by Valerie Parv
“Have you always been so cynical toward men?”
“Not all men.” Only those who got under her defenses and made her want them, she thought. And not them, him. Until Ben came into her life, she had never felt such a powerful yearning for any man. If Molly’s father hadn’t come to her in despair, pretending to need her, she would never have given in to him. It hadn’t happened again with him or anyone else.
She hadn’t wanted it to, she recognized. Until now.
Ben raked long fingers through his hair, leaving trails in the damp strands. “Then I must be the problem. Do you dislike me so much?”
“Not dislike.” Never that. “Distrust is probably a better word.” Distrust of herself as much as of him, she recognized. The strain of these last moments proved beyond a doubt that she couldn’t go on seeing him in any capacity, knowing all the love was on her side.
It was simple for him, she thought. To him, sex and love were separate issues, instead of being hopelessly connected the way they were for her. He had shown how little she could trust his talk of marriage. She should be thankful she hadn’t allowed him to do more than kiss her.
Instead she felt more confused than ever. Falling in love with Ben was the biggest mistake of her life. She understood why it had happened. He was dependable, principled. Two of the qualities she found most attractive in a man. Yet as long as he didn’t love her, they had nothing. She had thought she could marry him on his terms, but she couldn’t.
“I told the queen I’d asked you to marry me,” he said flatly. “She gave us her blessing.”
“Did you tell her why you proposed to me?”
“I didn’t have to. She understands the risk you took by deciding to help us.”
Marrying for reasons other than love was probably normal within the royal family, Meagan thought. Evidently Queen Josephine hadn’t found Ben’s proposal remarkable. Perhaps the royal women accepted having their men run their lives for them as the price they paid for their privileged existence.
Then Meagan thought of Princess Isabel’s determination to live her life her way. Things could be different. But Ben refused to accept his cousin’s choice. What chance did Meagan have of changing his attitude toward women?
“The danger to you and Molly still exists,” he continued grimly. “Adam is no closer to identifying the traitor within the castle.”
“Are you sure Shane wasn’t just talking big? If the traitor is one of the Stanbury family, wouldn’t they have known that it wasn’t the real Prince Nicholas they were abducting?”
He shook his head. “Only Prince Nicholas, my aunt and I knew that I was taking his place. Nicholas could have gone along with the scheme to make himself look innocent, but it seems unlikely, although it can’t be ruled out completely. No one who has seen what my aunt has suffered since King Michael was abducted could think she has anything to do with the conspiracy.”
“And you would hardly arrange to have yourself drugged, kidnapped and beaten,” she said, hating that it had happened under her roof. “That still leaves a lot of suspects.”
“Who have good reason to want you out of the way,” he reminded her. “Tomorrow I shall make our engagement public to forewarn the conspirators that you’re under my protection.”
Panic coiled through her. She wasn’t ready for this. As long as he didn’t love her, she never would be ready. But his jaw was set, suggesting that he wouldn’t take no for an answer. “I’ll agree on one condition,” she said.
“Name it.”
“That you release me from the arrangement as soon as the crisis is over.”
His look became coldly assessing. “If it’s what you want.”
“I do.”
The two words were bitterly ironic, since she knew she’d never say them to Ben in the traditional way. Perhaps she’d never get to say them at all, for he was the only man she could imagine making wedding vows to, and while he might say them, she knew he didn’t believe in them.
Chapter Twelve
Ben came into the antechamber to find Meagan bowed over a piece of fabric. Unreasoning anger swept over him. By proposing to her, he had thought he could take her away from the endless work that seemed to have been her lot in life. Now here she was slaving over something for his aunt, when—as his fiancée—she had no need to do it.
He couldn’t deny she looked beautiful with her hair curtaining her face and her lithe fingers working their magic on what he recognized as one of the castle’s vast collection of antique table linens. The pattern was a heritage rose design he had seen around him all his life, without paying it much attention. Now he noticed that the bloom on the embroidered roses matched the bloom on Meagan’s cheeks as she concentrated.
He watched her, loath to disturb the picture she made. All she needed was a tall pointed hat and a satin gown spilling around her feet to look like an image from a tapestry herself. She made him feel like a knight in armor, he thought, liking the idea more than was good for him. Riding to her rescue had a lot of appeal. Sweeping her onto his horse and carrying her off had even more.
Too bad it wasn’t going to happen. She had made it clear that she wanted their engagement to last only until the king was found and restored to the throne. Then he would have to release her. He sensed that, of all the challenges he’d faced in his life, this was going to be the most difficult. Sometimes he wished he wasn’t a man of his word.
He wondered what she would say if she knew he loved her. She didn’t want it, and he didn’t want to feel it, but he hadn’t a clue how to stop himself. The strength of the feeling scared the wits out of him. It was worse, much worse, than anything he’d felt before.
Watching her nimbly repair embroidered flowers with stitches you needed a magnifying glass to see, he felt a surge of warmth. A lock of hair fell across her eyes and she brushed it away impatiently. He didn’t think he could bear to watch her much longer without taking her into his arms. They ached with emptiness.
He’d known he loved her from the moment he’d dragged her out of the line of fire during the raid. He’d threatened to handcuff her to a tree for her own good, then found himself on fire with the image that conjured up. Helpless, she wouldn’t have been able to stop him ravaging her mouth until she was as aroused as she made him. Heck of a time for an erotic fantasy, but Meagan had that effect on him and more.
Telling himself he’d been angry with her for endangering herself didn’t wash anymore. His anger went all the way back to Marina for getting killed and leaving him, he recognized at long last. He’d dispelled a lot of the anger during the raid, using more force than strictly necessary to demolish the cottage door. In the process, he’d felt something break loose for good. He was free of the anger now, too late to repair things between himself and Meagan.
He coughed to catch her attention. “Aunt Josephine said I’d find you in here. What are you doing?”
Meagan looked up, unable to stop herself flushing at the sight of him. “I’m helping to restore some antique embroideries,” she said.
He frowned. “There are servants to do that.”
“I love this work. It’s what I’m trained to do. Molly’s asleep, and I have no chores, so I want to do something useful.”
He slid a hand under her chin, tilting her face up. “You don’t have to be useful.”
Lighting arced through her at his touch. “I can’t sit around the castle all day, looking decorative.”
“You can’t help it.”
She put aside the delicate fabric and fiddled with the tea-chest-sized box of threads provided for her when she’d agreed to undertake the work. At least the queen had understood Meagan’s need to make a contribution of her own. On the previous afternoon, Queen Josephine had invited Meagan to take tea with her, and had quizzed Meagan on her professional background. Meagan’s answers and a demonstration of her embroidery skills had impressed the queen sufficiently that she had offered Meagan the position of Curator of Antique Napery at the castle. She had a feeling
now wasn’t the time to tell Ben she had accepted. She needed the distraction of useful work, to help her deal with their sham engagement.
As a child, she had never expected to be grateful to her mother and elderly cousin for making her learn the old needleworking skills, but now she was. They would stand her in good stead when it came to preserving and restoring the valuable pieces collected in the castle over generations. “Cousin Maude didn’t raise me to be idle,” she said.
“Then it’s time you learned the art.” He took the fragile table runner out of her hands and set it aside.
She let her empty hands drift to her lap and lifted her chin. “Fortunately, the queen doesn’t share your antiquated ideas about a woman’s place. She’s asked me to take over the care of the royal napery collection.”
“You’ve agreed?” He read the answer in her expression, and his jaw tightened. “When were you going to ask for my opinion?”
She twisted a length of bright carmine thread between her fingers. “I suppose now you’ve announced our engagement, you’re going to lecture me on how I should behave as a royal fiancée?”
A decanter of brandy sat on a side table. He went to it and poured a glass. “There’s no need. I decided not to make the announcement.”
She folded the table runner carefully between sheets of protective paper, then placed the bundle into a camphorwood box. Slowly, she closed the lid. She didn’t want a sham engagement, so why did she feel as if the ground had fallen away beneath her?
There could be only one reason why Ben had chosen not to proceed with their mock engagement. “You’ve identified the traitor?”
He swirled the brandy in the glass but didn’t drink. “Not yet, but Adam assures us it won’t be long. If the traitor is close to the family, they already know I’ve sought the queen’s blessing for our marriage, so there’s nothing more to gain by going public.”
“Less fanfare will also make it easier to end the charade as soon as the traitor is caught,” she agreed.
He downed the drink in a quick swallow. “Isn’t it what you want? You have the protection of being known as my fiancée within these walls, but you’re still free to wait for Molly’s father to reappear in your life.”
“He isn’t likely to, nor would I give him houseroom if he did,” she snapped, too distraught by his decision to keep up the pretense any longer.
Ben put the glass down with exaggerated care. “You said you were in love with him.”
“You said I was in love with him.”
She heard his breath catch as he said, “You didn’t correct my assumption.”
Needing something to occupy her hands, she took an antimacassar out of the chest and spread it across her knees. The exquisite embroidery blurred before her eyes. “What’s the point of going over this now?”
He took the cloth from her and set it aside, then grasped her hands, urging her to her feet. “First rule of piloting—make sure you’re operating from correct information. Are you in love with Molly’s father, Meagan?”
She turned her head away, unable to look at him but unable to lie, either. “He took advantage of my compassion to trick me into bed once, that was all. I never loved him. He left us before Molly was born. I have no idea where he is now.”
Ben’s hand slid under her chin, forcing her to meet his gaze. To her amazement, he didn’t look angry. He looked—relieved, she thought, hardly able to believe it.
“Then you’re truly free?”
“No.”
His brow furrowed. “But you said…”
She touched a finger to his lips. “Hear me out. I can never be free because my heart belongs to a gallant man who doesn’t want any woman’s love.”
Ben’s features darkened. “He must be a fool.”
“Never that. He had a bad experience that made him decide against loving again. He became overly protective of women, and he reacts badly when they object to being treated as dependents.”
Understanding dawned and with it, a simmering anger that made her quail. “So what in blazes am I supposed to do? Stand by and watch you come to harm? My actions caused one woman’s death. I’m not prepared to let it happen again.”
“You didn’t kill your fiancée,” she said softly, wishing there was some way she could take away the anguish she saw in his gaze.
He gave a savage shake of his head. “If I hadn’t decided to stand her down from the mission because she wasn’t ready, she wouldn’t have felt driven to take someone else’s place and been killed.”
“According to your old C.O., you were right, she wasn’t ready.”
“I could have kept my mouth shut.”
“And she would have done precisely what she did do, one way or another. Mike Stafford is right when he says we have to be true to ourselves. You wouldn’t have loved her if she’d been a brown mouse.”
“Brown mice have their redeeming qualities.”
“If you like brown mice.” If he did, pity help her, because she didn’t know how to be one.
He read her mind. “No one can accuse you of being a brown mouse.”
She could hardly say the words, “Yet you want to mold me into one.”
He hesitated, then his expression cleared. “I know I’ll regret saying this, but I don’t want you to change.”
“Then stop blaming yourself for something that wasn’t your responsibility. Otherwise it’s going to keep coming between us forever. I don’t think I could stand that.”
He slid a heated palm down the side of her face. “I care about you, Meagan.”
“And I care about you. I promise I’ll take care of myself, but if there’s to be a chance for us, I can’t let you take over living for me. Don’t you see, if we do that, the conspirators win, and we become prisoners ourselves, afraid in case they strike at those we love.”
His fingers tangled in her hair. “You said your heart belongs to a man who doesn’t want it. What would you say if you knew he wants it more than life itself?”
She pulled in a shuddering breath. “I’d wonder if this was another attempt to control my life.”
“It would be difficult when his own is so far out of control, he’s in a tailspin with the ground coming up fast.”
She looked up and saw the confusion in his gaze, mirroring her own. “This is sudden, isn’t it?”
His hands tightened around hers. “Define sudden.”
She moistened dry lips. “Feeling as if your world will come to an end if you don’t get the answer you want.”
He nodded. “That’s reasonably accurate.”
“I know, because I feel the same way.” She lowered her lashes to hide the depth of feeling she knew her eyes revealed, then lifted them again. “This isn’t a ploy to get me to admit how much I need you, is it?”
“I thought I was the one doing the admitting.”
“Seems to be mutual so far. Oh, Ben, I was afraid if I let myself love you, you’d take over my life, and I couldn’t allow it.”
“And now?”
“Nothing seems to matter except being with you.”
A slow smile dawned on his craggy features. “That I understand. I wish I could tell you I won’t try to mollycoddle you in future, but it wouldn’t be true. Even now, my instinct is to protect you from all that’s bad in the world.”
“I could get used to it, I suppose. This cloak-and-dagger stuff isn’t really my style.”
“You could have fooled me, barging into your house after you’d heard all those bullets.”
“You were in there,” she said simply.
He heard the truth in her voice, and his own became ragged with emotion. “You really love me that much?”
“More than I can put into words.”
“Then we’ll have to find some other way, because I feel the same about you.”
He pulled her into his arms, kissing her so soundly that the room reeled around her. Light-headed, she kissed him back with a passion that left her breathless, loving the way he held her
as if he never meant to let her go.
Her heart skipped a beat. Would it always be like this with him? Even as she argued her need for freedom, she surrendered it to him so willingly that she felt confused. Could she truly be free if it meant living without Ben?
She could hardly breathe for the sensations eddying through her. So this was how it felt to be swept off one’s feet. She nuzzled his cheek, feeling the gentle abrasion of masculine skin against her feminine softness. “Are you sure you’re not just saying you love me to get your own way?”
He nibbled her ear, spearing her with sensation all the way to her core. “It seems to be working.”
“You don’t know how well.” She could hardly force the words out around a throat turned arid with desire. “Waiting until we’re married is going to seem like a lifetime.”
A groan slid from him. “For me, too. But we can’t think of ourselves until King Michael is safely back on the throne.”
“I know, but it’s going to be so hard.”
“Think of how wonderful it will be when we can finally be together, dearest Meagan.”
He startled her by dropping to one knee beside her, keeping tight hold of both her hands. “Meagan Moore, will you do me the honor of becoming my wife?”
“You asked once before, and I accepted. Nothing has changed. But yes, I will marry you because I love you with all my heart.”
He stood, gathering her against him. “Everything has changed. This time, our engagement is for real…and forever.”
He’d said that he didn’t believe in forever, but he said it now with such conviction that Meagan shivered. “It can’t possibly get any better than this.”
