One Night Before The Royal Wedding (Mills & Boon Modern)

by Sharon Kendrick

  Helplessly, Zabrina writhed beneath the featherlight accuracy of his tongue, scarcely able to believe that it could get any better. But it did. It was getting better all the time. It was so good that she felt as if she were going to faint with pleasure. She bit back a cry of disbelief mingled with joy, and just as her body started convulsing he pressed his lips against her pulsating core. Bunching up her fist, she dug her teeth hard into her fingers and bit on them as the flick of his tongue intensified the blistering sensations. One delicious spasm was followed by another and never had she felt quite so vulnerable—or so powerful—as she did in that moment. Time stretched and suspended and she found herself strangely reluctant to float back down to earth.

  Her eyelids parting, she saw Constantin opening the foil packet he’d retrieved earlier and Zabrina suddenly understood what it contained. She’d never even seen a contraceptive before—why would she?—and she’d always imagined she might feel a mixture of terror and embarrassment when eventually she did. But the only thing she was experiencing right now was a warm anticipation as he moved to lie on top of her. His flesh was silky and hard. She could feel the muscled weight of his body and his satin tip nudging against the core he had just kissed so intimately. She could detect a faint perfume in the air, and as he lowered his head to kiss her she could taste the scent on his tongue and realised that the taste was her.

  ‘Constantin,’ she said, almost brokenly.

  ‘What?’

  For a moment she felt him grow still against her, as if he was having second thoughts.

  Was he?

  Should she be having them?

  Of course she should.

  A lingering remnant of common sense reminded her of the insanity of what she was about to do—yet her body was so greedy for more of this incredible pleasure that it refused to contemplate any other alternative than what was about to happen.

  ‘What is it?’ he demanded again, his voice raw and ragged with need.

  ‘N-nothing.’ If she wasn’t careful she would start putting doubts in his mind, and the King’s servant would realise what a compromising position they were in. And if he decided to call a halt to it could she really bear it? No, she could not. Was that what made her instinctively thrust her pelvis forward, so that his tip entered by a fraction and he gave a soft roar as he thrust into her more deeply?

  Zabrina sucked in a disbelieving breath as he filled her and she was amazed at how quickly her body adjusted to his possession—as if she had been waiting all her life for this man to be inside her. She let out a slow shudder as he began to move and, very quickly, could feel an escalation of that now-familiar bliss with each powerful thrust he made. But as his mouth fixed itself on hers and she felt the lace of his tongue again, she suddenly became aware that this was about more than the purely physical. It felt as if the two of them really had become one—in every sense. Did she feel that connection because he’d convinced her to confide in him? Or because he’d made her feel almost normal—less like a princess and more like a woman?

  And that had never happened before.

  ‘Oh,’ she whimpered.

  He raised his dark head, his eyes seeming unfocussed. ‘Oh, what?’

  ‘It feels...amazing.’

  ‘I know it does.’

  What was that sudden edge to his voice as he drove even deeper? Zabrina wasn’t sure but right then she didn’t particularly care, because it seemed that instinct was guiding her movements again. Why else did her thighs lock with familiar ease around his back, and why else did she move her pelvis to meet each hard thrust? The low moans of pleasure he gave thrilled her immeasurably. Did that mean he liked the way she was responding to him? She hoped so because she liked everything he was doing to her.

  Everything.

  She liked the way his teeth teased her nipples into diamond points. The way he smoothed his fingers over her arching flesh, as if discovering every centimetre of her body through touch alone. Each thrust he made took her deeper, and then deeper still, into a new and intoxicating world which was becoming familiar to her. In her befuddled mind she saw the twitch of a colourless curtain, behind which was a glimpse of that rainbow place again. And suddenly it became real, and all those incredible sensations were swamping her in tantalising waves.

  It couldn’t be happening, Zabrina thought dimly. Not...not again.

  But it could, and it was.

  Oh, it was.

  As her body began to clench around him, he drove his mouth down on hers—as if recognising that kissing was the only way of stemming the euphoric cry which was bubbling up inside her. Zabrina yelped softly into his mouth as his movements became more urgent—until at last he jerked inside her, his head tipping back as he shuddered out his own moment of fulfilment.

  It felt like an intensely private moment but she was so dazed and spellbound that she risked a glance at his face.

  He looked enraptured. There was no other word for it. As if he’d just discovered the most delicious thing imaginable. And for a few silent seconds, Zabrina allowed herself the pointless luxury of fantasy.

  What if he’d realised—like her—that this type of connection was rare? So rare that she would be prepared to give up her destiny for it. For him. She could tell him that she’d meant what she’d said about his boss—that she had no desire to marry him, nor even any desire for him. She could renounce her royal title and they could run away together. There would be a terrible scandal, yes, but people would get over it and the world would move on. He was strong and resourceful. He could build them a cottage in the woods and she would bear his children. She would cook meals and grow vegetables and he would come home every night and take her into his arms, and... She frowned. It was true that she’d never cooked anything in her life, but she would soon learn!

  ‘Constantin,’ she said softly, and as she said his name an astonishing transformation seemed to come over him.

  The first thing he did was to withdraw from her, as if he couldn’t wait to put some distance between them. But not before she’d detected the way he had begun to harden inside her once more...and she sensed he was having to fight the urge not to thrust inside her again. She wished he would. She wanted to ask him if something was wrong but her inexperience warned her to wait a little. Because he might be awash with feelings of guilt and regret at what they’d just done—feelings she knew she should share, but somehow she just couldn’t. How on earth could she possibly feel guilty or regretful about something which felt as if it had been written in the stars?

  His back to her now, he peeled off the condom and dropped it on top of his discarded trousers, as if this was something he had done a million times before. He probably had, Zabrina reasoned, though she needed to understand that his life before he’d met her was none of her business and she must not question him about it. Not when they had more than enough questions of their own they needed to address. In fact, he was probably wondering where the hell they went from here, so surely it was up to her to put his mind at rest and reassure him that she wasn’t intending to pull rank.

  ‘Constantin?’ she repeated softly.

  He turned to face her then and Zabrina almost wished he hadn’t, because...

  Surely there had to have been some kind of mistake? Surely someone couldn’t have travelled from bliss to contempt so quickly. But eyes which had been soft and smoky with lust now resembled chips of grey ice and his face looked as if he had pulled on a dark mask of anger. Was he anticipating the repercussions of what they had done?

  She frowned. ‘Is...is something wrong?’

  ‘What do you think?’ he snapped, his voice as cold as his eyes.

  She swallowed. ‘I know we shouldn’t have—’

  Roman shook his head, unable to contain his anger for a second longer. Anger at the naked princess who was still tempting him unbearably, yes, but far more potent was the anger he was directing at
himself. How could he have lost control like that? How could he? ‘Damned right, we shouldn’t,’ he snarled.

  She was sitting up in bed and smoothing down her hair, shiny strands of which were tumbling from its constricting ponytail and falling tantalisingly over her bare breasts.

  ‘Look, I don’t have any experience but I do know that these things happen,’ she whispered.

  Her wide-eyed expression was completely at odds with the foxy euphoria he’d witnessed when she’d been orgasming underneath him and now Roman felt another spear of anger directed at the erection which was stirring at his groin. ‘Oh, please. Don’t insult my intelligence by playing the wounded innocent, when nothing could be further from the truth!’

  She blinked at him in confusion and it almost looked real. She was a good actress, he’d say that for her.

  ‘What are you talking about, Constantin?’

  The way she spoke his name made another wave of anger wash over him. ‘What do you think I’m talking about?’ Furiously, he rose from the bed and grabbed at his clothes, rapidly pulling on his trousers before heading towards the bedroom at the far end of the compartment. From there, he tugged a silken coverlet from the bed and walked back into the salon before tossing it to her. ‘Cover yourself up,’ he said, striding over to the door and turning the key in the lock.

  Thankfully, she did as he asked, concealing her delicious body from his hungry eyes with the aid of the bedspread. That was one less distraction at least, Roman thought grimly as a pert pink nipple was covered by a ripple of silk, though he couldn’t deny his faint sense of deprivation. His mind was buzzing but all he could see was the fearful gaze she was directing at the door before looking back at him, as if she had only just realised where they were and what they had been doing.

  ‘Oh, my goodness. We could have been discovered,’ she was breathing in horror. ‘Anyone could have walked in at any time.’

  Roman shook his head. He had been wondering how he could tell her what she needed to know—he just hadn’t been sure how to go about it. But now he was. There was a perfectly simple way of alerting her to the simple fact which was going to change her fate for ever. His, too. Yet wasn’t there a part of him which felt a kind of relief at the prospect that he would no longer need to marry her? No need to marry anyone.

  ‘Nobody would have walked in,’ he declared, with icy certainty.

  She gave a nervous laugh. ‘You can’t possibly know that.’

  ‘Yes, I can.’

  ‘How?’

  The stab of conscience he had all but eliminated made another brief attempt to unsettle him, but Roman quickly quashed it. Because surely her deception was far greater than his? He looked into her forest-green eyes and sucked in a deep breath.

  ‘Because my name is not Constantin Izvor and I am not the chief bodyguard to the royal household. I am—’

  ‘You are the King,’ she interrupted suddenly, her face growing as white as a summer cloud. ‘You are King Roman of Petrogoria.’

  CHAPTER SIX

  ‘HOW THE HELL do you know who I am?’ he demanded.

  Zabrina felt a flicker of pleasure that she’d taken him by surprise because surely her sudden realisation of the King’s true identity gave her back a modicum of control over this awful situation.

  But only a modicum.

  Keep cool, she told herself fiercely, as the train continued to rattle through towards the border which divided their two countries. Don’t let him guess at your thoughts or your feelings. Because if he does—if he does—that will give him even more power than he already possesses. If he realised, for example, that her primary feeling was one of hurt and betrayal, then wouldn’t that run the risk of making her appear even more foolish? She shuddered as she forced herself to recall her stupid imaginings. Had she seriously been considering renouncing her title and her life to live in a country cottage with him? She must have been out of her mind.

  ‘How long have you known my true identity?’ he questioned coldly.

  She forced herself to glare at him instead of drinking in his steely beauty, which she had been doing until just a couple of minutes ago. Why, if she was capable of winding the clock back even by a minute, she would still be in that dazed place of sensual fulfilment, her body all glowing and tingly. And wasn’t it crazy that, even now, she was finding it difficult to remain immune to his physical allure? It was very difficult to concentrate on anything when she noticed he’d left the top button of his trousers undone. ‘You mean, how long is it since I found out that you’ve been deceiving me, since even before I boarded this royal train?’

  ‘You dare to talk to me of deception?’ he flared back. ‘When you were planning to arrive in my country to great fanfare and acclaim and then to marry me, having had sex with someone you believed was my bodyguard?’

  Zabrina felt completely wrong-footed by his icy accusation, which was presumably his intention—because everything he’d said was true. She had done all those things. But it was all becoming much clearer now. When she had met the man who had introduced himself as Constantin Izvor, she had quickly noticed his autocratic bearing and had thought he was a little full of himself. Of course he was. He had been trying to behave like a commoner, when all his life he had occupied one of the most powerful positions in the region. No wonder he had struggled with humility. No wonder he had such strong traces of arrogance. She had thought that at times he seemed almost regal—because he was! Oh, why hadn’t she trusted her instincts and found out more about him, instead of taking everything he said at face value? Why the hell had she trusted him? Hadn’t she learnt ever since she was barely out of the cradle that men were selfish creatures who were not to be trusted?

  ‘You started it!’ she declared. ‘You started the whole seduction process!’

  ‘How?’

  ‘By telling me...’ Oh, how trite it sounded now and how gullible she had been. ‘By telling me that my skin was soft and silky—’

  ‘And do you respond to all men who compliment you like that?’ he snapped. ‘If, say, one of the servants had admired the colour of your eyes, would he have been allowed to put his head between your thighs and be in the position I now find myself in?’

  ‘How dare you?’

  ‘It’s a simple question, Zabrina. All it needs is a yes or a no!’

  ‘I shouldn’t even dignify that question by responding, because you know very well what the answer is. The answer is no, of course it is. Because I was an innocent,’ she elaborated, when he continued to look at her coldly.

  ‘What the hell,’ he iced out, ‘are you talking about?’

  Zabrina had thought it couldn’t possibly get any worse than it already was, but she had been wrong. She looked at the contemptuous curve of his lips and a terrible truth began to dawn on her—one so awful that initially she wouldn’t allow herself to believe it. Surely he didn’t think...? ‘I was a virgin,’ she repeated—and wasn’t it another stupid side-effect of the situation she now found herself in that she should feel embarrassed about having a clinical discussion about something so personal, when in his arms she had behaved completely without inhibition?

  ‘Oh, please.’ His laugh was bitter. ‘We may have both committed the sin of deception, but that time has gone, and from now on perhaps we should agree to speak only the truth.’

  ‘That’s exactly what I am doing.’

  ‘I’m giving you time to think about what you’ve just said and to modify it accordingly. You were no virgin, Princess. So please don’t insult me by pretending that you were!’

  Instinctively, Zabrina’s fingers dug into the silken coverlet as his gaze raked over her and she wondered if she had imagined that sudden brief darkening of his eyes. Was that because she was naked underneath it? she wondered. And did he still want her as much as she wanted him? How inconvenient desire could be, she thought bitterly, aware of her hardening nipples in respo
nse, and the molten heat which clenched so tantalisingly at the base of her belly. ‘Are you saying I lied to you about my inexperience?’

  ‘If it makes you feel better, I’ll be generous and put it down to you being creative with the facts. I can understand your reasoning because obviously you want to protect your reputation. But it won’t make me think any worse of you if you admit to the truth,’ he added. ‘It certainly won’t change the outcome of what I am about to do next.’

  Maybe she should have addressed the slightly sinister portent of ‘what I am about to do next’, but Zabrina was so horrified by his accusation that she briefly forgot his words. ‘Why are you saying that?’ she whispered, and then, as a sudden horrified thought sprang into her mind, she glanced over at the sofa to quickly put her mind at rest, relieved to see that it was as pristine as before. ‘Because there was no evidence? Were you hoping to fly the bloodied sheet from the palace balcony in Rosumunte on our wedding night? Aren’t we royals supposed to have moved on from those days?’

  ‘Please do not try to distract me with inappropriate sarcasm!’ He glowered at her. ‘Because I know how a woman behaves when it is her first time with a man. She is shy. She is tentative. She is often overwhelmed by what is happening to her.’

  ‘How encyclopaedic you sound, Roman. Which leads me to conclude that you must have had sex with many virgins before?’’

  ‘Some.’ He shrugged. ‘Not many.’

  ‘And is that supposed to make me feel better?’

  ‘I don’t imagine anything would be able to do that at the moment,’ he commented wryly and gave a sudden, heavy sigh. ‘But if it’s any consolation, I feel pretty much the same.’

  ‘It isn’t!’ she snapped. ‘I’m not interested in consolation, even if you were capable of providing any, which I suspect you aren’t. And as for knowing how a woman behaves when it is her first time—don’t you suppose that any shyness on her part might have something to do with the fact that you’re a powerful king? Except when you’re pretending not to be, of course.’ She gave a short laugh. ‘Surely your crime was worse than mine, since you knew exactly who I was. Was that your intention all along, Roman? To seduce me? Was this some sort of primitive test of my character to see how much temptation I could take before submitting to you?’