Читать книгу The Wedding Party Collection - Кейт Хьюит, Aimee Carson - Страница 73
ОглавлениеALYSE SAT ON the jet across from Leo. In the seven hours since they’d left St Cristos he hadn’t spoken to her once. They’d flown overnight, sleeping in separate beds, and now it was morning with the sky hard and bright around them, and cups of coffee, a platter of croissants and fresh fruit set on the coffee table between them.
Leo was scanning some papers, his expression calm and so very collected, while she felt as if she’d swallowed a stone, her insides heavy and leaden, her eyes gritty with exhaustion, both emotional and physical.
They hadn’t spoken since that awful exchange in their hut, when Leo had told her they were returning to Maldinia. She had no illusions about what would happen there; in a huge palace, with all of his royal duty beckoning, he would find it entirely easy to ignore her. They would see each other only for royal functions and occasions, and live separate lives the rest of the time.
Just like their engagement.
She swallowed, a hot lump of misery lodging in her throat. She couldn’t go back to that. She couldn’t live like that, not in Averne, where she wouldn’t even have the comfort of her studies and her own circle of friends to bolster her, the way she’d had in Durham—a little bit, at least.
She supposed, like Leo, she could focus on her royal duty. She had a service to perform as a princess of Maldinia, a duty to the country’s people, and she’d enjoyed and looked forward to that aspect of her royal life. Yet the thought of making it her entire purpose depressed her beyond measure.
She wanted more.
You’ve always wanted more. You gambled on this engagement, this marriage, in the hope of more—and now it looks like you’ll never have it.
She felt a hot rush behind her lids and blinked hard. She would not cry. There had to be some way to salvage this, some way to reach Leo again, to make him understand and open up to her once more. But how?
Closing her eyes, she pictured his unyielding face, the grim set of his mouth and eyes as he’d spoken to her that morning. He’d seemed colder than he ever had before, almost as if he hated her.
How had it all gone so disastrously wrong so quickly? They’d been making steps—baby steps, true, but still progress: drawing closer to each other, enjoying each other’s company. And then in one terrible moment everything had splintered apart. Everything had become worse than before because, instead of being merely indifferent to her, Leo was now angry.
Emotional.
Alyse stilled, realisation and hope trickling slowly, faintly through her. Why would Leo be so angry, so emotional, unless...?
Unless he cared?
Thoughts tumbled through her mind, a kaleidoscope of emotions and hopes. Maybe he’d enjoyed their brief time together more than he wanted to admit. Perhaps he was angry because he’d been hurt—and of course he wouldn’t like that. He’d hate it.
Knowing Leo—and she was knowing him more and more every day—he’d fight against feeling anything for her. She didn’t understand exactly why he resisted emotion and denied love so vehemently, but she knew there had to be a deep-seated reason, something most likely to do with his family and upbringing. And, when things got sticky, difficult and painful, of course he would revert back to his cold, haughty self. His protective persona, his only armour.
So how could she slip underneath it, touch the heart hidden beneath? How could she breach his defences, crack open his shell?
Sighing, Alyse opened her eyes and stared at the man across from her, his focus still solely on the papers in front of him.
‘Leo,’ she said, and reluctantly he lifted his gaze from the papers, his expression chillingly remote.
‘Yes?’
‘Are you really going to ignore me for the rest of this flight? For our entire lives?’
His mouth tightened and his gaze swept over her in unflinching assessment. ‘Not ignore, precisely,’ he answered coolly. ‘I don’t, for example, intend to ignore you tonight.’
Shock blazed through her, white-hot. ‘Are you saying,’ she asked in a low voice, ‘that you intend to—to consummate our marriage tonight?’
Leo’s expression didn’t change at all. ‘That’s exactly what I’m saying.’
Alyse licked her dry lips. Even now she could not keep a tide of longing from washing over her. She still wanted him, cold and angry as he was. She would always want him. ‘Even though you can barely summon the will to speak to me?’ she observed and he arched an eyebrow.
‘Speaking won’t be involved.’
She flinched. ‘Don’t be crass. No matter how cold this business arrangement is, we both deserve more than that.’
An emotion—she couldn’t quite tell what—flickered across his face and he glanced away. ‘As long as you realise that’s exactly what this is,’ he answered. ‘A business arrangement.’
‘Trust me,’ she replied. ‘I’m not likely to forget.’
Nodding in apparent satisfaction, Leo returned to his papers. Alyse sank against the sumptuous sofa, closing her eyes once more. So, she thought with a swamping sense of desolation, the only thing he wanted from her now was her body.
But what if, along with her body, she gave him her heart?
She stilled, opened her eyes and gazed blindly ahead. She’d just realised herself that she’d never actually loved him; her feelings for him had been part schoolgirl infatuation, part desperately wishful thinking. So how could she now offer this cold, proud, hurting man her heart?
Because that’s what I want for my marriage. Because even if she hadn’t loved him all of these years, she knew she could love him now. She could fall in love with him if he let her, if she got to know him as she had done over the last few days.
And that could begin tonight.
* * *
Five silent hours later they had landed in Maldinia on a balmy summer morning and returned by royal motorcade to the palace, unspeaking all the while.
The reporters had managed to get word of their early arrival and were waiting both at the airport and in front of the palace. They posed for photographs in both places, smiling and waving, Leo’s arm snug around her waist. She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye and saw that, despite the white flash of his smile and his seemingly relaxed pose, his body was rigid next to her, his eyes flinty. He might be willing to pretend, but he certainly wasn’t enjoying it. And neither was she.
Once they were back in the palace, Leo disappeared to his study and Alyse was shown to the bedroom she would have as her own—and it was clearly her own, not hers and Leo’s; it was a feminine room in pale blues and greys, gorgeous and utterly impersonal.
She sank onto the bed, feeling lonely, lost and completely miserable. A few minutes later, still lost in her own unhappy thoughts, a knock sounded on the door and, without waiting for a response, Queen Sophia swept in.
Alyse stood up, a wary surprise stealing through her. She’d had very few interactions with her haughty mother-in-law and she preferred it that way.
Now Queen Sophia arched one severely plucked eyebrow and swept a thoroughly assessing gaze over Alyse. ‘Why have you returned from the honeymoon so early?’
Alyse licked her dry lips. ‘Leo— He had work to do.’
‘Work? On his honeymoon?’ Sophia’s mouth pinched tight. ‘How do you think the public will react to that? They want to see a young married couple in love, you know. They want to see you celebrating. The monarchy still depends on you.’
Alyse thought of what Leo had said about his parents: their affairs, careless spending and utter indifference to their own people. In light of all that, Sophia’s insistence on royal decorum seemed hypocritical at best. ‘I would think,’ she answered, her voice wavering only slightly, ‘the monarchy depends on you just as much.’
Sophia’s mouth tightened further and her pale-blue eyes flashed ice. ‘Don’t be impertinent.’
‘I wasn’t. I was being honest.’
‘I can do without your honesty. The only reason you’ve risen so high is because we decided it would be so.’
‘And the only reason you decided it would be so is because it benefitted you,’ Alyse retorted, a sudden anger and courage rising up inside her. ‘With Leo and I in the spotlight, you could continue to do as you pleased—which it seems is all you’ve ever done.’ Two spots of bright colour appeared on Sophia’s high cheekbones. ‘Oh, I know it grates on you,’ Alyse continued, her temper now truly lit. ‘To see your precious first-born married to a commoner.’
‘Precious first-born?’ Sophia’s mouth twisted. ‘Has Leo not even told you about his brother? But then I suppose he doesn’t tell you anything.’
Alyse stared at her, nonplussed. ‘His brother...?’
‘Alessandro. His older brother. My husband disinherited him when he was twenty-one and Leo was eighteen. He would have been King.’ For a second, no more, Alyse thought she heard a faint note of bitterness or even sorrow in Sophia’s voice. Had she loved her son Alessandro? Loved him, perhaps, more than Leo?
‘We don’t talk about him,’ Sophia continued flatly. ‘The media stopped raking his story up over and over again years ago. But, if you wondered why the monarchy needed to be stabilised and restored, why we needed you, it’s because of the scandal of Sandro leaving the way he did.’ Sophia’s eyes flashed malice. ‘I’m surprised Leo never told you.’
Alyse didn’t answer. She didn’t sound at all surprised. Had Sophia guessed her schoolgirl feelings for Leo; had she perhaps used them against her all those years ago when she’d suggested their engagement? It seemed all too possible. She was shrewd and calculating and those ice-blue eyes missed nothing.
‘Be careful,’ Sophia continued softly. ‘If the sorry truth of your relationship with Leo comes out now, the scandal will consume us all, including you. You might have enjoyed all the attention these last few years, but it won’t be quite so pleasant when everyone starts to hate you.’ Sophia’s mouth curved in a cruel smile. ‘Besides, you’d be no use to us then. No use to Leo.’
Alyse just stared, her mind spinning sickly, and with a click of her heels Sophia was gone, the door shutting firmly behind her.
Alyse sank back onto the bed. Had the Queen’s parting shot been a threat? No use to Leo. If the media ever turned on her, if she became a liability to the monarchy rather than an asset, would Leo still want to be married to her?
It was a horrible question to ask herself, and even worse to answer. Knowing just what he thought of their marriage, she had a terrible feeling he wouldn’t.
And what about his brother? She could hardly be surprised that Leo had never told her about Alessandro; he had told her barely anything personal about himself.
And yet, it could explain so much. She’d suspected his sense of cold detachment stemmed from his upbringing; with parents like King Alessandro and Queen Sophia, how could it not?
But a brother? A brother who had perhaps been the favourite, who had gone his own way, leaving Leo to try and make up for his absence? To prove himself through his endless royal duty?
She knew she was making assumptions, trying to understand the man who still seemed so much of an enigma to her.
The man who would come to her tonight...
She felt a shiver of anticipation for what lay ahead. Was it wrong—or perhaps just shameless—of her actually to be looking forward to tonight, at least in part? No matter how little Leo felt for her now, she still wanted him. Desperately.
* * *
Alyse didn’t see Leo until that evening, when the royal family assembled for a formal dinner. He looked stunning in black tie, which was the standard dress for these cold family dinners. King Alessandro and Queen Sophia preferred this kind of rigid formality, and as she sat down across from Leo she wondered how it had affected him. How it had affected his brother.
It still surprised her that she’d never even known about him, not from Leo, not from his family, not even from any of the articles she’d read about the Maldinian royal family. Her family.
Her and Leo’s engagement, and the accompanying scrutiny and excitement, must have taken the attention away from Leo’s brother, almost as if everyone had forgotten it. Him.
Everyone but Leo. Somehow she didn’t think he had forgotten his brother. She wanted to ask him about it, wanted to learn more about this man and what made him the way he was, and yet...
From the cool expression on Leo’s face, he didn’t want to have much conversation—not with anyone, and especially not with her.
The dinner was, as Alyse had expected, stilted and mainly silent. Alessandro and Sophia both made a few pointed references to their early return from honeymoon, but Leo was indifferent to any criticism, and Alyse just murmured something about looking forward to settling into life in the palace.
As if.
Alexa shot her an encouraging look when she made that remark, her dark-blue eyes—the same colour as Leo’s—flashing both spirit and sympathy. Alyse knew Alexa was engaged to marry a sheikh of a small Middle Eastern country next year, and she had a feeling her new sister-in-law didn’t relish the union. At least, Alyse thought with a sigh, Alexa hadn’t had to pretend to be in love with her fiancé. As far as Alyse knew, she’d only seen him a handful of times.
By ten o’clock the dinner was finished and Sophia was about to rise first to escort everyone out to the salon where they would have coffee and petits fours. It was another part of the formal ritual, and one Leo forestalled as he rose before his mother.
‘It’s been a very long day. Alyse and I will retire.’
Alyse felt herself blush even though there had been no innuendo in Leo’s words, just a statement of fact. Sophia looked frostily affronted but Leo didn’t even wait for her acquiescence as he took Alyse by the hand and led her from the dining room.
‘Your mother doesn’t like her order interrupted,’ Alyse murmured as they headed upstairs. Her heart was pounding hard and her head felt weirdly light.
‘My mother doesn’t like anyone to do anything except what she commands,’ Leo answered shortly. ‘She’ll have to get used to disappointment.’
They’d reached the top of the stairs and he drew her down the hallway to a wood-panelled door, opening it to reveal a luxurious and very masculine bedroom. The duvet on the canopied king-sized bed had been turned down and a fire blazed in the huge stone hearth.
Alyse swallowed in a desperate attempt to ease the dryness of her throat. ‘This all looks very romantic.’
‘Are you being cynical?’
‘No, Leo.’ She turned to him, tried to smile. She wasn’t going to let this evening descend into something base and soulless, or even just physical. ‘I was just stating a fact. Don’t worry, I don’t think you had anything do with it.’
Leo gazed at Alyse, graceful, slender and so achingly beautiful. She looked both vulnerable and strong, he thought and he felt a blaze of something like admiration for her presence, her self-possession. Then he pushed that feeling away, hardened his heart—if that was indeed the organ that was being so wayward—and said coolly, ‘I certainly didn’t.’ She stood a few feet away from him and he beckoned her forward. ‘Come here.’
‘Is that a command?’
‘A request.’
She let out a shaky laugh. ‘Rather ungraciously made, Leo.’ Yet she moved towards him, head held high, her eyes flashing with spirit.
Leo made no reply, because in truth he didn’t know what to say, how to act. He didn’t want sex between them to be romantic. He didn’t want either of them engaging their emotions. Ever.
He wanted it to be nothing more than a necessary—and, albeit physically, pleasurable—transaction, yet he was already afraid it couldn’t be. Already be realised that his feelings for Alyse had changed too much for this to be simple—or sordid.
With the tiniest, trembling smile on her lips, she took another step towards him. Leo watched her hips sway under the silky fabric of her evening dress, a halter-top style in ivory that hugged every slender curve. ‘Why don’t you take that off?’ he said, his voice already thickening with desire.
‘Oh, Leo.’ She let out a soft laugh. ‘Why don’t you take it off me?’ And, despite the sorrow in that laugh, he heard a hint of a challenge in her voice and he knew she wasn’t going to make this easy for either of them. ‘Just because this is necessary doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy the experience,’ she continued quietly. ‘You desire me, Leo, and I desire you. That’s something.’
He didn’t answer, because he couldn’t. Somehow his throat had thickened; his blood pounded and his fingers itched to touch her. He’d thought at first she’d make it awkward by resisting, or at least not responding to his touch—a show of defiance.
Compliance, he realised then, was far more dangerous. Still he tried to keep himself emotionally distant, if physically close, knowing how difficult a task it was that he’d set himself.
Wordlessly he reached behind her and undid the halter tie of her dress. The garment slithered off her shoulders, and with one sinuous shrug it slid from her body and pooled at her feet. She gazed at him steadily, a faint blush tingeing her cheeks pink even as she kept her head held high.
She was magnificent. He’d seen her naked before but tonight it was different; tonight it was more. She wore a strapless lacy bra and matching pants, both skimpy items highlighting the lithe perfection of her body.
‘I don’t think I’m the only one who’s meant to be naked,’ Alyse said, and he heard both a smile and a tremble in her voice. She reached for the buttons on his shirt and, mesmerised, Leo watched as she undid them, her fingers long and elegant. Her hands smoothed over the already heated skin of his chest and shoulders as she pulled the tie and then the shirt off him.
She’d undressed him last night, had unbuttoned his shirt just like this and, while it had inflamed him then, it moved him now. Touched him in ways he wasn’t prepared for, didn’t want.
He pushed the emotion away and reached for her, needing to obliterate his thoughts—his feelings—with the purely physical. And at first the taste and touch of her lips against his was enough to accomplish his goal. He plundered her mouth, slid his hands through the luxuriant softness of her hair, brought her nearly naked body in achingly exquisite contact with his. All of it was enough to stop the unwanted feeling, the impossible emotion.
Almost.
Her response undid him. She wasn’t just unresisting, she was more than compliant. She answered him kiss for kiss, touch for touch, and he could feel the surrender in her supple body, the giving of herself. The offering.
With Alyse sex would never be a soulless transaction. Already it was something else, something he couldn’t want and yet desperately needed. He deepened the kiss.
Alyse matched him, her body molding and melting into his, her head tilted back as she emitted a low moan from deep in her throat, the sound swallowed by his own mouth. Desire consumed him in a white-hot flame; thoughts and feelings blurred and coalesced into one.
He was barely aware of unhooking her bra, sliding off her pants; distantly he felt her hands fumble boldly at his zip and then his trousers sliding down his legs. He kicked them off in one abrupt, impatient movement and, sweeping her up in his arms, her skin silken against his, he brought her to the bed.
Even now he fought against all he was feeling. She lay back on the pillows, arms spread, thighs splayed, everything about her open and giving. She gazed up at him without embarrassment or fear; even her gaze was open to him, open and trusting. Kneeling before her, his own body naked and vulnerable, his desire on obvious and proud display, Leo felt humbled.
Humbled and ashamed that he had been attempting something he now knew was impossible: emotionless sex with Alyse. With his wife.
She held out her arms to him. ‘Make love to me, Leo,’ she said softly, and he let out a sound that was something between a near-sob and a laugh. How had this woman reached him—reached him and felled him—so easily? His jaded cynicism fell away and his cold, hard heart warmed and softened into pliant yielding as he came to her, enfolded her body into his and buried his face in the warm, silken curve of her neck.
In response she curled around him, arching her body into his, giving him everything she had. Leo took it as his mouth claimed hers and his hands explored her warm, supple curves; then his body found hers as he slid inside and they joined as one—one flesh, one person. It felt holy and sacred, infinitely pleasurable, and so much more than he’d ever expected or thought he wanted.
His last cold reserve broke on the sweetness of her response as he drove into her again and again, losing himself, blending into her until he didn’t know where he ended and she began. And, even more amazingly and importantly, such a distinction no longer mattered.
* * *
Alyse lay back on the pillows, her whole body thrumming with pleasure. Leo had rolled onto his back next to her, one arm thrown over his face. As her heart rate began to slow from a thud she felt the perspiration cooling on her skin, the slight chill of the night air from the open windows...and the fact that she couldn’t see Leo’s expression. She had no idea what he was thinking or feeling at all.
Just moments ago when he’d been touching her—been inside her—she’d felt so close to him, in such glorious union that all of her fears and doubts had been blown away, scattered like so much cold ash.
Now they returned, settling inside her, unwelcome embers fanning into painful flame.
She’d given everything to Leo in that moment, everything she had in her to give... But perhaps even now he’d turn away from her, slide off the bed and stalk to the bathroom, as coldly indifferent as ever. Even as she braced herself for it she knew she couldn’t keep herself from being hurt, or even devastated. She might not love him—yet—but she’d still given more to this man than to any other.
She felt Leo stir next to her and still she was afraid to say anything, to break whatever delicate bond held them together in this moment, the remnants of their love-making. Words would, she feared, sound like challenges to Leo, perhaps accusations or even ultimatums. For once she wanted simply to let this moment be whatever it was, and not demand or yearn for more.
Slowly he moved his arm from covering his face and swung up so he was sitting on the edge of the bed, his feet on the floor, his back to her.
‘I’ll get us something to drink,’ he said and, slipping on his boxer shorts, he went to the en suite dressing room.
Alyse lay there for a moment, increasingly conscious with every cooling second of her own nakedness, yet she was loath to cover herself, to leave the intimacy of what had just happened behind—or, worse, pretend it had never happened... Just as Leo, perhaps, was pretending.
Or maybe he wasn’t pretending. Maybe, for him, it had been just sex and she was the one, as always, who was constructing castles in the air—castles made of nothing, as insubstantial as smoke or mist, dissipating just as quickly.
He returned a few minutes later while she still lay there on the bed, naked and fighting against feeling exposed. She pushed her hair away from her eyes and struggled to a sitting position, still resisting the urge to cover herself. She’d promised herself—and, without his knowledge, Leo—that she would be open to him tonight. That she wouldn’t dissemble, guard or prevaricate. Not even now, when every instinct she possessed screamed for self-protection.
‘Here.’ His voice sounded alarmingly brusque as he pressed a bottle of water into her hands.
‘Where—?’
‘There’s a mini-fridge in the dressing room.’ The corner of his mouth quirked in what Alyse couldn’t be sure was a smile. ‘They put champagne in there as well, but I thought we’d had enough of that.’
‘Ah. Yes.’ Because this wasn’t a champagne-worthy moment? She took a sip of the chilled water.
Leo drained half of his own before he lowered it from his lips, twisting the bottle around in his hands, his gaze averted from hers. Alyse just waited, sensing he intended to say something, but having no idea what it was.
Finally he lifted his gaze to meet hers, and even then she couldn’t gauge his mood, couldn’t fathom what he intended to say, or how he felt at all. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Alyse braced herself.
‘I don’t know,’ he began haltingly, ‘how much I have to give.’
Ayse just stared at him, his words slowly penetrating the dazed fog of her mind. I don’t know how much I have to give. She felt a smile spread across her face—a ridiculously huge smile, considering what he’d said was a far, far cry from a declaration of love.
And yet it was something. It was a lot, for a man like Leo, because he was saying—at least, she hoped he was saying—that he still had something to give. And, more importantly, that he wanted to give it.
‘That’s okay,’ she said softly and Leo glanced away.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said after a moment. ‘For treating our marriage—our relationship—like an imposition.’
‘That’s what it was for you,’ Alyse answered. She didn’t add what everything inside her was hoping, singing: until now.
‘I’ve never tried a real relationship before,’ he continued, his gaze still averted. ‘At least, not for a long while.’
‘Neither have I.’
He glanced at her then, a slow smile curving his mouth. ‘Then that makes two of us.’
She smiled back, her hopes soaring straight to the sky. ‘I suppose it does.’
Neither of them spoke for a few moments and Alyse couldn’t keep the lightness, the giddy relief, from swooping through her. She tried to tell herself that really this was very little, that she wasn’t even sure what Leo was saying or offering. Yet still, the hope. The joy. She couldn’t keep herself from feeling them, from wanting to feel them.
Eventually Leo took her half-empty water bottle as well as his own and put them away. Alyse slipped to the bathroom and returned to find him in bed, the firelight flickering over his bronzed body, his arms above his head. She hesitated on the threshold, still unsure how to act, and then Leo pulled aside the duvet and patted the bed.
‘Come here,’ he said softly and, smiling, she came.
She slid into the bed and felt her heart lurch with unexpected joy once again when he gently pulled her to him and cradled her body against his own, her head pillowed on his arm. She breathed in the scent of him, a woodsy aftershave and clean soap, and listened to the crackle of the logs in the fireplace and the steady beat of his heart against her cheek. She felt almost perfectly content.
Neither of them spoke, but the silence wasn’t tense, strained or even awkward at all. It was a silence of new understanding. And, instead of pressing and longing for more, Alyse let this be enough. Lying in Leo’s arms, it felt like everything.
