Romancing the Crown Series

by Romancing the Crown Series (13-in-1 bundle) (v1. 0) (lit)

  Lord, you're pitiful, just get off it, she snapped at herself inwardly.

  Because of her silly thoughts, she followed Lucas rather meekly up those stairs. She wondered if her weariness was why the place seemed to expand with every step she went up, or if it was some strange optical illusion. At the top Lucas seemed to hesitate for a moment, then turned left.

  They went through a large room she guessed was a sitting room of some kind, or a common area for the upper floor. It was furnished in bold colors that could have overpowered the room were it not for the many tall French doors in the far wall, opening out onto a lovely terrace with a gasp-inducing view of the sea. As they continued, she saw a balcony that she recognized as the one she'd looked up at from below.

  But then Lucas was opening a door and gesturing her through. She stepped into one of the most incredible rooms she'd ever seen, decorated in luscious tones of blue and green, furnishings a bit ornate for her taste, yet fitting in this gilt-edged setting. The bed was a huge four-poster such as she'd only seen in pictures, so tall there was a three-step stool beside it. Each post of the bed was swathed in rich fabric of a deep royal—of course, she thought—blue, while the windows were draped in equally rich fabric of green patterned with the same blue. The matching bedspread had the unmistakable sheen of silk, and inanely Jessie wondered if anybody ever dared eat in bed around here.

  Beyond the windows she saw that she had a terrace of her own, with the same breathtaking view as the large parlor they'd come through. The thought of stepping outside to that view in the morning—or perhaps at night, since it would be so much warmer here, the novelty of that attracted her—was enticing, and she smiled.

  She realized that her bags were already here, placed neatly on the carved mahogany bench, upholstered in the same silk, at the foot of the huge bed. She wasn't sure how they'd managed that, and wondered if everything at the Sebastiani palace worked so quietly and efficiently.

  "I'll have someone unpack and press your things," Lucas said, "but for now why don't you lie down for a while? We'll have lunch in a couple of hours."

  "Lunch? What time is it here?"

  "Ten a.m. On Tuesday," he added, with the ease of one long used to crossing more time zones than he had fingers.

  She shook her head; another thing she could never get used to. "I would like to sleep for a while," she agreed. "And," she added, "I can unpack myself."

  "Of course you can," Lucas said easily.

  He turned as if to go, then turned back to her. He gave her a look she couldn't quite define. And then he leaned over, cupped her face in his hands, and kissed her. With exquisite care, yet so deeply and thoroughly that she was reminded of those days back on the ranch when she and the hand named Joe had fallen so totally and completely in love.

  When neither of them had known who he was. When the idea of this place, and him belonging in it, would have been the height of absurdity.

  He left her reeling, without saying a word. And she rather dizzily wondered why he'd put her in here, instead of his own room.

  She snapped out of her pleasurable haze. What on earth was she thinking? Did she really want to stay with him in this place, with his parents, knowing her private life would be public knowledge, and no doubt the subject of gossip from the moment it was learned she was sharing Lucas's bed? Not that it wasn't obvious by Luke's very existence, but it was one thing on her ranch, where everybody minded their own business, and something else here, where from everything she'd seen and heard, these people lived in a goldfish bowl. And she wasn't about to provide any entertainment for the fish watchers.

  That decided, and with a sense of relief that Lucas had had the sense to put her here, she slipped out of her travel-wrinkled clothes. She dug her nightwear out of the smaller suitcase, and with a sense of wicked glee at sleeping amid silk and satin in a faded T-shirt bearing the image of Taz, pulled it on and climbed up the steps and fell into the sumptuous bed. She was asleep in moments.

  * * *

  "She's lovely, Lucas," his mother said.

  "Yes. She is."

  Lucas continued his pacing across his parents' sitting room. Even the much-loved view of the gardens and the sea beyond, including the yacht harbor where his parent's luxurious, hundred-and-twenty-five-foot Sophia was docked next to his own smaller sailboat, were unable to hold his gaze for long.

  "Why don't you sit, son?" his mother asked.

  "Can't," he said briefly, making a turn and going back the way he'd come. He knew if he tried to be still, he would quite simply fly apart. He wasn't sure why, he should be feeling relaxed now that he had Jessie under his roof, but that wasn't how he was feeling at all.

  He saw his parents exchange glances, and wondered what they were thinking. They'd been married so long they could communicate without speaking, an oddity he'd accepted but never quite understood.

  "She seems quiet," his father put in.

  "She's nervous," Lucas said, stopping for the space of two breaths before resuming his back-and-forth treks. "I had a devil of a time convincing her to come at all."

  "Is she angry with you?" his mother asked. "Surely she doesn't believe those tabloid stories."

  Lucas winced. He'd been unaware of the flurry of stories and rabid, wild speculation that had appeared in the trashy papers, but his personal secretary had placed a pile of them on the desk in his office downstairs, by way of warning and preparedness. He'd dreaded it, but he'd looked at them. The first ones were full of the news that he was alive, and later the news of Luke's existence had broken.

  The stories had ranged from the merely sensational, playing up his part in the breakup of the U. S. cell of the terrorist Brothers of Darkness—which had consisted mostly of trying to stay alive while in their hands—to the utterly lurid, focusing on the innocent, naive American he'd seduced and abandoned, with frequent mentions of his "alleged" amnesia. Those stories managed to plant the idea that he'd really known who he was all along, and had just chosen to dally with "a commoner" out of arrogant ennui, because his old thrills had palled.

  "She doesn't read them, thank God. If she did, I never would have gotten her here, not because of what was in those stories, but because they even exist. The idea of living in a glass house open to the world doesn't appeal to her."

  "Then why was it so hard to convince her to come here?" his father asked. Lucas had to smile inwardly at his borderline indignant tone. His father believed wholeheartedly there was no better place in the world than Montebello. He liked, respected, even admired the United States, but Montebello was still his pride and joy.

  "Because she has some crazy idea that Luke—" he began, then stopped. He had to be fair, he told himself. Jessie had valid concerns, and he wouldn't belittle them by speaking disparagingly of them to his parents.

  So with an effort, he explained to them in some detail. When he'd finished, his mother nodded in understanding, while his father looked bewildered.

  "But the boy will have every advantage!" he exclaimed.

  "She knows that. She just doesn't think it outweighs freedom of choice."

  "But he is the heir. How can she possibly—"

  He broke off when his wife gently touched his arm. "I understand perfectly," she said softly. "I'm British, and I've learned what happens when someone who doesn't want it is forced to take the crown."

  Lucas gave his mother a grateful look. But it turned into a frown as he realized she had just validated part of Jessie's argument. He'd have to tell her not to mention that view to Luke's mother, if she wanted her grandson here to continue to spoil.

  "But it's hardly like that here," Marcus protested.

  "How is she to know that?" Gwendolyn said soothingly.

  Grumbling somewhat, Marcus subsided. Lucas wasn't truly worried about his father. He might take affront at the implication anything in his beloved Montebello could ever be bad for his grandson, but once he was face-to-face with Jessie, his powerful sense of fairness would kick in and he would be just that wi
th her, fair.

  But it was going to have to wait, Lucas thought later as he inched open her door after she didn't respond to his light knock. He saw the small shape under the covers of the bed and moved quietly into the room. She was sound asleep, looking so weary he didn't have the heart to wake her.

  He used the intercom—a system he had introduced when he'd grown tired of the ancient bell-pull system—to speak to the upstairs maid who handled the guest rooms, and asked her to please notify him when Jessie was awake and ready to go downstairs.

  Lunch came and went. She never called.

  Later, Lucas headed purposefully up the stairs from his office. He understood that Jessie had been tired and wary, and reluctant to face his parents under those conditions. But he'd let her rest for six hours now, and if she didn't get up for a while, he told himself, her sleep patterns were going to be hopelessly confused. So he headed for the guest wing to wake her up.

  When she didn't answer his knock, he became concerned; the maid said she'd peeked in twice to find their guest still sleeping. Perhaps the woman had mistaken the situation, maybe Jessie was ill, or something else was wrong. She'd been through a horrible ordeal, after all, and wasn't that long out of the hospital.

  Determined now, he reached for the ornate door handle. He let out a tiny breath of relief when he found she hadn't locked it; she didn't feel that threatened, apparently. He pushed it open and stepped inside, his mouth open to call her name when he spotted her out on the terrace.

  She was wrapped in the guest robe from the bathroom, and leaning on the stone balustrade. The slight breeze lifted strands of her hair, which gleamed gold in the afternoon sun. There was something about the sunlight here in his homeland that was unlike anywhere else, he thought.

  He crossed the room quietly, enjoying simply watching her as she looked out to the sea. She looked entranced, and he hoped she was. It was the first step toward falling in love with Montebello.

  "Jessie?" he said softly as he reached the French doors that led outside. He didn't want to startle her. She turned to look at him. She didn't seem surprised by his presence, and in fact looked almost as if she'd expected him.

  "I'm sorry," she said immediately. "I must have been more tired than I realized."

  "That's all right," he said, going to stand beside her. He noticed then that tendrils of hair around her neck were damp, and realized she must have showered and come out here before dressing.

  Before dressing.

  Which meant she was likely naked under that damnably thick robe.

  He swore silently. He'd tried not to pressure her. After that night on the ranch when she'd agreed to come back with him, he'd walked so carefully that whole eggs wouldn't have broken beneath his feet. He had never assumed he was welcome in her bed, and indeed had spent a couple of achingly lonely nights alone when she'd been so exhausted from pushing to get done everything she wanted to before they left.

  He'd been so careful then because he didn't want anything to interfere with getting her here, and he was desperately afraid he'd somehow say something to make her change her mind. It had been a very strange feeling for him. He was a man who hadn't spent much time worrying about how he dealt with people; as Prince Lucas Sebastiani, people worried about how they dealt with him. And never was he afraid that he might repel someone he didn't want to. People went out of their way to spend more time with him, not avoid him.

  He'd never thought much about his assumptions before, and how ingrained they were. And this added to the niggling uncertainty he now felt regarding things he'd always been positive about. Jessie Chambers, he thought, had truly rattled his cage, as his American FBI friend was wont to say.

  And never more than at moments like now, when all he could think about was how soft and sweet she was, how luscious she tasted, how her body could coax his to heights he'd never believed existed, again and again.

  Her expression slowly changed, telling him that his must have also.

  "Lucas," she began, and he didn't miss that she took the tiniest of steps backward.

  "I see," he said tightly.

  Jessie looked suddenly flustered. "I know this is a huge place, but it is your parents' home."

  "Yes, it is. And I would never do anything they wouldn't approve of here."

  "You do that elsewhere?" she asked, and he supposed he'd asked for that one.

  "The Playboy Prince did," he admitted. "But I gave up my 'elsewhere' the day I came home from America, because I knew I could never be that man again."

  For a long moment Jessica just looked at him, and he wished he knew what was going on in that quick mind of hers. Did she not believe him, not believe he'd truly changed? Or was she thinking about the way he'd walked out on her?

  He had the fleeting thought that she might have seen, or someone had told her about, the tabloid stories, but he didn't know when that could have happened. And certainly none of his staff or the palace staff would have been foolish enough to say anything. Most of them had been with the Sebastiani family for years, and were utterly loyal. Treating people well was a philosophy his father carried through down to the lowliest of employees.

  He opened his mouth to plead with her to believe him, that he was no longer that kind of man. But he knew Jessie wasn't a woman who believed in talk, she believed in actions. He couldn't tell her, he would have to show her.

  But at least she was here, so he had a chance.

  Somehow he doubted that ignoring her reservations about being in his parents' home and jumping her here and now, as he so much wanted to do, would convince her. The allure of her naked, still damp body was nearly overwhelming, but the thought of driving her away by proving he thought of nothing but pleasure gave him the tiny edge he needed to tamp down the fire that threatened to break loose.

  He made himself back up a step. "My mother has ordered dinner served in the breakfast room." Jessie looked puzzled, and he explained. "It's where we eat on informal occasions, or when it's just family. It's much more relaxed, and she thought you might be more comfortable there."

  "Oh. Thank you." Then her brow furrowed. "What should I wear? Not that I have a lot of choice," she said rather ruefully. "Not much call for dressing for dinner on the ranch."

  He resisted the temptation to tell her just the robe, and said evenly, "Informal means casual. I admit jeans aren't my mother's first choice for attire, but she's had to surrender since all her children wear them."

  Jessie looked suddenly panicked. "Are they here? Your sisters?"

  "Not at the moment. But even if they were, I promise you they don't bite. Julia is quite regal these days, since marrying Rashid, but she's still her generous self. Christina is brilliant, but Jack keeps her in line. And Anna is still adorable, and leading her new husband a merry dance. Both she and Christina are expecting."

  "Sounds.. .active." Jessie looked a bit overwhelmed.

  "It is, but it's also fun. They've all found a happiness that practically glows."

  He didn't add that he wanted to see that glow on her face; he knew she wasn't ready to hear it. But he did want it, and the only thing he wanted more than that was to be the one that put it there.

  Chapter 12

  Jessie was starting to feel smothered with kindness as she walked along the terrace outside the first floor of the palace. It wasn't oppressive, not really, but definitely unrelenting. It made her feel as if everyone was under orders to make her welcome, which took some of the spontaneity out of it all.

  On the other hand, she couldn't deny that the imposing King Marcus and the lovely, charming Queen Gwendolyn positively doted on Luke. And the baby already responded to them with happy familiarity, so she knew this was not simply a show put on for her benefit. They also made it clear they would welcome her into the Sebastiani family graciously, but, Jessie suspected, it would be as much because she was Luke's mother as anything else. More, probably.

  Of course, once the king and queen made it clear she was accepted, the rest of the family—an
d probably the country, if what she'd heard about the high regard the populace had for the royals was true—would follow their lead. Were she crazy enough to accept this loveless bargain, her life would not be difficult in that regard, at least. In the beginning, anyway. She seemed to recall a couple of British royals who had married into The Firm and had been welcomed at first....

  But as determined as everyone was to make her feel welcome, she couldn't miss the fact that everyone here apparently considered her marriage to Lucas all but accomplished, nothing left but the paperwork.

  Jessie stopped to peer through a tall window into the huge grand ballroom, remembering then how she had even been asked by a cheerful woman who identified herself as the queen's junior secretary where she thought she might like to have the ceremony, inside in the grand ballroom, or perhaps out in the royal gardens, since the weather was always lovely in Montebello. Jessie had honestly blanked for a moment before realizing the woman meant wedding ceremony, which earned her a very startled look.

  The fact that they all seemed to think that her marriage to Lucas was a sure thing made her feel even more determined to make her own decision, in her own sweet time. And if her choice turned out to be no—as, of course, it would—wouldn't they all just feel a bit silly, for thinking their precious prince was irresistible?

  The problem was, Lucas darn near was irresistible. She'd proved that a time or two, she thought ruefully. He had only to touch her, kiss her, and she was ready to give in. In that way he was still Joe, able to leave her breathless and longing for more with a single kiss.

  But she had to be strong, no matter how she might ache for his touch. She had to make this decision with a clear head, and clarity was the first casualty of Lucas's touch; thinking much at all through the golden haze of pleasure he could rouse in her was impossible.

  "Ready for the rest of the tour?"

  Jessie sighed as Lucas came up behind her, as if she'd conjured him up with her thoughts.