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

by Sharon Kendrick

  She spoke without thinking and must have hit a raw nerve because a flash of something dark ravaged the carved beauty of his face. It was as if he’d put on a savage mask which made him almost unrecognisable, but it was gone in an instant, his features shuttered and emotionless again—as if he was all too aware that the prying lenses of the cameras were trained on them.

  ‘I had forgotten that you spoke fluent Petrogorian,’ he bit out. ‘Perhaps I would do well to guard my tongue in future. But even so, do you consider this is an appropriate time to ambush me with such questions?’

  Zabrina was aware that she had either hurt or angered him but she hadn’t meant to do either. It hadn’t been intended as a point-scoring exercise, or a desire to catch him off-guard—she’d just wanted to find out more about the man she was to marry.

  ‘Roman—’

  ‘Let’s just concentrate on what we’re supposed to be doing, shall we?’ he interrupted, his lips barely moving as he edged out the words—presumably to foil any would-be lip-readers. ‘And smile. No, a big smile, Princess. Act like you really mean it. We’re here.’

  The powerful car drew to a halt in front of the applauding palace staff and Zabrina glanced up to see figures clustered at upstairs windows high above, capturing the image on their cell-phones. Roman leapt from the car and opened her car door himself and as he held out his hand to help her down, Zabrina was aware of two things. Firstly, that the brief touch of his fingers was enough to send soft shivers of desire rippling down her spine, making her wish he would lift them to his lips and kiss them. But he didn’t.

  Because the second thing she noticed—and this was the one which stayed with her for the rest of the day—was that the grey eyes which were turned in her direction were as empty and as cold as ice.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  SOFT SUNLIGHT FLICKERED over the profuse spill of roses, bathing the famous gardens in a rich golden glow as Zabrina stared out of the vast windows.

  But no matter how hard she tried to concentrate on the beauty outside, or on the small dish of fruit on the table in front of her, it was difficult to focus on anything other than the devastatingly handsome man who was seated opposite. The morning light was glinting on his cropped dark hair, making her realise how much it had grown, and his snowy white shirt emphasised the muscular width of his shoulders.

  Suddenly he pushed his empty coffee cup away and leaned back in his chair to study her. Was he aware she’d been watching him with a hungry desire which wouldn’t seem to go away? And did that fill him with a sense of triumph—and power?

  ‘Today’s the big day, isn’t it?’ he said.

  Zabrina gazed at him blankly. The only ‘big day’ which seemed to be on everyone’s lips wasn’t for another three weeks—unless somebody had brought the wedding forward and not bothered to tell the bride. She hoped not, because there were still what looked like five million seed pearls to sew onto her traditional Petrogorian wedding dress and sequins which needed to be scattered all over her tulle veil. She picked up her silver spoon, still trying to get used to the enormous emerald and diamond engagement ring which felt too heavy for her finger. ‘Big day?’ she repeated.

  ‘Your horse,’ he said. ‘What time does it arrive?’

  ‘He. The horse is a he, not an it,’ Zabrina corrected, watching as a servant silently moved forward to refill the King’s cup with inky-black coffee. ‘And his name is Midas.’

  ‘Ah!’ He picked up a sugar cube. ‘Named after the king who wished for an excess of gold and almost ruined his life in the process?’

  ‘That’s the one.’

  He lifted his dark brows in arrogant query. ‘Perhaps there is an allegory in that story for us, Zabrina.’

  ‘Let’s hope not,’ she said darkly.

  A brief smile curved the edges of his lips as he dropped the sugar into the cup and began to stir and Zabrina found herself mesmerised by the circular movement of his fingers, wondering how he could make such a simple action look so insanely sexy. But then, he made just about everything he did look sexy. Was that deliberate? Was he taunting her? Reminding her of that heart-punching intimacy they’d shared on the Petrogoria-bound train, which was now being put on hold until they were married?

  Stop it, she thought. Just stop it. You are supposed to be having a polite breakfast conversation about the day ahead.

  The kind of measured diary conversation they’d been having every morning since she’d arrived in Petrogoria last week. This was the public face of their formal engagement, as opposed to the private anxieties which plagued her every night when she was alone in bed.

  Over coffee, fruit and eggs over easy—for him—they would go through the various royal duties which had been mapped out for them by their private offices—some together and some apart. Solo duties she welcomed. In many ways, it was less distracting when Roman wasn’t by her side distracting her with his powerful presence.

  Hadn’t she thought—hoped—that he would go back on his determination for their nights to be spent separately? But she had been wrong. He hadn’t and now she had started to wonder if his reluctance to touch her meant he was having second thoughts about the wedding. But rejection was something she wouldn’t countenance—not now—and so she threw herself into her new charities with fervour, hoping that her engagements would make her fit in and feel easier about her place here.

  Because Roman had been right. Or rather, Roman when he had been masquerading as Constantin and answering her questions with an alluring frankness, leaving her wondering which of them was the real man. The understanding and passionate bodyguard, or the cold, disciplined king?

  It didn’t matter.

  The fact remained that the royal palace of Petrogoria was intimidating, just as he’d warned her.

  For a start it was big. Way bigger than she’d imagined and everything was on a much larger scale than what she was used to. It made her childhood home seem like a matchbox lined up next to a shoebox. And it wasn’t just the size—it was all the contents. There was more of everything. More Old Master paintings, more ancient books and precious artefacts. The scaled-up fountains sprayed bigger and more impressive plumes of water and the corridors seemed endless. And these weren’t the familiar corridors of home—the ones which she’d run along and explored and hidden in, from when she’d first learned to walk. These were impossibly wide marble passageways, lined by inscrutable servants who bowed or curtseyed whenever she passed them. Here there were no friendly cooks or grooms who’d known her since babyhood and who had treated her with a slightly modified version of informality, which she’d always found comforting.

  Roman had described it as home.

  It just didn’t feel like her home.

  Life here was like being part of a beautifully choreographed dance—with the King positioned at its glittering centre. Everything revolved around him. Sometimes Zabrina felt like a satellite to his blazing sun—as if she were an insignificant and very distant star. Each day they took their meals together in different dining rooms, all of them exquisite. They ate breakfast overlooking the fabled rose gardens and lunch was taken in a huge windowed chamber, decorated in a dizzying spectrum of blues. Dinner was served either in the supposedly more low-key Rose Room—which wasn’t low-key at all—or, if they had company, in the highly ornate Golden Dining Room. Because if people were coming to eat in a palace as famous as this one, they liked to really feel they’d had the whole palace ‘experience’.

  After dinner she and Roman might have a nightcap—rare—before retiring to their separate suites, though she gathered from remarks which Silviana had made that the King often worked in his study until the early hours of the morning. Whatever he did, it didn’t involve her. In fact, none of his life did. Not physically, at least. Amid the careful carving out of her role as his future queen and the increasingly frenetic arrangements for the wedding, there had been no rerun of that heady sensual epi
sode on the train.

  The King of Petrogoria had not laid a finger on her since she’d walked over the threshold of his glittering golden palace.

  Had she thought it might be different?

  Yes, of course she had.

  Had she offended him hugely by kicking him out of her carriage that night, when it had been obvious that—after all the dust had settled—he had wanted to stay and carry on with more of what they’d been doing? Probably. She had felt so strong and so sure of herself at the time. She’d been infused with a powerful sense of self brought about by that magical sexual encounter and had felt no qualms about castigating him for his deception, and for refusing to believe that he was her first lover.

  Yet the annoying thing was that her show of defiance seemed to have backfired on her—because he had taken her at her word, quite literally! And by keeping his physical distance, he had managed to fill her with a lingering sense of uncertainty. The brief and heady authority she had felt when he had been in her arms had shifted, and now he was the one who seemed to possess all the power. She wondered if she had wounded his pride and ego in such a way that he now found the thought of touching her unpalatable. Should she ask him?

  Roman, don’t you find me sexually attractive any more?

  Roman, don’t you want to take me to bed?

  No. Because deep down she knew the answer to that, no matter how insecure she sometimes felt. It was made plain by the smoky hunger which flared in his eyes whenever she inadvertently caught him watching her, before quickly composing his handsome face into its more habitual impassive mask. He still wanted her, all right. That mutual desire showed no sign of abating. Predictably and potently, it fizzed between them whenever they were in the same room together. Like a flame, she thought, with equal longing and despair—bright and vital—yet tantalisingly ephemeral.

  His grey gaze was fixed on her questioningly. ‘So is he gold?’

  ‘Who?’ She looked at him in confusion, trying to gather together the scramble of her thoughts. ‘Oh, you mean Midas?’

  He made no attempt to hide his sardonic smile. ‘Isn’t that what we’ve just been talking about?’

  She flushed, wondering if he had any idea what had been preoccupying her. She hoped not. Though what did she know? Probably any woman who found herself alone with him spent the majority of their time fantasising about what he was like in bed. It was almost a pity that she had actually experienced it—because didn’t that make it harder to shift the tantalising images from her head?

  She cleared her throat and forced herself to concentrate on her beloved horse. ‘No, he’s not really golden. More of a bay. An Akhal Teke, actually. But when I first got him it was my birthday and I was taken down to the stables early in the morning and there he was, with the sunshine glinting off his coat like metal—and he looked...well, he looked magical really. Like a living golden statue.’ She paused, the iced mango in her bowl forgotten as an unexpected wave of nostalgia washed over her and she looked at him rather sheepishly, surprised by the narrowed interest in his grey eyes. ‘I don’t know what made me tell you that.’

  But she did know. It was just a long time since she’d allowed herself to think about it.

  It had been one of those unusual periods of her upbringing when an air of something like calm had settled over the palace, mostly because her father had returned into the bosom of his family after his latest affair. After one of these interludes, her mother’s overriding reaction would always be one of profound relief that everything could be ‘normal’ again. Often, this would provide the ideal opportunity for the palace to release a photo depicting happy family life. It was also one of the reasons why her father would overcompensate—materially, at least—and overspend even more than usual. Thus, Zabrina had been gifted a beautiful and very expensive horse with a scarlet ribbon tied around his neck and the cake they had all eaten later for her birthday tea had been ridiculously big.

  The memory of that monstrous gateau made her feel a little nauseous and she pushed her half-eaten dish of mango away, forcing herself to change the subject. But maybe she should capitalise on the fact that Roman seemed to have let his guard down and this was the most relaxed he’d been. There were a million questions she wanted to ask him but instinct told her that she needed to tread carefully. Maybe he was like a prized thoroughbred, who needed careful handling. ‘Can I ask you something, Roman?’

  Instantly, his eyes narrowed with caution. ‘You can ask. I won’t guarantee that I’ll answer.’

  She wondered if he had been a lawyer in a previous life. ‘Are you planning to do anything with the Marengo Forest after our wedding?’

  Roman sat back in his chair as he stared into the long-lashed beauty of her green eyes. She could be quite...unexpected, he conceded. He had imagined her mind to be flapping with those tiresome thoughts women so often entertained and had been anticipating her demanding to know how he ‘felt’ about her. And that was the last thing he wanted to answer. Because the bizarre truth of that was he didn’t really know and there was no way he wanted Zabrina to realise that.

  She seemed such a contradiction. Sometimes seasoned, sometimes innocent, sometimes spoiled and at others sweetly thoughtful. Her complexity intrigued him and he had no wish to be intrigued, because that wasn’t what this union was supposed to be about. She unsettled him and he didn’t like being unsettled by a woman. Hadn’t he vowed that was never going to happen to him again? That no woman should have any kind of power over his thoughts and his feelings?

  That was one of the reasons why he hadn’t touched her since he’d brought her to his palace. Why he hadn’t given into the silken tug of desire even though every time he saw her he grew exquisitely hard. He swallowed. Before her arrival, she had been allotted a separate suite at the opposite end of the vast palace complex. At the time he had accepted there would be no sex before marriage because the Princess was a virgin and tradition demanded it. And even though her subsequent behaviour had meant there was no reason for such a restriction, he saw no reason to change the existing plan, because he could see a definite advantage to denial—no matter how frustrating he might find it.

  Because hadn’t Zabrina of Albastase smashed down all his carefully erected defences that night? Hadn’t he found himself unable to resist her in a way which had been mind-blowingly unique? His mouth hardened. She had made him lose control in a way which was alien to him, transforming him into a man he didn’t recognise, or particularly respect. In her arms he had felt as if he had died and gone to heaven and it had been terrifying and delicious. But he realised it had put her firmly in the driving seat and he wanted to shift the balance of power back in his favour. And that was why he continued to distance himself from his future bride, no matter how great the cost to his equilibrium.

  She wanted him. Of course she did. Every woman had always wanted him, ever since he’d reached puberty. But what he felt for her was right off the scale. It was as though provocative and carnal invitation thrummed from every pore of her delicious body. At times it became almost too much to bear and he was tempted to throw caution to the winds and take her in his arms. His fantasy involved either the slowest removal of lingerie in the history of the world, or ripping off her panties and plunging deep into her syrupy heat as her little cries of encouragement urged him on.

  But he wasn’t going to do that. He was going to make her wait, even if he half tortured himself with frustration in the process. He would demonstrate icy control and defer delight until the appropriate time and that would be an invaluable lesson in self-denial. Zabrina would come to him on their wedding night, humbled by his restraint and eager to taste pleasure once again. Because delay heightened hunger.

  His mouth twisted.

  Or so he’d heard.

  He looked at the gleam of wavy dark hair which fell so abundantly over her shoulders. At the green silk dress which matched her eyes and clung so enticingly to t
he small and perfect breasts. He’d thought about those breasts a lot recently, especially at night when he’d been lying in his lonely bed, sleeplessly staring as the shifting moon painted the walls silver. Just as he’d thought about her strong, slim thighs and the way his head had fitted so perfectly between them.

  ‘Of course I’m planning to do something with the Marengo Forest,’ he said, reluctantly dragging his thoughts back to the present, knowing he had no one but himself to blame for the hard throb of his erection. He cleared his throat. ‘Its return has been in my sights for a long time and I have big plans for it.’

  She looked up from where she had begun to pleat her napkin with those tanned fingers which had worked such magic on his shuddering flesh. ‘You do?’

  He frowned. ‘Why else do you think I should go to so much trouble to acquire it? Why I’m prepared to pay such a monumental amount of money for it, in the form of your dowry?’

  ‘I hope you think I’m worth it.’

  He saw her cheeks colour and momentarily felt a little bad as she made the sardonic comment, but only for a moment. Hadn’t they both agreed to be pragmatic about the situation? ‘It’s a deal, Zabrina,’ he said simply. ‘Remember? And this is not just about territory—about me having some hypothetical need to return the Petrogorian flag to its rightful place. I want to build an airport nearby—it’s a pristine, natural wilderness which is ripe for sympathetic eco-tourism.’

  ‘Oh.’ Her fingers stilled on the napkin, the white linen folds making her skin look like softest gold. ‘Oh, I see.’

  ‘So what makes you appear so crestfallen?’ he enquired idly. ‘The price I’m paying for that piece of land is more than you could have ever hoped of achieving, if you’d sold it on the open market. Even you must realise that.’

  ‘Yes, of course I do. It’s not that.’

  ‘What, then?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’ She shook her head. ‘It won’t be of any possible interest to you.’