by Ashley Hall
Isabella is tired of being smart. She rolls over, hiding her face against Gabe's chest. “Just tonight. Just this once.”
He snorts and drapes an arm over her side. Gabe yawns. “Whatever you say, baby.”
Chapter Fifteen
Isabella wakes up to an aching spine and crusted thighs. Her first thought is, How gross. Her second thought is, Where is he?
Because the bed is empty, save for her, and she cannot hear the television or the radio playing in the main sitting room. Disappointment sweeps over her.
He didn't stay? That's strange.
Strange is the only word that comes to mind. Gabe came all the way over here, and he left, just like that.
Gingerly, she sits up. Isabella casts around for her slippers but cannot find them. “Damnit,” she hisses. “Is nothing going to go right?”
The mess between her legs is bothering her. The floor is cold under her feet. Isabella rakes a hand through her hair and pulls a face.
She needs a shower desperately.
Much to her surprise, Gabe's clothes are still in the living room. The bathroom door is sitting partially ajar, and the sound of water slamming against porcelain floods the air. Curious, she peeks into the room. “Gabe?”
Isabella can just barely make out his form on the other side of the fogged-up glass. He's all broad shoulders and fine muscles with scars on his back and tattoos on his skin.
He doesn't hear her come in. Isabella, feeling giddy and bold, gets a towel out of the cabinet and lays it on the bathroom counter next to Gabe's. “I'm coming in,” she says, even though there's no way he can hear her.
Quick steps carry her across the bathroom. Isabella goes before she loses her nerve. She rips open the sliding glass door and steps inside. A cloud of hot, humid air slams her in the face. She laughs, nervous, and says, “I hope you don't mind.”
“What, a chance to look at you? Fuck no.” Gabe grins, wraps an arm around Isabella's waist, and pulls her close. “Your folks left a note under the door. They're out for the day, something about a meeting with Uber-whatever.”
“I'm not even going to bother trying to correct you,” says Isabella, laughing. She stretches up on the tips of her toes, pressing a soft kiss against Gabe's mouth. “I'm just glad you didn't leave.”
“Like you did?” Gabe puts a hand on Isabella's waist, another on her shoulder. Without warning, he spins her around and slams her up against the blue and white checkered tile of the shower. It stings a little, but the kiss that follows it is enough to wipe that away.
Her arms wrap around Gabe's neck. Hair clings to the back of her neck and spreads out across her shoulders. It flattens out when it's wet. Gabe smells like coconut, like the hand-crafted shower gel Isabella loves so much.
“Like I did,” says Isabella softly. The words are muttered against Gabe's mouth. She feels bad for taking off like that, but it's what had to be done. “You sound upset over that.”
It's what should be done now, too. This whole thing is a mess, but Isabella is starting to think that she really loves messes.
Gabe gives her a light, meaningless slap on the shoulder. “Do you want me to make you leave?”
“It's my shower,” chides Isabella. “If anyone's going to leave, it's going to be you.”
Gabe snorts. “You think you can make me leave?”
“Maybe?”
“No,” says Gabe. He shifts, pressing his erection against Isabella's water-slicked thigh. “I really, really don't think so.” He pulls a handful of wet hair in front of Isabella's eyes. “But you could give it a shot if you want.”
“You want me to try and leave?”
Gabe's only answer is to tug on her hair, to ply her mouth with fierce, stinging kisses. Her lips bruise beneath the onslaught. Without thinking, she presses her palms against Gabe's soap-covered chest.
There's no way she could get out from under him, even if she wanted to, which she doesn't. Already, there's pleasure pooling in her gut; there's heat spreading between her thighs. Isabella thinks that she could do this forever, but then Gabe is pulling on her hair again, and all she can think about is getting him closer.
Nails rake over Gabe's shoulders, finding the scars and the divots of his muscles. A hand lands on Isabella's hip and slides back to cup her firm ass. Teeth nip at the side of her throat and suck at her pulse point.
Distantly, Isabella knows that hiding these marks is going to be hell. But mostly, she thinks that this is wonderful—being splayed open here, pinned up against the wall. Gabe's other hand curls around Isabella's left wrist, pinning it to the bathroom wall. His nails leave white crescents on her skin.
“Fuck,” she says, the word little more than a draining breath. Isabella is still tired from the night before. She isn't used to this, but Gabe is clearly raring to go, and there's no telling when they might see each other again.
In fact, there's no telling if they will see each other again. That thought makes something in Isabella's chest clench up. Her heart skips a beat and she shifts, rubbing her thigh up against Gabe's cock.
“No shit,” says Gabe. “You can be a little slow, huh? Did it take you this long to figure out that's what we were going to do?”
Isabella gives a stuttering moan. “Here?”
“Right here. Right now.”
“I don't—”
Nimble fingers slip between Isabella's cheeks. They run down, slipping into her cunt from behind. A single finger, that's all it takes, then Isabella is melting, only held up by Gabe's strong arms and the wall of the shower behind her.
“Shut up,” says Gabe firmly. “Just shut up, Isabella.”
His grip is firm. A second finger slips into Isabella's cunt. Her head falls back to rest against the wall. The word okay is caught in her throat, wedged between a soft sigh and a trembling breath.
If it means keeping Gabe around, she doesn't think she'll ever talk again.
The water is hot, almost burning. Gabe makes quick work of stretching her out, though their romp the night before did a good enough job of that. Then he takes hold of one of Isabella's leg and wrenches it up to rest around his waist.
It makes her hip hurt, makes her eyes sting. But then Gabe's balls-deep in her, and that pain is gone, and it doesn't matter because she's already knocked up. Even with the threat of a wedding looming in her future—right now, right here—this is perfect.
Isabella's head drops forward, resting on Gabe's shoulder. “I love you,” she says, but the words are muffled by water-slicked skin and the sounds of the shower. “I think I love you.”
# # #
They have to part ways in a rush. Isabella's parents come home early, while they're still in the shower. It takes a scramble of limbs to depart from each other, and a life-long practice of hiding her feelings, to push out of the bathroom—shower off, lights off, Gabe trying to catch his breath—and face down Alexandra.
The Queen is lingering in the main sitting room of the hotel near the door. For a second, Isabella thinks that her mother has surely seen the discarded clothing of her maybe boyfriend, but the older woman is clearly just lost in her own thoughts.
Isabella adjusts the soft yellow cotton towel wrapped around her body. “Really, Mother? Do you just not know how to knock?”
“Be grateful I'm letting you stay in here on your own,” says Alexandra. “It could be worse. I could make you keep the door open.”
There's a note of humor in Alexandra's voice. If Gabe wasn't still hidden away in the bathroom, Isabella might find herself intrigued. Her mother seldom joked, and she almost never smiled.
And yet here she is, with the faintest of smiles on her face. She gestures towards the couch. “Can I talk with you, Isabella?”
“Of course,” says Isabella stiffly. She pushes the bathroom door shut and joins her mother on the couch. “But you could have picked a better time. I was enjoying myself. They have wonderful showers here, and I was thinking about taking a bath now that I am clean.”
Hopefully, it will look like her skin is just flushed by the red water. Belatedly, Isabella realized that there is no way to hide the obvious bruises on her shoulder and neck.
It is obvious that Alexandra sees them, and yet she carries on in a light tone, as if they aren’t there.
Alexandra says, “When I was your age, I hated my mother. I thought she was controlling, demanding, and ignorant of my own needs.”
Isabella's heart stills, just for a moment. She seldom hears stories of her grandmother, the late Queen of Bavaria.
“I didn't understand, just like you don't understand. Sometimes, I forget about that,” continues Alexandra. Clearly, she's been thinking about this for a long time. “My mother was strict, and she didn't explain anything. She told me what to do and expected that I would follow her blindly. At first, I did...just like you did when you were younger.”
“I'm not young anymore,” says Isabella softly. The bathroom door creaks open. She can hear footsteps padding lightly against the tile. “I don't want to listen to your every order, Mother. I want to be my own person.”
Alexandra sounds close to tears when she says, “I wish you could be but, darling, you cannot. I haven't been honest with you, just like my mother wasn't with me. And that's wrong. I cannot keep the secret from you any more, Isabella. We need you to marry the Duke of Cambridge. The country needs it.”
“I don't want to! Mother, I don't love him!”
“It's that or a potential war.”
In the silence that follows, Isabella can hear everything— the front door opening when Gabe slips outside of the hotel room, the water dripping from the spray nozzle of the shower, her own blood rushing through her veins.
When she talks, her tongue feels like cotton. “What?”
“There has been great unease between our two countries over the borderline. Cambridge is demanding that it be changed, moving in their favor, of course.” Alexandra closes her eyes. She breathes in deeply and then exhales. It sounds ragged, like she's been holding that breath in for far too long. “This would solve that. If our two countries bonded together via marriage, then the border wouldn't be a problem. There would be no threat to our people. That is why I married your father, and this is why you will marry the Duke. Please. Please. Don't argue with me on this matter anymore.”
Alexandra stands up, then presses a kiss against her daughter's forehead and leaves.
Isabella wishes she had never come inside.
Chapter Sixteen
Still feeling numb, Isabella opens up the window of her bedroom, even though she knows that she's not allowed to. Music comes streaming in.
Someone is getting married down beside the pool. The actual ceremony has ended, and now they've all just settled into the after-party. The bride looks beautiful in her white gown with her arms wrapped around her new husband and her head settled on his chest.
It's a horrible thought, but Isabella cannot help but imagine what she would look like in a white wedding gown and what Gabe would look like holding her, dressed up to the nines. And the Duke, what would he look like?
Faintly, Isabella recalls seeing pictures of him. He's not a bad looking man, all things considering, but the thought of entering into a loveless marriage still makes her stomach churn. It's no secret that her parents never felt anything more than a strong friendship for each other, that their copulation was nothing but business, nothing but a job.
Sometimes, Isabella thinks that she isn't anything but a job to them, too. That would make sense, with how her mother is offering her up as a treaty. What are they, still stuck back in the middle ages?
It makes her chest feel tight to think about. At the same time, Isabella cannot get the thought out of her head. Maybe marrying the Duke is what she's supposed to do, after all.
The song switches out by the pool.
Tears burn at the edges of Isabella's eyes. She's still clad only in her towel. Really, she needs to go get dressed and prepare to face the day. But her eyes are glued to the dancing couple. The groom catches his wife in a tight hug as the song ends, plastering her face in soft kisses that make her squeal in laughter.
Isabella's parents have never behaved like that before. And she knows, in her heart of hearts, that the Duke will never behave like that around her, either. A loveless marriage will be nothing but propriety and halfhearted jokes and stilted sex.
Her stomach curls. She regrets, desperately, that she and Gabe didn't get to finish their affair in the bathroom. More than that, she regrets not getting his number or any other way of contacting him.
“Isabella,” she sighs, finally pulling herself away from the window, “you have never been such a fool before in your life.”
# # #
That night, Isabella is set to accompany her parents to another party. It's a grand affair—the women wear silken gowns and up-done hair, and the men have dark ties and crisp suits. There's nothing about this that says small or little or second class.
Instead, it screams announcement, and the look on her mother's face screams lies. There's something afoot, and Isabella knows she won't like it. In her own private display of childishness, she chooses to stand by the snack table the entire evening.
The music hums in her mind, but it's nothing compared to the song that had played at the wedding down below. Isabella finds herself humming it. Then, she finds herself singing it lightly under her breath. “Ho—So show me family. Hey—All the blood that I will bleed. Ho—I don't know where I belong. Hey—I don't know where I went wrong. Ho—But I can write a song—Hey.”
“Truly lovely,” says a smooth, rolling voice.
Isabella jumps. She spins around, only to come face to face with a very handsome man. He's all broad shoulders and slicked back hair. Even the scar running along the side of his left jaw does nothing to detract from his appearance. If anything, it adds to that bad boy appearance that Isabella has come to love. “Oh! You startled me! I'm sorry, am I in your way?”
“Heavens no,” says the man with a snort that completely disagrees with his eloquent manner of speech. “I'm just over here trying to get away from that.”
The man gestures to the party as a whole, and Isabella hums in agreement. “After a while, they get boring.”
“After a while, the people get boring.”
“You don't look boring.”
The man smiles at Isabella and says, “I'm not. You can call me Slade.”
“That's a strange moniker to go by,” says Isabella lightly. “But if we're using nicknames, you can call me Izzy.”
“Princess Izzy.” Slade hums thoughtfully. “I think that's suiting.”
“Ugh—no. No more princess titles for the night or you can turn right around and go back to cavorting with the rest of them.” Isabella waves her hand at the crowd of governors and senators and rich men who have paid their way inside.
She cannot take it anymore. After having a taste normalcy after being around Gabe, Isabella knows that the royal life is not what she wants, but more importantly, it's not what she needs.
“Perhaps a walk outside would help?”
“What, in the garden?”
Slade hums. “That would work. Just somewhere that isn't here.”
“Agreed,” says Isabella. She plucks a cubed cheese off the tray and lets Slade guide her out into the night. Today’s party is being held at a grand resort whose name Isabella cannot remember. The main hall leads out into a beautiful garden, where all manner of plants have been meticulously tended.
She stops to pluck a rose from a bush and sniffs it. Slade smiles at her. “What's a woman like you doing out here, all on your own? I'm surprised that your parents don't have a task force around you.”
“What, because I'm pregnant?” Isabella snorts. She rolls the stem between her thumb and forefinger. “Mother would like that, but Father won't let it happen. It's probably his one saving grace.” She does a bad impression of her father on purpose. “We must keep up our appearances!”
“Th
ey sound lovely.”
“Oh, don't mind me. I'm just sore with them right now. Truly, they're good people. They care for their country very much.”
“And you?”
Isabella blinks. The petals are white. She would like white roses at her wedding, she thinks, and tulips, too. “I love it very much too, of course.”
“No,” laughs Slade. “I meant, what do they think about you?”
“Oh. That's, that is a rather personal question to ask, considering we just met, don't you think?”
“Perhaps,” says Slade, “but I'm rather taken with you; I must admit. It would be nice if we could get to know each other a little bit better.”
