was falling for it again, letting desire make a mockery of all her good intentions.
Was she really going to be this woman? A woman who let passion control her actions and dictate her life. Was she really going to fall into the habit of sleeping with someone she desired even when love wasn’t a part of the equation?
‘We can’t do this.’ She shook her head, pulling away from his kiss, and now his body on hers felt like a crushing weight from which she needed to be free. She pressed her palms to his chest and felt the brief impression of his fast-racing heart before she shoved him bodily off herself and rolled out of bed.
‘I can’t,’ she repeated, though he hadn’t said a single word. He was simply watching her with the same intensity with which he’d been kissing her a moment earlier.
‘I’m not going to do that.’ She pulled her straps back into place, her fingers shaking so much she had to curve them into fists and hold them by her side.
He was still watching her, saying nothing, just staring, and though she was now fully dressed she felt more naked and exposed than ever before. She’d put a stop to whatever had been about to happen—but the inevitably of their coming together was still heavy in the room.
He watched her for a long time, as if seeing all the pieces of her soul. ‘How come you were still a virgin, Frankie?’
The question pricked something in the region of her heart. She knew her expectations were out of step with most people’s reality, but they were her feelings, her resolves. ‘I...just was.’
‘No.’ He propped up on one elbow, apparently completely relaxed. ‘I don’t believe it was a matter of you having simply not slept with anyone.’
‘Why not?’ She challenged, her eyes sparking with his.
‘Because you’re a flesh and blood woman,’ he murmured throatily. ‘And I know for myself how sensual you are. How hungry your appetite...’
Her pulse sped up and with his eyes digging into hers she found she didn’t want to lie to him. What was the point? ‘I wanted to save myself for my husband.’ She slid her gaze sideways, aware of how juvenile the assertion must have sounded. She focused her eyes on the wall and didn’t see the look of intense concentration that overtook his features.
‘Why?’ A single word, rough and husky.
‘I’ve told you: sex should mean something.’ She frowned. ‘I thought it should mean something. I was... I think sex and love should go hand in hand and when I eventually fell in love, and someone loved me, I wanted it to be something I shared with them.’ When had she first started to align sex with love? She wasn’t sure she’d ever know. When had she inextricably bound the two, sentiment and act, together? ‘And then I met you.’
There was a self-mocking tilt to his beautiful lips. ‘A man who thinks sex is for fun and love is a
construct.’
Her heart stammered at the coldness of that assessment. ‘A man I couldn’t resist.’ She shook her head, clearing the vestiges of the past from her mind. ‘But that was years ago and I’m not the same person any more.’ Certainty strengthened inside her. ‘I guess you could say I learned my lesson.’
‘We have already discussed this. I need another child, another heir...’
She ignored the cold, callous conclusion to that sentence—in case anything happens to Leo. ‘That’s an entirely separate proposition to what we were just about to do. Sleeping together because we aren’t strong enough to listen to common sense, to do the right thing, is simply a matter of poor judgement.’
‘You are cutting off your nose to spite your face,’ he observed dryly.
His comment was utterly accurate. In putting a halt to their sensual pull she was only hurting herself because she wanted him with all of herself. She needed him. And yet she was resisting him because her pride demanded it of her. Not just her pride—her heart. Her heart, that could have so easily been his; her heart that had been hurt and ignored too many times to easily trust. ‘I’m not. I’m just... I’m someone who always wanted the fairy tale,’ she said quietly.
But often the most quietly voiced sentiments carried the most resonance.
‘There’s no such thing as fairy tales,’ he said after several beats of silence had passed, and he stared at her for a long moment, his expression a mask of intensity. ‘And even if there were, I could not give it to you.’
She sucked in an unsteady breath, lost for words.
‘You can get back in bed, Frankie. Relax. I won’t touch you unless you ask me to.’ And he turned onto his side, his back to her.
Silence fell. She stood there, watching him for a moment, and when his breathing was rhythmic and steady she climbed into bed, turning her own back on him and hugging the edge of the mattress.
* * *
It was a recurrent nightmare but that didn’t change the fact that it flooded Matthias with adrenalin as if it was all happening for the first time. He was back in the limousine. The smell of petrol and burning flesh filling his nostrils, his body trapped, his eyes open. His parents were dead but Spiro, beside him, was still alive.
His cries were like nothing Matthias could put into words.
‘I’m coming,’ he promised, pushing at the metal that was heavy on his chest. ‘Just keep your eyes open.’
The driver was dead too. He couldn’t see the security agent who had been travelling in the same car as them.
‘I can’t, Matt,’ Spiro groaned, and his dark eyes were covered with tears.
‘You must.’ Matthias, a teenager, swore darkly into the limousine and Spiro winced. He had to get free. He had to save them.
‘I’ll be there in a second. Hold my hand.’ He reached out and the pain was like nothing he’d ever known before. His arm was broken. He grunted, extending it as best he was able. It was just far enough. Spiro put his smaller hand in Matthias’s, and Matthias looked at them; their flesh was the same colour, their hands the same shape. But Spiro’s was cold. Ice-cold, like nothing Matthias had ever known.
‘Listen to me.’ Matthias spoke urgently. ‘I can hear sirens in the distance. Can you?’ There was a bleating—from far away. ‘They’re coming to help you, Spiro. They’re going to cut you out of this car and take you to hospital. I’ll be beating you again in basketball in weeks.’
Spiro smiled—his teeth were covered in blood. Matthias’s chest ached. His younger brother’s eyes were heavy.
‘Damn it—stay awake,’ Matthias commanded, pushing at the metal once more. It budged, but only by a tiny amount. ‘Damn it!’ he shouted again.
‘Matt...’ Spiro dropped his hand and Matthias jerked his head towards his brother. Stars danced in his eyes and for a second he blacked out. When he came to the sirens were louder, and Spiro was sleeping. At least he looked like he was sleeping.
‘Spiro!’ Matthias pushed at the metal—it must have weighed a ton. Nothing moved. His own body was broken. Hysteria groaned inside him. ‘Spiro!’
He turned towards the front of the car and wished he hadn’t, when the sight of his parents’ mangled bodies filled his vision. He closed his eyes and prayed, then swore, then reached for Spiro with an arm that didn’t seem to want to obey his brain’s commands.
He needed to get free so he could save his brother. There was no water—the car had swerved to avoid a boulder in the middle of the road. It had flipped over into a valley and landed on its roof. But in Matthias’s dream they were always on the edge of water, and slowly it seeped into the car. Not transparent like the water that surrounded his palace, but a sludgy black, then burgundy, like blood.
Spiro died and Matthias could do little more than reach for his hand.
At fifteen, he lost everyone he’d ever loved.
It would be two hours before the rescue teams could free him. Two hours in which he stared at his brother and tried not to look towards his parents. Two hours in which his heart, though still beating, ceased to feel.
* * *
‘Matt?’ She pushed at his shoulder; it was damp with perspiration. ‘Matthias? Wake up.’
He made a noise and then sat bolt upright, so his head came close to banging hers. His eyes were wide open and when they swung to face hers they were huge and dark. The sun was not yet up but the sky had taken on a dawn tinge—gold and pink warred with silver-grey, bathing the room in a warm glow.
His breathing was rushed, but not in a good way. Not in the way hers had been the night before. He stared at her as though he was drowning and she could save him; he stared at her as though he expected her to say or do something, but she couldn’t fathom what.
‘Are you okay?’ she asked, as slowly his face assumed its normal handsome appearance. His lips closed, his eyes shuttered, his colour returned to normal.
‘I’m fine.’ He swung his powerful legs off the side of the bed and cradled his head in his hands for a moment. His back was turned to her yet again, but this time she resented that.
‘You had a bad dream.’
He made a guttural sound.
‘Want to talk about it?’
Another grunt, then he pushed to standing and strolled towards the French windows that led to the balcony.
‘I’ll take that as a no,’ she murmured, more to herself than him.
He heard though and turned back to face her. He was wearing boxer shorts, but it still took a monumental effort for Frankie to keep her attention trained on his face. ‘It’s nothing.’ He pushed the window open and stepped outside. The pale curtain billowed in after him.
Not understanding why, she followed him, knowing he was seeking privacy and that she should let him have that, knowing she had no reason to go after him. Understanding he wouldn’t welcome the intrusion but going anyway. She padded across the room, swallowing a yawn as she went, and emerging on the balcony.
He was staring at the ocean. She followed the direction of his gaze, unable to ignore the appreciative gasp that was a natural response to the sheer beauty before her. In the early morning light the sea shimmered silver and flashes of pre-dawn sunlight made the ripples appear to glisten like diamonds and topaz. The sky itself was a work of art she could never replicate—colours that didn’t appear in any manmade palette, and the combination of which, if she’d pushed them into service, would be almost garish.
‘He was only nine years old.’ Matthias surprised her by speaking. She drew her attention back to his face and something in her chest skidded to a halt. His expression was the most sombre she’d ever seen—not just on Matthias, but on any human being.
‘Who?’
He looked at her then, but as though he didn’t really see her. His expression didn’t shift. ‘My brother. Spiro.’
Liana had mentioned Spiro, and now it made sense. Her
heart broke for him.
‘He was nine when he died.’
Grief clutched at Frankie’s chest. ‘How?’
‘A car accident.’
‘I’m so sorry.’
It was the wrong thing to say. He withdrew from her visibly, shrinking into his hard-edged shell.
‘It is what it is.’
‘Don’t do that,’ she murmured, shaking her head. An early morning breeze came from the ocean, carrying with it the tang of sea salt and ruffling Frankie’s hair. She caught it with her fingertips and held it over one shoulder. ‘Don’t act like it doesn’t matter. You’re talking about your brother’s death. It’s okay to say you’re upset.’
If anything, his features tightened. ‘What good can come from being upset?’ he asked, the words flat, turning away from her, showing he didn’t expect an answer.
‘Plenty.’ She gave one anyway. ‘Being upset, talking about how you feel, helps you move on. Helps you process...’
He shook his head. ‘Why should I get to move on when Spiro has died?’ He gripped the railing and leaned over it a little, staring at the ground beneath. ‘Sometimes I think that if I can just reach for him in my dream, it won’t have happened. That I will wake up and he will be here. Sometimes I think the accident was the nightmare, only I don’t know how to rouse myself from it.’
Frankie made a small sound of sympathy.
‘There is no processing this.’ His eyes were hollow when he turned to her. ‘There is no moving on from it. And I don’t want to move on. Spiro is a part of me—his life, and his death. I live for both of us.’
Her fingertips ached to touch him, to comfort him, only the memory of how incendiary contact with this man could be was still alive in her gut, fresh in her mind, and so with great determination she kept her hands at her sides.
‘Your parents died in the accident as well?’ she murmured gently.
His response was a curt nod but the pain in his eyes was palpable, his emotions strong and fierce.
Shock Heir for the King Page 9
