by Kendrick, Sharon; Lawrence, Kim; Crews, Caitlin; Milburne, Melanie
Chloe propped her chin on her steepled fingers and scanned the garment that Sabrina hung on a coat hanger and hooked over her wardrobe door.
Chloe gave her verdict. ‘Nice, love the fifties vibe, but you could show a bit more cleavage.’
Sabrina raised a brow.
‘You did ask,’ her sister said.
‘No, actually I didn’t.’
‘Well, you should. Have you any idea how many people read my fashion blog? I am considered a fashion guru.’
‘And what do you think Dad is going to consider about that?’
Sabrina angled a nod in the direction of the micro miniskirt her sister was wearing in neon green.
‘He won’t see it,’ Chloe said with a grin as she rolled over and pulled herself into a sitting position, her long legs tucked under her.
It was then Sabrina saw what her sister was wearing on top.
Chloe gave another million-voltage smile and held her arms wide to proudly show off the T-shirt. Sabrina had seen identical ones in the tourist shops in the capital of Vela Main, where the iconic image was reproduced on everything from tea towels to mugs. It was of the Venetian Prince who had fought for, and gained, independence for Vela.
‘You like? I’m showing my hands-across-the-border solidarity. They say his eyes follow you round the room.’
‘They do,’ Sabrina said shortly. She had seen the original on the wall of the great hall in the royal palace.
‘Don’t you think their Pirate Prince looks like the bad brother? I can’t see how anyone could have thought he was a bastard,’ Chloe added, pulling the fabric outwards to look at the face of the Venetian Prince famous for being the man who had fought dirty to secure Vela Main’s independence from Venice. That, and his career as a successful pirate.
It was Luis who had pointed out the similarity during a day trip her family had made the previous year to take lunch with the royal family at Vela Main.
‘His eyes really do follow you around the room,’ she had said, staring at the original of the much-reproduced image.
‘Sebastian has the same trick,’ Luis had said.
‘He was very handsome. Him,’ she’d added, pointing at the portrait and adding hastily, ‘Not your brother.’
Luis had laughed at her embarrassment. ‘You might change your mind when you two finally meet. I’d like to say Seb got the looks and I got the brains, but…’
‘I think you’re very smart, modest and good-looking.’
Whenever doubts had crept in Sabrina had reminded herself that Luis couldn’t have been more unlike his hateful brother if he’d tried.
They were day and night, Sebastian definitely being night, even though his eyes had made her think of the brightest, most blindingly blue summer sky when he’d bent his head and fitted his cool, firm lips to hers.
She felt the guilty heat rise through her body as she reminded herself that she could have stopped it from happening!
Belatedly aware that Chloe was staring at her, she shook her head.
‘A bit,’ she conceded before changing the subject. ‘God, you look like an advert for something healthy…or toothpaste?’
‘And you, sweetie, look like you were doorstepped by the national media.’ She held out her arms. ‘Hug?’
‘Yes, please.’
Sisterly hug exchanged, they sat down on the window seat side by side.
‘I’m quite jealous of the number of hits you got…did you watch it?’
Sabrina did not pretend not to understand; she had heard she had gone viral. ‘No, I was there.’
‘Don’t look so gloomy. I know many women who would pay to get chucked into the back seat by Sebastian Zorzi, and you were wearing nice undies.’
Sabrina’s eyes widened. ‘You couldn’t…?’
Chloe chuckled at the shocked reaction. ‘No, just a lot of leg.’ Her expression sobered. ‘Seriously, though…?’
Sabrina angled an enquiring look at her sister’s face.
The grin re-emerged. ‘He is seriously gorgeous! How about a double wedding? I’m up for it if you are!’
‘What, and share my day in the spotlight?’ Sabrina said, struggling to reply in kind because the image of her sister, dressed in white, standing beside a tall, lean, handsome figure made her feel a little queasy.
‘Because we all know how much you love that.’ Chloe’s smile vanished. ‘Brina, are you all right? I’m just trying to lighten the mood, you know. Are you really going to do it?’
‘Do what?’
‘Go through with this crazy medieval marriage of convenience? You can’t let yourself be used this way, Brina. It’s so wrong.’
‘I don’t have a choice.’
‘There is always a choice, Brina.’
Sabrina shook her head and veiled her eyes with her lashes. It was true, but now the time was here she wished she believed it. ‘I want to marry Luis. He’s a nice guy.’
Chloe’s expression grew serious as she took her sister’s hands in hers and said gravely, ‘Don’t you think you deserve better than nice? A husband who thinks you are more important than anything?’
After a shocked moment Sabrina brought her lashes down in a protective sweep as she swallowed the emotional lump in her throat. Chloe had voiced the thoughts she didn’t dare even allow herself to think.
‘Since when did you become a paid-up member of the soppy romantic club?’
Chloe’s smile was back as she jumped to her feet. ‘I hide it well. So how about I do wear this tonight?’ She moved her hand down the tiny skirt she wore. ‘And flirt with the sexy Sebastian?’
Sabrina struggled to respond to her sister’s teasing smile, managing some sickly approximation of an answering smile despite the tight feeling of rejection in her stomach.
‘Chloe, be careful. Sebastian Zorzi, he isn’t the sort of man you play with.’
She thought of eyes so blue they took your breath away and felt a little shiver trace a sinuous path down her spine as the memory surfaced, both terrifying and seductive. She didn’t want Chloe to be exposed to the danger he represented.
Or maybe you don’t want her to be kissed.
‘He’s dangerous.’
Chloe laughed. ‘He sounds better and better. Now how about a glass of wine to get us in the mood, or to at least prepare me for the undoubted cold shower that awaits me when I go to my room? Perhaps when you’ve sold your body for the good of the country we can get the plumbing fixed?’ She grinned and produced a bottle from the capacious handbag she had dumped by the door. ‘Glasses?’
CHAPTER THREE
HER MOTHER ENTERED her bedroom with dramatic abruptness just as Sabrina was fitting the last hair in the smooth twist she had wound her hair into.
‘There has been a disaster with the meal. Don’t ask!’
Sabrina didn’t but the harassed Duchess told her anyway. ‘I found out an hour ago that the Queen is gluten and lactose intolerant. Half the menu had to be revised. The chef is not happy.’
‘I’m sure it will be fine,’ Sabrina soothed, getting to her feet. Focusing on her mother’s panic made it somehow easier to deal with her own nerves. ‘Just breathe, Mum.’ She laid a hand on her parent’s arm.
The Duchess took a deep breath. ‘Yes, I’m sure you’re right, but I’m running terribly late. I haven’t even started getting ready, not that it really matters. The Queen—’ she lowered her voice and glanced over her shoulder, as though someone might be listening, before adding in a note of mingled envy and despair ‘—always makes me feel inadequate. I swear the woman gets younger every year!’
‘Mum, you always look lovely!’ Sabrina protested.
Her mother smiled. ‘You’re a good girl, Brina. And you’re right, of course, at my age it’s silly to worry about what I
look like.’
‘I didn’t say that,’ Sabrina protested. ‘There’s plenty of time for you to go and get ready.’
‘I can’t. I promised Walter that I’d run through the final details with him and speak to the staff.’
‘Leave it to me,’ Sabrina said, pretty sure she would regret the offer. The major-domo, Walter, always made her feel as though she were ten again and he’d just caught her trying to glue together a piece of porcelain she had broken. ‘You go and get ready.’
‘Really?’
Sabrina nodded.
The Duchess gave her daughter a gentle hug. ‘You’re an angel. I really don’t know what I’ll do without you when you’re married.’
‘Pretty much what you’ve been doing for the past seven years while I’ve been living in London, except from now on I’ll be closer.
‘Of course. You’re such a sensible girl. You’ve never given us a moment’s worry, unlike your sister! Speaking of Chloe, I’m going to check what she’s wearing.’ Reaching the door, she stopped and turned back. ‘You look very beautiful tonight.’
Sabrina grinned and smoothed the full skirt of the calf-length fifties-style pale blue silk dress she wore. ‘Oh, this old thing?’
‘And you’re wearing your grandmother’s pearls,’ the Duchess said, an emotional crack in her voice, as Sabrina touched the string of antique pearls wound around her slender neck. ‘You do know we are both very proud of you, don’t you? I wish there was another way. That you could—’
‘Nobody is forcing me to do anything. Luis is a lovely guy and I plan on being very happy.’ She took her mother by the shoulders and propelled her out of the door. It was only when the door had closed again that her forced smile faded. Happiness, she reminded herself, was not a right; in her case it was more a hope.
* * *
Sabrina didn’t search out the major domo; she knew he’d find her. She relayed her mother’s concerns, being careful not to tread on Walter’s toes. He responded with his habitual air of statuesque calm to her queries. It was at his suggestion she had a few words with the staff, mainly to thank them for their efforts in hosting the royal party at such short notice.
Then, with Walter, she checked out the table setting in the formal dining room. It was a room they rarely used as a family, but tonight the table groaned with silver and crystal, and happily the candlelight hid a multitude of sins—including the massive crack in the ceiling, which the engineer’s report had ominously referred to as significant.
There was, it seemed, only one decision for her to make.
‘Her Grace had not decided if we should serve the aperitifs in here, or the small salon?’
It was a courtesy, she knew, because Sabrina had already seen the scene set in the salon as she’d walked past, but she happily maintained the illusion that it was her decision and responded to the courtesy enquiry gravely. ‘I think, the small salon.’
The major-domo tipped his head in stately approval of her response. ‘I will see to it. If there is nothing else…?’
‘Nothing, thank you, Walter.’ About to follow him from the room herself, Sabrina paused and turned back. She walked across to the row of French doors that lined one wall and she began to open them up. The last one stubbornly refused to budge, causing her to curse softly. She aimed an irritated kick at it with one narrow, elegantly shod foot, before she paused to get her breath.
The same cool draught of mountain air that Sebastian felt on his face as he reached the open doorway made the full skirt of Sabrina’s dress billow around her slender legs. He watched as, eyes closed, long lashes fanning darkly against her smooth cheeks, eyes squeezed closed, she let out a long sibilant sigh through parted pink lips as she turned her face into the breeze, making no attempt to tame the fabric as it lifted and fluttered some more.
The tilt of her chin and the elegant placement of her arms made him think of a ballet dancer. An idea that was reinforced as her head fell back revealing the long, lovely line of her neck and throat and the angles of her collarbones. Though high to the throat, at the back the bodice of the dress she wore was cut into a deep vee that exposed a half-moon-shaped mole on the crest of one delicate shoulder blade.
Sebastian felt the heat rise through him and forgot to breathe, forgot how to breathe as the graceful image burned deep into his brain. Hunger tightened its grip, a primal pleasure/pain presence low in his belly and all points south. There were so many warning bells ringing in his head that he was deaf to everything but the heavy thud of his heart, the ache in his body and the whisper of sound as the fabric brushed against her legs.
Then she opened her eyes and gave a tiny sigh. The sound snapped the sensual spell that had held him transfixed, leaving behind something that he refused to recognise as tenderness. That sigh had sounded so damn wistful.
She remained oblivious to his presence as he crossed the room. She had both hands braced against the door frame and was pushing against the stubborn door, when he placed a hand above her head on the door jamb.
The door gave with a shudder.
‘Thank you.’ Sabrina turned, the corners of her soft mouth lifted in a smile of gratitude, which melded into one of dismay as she saw that it was him.
Sabrina stepped back so quickly that she almost lost her balance. The impact of his physical proximity acted like a live current, her quivering stomach vanished into a bottomless black hole and it took every ounce of her willpower to stop herself backing through the open door, which would have been impossible anyway because her limbs were paralyzed with shock. They call it lust, Brina.
Ignoring the mocking voice in her head, she lifted her softly rounded chin to a warily aggressive angle and directed a cool look up at the tall figure of the Zorzi black sheep. Sebastian just stood there in his formal black tie and tux, looking as if he had just stepped off a glossy Hollywood set.
‘You’re too early!’ Panic made her voice sharp.
‘I could hardly wait to sample the well-known hospitality of East Vela,’ he countered sardonically as his heavy-lidded stare travelled from the top of her glossy head to her heels and back. Sabrina fingered the pearls at her throat, trying desperately to ignore how his assessing and overtly sensual gaze made her whole body tingle.
The nervous action drew his stare to her throat, where a blue-veined pulse pushed against the pale skin.
‘You startled me. I thought you were Walter.’
So the smile was for Walter. ‘You look…good.’
No smile came with the compliment, which was delivered in an expressionless voice.
‘So, should I?’
‘What?’
‘Go away and come back.’
Sabrina flushed and moved her head slightly to look past his shoulder willing someone, anyone, to appear.
They didn’t.
‘If you were expecting Luis he’s waiting on an important call.’
She firmed her shoulders and reminded herself that being pleasant to people she didn’t like was part of her future job. She could not allow personal feelings to enter into it. ‘No, of course not. You just took me by surprise and this is a bit…awkward.’
‘Why?’
She tightened her lips and glared at him. ‘I have no pleasant memories of our last encounter.’
‘I can think of one,’ he teased, looking at her mouth.
The longer their glances held, the thicker the atmosphere in the air became. Sabrina was the first to look away, fixing her eyes on a point over his shoulder as she fiddled with the pearls. ‘I had assumed you were drunk but I can see now that you’re always…’ Her words faded as the vivid memory resurfaced. His breath the other day had not actually tasted of booze, just mint and… No, she was not going to go there!
‘Irresistible?’
Before she could react to the suggestion the a
ntique string of pearls she was playing with snapped.
Sabrina immediately fell to her knees, trying to grab the pearls, which were bouncing across the polished wooden floor in all directions. ‘Oh, no! No, no, no.’
‘Relax, they’re not the crown jewels…’ He stopped, his teasing look vanishing from his face as she lifted her head and he saw that she was close to tears.
‘Just go away!’ she hissed. ‘I don’t give a damn about the crown jewels. They were my grandmother’s pearls.’
With a frown he dropped down, squatting on his heels beside her. He saw the little tremors that shook her shoulders and felt something twist hard in his chest. He did his best to ignore it, telling himself it was either indigestion or the threat of tears that had caused it. He’d never liked seeing women crying.
‘She left them to me. She always wore them and now they’re ruined! Everything is ruined…’ Dignity forgotten, on all fours now, she stretched to retrieve a pearl that had slipped under a chair, but as her finger touched it it bounced away. ‘I can’t do this! It’s so, so… No, I just can’t!’
‘What we need is a system. An inch-by-inch search. What do they call it—a fingertip search?’
The image that drifted into her head involved his fingertips moving very slowly, but the surface they were exploring, the secret crevices they were discovering, had nothing to do with the wooden floor! What was happening to her?
‘You count and I’ll retrieve.’
She struggled to drag her thoughts back to the present. The process felt like swimming through warm honey. There was a horrible temptation to taste it.
‘That really isn’t necessary,’ she managed finally, her voice carrying nowhere near the level of conviction she was hoping for. ‘I’m really not that sentimental.’
He had already lifted the heavy starched linen tablecloth; at her comment he glanced back over his shoulder. ‘Yes, you are, which is fine. Make yourself useful and hold this up. There are some under here.’
