by JoAnn Ross
It wouldn't be anything but a one-night stand, a little voice in her mind piped up. At best, a brief affair. Because in four short days the prince would become regent and she and her sisters would leave Montacroix, continuing the tour.
It wouldn't be the fairy-tale ending she'd dreamed of as a child. Prince Burke was not going to ride up on his white charger and carry her off to his castle, where they'd live happily ever after.
But, dammit, Sabrina decided, throwing the pillow onto the floor, at least she'd have one night—one magical, fairy-tale night—to remember all the rest of her life.
Making her decision, she left the bed, slipped into her robe, took several deep breaths to calm her galloping nerves, then headed down the hall.
9
Afraid that someone would hear her knocking on Burke's bedroom door, and even more afraid that she'd lose her nerve, Sabrina took another deep breath, briefly closed her eyes and then, before she could change her mind, turned the antique brass handle.
When the door squeaked, her heart jumped to her throat and she pictured hordes of royal guards descending on her. She quickly slipped inside, shutting the door behind her.
After her quick race down the hall, the bedroom, by contrast, seemed as dark as the inside of a cavern.
Gradually shadows became forms, and Sabrina was able to view Burke, lying naked on his back in a magnificent high bed. He'd thrown the sheet off during his sleep. The moonlight slanting through the high palatine windows outlined his sculpted, muscled chest under the sprinkle of dark curls.
His hips were lean, and although she knew it to be wrong, she couldn't resist looking at his sex, which appeared half aroused. Her heart took up an erratic beat and her blood warmed. She dragged her gaze down his legs, unsurprised to find them strong and muscled. His feet were long and narrow and beautifully arched.
Sabrina stood beside the bed for a long silent time, drinking in the sight of this man she'd been so instantly attracted to, despite her best intentions. The man she wanted. The man she loved.
Love. The word, which her rational mind had not allowed her to consider, bounced around in her head like a steel ball in a roulette wheel. But instead of terrifying her, Sabrina felt a certain welcome calm. She did love Burke. Enough not to ask him for what he could never give. She would have to settle for only this brief time together.
And given the choice, a few fleeting days of absolute happiness were far preferable to a lifetime of regrets.
A soft summer wind sighed in the branches of the ancient oak trees outside the window. Inside, there was only the soft, steady sound of Burke's breathing. And the wild staccato beat of Sabrina's heart, pounding in her ears.
She remembered how, during the family's celebratory dinner earlier this evening, he'd assured everyone that he was fine, that he'd only suffered a slight concussion. But his eyes had been laced with pain and he'd promised a clearly distraught Jessica that he would take the pain pills the doctor prescribed as soon as he retired.
What if the pills had put him in such a deep sleep she couldn't rouse him? Sabrina wondered now. Or worse yet, what if he awoke only to turn her down? The humiliation would be horrendous.
But leaving now, and never knowing, would be worse.
Sabrina untied the ribbon holding her robe closed. It landed in an emerald satin puddle at her bare feet. As she sat on the bed the mattress sighed; Burke murmured inarticulately, but did not wake up. A dark lock of hair had fallen over his forehead. When Sabrina hesitantly brushed at it, her tender touch drew a smile.
Emboldened, she trailed her hand down his cheek, then traced the outline of his mouth. Her hand continued down the strong column of his neck, across his broad shoulders. She pressed her palm against his chest, liking the strong, solid feel of it. Burke exhaled a long breath and covered her hand with his. But he did not wake up.
It was exhilarating, this freedom to watch him, to touch him, unobserved. It made her head light; desire sang its high sweet song in her veins. Sabrina felt dizzy. She felt warm. She felt wonderful.
With a forwardness that once would have shocked her, she pressed her lips against his chest. His flesh was warm and tasted so marvelously, mysteriously male. When she flicked her tongue against one of his dark nipples, Burke growled and thrust his hands into her flowing blond hair.
Burke was having the sweetest, sexiest dream. He was lying on a sun-warmed beach in Monte Carlo, or Cannes, perhaps, with Sabrina. For some inexplicable reason, the beach was deserted, save for them, giving them the freedom to touch and be touched. To love and be loved.
Her beautiful, slender hands were like gentle birds as they explored his heated flesh; her warm sulky lips created a deep ache inside him that went all the way to the bone. Then farther still.
Her hair draped over him, carrying the scent of gardenias and feeling like strands of exquisite silk against his skin. He pulled her down on top of him, pressed her body to his, and ran his hand down her smooth back.
A warm ocean breeze caressed their bodies, the ebb and flow of the tide echoed their lovers' sighs.
"Sabrina," he murmured against her throat, drinking in her sweet scent. "Ma chérie."
She moved fluidly against him, making the fires burn even higher. "Oh, Burke."
She whispered his name once. Then a second time. And, as her lips brushed against his, teasing, tantalizing, a third.
This time her soft voice parted the gauzy curtain of his dream. Burke opened his eyes and found himself looking directly into hers. They were wide and misty and shone with a woman's secret pleasure in the slanting silver moonlight.
"If you are a dream," he murmured, skimming his hand over the emerald column of her silk nightgown, "please, don't ever wake me."
Sabrina gave him a womanly smile that reminded him of how Eve must have greeted Adam when she'd arrived in his garden, with her flowing silk hair, creamy flesh and tempting, dangerous female allure. Then she kissed his cheek, roughened with a day's growth of beard.
"I seem to recall you saying that you save 'please' for the really important things."
Her words sank in, having the effect of a fire alarm. "Mon Dim," he said, his hands tangling tighter in her fragrant hair, "you are real."
Lowering her mouth back to his, Burke kissed her. The kiss, long and lingering and infinitely intoxicating, went on and on and on.
"Extraordinary," he murmured as he nudged the thin strap of her nightgown aside with his mouth and kissed her shoulder.
With only his clever hands and his wicked, wonderful lips, Sabrina felt like she was floating. "What?" she managed thickly, wondering when exactly she'd lost control of the situation. When she'd first sat down on the bed, she'd been the one to touch. To taste.
But now her head was swimming and her bones were melting and she had surrendered all control—all power—to him.
"You."
He rolled over onto his side, bringing Sabrina with him. His hands followed the outline of her soft curves while hers trailed along the more rigid lines of his body, the smoothness of taut skin over muscle. "You are absolutely extraordinary."
"So are you," she whispered. And it was true.
For a long drawn-out time they lay facing each other, exploring the differences in their bodies by touch, by taste, by smell.
Outside the leaded glass window, a pale white moon rose. Inside, passion built. Sabrina was straining against Burke, eagerly, desperately.
His lips found one of her nipples and he sucked, drawing fire. Drawing life. As he kissed her swollen breasts, the sensitive back of her knees, the cord at the inside of her thigh, drawing a soft cry of absolute pleasure, Burke realized that he'd been wanting this woman all his life. He'd been waiting for her. She was everything he'd ever dreamed of in a woman, more than he'd hoped for in a wife.
Wife. That singular word, which he'd successfully and deftly avoided all these years, seemed so perfectly matched to Sabrina Darling that it could have been coined with her in mind.
Even
more than any of the innumerable European princesses his father had invited to the palace during these past months, Sabrina Darling was a woman born to wear flowing satins and silks and rich, disturbing scents.
And she was his. All his.
Rocked by an unexpected and riveting surge of possessiveness, Burke swore at the silk barrier between them. His long fingers curled around the lace bodice of the nightgown and ripped it ruthlessly to her waist. Sabrina did not protest. Rather, she moaned and wrapped her arms around him. Her mouth locked greedily to his, her hands clutched at him as if she feared falling off the edge of the world. Pleasure burst from her to him; desire flared.
She was hot and smooth and fragrant; the torn nightgown clung to her damp skin. His name burst from her lips on a husky, sensual cry as Burke's ravenous mouth found her breast. Caught up in a whirlwind of passion, Sabrina was unaware of the breathless, erotic demands she uttered.
Burke's hands, and then his mouth, burned a slow path across her breasts, down her body, over her stomach, to the inside of her thighs. When his fingers slowly circled their way through the golden nest of curls, prolonging each touch, Sabrina arched her hips, offering, welcoming.
"Exquisite," Burke murmured, brushing a fingertip over her quivering, moist flesh.
"Please." Taut with anticipation, Sabrina dug her fingers into the sheets. Passion shimmered in that single aching word.
Needing no further invitation, Burke touched his tongue to the rising, pulsing bud. Startled by the flare that shot through her, Sabrina gasped and jerked away.
Infinitely patient, Burke soothed her with soft, husky words, touching and kissing his way around the ultrasensitive flesh, assuring her that he would not do anything she did not want him to do.
"You tell me when you're ready, chérie," he murmured, his cheek nuzzling the soft triangle of hair, his warm breath feathering the gold curls. "I promise, I won't hurt you."
She saw the truth in his eyes. She felt the love in his voice. And as his hand caressed her hip, Sabrina did something she thought she'd never do again. She allowed herself to trust.
"No," she whispered. "You'd never hurt me."
Her trust was strangely more staggering than her obvious desire. More sobering. Burke vowed to be worthy of it.
"Let me know what you want."
Tremors coursed through her. "I think," she said, on something close to a sob, "I'd like you to do that again."
Sensing that she was not accustomed to putting her needs into words, Burke didn't question her further.
He flicked his tongue once more against the pink nub. Although she closed her eyes and her fingers dug into his shoulders, this time she did not move away.
Encouraged, he began to suck lightly, tasting the honey, the warmth. "Do you like this?"
Sabrina gasped as first one finger, then two slid into her. All the time his mouth did not cease its sweet sensual torment.
"Oh, yes." Her thighs were trembling, a slick sheen of perspiration beaded up on her burning flesh.
"How about this?" His voice vibrated against her most intimate place, and then she felt his caressing fingers replaced by his tongue.
"I…don't…know." The wicked, clever tongue was licking at her, probing her secrets, drawing her out. "Yes," she admitted breathlessly. "Please. Don't stop."
Burke had no intention of stopping. In truth, as his own body throbbed with unrequited, painful need, he didn't think he could. Sabrina was like no other woman he'd ever met. She was an intriguing blend of sensuality and innocence. In fact, if he hadn't known she'd been married, by her initially shy response to what should be a natural part of lovemaking, Burke would have suspected that she was a virgin. She was, he realized, an emotional virgin.
The idea that no other man had ever brought her to such heights was immensely gratifying. As her hips began to rotate in uninhibited demand against his mouth, and the soft, eager sound of a woman approaching climax escaped her parted lips, Burke felt a surge of what he recognized to be purely chauvinistic satisfaction.
Sabrina could hardly breathe. Desperate, she wanted to beg him to wait, to give her a moment. But she couldn't get the words out. All she could do was hold on for dear life as he took her higher and higher.
Wetness was pouring from her, hot and thick. Then, finally, blessedly, secrets hidden for a lifetime exploded, hurling her across time and space.
She was still trembling from the aftershocks when she felt him enter her, fill her.
Smiling, Burke touched his mouth to hers, giving her a taste of herself. Silent tears streamed wetly down her cheeks, sparkling in the muted light like trails of diamonds. Still smiling, Burke gently brushed a tear away with his finger.
And then, although she'd never believed it to be possible, before she'd even recovered, he was driving her up and up again.
Lost in a passion of their own making, Sabrina wrapped her arms around him, hung on tight and followed Burke into the mists.
Sabrina lost track of how many times they made love that night. The lingering touches, the kisses, all melded into one another, like a series of sensual dreams.
Hours later, they were lying entwined, a tangle of naked arms and legs, when she heard the sound of a cock crowing outside the palace window. A pale silvery light was banishing the midnight shadows.
"I have to leave," she whispered.
"Mmmph." He pulled her tighter against him and buried his mouth against her throat. "Why?"
"It's almost morning."
"So?" She was so sweet. So wonderful. And, he reminded himself for the umpteenth time this, night, she was his.
"If anyone sees me leaving your room—" . "They won't be surprised." He ran his palm down her back, pleased by her answering tremor.
That was, unfortunately, all too true. "You don't understand," she said, pulling away from his hypnotizing caresses. She sat up against the hand-carved headboard, glanced around for the sheet to cover herself, then decided that it was a bit late for modesty.
She looked so enticing, with her hair tumbled artlessly over her bare shoulders, with the flush of lovemaking tingeing her cheeks, and her lips full and dark from a night of kisses. Looking at her, all warm and flushed, Burke felt a renewed surge of desire.
"I'm trying."
"Perhaps it would help your concentration if you looked at my face."
Guiltily he dragged his gaze from her creamy breasts. "Touched But, you have to understand, ma chérie, if you present a man with such sweet temptation…" He shrugged with an elegant continental flair that reminded her again what different worlds they came from.
Sabrina shook off the unhappy thought, refusing to allow it to detract from the pleasure she was still experiencing from their lovemaking.
"So much of my life has been public," she murmured. "I'd prefer to keep our affair private." If she was the only one who knew, it would hurt less when it was over.
Burke didn't like her use of the word "affair," but not wanting to get into an argument over semantics, he decided that it was merely a difference in their languages. From the way she'd opened to him like a delicate flower bud beneath a loving sun, Burke knew that Sabrina understood they'd made a commitment to each other.
"While I hate the idea of you leaving my bed, I suppose I can understand your concern." He lifted her left hand to his mouth and kissed her fingertips, one by one. As his lips brushed against the knuckles of the third finger, Burke ran through a mental inventory of the Giraudeau royal jewels in an attempt to determine which of the many priceless rings to give her.
Diamonds were too ordinary, emeralds too obvious. Rubies were always nice, and would go well with that dress she'd been wearing the first night, but his world was filled with women who wore rubies and emeralds and sapphires. Burke wanted something different for Sabrina. Something that was as special as she was.
"Burke?" Sabrina glanced up at him curiously. He seemed a million miles away. "Is something wrong?"
"What could be wrong?" He bestowed one
of his bone-melting smiles on her. "Here I am, alone in bed with the most enticing, exciting, passionate woman in the world, and—"
She put her palm against his smiling mouth. "Only with you."
For some reason, it seemed important that he understand that what they'd shared was different. Special. So that years from now, when he had a beautiful wife and a handsome son who looked like him, a son who would also inherit a kingdom, he might, from time to time, think back on the American actress who had loved him.
"I know." It had been too long since he'd tasted those luscious lips—five minutes at least. So he bent his head, intent on kissing her.
Sabrina pulled her head back. "Was I that bad?"
Her cheeks flamed. Not with passion, Burke considered, but embarrassment. "On the contrary, you were wonderful. Magnifique. You are the most passionate woman I've ever been with, Sabrina. You did, in truth, wear me out."
His words sent a glow of womanly pleasure through her. "I suppose you're proud of yourself."
"Immensely," Burke agreed. "As you should be proud of yourself. You are, chérie, a natural-born courtesan."
Not realizing that Sabrina considered this a passing affair, Burke could not know how badly that particular description stung.
"I have to leave. Now." She was out of his arms and out of the bed before Burke knew what had happened.
"Sabrina?"
"What?" She picked up the discarded nightgown, realized it was torn beyond redemption, and began looking for her robe. "Is something wrong?" Burke left the bed as well. Locating the robe on the floor, he handed it to her.
Unable to meet his concerned gaze, she turned her back and shrugged into the robe. "What could possibly be wrong?" she asked on a falsely bright voice that only wavered slightly.
"I believe that's what I asked you."
"I'm just tired," she hedged. Her fingers had inexplicably turned to stone. "Damn."
"Here. Let me." Reaching out, he tied the satin ribbon. As she watched the movement of those deft fingers, Sabrina remembered how they'd felt on her body, and experienced an unwelcome surge of heat. "There."
