The Runaway Princess (16 page)

He sounded seductive.

The air seemed thin, sucked into the vacuum by this man's flagrant sexuality. The way he looked at her in the moonlight, the possession inherent in his touch, the authority in his voice, all made the truth clear to her. He might as well just have said it. This prince who was built like a peasant wanted her.

Her thoughts careened as she stared at the broad hand that held her in place.

All right. He wasn't built so much like a peasant. More like a warrior, with thick forearms that could swing a weapon and broad shoulders that could lift a princess.

He frightened her, yet at the same time some unfamiliar sentiment moved within her. His strength, his boldness, his maleness brought forth a corresponding feminine softness in her.

“Do you trust me, Evangeline?” he asked.

“I do,” she answered. When he laughed, deep and overly pleased, she realized how much that had sounded like a wedding vow. “I mean, of course I do, or I would have clobbered you by now.”

Unoffended and certainly unworried, he relinquished his hold on her and stood. Water streamed off of him, pressing the drawers close to his legs, and she looked when she should not. He was strong, muscled . . . aroused. Aroused, just as he had been in her bedchamber at the château, just as he had been in the storage chamber at the convent. Did the man live in this erect state day and night?

He stretched, his hands reaching for the stars, and she realized his condition didn't embarrass him. Subtlety was beyond him.

As was duplicity?

Oh, yes. He thought she was the princess, his to take and make his own. He wouldn't woo her if he didn't. Yet if she didn't convince him of her true identity, who was the duplicitous one?

Gathering his tools, he strode toward the shore. He wrapped them and placed them in the bag, then drew out several lengths of material. Beckoning to her, he commanded, “Stay low and keep your foot up, princess. Don't drag it across the bottom.”

She couldn't hide in the water all night, so moving like a crab, on her hands and one foot, she crept toward him. “I'm truly not the princess,” she said.

“After tonight, I don't blame you for saying so.” He squatted in the pool and held out his hands, material draped between them.

“I mean it.” Cautiously, she held out her injured foot. “I'm Evangeline Scoffield of East Little Teignmouth, Cornwall. What will it take to convince you?”

“You know that very well.”

“I do?” She stared at him as he dried her foot with care. Uncorking the bottle, he applied a poultice of mashed leaves. A faint, minty scent teased her nostrils as he wrapped rag strips around her arch.

“Any time you want to show me the proof, I'm more than willing.” Leaning over her, he slid his arms around her and warned again, “Keep your foot up.” He lifted her out of the water, up against his
chest. Her arms went around his neck, grabbing instinctively, desperate not to fall. But her hands found the soft, wet curl of hair at his neck, and the corded muscles that shifted as he walked with her to the shore.

Misgivings deluged her. This was too real. The air was too cold, the water plastered her chemise too closely, his glance was too confident.

How had she come to this moment? What thread of fate had she plucked that wove her into this royal tapestry? She gave a convulsive shiver.

“I have a towel of sorts to dry off with and a rug to wrap up in.” He stood her on a flat stone that raised her to his level.

Tentatively, she put her weight on her foot. The wound was better. Much better. “Where did you get all that?”

“When I was a lad we had a hunting lodge not far away where we summered.” He spoke carelessly of the kind of wealth she could only imagine. “I found this place. I would bring up supplies and hide them in a hollow tree, wrapped in an oilcloth.” He shook out a blanket. “The clothing no longer fits me, the hardtack is no longer hard, and this rug is musty, but I shook it and aired it on the trek back here.”

“Very helpful.” Her teeth were chattering now, from nerves and from cold.

Handing her a length of cloth, he said, “This is from the bag. I'll hold the rug. You take off your garments and dry yourself.”

She remembered the signs of life in his drawers. “I don't think that's a good idea.”

“You can't sleep in those wet clothes. You have to take them off so I can hang them to dry. Now do as I tell you.” He raised the material between them.

“Why can't you just turn your back?”

“Why can't you do as you're told?” he asked in a muted roar.

Surely his temper was a good sign. She stared at the wool weave and fingered her chemise. Why was she suspicious of him and his intentions? He moved without stealth. He performed every task openly. He'd been in the water with her and managed to keep his hands to himself.

Well, except for that moment when he'd held her face and said he could see her body. Now that the ordeal of purging her wound was over, she conjectured his threat had been nothing more than a ruse to extract bravery from a coward.

If Prince Danior planned to seduce her, she imagined he would inform her before he started, and probably keep her apprised every step of the way.

And tell her she lied if she didn't respond as he expected.

She grinned and lifted the makeshift towel.

“Are you getting out of your clothes?” he demanded.

“I'm drying my hair.” Her voice had just as much snap as his did, and she told herself he couldn't be both aroused and irritated.

He sighed like a long-suffering martyr.

She draped the towel around her neck and loosened her chemise. The damp made the fabric stick to her flesh, and her fingers shook, but as quickly as
she could, she pulled the garment over her head, tossing everything across a bush. The branches swayed and groaned under the weight of the wet material, and without volition she glanced warily at the blanket. It remained immobile. A warrior stood behind it, but he behaved like a gentleman. As quickly as she could, she rubbed herself down, trying to subdue the goose-bumps with briskness, but nothing helped. The ground might be warm, but the air was frigid.

I'm done.
A mixture of embarrassment and excitement kept her silent.
Hand me my clothes.
She should have fetched them before she stripped and found herself holding this feeble excuse for a towel. Its thin length wouldn't even cover the important parts, so reluctantly she draped it around her hips and held it with one hand. The other arm she pressed across her breasts, and she cleared her throat. “I'm done?”

She didn't mean for it to come out like that, quavering and unsure, but it didn't matter anyway, because this time when she looked at the blanket, she saw Danior. He still held it out at arms' length, but he had lowered it enough to look at her. At her body.

And he was smiling.

Evangeline had never seen the prince smile like that.
As if he were astonished and proud and relieved, a man facing his fate and finding it wonderful.

“My clothes?” she rasped.

“You won't need them tonight.”

The wound in her foot must have weakened her more than she realized. She heard him, and she didn't mind. He stared at her, and she liked it. He planned to debauch her, and she wanted it.

“Danior?” she whispered.

To answer, he enveloped her in the rug, picked her up, and walked toward the pine bough bed nestled in the hollow just at the edge of the forest. His face was close to hers, close enough that the warmth of his breath touched her cheek, and in the moonlight she saw the faint, anticipatory glimmer of his eyes.

“Danior?” she whispered again.

He pressed his mouth to hers. A day's growth of beard scraped her chin. He smelled damp and tasted clean. Water clung to him and seeped through the rug, carrying the heat of his determination.

A simple man. She'd seen him as incapable of wily enticement. Nothing had happened to change her mind. There had been nothing wily about his conduct; to a simple man, a bath together in God's most romantic setting must naturally be followed by their coupling.

The worthless little towel fell from her fingers.

Lifting his lips, he murmured, “Evangeline, I want you.”

Remembering his earlier laughter, she asked, “Do you really want me?” Madly, truly, uncontrollably, she meant.

“My God, woman, what do you think this is all about?” Taking the last steps to the bed, he laid her down and lay atop her.

He blocked out the sky. He weighed her down, and the woven wool confined her movements. But before the old panic could set in, he freed her from its constraint.

“Stay there,” he admonished. “And I mean it this time.”

He must not have felt sure of her, for he didn't move far. Just to the foot of the bed, where he stripped off so quickly she scarcely had time to note she lay on the cloak, the pine boughs beneath her were deep and fragrant, the trees surrounding them gave them shelter and shadow, and she was trembling. Trembling from cold, and trembling from nervousness.

Oh, Leona had allowed her to read amazing Oriental texts describing the most outrageous acts men and women could perform together. But much like descending a tower on a rope, knowledge lent
little to reality. This adventure, more than all the others, required courage, and her meager store had been depleted.

She clenched her teeth, clutched her fists, locked her knees together. She kept her eyes wide and fixed on the specter that was Danior, and concentrated on maintaining her composure. She couldn't yell, she couldn't run away, so she would endure.

Cold air rushed in as he lifted the cover and slid beneath. Then the goad of flesh against flesh brought a flash of heat. Their bodies pressed together along every inch possible. Above her head was his, outlined against the stars and the silhouette of the branches. Below her feet were his, stretched beyond the reach of her toes. He surrounded her in every way, yet he leaned on one elbow to regulate his weight.

He remembered what she feared, and with the rough glide of his palms up her arms, she realized he also remembered what she desired.

“Evangeline, you are my wife, my only.”

She could see nothing of him; the trees protected them from any vagrant beams of moonlight, and his face was a mystery to her. But his voice was deep and inexorable; he bound himself to her, whether she wished it or not. Haltingly, she tried to tell him the truth one last time. “I'm just a woman who sought adventure. I never expected to get this—love at a poolside with a prince. And I know it can't last.”

“But it will last.” His voice became the murmur of a sweetheart in the darkness of the night. “All my life I've waited for you, and for this.”

Did she believe him? She should; he never wavered in his beliefs, he never lost his head. Yet beneath the exceptional control he displayed, she detected signs of volcanic emotion. It was evident in his body, in the way his hips nudged against hers.

And he was big. No matter what the books said, at this moment she didn't believe he would fit inside her. This basic act seemed absurd, a jest played by some deity. Some
male
deity. She'd made Danior lose control once before, and the results had almost swept her, swept both of them, away.

His emotions seemed firmly clamped down, but before a woman dared let a man garn access to her body, she needed to be sure of the man and his passions.

“Danior?” Her voice quavered. “Will this be . . . safe?”

“Safe.” One of his hands stroked a lock of her hair back over her ear. The other hand held her waist, pressing her against him. “I live to keep you safe.”

“Because I'm the princess?”

He took a breath. She knew he did, because she felt the inhalation against her chest.

“Because you're the princess,” he agreed.

Then he held his breath. She felt that, too, and the waiting tension in him. The wretched man wouldn't lie. Probably didn't know how to lie. And she, like a fool, found that more attractive than false and honeyed words.

Her fists had unclenched. Her hands lifted, her fingertips touched his chest. “I'm not the princess. Will you still keep me safe?”

The query was a luxury, bought with bemused certainty. She'd traveled on his back for miles, for hours. She'd touched and been touched by him more than any other human being in her life. She knew him from the words he'd spoken, from his acts of valor, but more important, she knew him with her instincts. Danior would keep the lowest peasant safe. Even when he discovered the truth—no, when he'd had the truth hammered home to him—he would never abandon her. Somehow, somewhere, he would keep her safe.

And he knew the question required no answer, for his laugh rumbled through him—rumbled through her—and he pressed a kiss on her forehead. “Forever.”

She knew his form, but this nakedness was different: shocking and comforting, not enough and yet too much. The muscles that flexed beneath her palms were covered not by cloth, but by skin and hair. He rubbed his legs along hers, and they, too, were rough with hair. She wondered if his whole body was hairy, and why that intrigued her, and if she would discover for herself.

The idea appealed, and in a rush of daring—her hands were already on his chest, after all—she stroked her fingers upward through the mat on his chest.

His muscles clenched, his breath whispered along her face. He grasped her arms and for a brief moment, she thought her simple motion had pushed him from restraint to impetuosity.

She froze, waited. If he grabbed her, forced himself on her in a haste of desire, it would be painful
and upsetting, yes. But if he did, she wouldn't have to make this decision, to follow the adventure through, to face the consequences of giving herself.

She was a true coward.

And this prince was a true lover. His grip on her arms loosened. “Touch me,” he said, and lifted himself to allow her full access.

She should have known she couldn't take the easy way out. Her questing fingers continued to move, enjoying the texture, the curl, the slight rough sensation as her palm followed the growth of hair toward his shoulder. There she discovered a series of pits, deep marks in his skin, and her fingers lingered. “What's this?”

“When I was little, I fell off my pony into the gravel.”

Had he ever been little? But if she asked, he would say she should remember. So she said only, “Ouch.”

The patch of skin against his collarbone was too smooth, devoid of hair and slightly rippled. “And this?”

“Boiling tar. We were besieging the French, and they—”

She imagined the agony and flinched.

He, perhaps, remembered her squeamishness and interrupted himself. “It was a long time ago.”

A ridge ran along his left ribs, and she explored it gently. “What's this?”

“A bayonet at close quarters.” Then, defensively, “But I was only sixteen and unprepared.”

Only sixteen. “Napoleon hadn't even crossed the Pyrenees when you were sixteen.”

He caught her hand. “It was an assassination attempt. I let a friend get too close.”

Horrified, she stammered, “Do you . . . trust anyone?”

“You.”

If anything, she was more horrified, but before she could speak he kissed her parted lips, then pressed his tongue into her mouth. It was a slow, deliberate invasion, a preparation, an incitement. She had wanted to dispel his illusions, but tonight she would be his greatest illusion.

So she gave him what he wanted and kissed him back. Each sensitive nerve responded to the rasp and slide, and their heads turned and strained as they explored intimacy. He showed her what he wanted, she showed him what she knew, and their two bodies moved in a dance choreographed by nature. His palm rasped across her shoulder and down to her breast, cupping it and pressing it just as he had her lips—firmly, deliberately. He was teaching her, allowing no withdrawal, no second thoughts.

But she had them. With a gasp she pulled back, from the kiss. He followed, and his teeth nipped at her earlobe, then his tongue stroked the outer shell.

He was damp and warm and breathy, and she shivered, overwhelmed with sensation and a sense of inevitability. This was the reason she'd run from him when she saw him across that dining chamber. To have her in his arms had been his goal, and all her objections and all the obstacles were nothing but chaff. For Danior, an objection was fated to be overruled, an obstacle meant to be overcome. In his
mind, she was his, and through the peril and the struggle he had convinced her of that truth. And one other.

She loved him. Imbecile that she was, Miss Evangeline Scoffield of East Little Teignmouth, a girl from nowhere, an orphan, loved the crown prince of Baminia.

Danior's lips slid to her shoulder, over the rise of her breast to her nipple, catching it in his mouth. She gasped and clutched at him as if he could keep her from this sweet insanity. Keep her from it, when he was the cause. He suckled her, and each nerve stretched and hummed. She writhed, moving against him like a woman with no thought of decorum.

She
had
no thought of decorum. Her knees, so carefully locked together, had somehow separated. He rested between her legs, so close against her his every motion brought her pleasure—and a twinge of fear. So close. He was so close.

When he lifted his head, the dampness his mouth left behind brought her nipple to a tight point, creating a gratification sharper than any she'd ever experienced. A gratification that was almost pain.

Love. Pain. What difference?

Love. Madness. She suffered from a madness carried on the mists and breeze, a madness that swept her to a more primitive time when this man existed alone on earth, and
she
had been created for him.

She had to have this. She had to have him. Like the trip down the rope, she would start with a single, daring breath and trust in luck and God and her own insight to get her through to the end.

“Danior.” She slid her hands up over his shoulders, exploring each bulge and ripple. Exalting in each bulge and ripple, as if his strength gave her, the female of his choice, prestige. If Danior were hers, she could smugly prance among the other woman-creatures, secure in the knowledge her man was the best. “You are so beautiful:”

“Men aren't beautiful.” He sounded distracted, and he arched like a cat being stroked. “I'm not even handsome.”

“Who told you that?”

With only the faintest of sarcasm, he replied, “I believe it was a young woman named Evangeline.”

Cupping his head, she tugged his mouth to hers. “She was a fool.” A million kinds of a fool.

This time,
she
kissed
him
, touching their lips, then using her tongue as he had, to tease and tempt and imitate. As he arched over her, she felt his control slip.

He caught himself, lurching as if he'd fallen, then held himself still. Whispering, “Evangeline,” he made the kiss his.

That kiss became one, then another, each a work of wonder. He embraced her, opening her to him. He stroked her sides, following each contour repeatedly. He touched her breasts lightly, then as she responded, he stroked more firmly. Soon, with every motion, she lifted herself, mindlessly seeking his caress.

She existed in the world he had made for her, nestled in the hollow of the earth, with trails of mist from the pool and the darkness left behind by a setting moon. She caught glimpses of the stars, light
torn from shreds of the sky. She breathed in spicy cold air and grappled beneath the rough wool blanket, seeking comfort and desire and satisfaction all from this one man.

At the convent he had said he fought to have her depend on him for everything.

He had won.

His hand stroked over her belly, spanned the width of her hips, then slid lower. The world slowed and stilled as he imitated her earlier quest; he explored the slight triangle of hair that sheltered her femininity, seeming to find delight in each perception. Then he moved lower, and she closed her eyes and tensed. He could bruise her if he touched her roughly. He could excite her if he touched her well. Either way she would reveal her vulnerability. She loved him with a newfound, fragile love; but did she trust him with this?