‘Majesty.’ He gave a deep bow.
‘I’m just finishing up here.’ She glanced at her watch, wondering what had prompted this rare and unheralded visit. ‘I don’t have to be at the Women’s Refuge for another hour, do I?’
‘The King wishes to speak with you.’
It was pointless to say, Couldn’t the King have come and told me that himself? Because that wasn’t how it worked. Millie rose to her feet. ‘Very well. He is at work?’
‘He awaits you in your suite, Majesty.’
‘At this time of day?’ she asked in surprise. But it was a rhetorical question and Alesso said nothing. Even if he had known the answer he would still have said nothing, for his first loyalty lay towards Gianferro. As did everyone else’s.
Still unsmiling and unspeaking, Alesso accompanied her through the long portrait-lined corridors towards their suite of rooms, and Millie began to feel unaccountably nervous. ‘I do know the way!’ she joked.
‘I gave His Majesty assurance that I would conduct you there myself,’ he said formally.
The unwelcome thought flitted into her mind that it was like being led towards the gallows. A little knot of unknown fear at the pit of her stomach began to grow into a medium-sized ball, and by the time Alesso knocked and then opened the door her heart was racing.
It raced even harder when she saw Gianferro standing there, his face a study in anger, dark and brooding, and looking like she had never seen him look before.
‘Grazie, Alesso,’ he clipped out.
There was silence as she heard the door being closed behind his aide, and then Gianferro spoke, in a harsh voice she didn’t recognise.
‘I think you owe me some kind of explanation, don’t you, Millie?’
CHAPTER NINE
MILLIE stared at the unfamiliar sight of a Gianferro whose face was contorted by fury. Normally it was implacable. Enigmatic. It wasn’t just that he had been brought up to conceal his innermost feelings—Gianferro didn’t do big emotions. She felt the shivering of apprehension suddenly tiptoeing over her skin as she stared at him.
‘Explanation for what?’
The fury became transmuted into a look of icy disdain, and somehow that made her even more apprehensive. ‘Oh, come, come, Millie,’ he said silkily. ‘I am not a stupid man.’
‘Perhaps not,’ she said shakily. ‘But you are being a very confusing one right now. How can I give you an “explanation” when I don’t have a clue what it is I’m supposed to have done!’
The black eyes narrowed and he regarded her silently, and Millie was reminded of some dark, jungle predator in that infinitesimal moment of stillness before it pounced.
‘How is Oliviero?’ he clipped out.
For a moment she had no idea what he was talking about—and when she did it made even less sense. Millie frowned. ‘You mean my Italian teacher?’
‘Or your lover?’
She stared at him. ‘Are you…crazy?’ she whispered.
‘Maybe a little, but perhaps I am not the only one.’ His mouth curved into a cruelly sarcastic smile. ‘Does it feed your ego to make some poor little teacher fall in love with you?’
‘What are you talking about?’ she asked, in genuine confusion. ‘Oliviero is not a “poor little” anything—he happens to be a brilliant linguist.’
‘My, but how you defend him!’ he mocked.
Millie felt as though someone had just exploded a bomb in the centre of her world, and she had no idea why. But Gianferro was angry—really, really angry—and the first thing she needed to do was to calm him down.
‘Won’t you tell me what this is all about?’ she pleaded.
Gianferro’s breathing was ragged, rarely could he remember feeling such an all-consuming rage, and yet her face betrayed nothing other than what seemed like genuine confusion. Unless she was a better actress than he had bargained for.
‘Very well.’ His dark eyes sparked accusation. ‘The editor of the Mardivino Times rang Alesso this morning to ask whether anyone would like to comment on the rumours sweeping the capital about my wife.’
‘R-rumours?’ she stammered, in horror. ‘What kind of rumours?’
He heard the faltering of her words with a grim kind of understanding. Now, that—that—sounded like guilt. ‘You don’t know?’
‘Of course I don’t know—Gianferro, please tell me!’
He felt the acrid taste of jealousy and rage tainting his mouth with their poison as he glanced down at a piece of paper which was covered with Alesso’s handwriting. ‘Apparently you have grown close to—and I quote—“the devastatingly handsome young Italian who has broken hearts all over Solajoya”.’ He looked at her trembling lips, cold to their appeal. ‘Well?’ he shot out. ‘What have you to say?’
The accusation was so unjust and so unwarranted that part of her wanted to just tell him to go to hell and storm out of the room. But she couldn’t do that—and not just because that wasn’t the way queens behaved. She was his wife and this was a genuine misunderstanding.
‘It isn’t like that at all! He has just been…kind to me.’
His mouth twisted in scorn. ‘I’ll bet he has.’
‘Gianferro, please.’ Her voice gentled. ‘Stop it.’
But he couldn’t stop it, nor did he want to. It was as if he had stepped onto a rollercoaster with no idea of how to get off again. If she had obeyed his orders then she would never have found herself in this position! Black eyes bored into her. ‘So you do not deny that you have spent time alone with him after every class?’
‘That’s one way of looking at it,’ she said calmly. ‘But that isn’t how it—’
He sliced through her words. ‘Just you and him? No one else?’ If she denied this then he would know that she was lying, for had not her bodyguard been questioned just minutes earlier?
‘Well…yes. But nothing has happened—’
‘Yet.’
‘How dare you?’
‘No, Millie,’ he said heavily. ‘How dare you? How dare you be so thoughtless, so naïve?’
‘I thought that what was one of the reasons you married me!’ she retorted. ‘I thought you liked that!’
He believed her now, but she must understand that he would not tolerate such behaviour. ‘You’d better sit down,’ he said heavily.
‘I don’t want to sit down. And certainly not if I’m going to be treated like a naughty child.’
‘Don’t you realise how people talk?’ he demanded. ‘How quickly rumours can gather force in a place like this?’
‘And how quickly you believe them!’
‘Then prove me wrong!’ he challenged.
She had to convince him that she was completely innocent—and, more than that, didn’t she owe him some kind of explanation for how this ridiculous misunderstanding had arisen? Shouldn’t she try to make him understand why she’d acted the way she had? Dared she admit that Oliviero’s attitude had been like a breath of fresh air blowing through the formal world of the Court?
‘He made me feel like me,’ she admitted slowly.
‘Do not talk to me in riddles, Millie. Explain.’
‘He seemed to like me just as a person. As me—Millie. Not because I was Queen.’ Her blue eyes were full of appeal. ‘He didn’t even know for sure who I was. Not at first.’
His eyes were hard. ‘Now you really are being naïve. Of course he knew!
‘I didn’t tell him.’
‘The whole class knew.’ He sighed. ‘Do you not think that people might not have noticed the Royal crest on the car? The presence of a hulking great bodyguard outside? The fact that you were accompanied to the class by the Ambassador’s wife herself? Did you not consider that people might recognise you from your photographs?’
‘He may have known,’ she said staunchly. ‘They may all have known—but it didn’t seem to matter. It made no difference to the way they treated me.’
‘Oh, you little fool, Millie!’ he retorted. ‘How do you think I found out all
this?’
She stared at him. ‘From the bodyguard?’
‘No, not from the bodyguard! From the Italian himself!’ he snapped. ‘Via the newspaper! He has been hawking your story round to the highest bidder!’
‘But there is no story!’ she protested.
He saw the hurt which clouded her big blue eyes and felt a momentary pang, knowing that he was about to disillusion her further, that this would shatter her trust completely. Could he do it? Had he not taken enough from her already in his quest for the perfect wife?
His mouth hardened. He had to.
‘Maybe there isn’t,’ he agreed. ‘But there was enough of a story for the editor to be interested. “A special closeness…” His eyes narrowed. ‘Do you deny there was that?’
‘A closeness?’ Millie rubbed at her eyes. ‘Yes, probably. But special? Yes, probably that, too—if a person makes you feel something that other people can’t.’
He flinched, for the barb was directed as much at him as at anyone. ‘And what was that?’ he asked quietly.
‘He made me feel…’ Millie shrugged as she struggled to find a word that didn’t make her sound pathetic. Or ungrateful. ‘Ordinary, I guess.’
‘But you are not ordinary, Millie. You never have been and you certainly never will be now.’
It was a bit like having someone tell you that Father Christmas was not real—an unwelcome but necessary step into the world of grown-ups—and Millie recognised that Gianferro was right. She wasn’t ordinary—she had bade farewell to the ease of an anonymous life on the day she had taken her wedding vows. She was Queen, and she must act accordingly.
She felt the sting of tears at the back of her eyes. ‘I’ve been so stupid,’ she whispered.
Inexplicably, her disillusionment hurt him more than her tears, and he went to her then, pulled her to her feet and gathered her into his arms and into his embrace. She was stiff and as awkward as a puppet, and maybe so was he—just a little—for to comfort a woman was a new experience for him. To touch without sensual intent was like walking on uncharted territory, but he began to stroke her hair and gradually she began to relax.
‘Maybe I am the one who should be sorry,’ he said softly, and for possibly the first time in his life he tried to see things from someone else’s point of view. He frowned. ‘You think that I neglect you?’
Was this part of being grown-up too—accepting her role completely—telling him that no, he didn’t neglect her? ‘You are a very busy man,’ she said evasively.
He pushed her away a little, so that he could look down at her face. ‘Which does not answer my question.’
‘I think it does, Gianferro. There are only so many hours in the day, and yours are filled with work. So many demands on your time—and I don’t want to become another burden when already you have so many.’
‘Would it help if I made space in my diary once a week—so that we could have dinner alone together no matter what?’
They would never be completely alone, of course…there would always be servants and aides hovering in the background. But she recognised that he was making an effort, that the offer itself was an important gesture of trying to see things her way. And in response she must try to see things his way.
‘That would be lovely,’ she said evenly.
His eyes narrowed. He had softened the blow…now came the steel punch which lay behind it. ‘You do realise that these lessons will have to stop?’ he questioned softly. ‘That you cannot be friends with this man any more?’
She nodded, determined not to let him see her hurt or her sinking realisation that in the end Gianferro had got his own way. Maybe he always did. ‘Of course I do.’ She must show him that she could be strong, that these things did not matter. ‘It’s just taking me a bit of time to make the adjustment,’ she admitted with a smile.
He pulled her closer. ‘And that is perfectly natural. Perhaps you are a little homesick? Would it help if I arranged for you to take a trip back to England?’
And be even further away from him?
She wasn’t homesick at all. She was lovesick. Wanting to give so much more to him than he wanted, or needed. Wanting time to lie in his arms, to lazily trace her fingertips over the beautiful contours of his face. Wanting him not to be so frazzled with work that he would not fall into an instant sleep once they had made love. They were talking now in a way they rarely did, and it made her feel so close to him that she wanted to hang onto the feeling for ever, to imprint it on her mind.
She wound her arms around his neck and looked up into his face. ‘Oh, Gianferro,’ she sighed. ‘Won’t you just kiss me?’
Her parted lips were pure temptation, as was the buttercup tumble of her hair, and Gianferro hesitated only for a fraction of a moment before lowering his head, his lips touching hers in a kiss which was supposed to be fleeting. But then he felt them part, and the warm eagerness of her breath as it heated him. She was always so responsive! As a pupil, she had far surpassed all his expectations.
But the word pupil reminded him of her folly, and the brief tang of anger heated his blood, set it pulsing around his veins. His body responded with the age-old antidote to anger. The pressure of his lips hardened and he pulled her body against his almost roughly, feeling her instant response as her soft curves melted into his.
Millie felt the heated clamour of her breasts as they became swollen and hard, and opened her mouth eagerly as his tongue flicked in and out, tightening her grip on the broad shoulders, not daring to touch him anywhere else in case he stopped.
But he didn’t stop. He touched her aching breasts, then slid his hand down to mould the contours of her hips, and she could scarcely believe it when it began to ruck up the hem of her dress, his fingertips finding the silken temptation of her inner thigh.
‘Gianferro!’ she gasped indistinctly against his mouth.
‘What is it?’ he drawled.
She was so on fire with need that she paid no heed to logic or good sense. To the fact that he had insulted and accused her—only to the knowledge that she wanted him so badly. ‘Make love to me,’ she said brokenly.
Dimly he was aware that he had about half an hour until his next appointment, and that this was sheer and utter madness—but what other feeling in the world could suck you so willingly down into its dark and erotic vortex and obliterate every other?
He stared down at her, at the pale upturned face and the parted lips, and he sucked in a hot and hungry breath as he forced himself to resist them. ‘Do you want me and only me?’ he demanded.
‘Yes!’ she gasped. ‘You know I do!’
In one corner of the room was a chaise longue which was rarely used, and he pushed her towards it. She went willingly, unprotesting, not daring to speak in case that broke the spell, brought him to his senses.
For she had never seen Gianferro like this before—so fervent and intent, almost…not out of control, no—for that would be alien to his nature—but like a man who had for once given in to what he truly wanted rather than what was expected of him.
His face dark, his eyes almost unseeing, he pushed her down and slid her panties right off, brazenly touching the moist heat which seared him, a grim, hard smile curving his lips as she writhed in response. And then he unzipped himself and Millie watched him—the hunger of her body momentarily suspended by the unbelievable sight of Gianferro moving towards her—in broad daylight—to make love to her.
It all happened very quickly—but she guessed there was time for nothing else. There was no formality, no tenderness and no foreplay—but she didn’t need it, and neither did he. God, she had never felt so on fire with need! A small cry of anguished pleasure formed on her lips, but he kissed it away with a hard and efficient kiss which muffled it as he thrust deep inside her.
Maybe it was the sheer incongruity of what they were doing in Gianferro’s study in the middle of the day which heightened her senses to an almost unbearable pitch, but her appetite was so sharpened that her orgasm happ
ened almost immediately, and she felt him give one hard, final thrust before he too followed, his dark head falling onto her shoulder.
They stayed like that for a moment—she could feel his breath, warm and rapid against her neck—and then he raised his head, his dark eyes glittering with a look she dared not analyse for fear of what she might read there.
‘Does that make you feel better, Millie?’ he questioned slowly, as he carefully eased himself out of her.
Her euphoria evaporated. He made it sound as if she had just been given a dose of medicine! But she wouldn’t let her hurt show…indeed, wasn’t she being a little precious to feel hurt? Gianferro had just done something extremely out of character—something they had both needed—and he had done it without a thought to propriety. She must be making some kind of progress, and she should seize on that and cherish it.
She wound her arms around his neck. ‘Oh, yes,’ she whispered. ‘That was wonderful.’
Gianferro’s eyes narrowed as he untangled her arms. ‘You’d better straighten yourself up.’
Millie’s cheeks grew pink as she reached down to find her crumpled panties, aware that she was all sticky and that it was miles back to her own office. ‘Can you pass me some tissues?’
Gianferro stared, her matter-of-fact question making him feel slightly dazed. ‘Can I what?’ he echoed in disbelief.
‘Well, I can hardly ring for a lady-in-waiting to help me.’ She looked at him, biting her lip. He wasn’t exactly making it easy for her. ‘Can I?’
Without a word, he turned and did as she asked, grateful for the fact that his back was towards her and she would not see the look of disbelief in his eyes. It wasn’t the thought that someone might have walked in which so nagged at his conscience—no one would have dared—but more the fact that what had just taken place had been so…so…
So utterly inappropriate.
Was that why she had broken out of the mould she must know was expected of her? Had she deliberately flirted with the young Italian to get just this reaction—to make him jealous enough to behave in a manner more befitting a sex-starved teenager than a king? And it had worked, damn her! It had worked!
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