by Cara Colter
She covered the intensity of the moment by pasting a smile on her face. “You’re welcome. People pay big money for the mud treatment at the spa.”
“Yes,” he said, watching her closely, as if he knew she was covering, as if he knew exactly how fake that smile was. “I know.”
And of course he would know. Because that was his world. Spas and yachts and polo ponies.
His world. He had playfully said he would take her prisoner, but the truth was his world was a prison in many ways.
And he could not invite her into it.
She did not have the pedigree of a woman he would ever be allowed to love.
Love. How had that word, absolutely taboo in her relationship with him, slipped past all her guards and come into her mind?
But now that it had come, Meredith was so aware how this moment was going to have a tremendous cost to her. Because, she had ever so briefly glimpsed his heart. Because she had seen the coolness leave his eyes and be replaced with tenderness. Yes, this moment had come at a tremendous price to her. Because she had let her guard down, too.
For a moment she had wanted things she could not have. Ached for them.
Still, if she had this choice to make over, how would she do it? Would she play it safe and stay in the ball-room, tolerating his wooden performance, allowing his mask to remain impenetrable?
No, she would change nothing. She would forever be grateful she had risked so much to let him out of his world, and his prison. Even if it had only been a brief reprieve.
And in return, hadn’t she been let out of hers?
He turned from her, but not before she caught the deeply thoughtful look on his face, as if every realization she was having was also occurring to him.
He walked back through the fern barrier, leapt into the hot springs completely clothed. She watched his easy strength, as he did a powerful crawl that carried him across the pool to the cascading water of the falls. She quelled the primitive awareness that tried to rise in her.
Instead, she dove into the pool, too. Her skin had never felt so open to sensation. He had climbed up on a ledge underneath the falls, and she saw the remnants of their day falling off of him as if it had never happened.
It was time to clean herself of the residue of the day, too. She swam across the pool and pulled herself up on the ledge beside him.
The fresh, cold water was shocking on her heated skin. It pummeled her, was nearly punishing in its intensity.
Though she and Kiernan stood side by side, Meredith was painfully aware some distance now separated them, keeping their worlds separate even in the glorious intimacy of the cascading water world that they shared.
She slid him a look and felt her breath catch in her throat.
His face was raised to the water, his eyes closed as what was left of the mud melted out of his hair and dissolved off his face, revealing each perfect feature: the cut of high cheekbones, the straight line of his nose, the faint cleft of his chin.
The white of Andy’s shirt had reemerged, but the shirt had turned transparent under the water, and clung to the hard lines of Kiernan’s chest. She could see the dark pebble of his nipple, the slight indent of each rib, the hollow of a taut, hard belly. It made her mouth go dry with a powerful sense of craving.
To touch. To taste. To have. To hold.
Impossible thoughts. Ones that would only bring more grief to her if she allowed them any power at all. Hadn’t her life held quite enough grief?
Was it the coldness of the water after all that heat, or her awareness of him that was making her quiver?
Meredith felt herself wanting to save this moment, to remember the absolute beauty of it—and of him—forever.
He finally turned and dove cleanly off the ledge, cutting the water with his body. With that same swift, sure stroke, Kiernan made his way back across the mineral pond to where he had set the baskets. How long ago? An hour? A little longer than an hour?
How could so much change in such a short amount of time?
She dove in, too, emerged from the pond, dripping, and flinging back the wetness of her hair. She saw, from the brief heat in his eyes before he turned away, that Molly’s shirt must have become as transparent as Andy’s.
She glanced down. And she had accused him of boring underwear? Her bra—a utilitarian sports model made for athletic support while dancing—showed clearly through the wet fabric. But from the look on his face you would have thought she was wearing a bra made out of silk and lace!
She shoved by him, and rummaged through the baskets, tucked a towel quickly around herself and then silently handed him a towel and a change of clothing.
Was there the faintest smirk on his face from how quickly she had wrapped herself up?
“You’re prepared,” he said.
Yes. And no. There were some things you could not prepare for. Like the fact you hoped a man would tease you about being a prude, like the fact it was so hard to let go of a perfect day.
But he didn’t tease her, or linger. He ducked behind a rock on one side of the glade and she on the other. She did not want to think of him naked in a garden, but she knew the temptation of Eve in that moment, and fought it with her small amount of remaining strength.
The trip back was eerily silent, as if they were both contemplating what had happened and how to go forward—or back—from that place.
Meredith drove back through the same service entrance to Chatam Palace. On the way in she had to stop and show ID, and her palace pass. She did not miss the stunned look on the face of the guard as he recognized the prince squished in the seat beside her. He practically tossed her ID back through her window, drew himself to attention and saluted rigidly.
It could not have been a better reminder of who the man beside her really was.
And the look of shock on the guard’s face to see the prince in such a humble vehicle with a member of the palace staff, could not have been a better reminder of who she really was, too.
He was not Andy. She was not Molly.
He was a prince, born to position, power and prestige. She was a servant’s daughter, a woman who had given birth to an illegitimate child, a person with so much history and so much baggage.
She let the prince out, barely looking at him. He barely looked at her.
They did not say goodbye.
Meredith wondered if he would show up for their scheduled dance session tomorrow. Would she?
The whole thing had become fraught with a danger that she did not know how to handle.
And yet, even that tingling sensation of danger as she drove away from the palace after dropping Kiernan off there, served as a reminder.
She was alive.
She was alive, and for the first time in a long, long time, she was aware of being deeply grateful that she was alive. The pain. The glory. The potential to be hurt. The potential to love. It was all part of the most incredible dance.
There was that word again.
Love.
“Forbidden to me,” Meredith said. Because of who he was. Because of who she was, and especially because of where she had already been in the name of love.
But of course, what had more power than forbidden fruit?
When Prince Kiernan walked through the doors of the ballroom the next morning, Meredith did not know whether she was relieved he had come, or sorry that she had to be tested some more.
He was right on time as always.
They exchanged perfunctory greetings. She put on the music. He took her hand, placed his other with care on her waist.
The trip to the hot springs had obviously been an error in every way it was possible for something to be an error.
This was turning out to be just like the day she had ridden his horse and they had danced in the courtyard to the chamber music spilling out the palace windows.
Prince Kiernan’s guard came down, but only temporarily!
And when it went back up, it went way up!
After half an hour of
tolerating a wooden performance from him, Meredith was not tingling with awareness of being alive at all! She was tingling with frustration. Was he dancing this badly just to put her off? Maybe he was hoping she would cancel the whole thing. And maybe she should.
Except she couldn’t. It was too late now to start over with someone else. The girls, rehearsing separately, at her studio, had practiced to perfection. They were there night and day, putting heart and soul into this.
She wasn’t letting them down because Prince Kiernan was the most confoundedly stubborn man in the world.
But really, enough was enough!
“This is excruciating,” she said, pulling away from him, folding her arms across her chest and glaring at him.
Somewhere under that cool, composed mask was the man who had chased her, laughter-filled, through the mud.
“I warned you I had no talent.”
“Call somebody,” she snapped at him. “It’s like a game show where you have a lifeline. Call somebody, and use your princely powers. Have them find us the movie Dancing with Heaven. And deliver it. Right here. Right now.”
It was an impossible request. The movie was old. It would probably be extremely difficult if not impossible to find.
For a moment he looked like he might argue, but then he chose not to, probably because he wanted to do just about anything rather than dance.
With her.
With some new tension in the air between them. Harnessed, it would make for an absolutely electrical dance performance.
Resisted, it would make for a disastrous dance performance.
He took a cell phone out of his pocket, and placed a call.
“Tell them not to forget the popcorn,” she said darkly. “And I’d like something to drink, too.”
“You’re being very bossy,” he said. “As usual.”
Within minutes his cell phone rang back. “It’s set up in the theater room,” he said.
“Can’t we watch it here?”
“No, we can’t. I’m not sitting on an icy cold floor to watch a movie. Not even for you.”
Not even for you. She heard something there that she knew instantly he had not intended for her to hear. Something that implied he would do anything for her, up to and including going to the ends of the earth.
She deliberately quelled the beating of her heart and followed the prince to where he held open the ballroom doors for her.
It was the first time Meredith had been in the private areas of the interior of the palace. The ballroom, along with the throne room, and a gallery of collected art was in the public wing of the palace, open to anyone who went there on a tour day.
Now, Prince Kiernan led her through an arched door flanked by two palace guards who saluted him smartly. The door led into the private family quarters of the palace.
They were in a grand entranceway, a formal living room on one side, a curving staircase on the other. The richness of it was startling: original old masters paintings, Persian rugs, priceless antiques, draperies and furniture upholstered in heavy brocaded silks. A chandelier that put the ones in the ballroom to shame spattered light over the staircase and entry.
Kiernan noticed none of it as he marched her up the wide stairs, under the portraits of his ancestors, many of whom looked just like him, and all of whom looked disapproving.
“What a happy looking lot,” she muttered. “They have aloofness down to a fine art.”
He glanced at the portraits. “Don’t they?” With approval.
So that’s where he got his rigidity!
“Maybe I’m wasting my time trying to break past something that has been bred into each Chatam for hundreds of years.” And that they were proud of to boot.
“I’ve been trying to tell you.”
And maybe if she hadn’t been stupid enough to take him on that excursion yesterday, she would have believed him.
“This floor is where guests stay,” he said, exiting the staircase that still spiraled magnificently upward. He led her down a wide corridor.
Bedroom doors were open along either side of the hallway and she peeked in without trying to appear too interested. The bedrooms, six in all, three on either side of the hallway were done in muted, tasteful colors. The décor had the flavor and feel of pictures Meredith had seen of very upscale boutique hotels.
It occurred to Meredith that princes and presidents, prime ministers, princesses and prima donnas had all walked down these corridors.
It reminded her who the man beside her really was, and she felt a whisper of awe. He opened the door to a room at the end of the long hallway.
Meredith tried not to gape. The “theater room” was really the most posh of private theaters. The walls were padded white leather panels with soft, muted light pouring out from behind them. The carpets were rich, dark gold with a raised crown pattern in yet darker gold. There were three tiers of theater style chairs in soft, buttery distressed leather. Each chair had a light underneath it that subtly illuminated the aisle. The chairs faced a screen as large as any Meredith had ever seen.
Two chairs were in front of all the others, and Kiernan gestured to one of them. Obviously she was sitting in a chair that would normally be slated for the most important of VIP’s. She settled into the chair.
“Who’s the last person who sat here?” She could not stop herself from asking.
If Kiernan thought the question odd he was polite enough not to let on. “I think it was the president of the United States. Nice man.”
Never had she been more aware of who Kiernan really was.
And who she really was.
A man in a white jacket, very much like the one she had borrowed from Andy, arrived with a steaming hot bowl of popcorn for each of them. He pushed a button on the side of her seat, and a tray emerged from the armrest.
“I was kidding about the popcorn,” she hissed at Kiernan, but she took the bowl anyway.
“A drink, miss?”
Part of her was so intimidated by her surroundings, she wanted to just say no, to be that invisible girl who had accompanied her mother to work on occasion.
But another part of her thought she might never have on opportunity like this again, so, she was making the most of it. She decided to see how flummoxed the man would be if she ordered something completely exotic and off the wall—especially for ten o’clock in the morning. “Oh, sure. I’ll have a virgin chi-chi.”
The servant didn’t even blink, just took the prince’s order and glided away only to return a few minutes later.
“My apologies,” he said quietly. “We didn’t have the fresh coconut milk today.”
She had to stifle a giggle. A desire to tease and say, see that that doesn’t happen again. Instead, she met the man’s eyes, and saw the warmth in them, and the lack of judgment.
“Can I get you anything else?”
“No, thank you for your kindness,” she said. And she meant it.
She took a sip, and sighed. The drink, even without the fresh coconut milk was absolute ambrosia.
The movie came on. For the first few minutes Meredith was so self-conscious that Prince Kiernan was beside her. It felt as if she was on a first date, and they were afraid to hold hands.
Dancing with Heaven was dated and hokey, but the dance sequences were incredible, sizzling with tension and sensuality.
Though she had seen this movie a dozen times, Meredith was soon lost in the story of a spoiled selfcentered young woman who walked by a dance studio called Heaven, peeked in the window, and was entranced by what she saw there. The dance instructor was a bitter older man whose career had been lost to an injury. He taught dance only for the money, because he had to.
Through what Meredith considered some the best dance sequences ever written, the young woman moved beyond her superficial and cynical attitude toward life and the instructor came to have hope again.
Wildly romantic, and sizzling with the sexual chemistry between the two, the instructor fought taking advantage of th
e young heiress’s growing love for him, but in the end he succumbed to the love he had for her and the unlikely couple, united through dance, lived happily ever after.
What had made her insist the prince see this ridiculous and unrealistic piece of fluff?
When it was over, Meredith was aware of tears sliding down her face. She wiped at them quickly before the lights came up, set down her empty glass and her equally empty popcorn dish.
“Now you know what I expect of you. I’ll see myself out. See you in the morning.”
Kiernan saw that Meredith was not meeting his eyes. Something about the movie had upset her.
He ordered himself to let it go, especially after yesterday. Not that he wanted to think about yesterday.
He’d kissed her, and it hadn’t been a little buss on the cheek, either. No, it had been the kind of kiss that blew something wide open in a man, the kind of kiss that a man did not stop thinking about once it had happened.
It was the kind of kiss that made a man evaluate his own life and find it seemed empty, and without color.
The problem was they had been pretending to be ordinary.
And between an ordinary man and an ordinary woman maybe such things could happen without consequences.
But in his world? If he went where that kiss invited him to go, begged him to go, the world she knew would be over.
She had trusted him with her deepest secrets. How would she like those secrets to be exposed to the world? If he let his guard down again, if he allowed things to develop between them, Meredith would find her past at the center ring of a three-ring circus. Pictures of her baby would be dug up. Her mother’s past would be investigated. Her ex would be found and asked for comments on her character.
So, even though the movie had upset her, it would be best to let her go.
And yet he couldn’t.
He stepped in front of her.
“Are you upset?” he asked quietly.
She looked panicked. “No. I just need to go. I need to—”
“You’re upset,” he said. “Why? Did the movie upset you?”
“No, I—”
“Please don’t lie to me,” he said. “You’ve never done it before, and you have no talent for it.”
