A Royal World Apart Read online

  “I believe what you said to me,” she said. “If I didn’t …” she looked up at the ceiling, then around. “Well, if I didn’t we shouldn’t be here. This might be temporary, but … we do have a connection. At least I feel one with you.”

  In all honesty, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt connected with anything. Anything beyond vague, cold concepts of honor, of right and wrong. He’d cut off the flow to his heart and dwelt in his head.

  But Eva forced him back to his body, back to feelings and passion and desire. Caring. Things he’d been certain he’d lost.

  “This is beyond my experience,” he said, knowing he owed her honesty. No empty promises. “And you are the most amazing woman.”

  She smiled faintly. “You say the nicest things.”

  Nice. He’d never been accused of being nice. “I’ll get the condoms.”

  Eva was there, waiting for him, her mouth curved up, resting on the pillows, her breasts bare. She was a temptress, every fantasy, every desire he’d ever had come to life.

  He curled his hand into a fist, felt the hard bite of his wedding ring. He paused for a moment, lifting his hand to examine it. He pulled it off and set it on the dresser.

  Tonight, in this bed, there would be no ghosts from the past. There would be nothing but Eva and Mak. Nothing but their desire. Their pleasure. He would make sure of that.

  He unbuttoned his shirt and discarded it before working at his belt. She was watching him, her eyes rapt on him. He pushed his jeans down his hips, discarding his underwear with them, before joining her on the bed.

  He lay across from her, on his side, facing her, and she rolled so that she was facing him, the indent of her waist and flare of her hip even more dramatic and provocative in that pose. She reached out and touched his arm, her fingertips drifting from his bicep to his chest, her light touch skimming over his nipples. His muscles jerked beneath her hand and his erection hardened even more, so hard it was nearly painful now.

  He pushed her dress down her hips, taking her panties with it, leaving her completely naked. He couldn’t stop looking at her. At her utter perfection. The smoothness of her skin, the roundness of her curves, the dark shadow at the apex of her thighs, her lush breasts.

  “You are everything a woman should be,” he said.

  She reached out and put her hand on his chest. “You’re everything, more, than I imagined a man could be, so … maybe we’re even?”

  “Not even close,” he said. “I am outmatched.”

  She kissed him and for a moment, he was lost in it. He pulled her to him, every bare inch of her against every bare inch of him. She put her leg over his, exposing the heart of her more fully to him, bringing her in even closer.

  He moved his hands over her skin, over and over, cupping her butt, relishing every bit of her feminine perfection. She moaned into his mouth and he flipped her to her back, holding himself over her.

  Her eyes widened and he dipped his head to kiss the valley between her breasts. “You have to bear with me, printzyessa,” he said, trying to disguise the tremor in his voice, “because I have had a lot of years to think about this moment. And there are things I desire … and I must take my time so I can have all of them.”

  “I don’t … is there time?” she asked. Her voice shook.

  “We have all night. Days.” He kissed her ribs, her stomach, her hipbone.

  “Oh … Mak.”

  “I like that,” he said, smiling against her skin. “My name on your lips. I’ll work very hard to make sure I hear it often.”

  He touched her inner thigh and she parted her legs for him. He pressed a kiss to the tender skin and she shivered. “Mak.”

  “Like that,” he said, kissing her thigh again, closer to her core. “Just like that.” He slid his finger over her wetness, as he’d longed to do. He moved his fingers over her clitoris. She responded with a low moan, and he repeated the motion.

  Then he dipped his head and tasted her, roaring heat firing through him, igniting his smoldering desire into an inferno. Her hips bucked and he stilled them, using his mouth and fingers on her, his stomach tight with longing.

  The need to keep pleasuring her like that forever, the need to take everything with no finesse and no thought for anything but his own desire—they warred with each other, the lusts of his flesh at odds, in ecstasy.

  He felt her tense beneath his touch, her body pulsing around his fingers as he continued to lavish attention on her with his tongue. She gripped his shoulders and cried out his name, her voice hoarse, her fingernails biting his skin.

  Pride, pleasure so acute it was almost pain, flooded him. He had brought her to the peak, had make her lose herself in her release. He had given Eva all she deserved. And he intended to give her more, even as he took for himself.

  He lifted his head, keeping his fingers inside her tight wet body, establishing a rhythm, making sure she stayed ready. He reached beside him with his other hand and picked up the condom strip, abandoning Eva’s pleasure for a moment while he tore off a packet and opened it.

  “May I?” She extended her hand, and he gave her the packet. She took the condom out. “First things first,” she whispered, wrapping her hand around his naked shaft, squeezing him tightly.

  He sucked in a sharp breath, pleasure piercing him.

  “Good?” she asked.

  “Good doesn’t cover it,” he said, echoing her earlier words.

  She rolled the condom onto his length, her movements slow, methodical, achingly arousing. “Just perfect,” she said, a smile on her lips.

  He drew her to him and kissed her, lying her back down on the soft bed. She parted her thighs for him, one hand on his back, the other sliding to his butt, urging him on, urging him home. He slid into her slowly, pausing when her breath hitched, letting her grow accustomed to having him inside her. Letting himself acclimate to the feeling of her heat around him.

  He gritted his teeth, every muscle in his body so tense it quivered, his arms and thighs shaking as he tried to keep from thrusting into her, hard and fast. When she arched into him, he would give them both more, and when she tensed, he stopped again, giving them both a moment to breathe.

  Finally, he was buried inside her, her legs locked around him, a sweet sigh on her lips. He kissed it away, catching the noises of pleasure that escaped, claiming them for himself. Calling his name up from her again and again as he moved inside of her.

  The intimacy of it jarred him, the reality of being inside Eva’s body far surpassing any fantasy, any depiction on screen or in books. She was surrounding him. Her breath, her voice, her softness, her scent. His world was reduced to her. Was dependent on her.

  She stiffened beneath him, her full breasts pushed against his chest, and he felt the pulse of her orgasm around his erection. Deep, raw need overtook him, his thrusts losing all measure of control, all rhythm, as his mind lost its connection with time and space.

  There was nothing but Eva. Nothing but her body, their connection.

  He let go of everything, everything but the intense feelings rolling through his body. It was like going over the edge of a cliff, release roaring through him as he fell into ultimate, uncontrolled sensation. His chest burned, sensation bursting through him as he found his pleasure.

  In the aftermath, he pulled her to him, resting his forehead on hers. She moved her hands over his chest, murmuring words so tender, so sweet, they were like balm, spreading healing over his soul.

  He held her as his heart quieted, until his muscles stopped shaking. Until his hands stopped trembling.

  In the morning, they might regret it. He would find his way back to his controlled, careful path. There would be recriminations.

  But that was for the morning. Tonight he would allow himself to stay lost. Lost in Eva.

  It felt better than being found ever had.

  CHAPTER TEN

  EVA had woken up that morning feeling the same. Turning twenty-one hadn’t made her feel any differe
nt. But she felt different now.

  She turned and looked at Mak. He was on his back, his eyes closed, the lines in his face more shallow as he slept, his expression relaxed. His chest was bare, the hard, cut lines of his muscles exposed, tempting. She traced the ridge that ran down the center of his abs, down to the point covered by the sheet. The bit of fabric rode tantalizingly low, giving her a tease, a taste of the rest of his body without giving it all away.

  He was amazing. He’d been amazing. She hadn’t realized pleasure like that was possible. Hadn’t even had a clue. But he’d blown away every expectation. A smile curved her lips. They’d been explosive. And none of it had come from past experience. None of it from great practiced skill. It had just been … them.

  Her stomach fluttered and along with the fluttering came a resurgence of desire. Mak had been beyond fantasy for her. She hoped very much that she’d been the same for him.

  She pressed a kiss to his shoulder, her mind replaying everything that had happened since dinner. He stirred beneath the contact, and she kissed him again, letting her fingers join in, drifting over the lines of his stomach.

  He shifted beneath her touch, the change in his breathing signaling his return from sleep.

  “How come you had to learn to disassemble a bomb?” she asked, the question popping out of her mouth without any thought. But she was curious.

  One of his eyes opened and he looked at her. “Just in case. A good skill to have. I only had to use it once.”

  “On a real bomb?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s horrifying.”

  “It all worked out. Normally I’m guarding a person, and military tend to handle bombs and other hazards of that nature. But I happened to find one positioned at the entrance of the home of a political official I was guarding. There was no time to wait.”

  “Inexperienced is simply not the right word for you,” she said. “You’ve experienced things I can’t even fathom.”

  He rolled over so quickly she didn’t have time to do anything beyond offer a half-hearted squeak of shock, his body covering hers, his hands on either side of her head. “And we’re working at remedying things I may not claim proficiency in yet.”

  “You feel quite proficient to me.” She could feel his erection, hardening against the juncture of her thighs.

  “You have no one to compare to.”

  “Don’t need to,” she said, stretching her neck to kiss his mouth. “Don’t want to.”

  She could happily stay in bed with him forever if she had the chance. If she could freeze one moment and draw it out for as long as she liked, it would be this one. With Mak, so strong and firm on top of her, his gray eyes searing into hers, his heart pounding hard and heavy against her chest.

  The kiss caught fire, heat licking through her veins, pooling in her stomach. She was ready for him again. She doubted if there would ever be a time when she wasn’t.

  She parted her thighs, let him settle down against her. She trapped him, curling her legs around his calves, her hands on his shoulders. She rocked against him, and a muffled curse escaped his lips.

  “What?” she whispered.

  “If you keep doing that, this will end very quickly.”

  “That’s fine. You lasted admirably the first time.”

  He took one of her hands from his shoulders and captured it in his, before taking the other one in the same hand and lifting her arms up behind her head so that they were resting on the pillows. And she was powerless. “Admirably, huh?”

  “I’ve heard … not that I’ve heard much … that some men can’t last long enough to give a woman, you know, pleasure. I was prepared for that the first time.”

  “Really? Well, printzyessa, I have had years, and years of practice controlling myself.” He dipped his head and took one of her nipples into his mouth. She arched into him, lost in the heat and friction, in the deep pull that started low in her body and radiated through her.

  “Then, in the interest of control, maybe you should grab another one of those condoms,” she said.

  “Good idea.”

  Happiness had always been a kind of vague, elusive goal. Eva hadn’t ever felt truly happy, not since her mother’s death or Xander’s departure closely after.

  And since that horrible arranged marriage to whichever bachelor bid highest had started to get so close to reality, happiness had drifted even farther away.

  Maybe Mak was right. Maybe happiness wasn’t that important. But right now, sitting in the hot tub, with the warm water shielding her skin from the bitter cold, and Mak’s arms around her, her head rested on his hard chest, she felt that happiness had arrived. And she felt as if she didn’t want to live another day without it.

  “Tell me something,” she said, tracing a faint scar that ran along his forearm.

  “What?”

  She shrugged. “Just something. Anything. Something you’ve never told anyone before.”

  He shifted, his arms tightening around her waist, his hand flat on her stomach. “You already have quite a few of my secrets, Eva.”

  She arched her head back and kissed his throat. “Just a few more.”

  “You would make a great spy.”

  “Would I?” she asked, laughing.

  “A man would give up anything just to have a kiss from you.” His words were light, but there was an undertone of darkness there. One that told her he felt he’d given up something to be with her. And it was more than virginity.

  She felt a twinge of guilt, and she tried to block it out. It was needling at her happiness, and she didn’t like it. Wouldn’t let it.

  “Well, I’m not asking you to breach national security.”

  “All right, but we trade. Prisoner exchange.”

  “We’ve already done that,” she said. “At least physically. My virginity for yours.”

  He chuckled. “True enough.” He paused for a moment, his fingers playing over her stomach. “I am not an honorable man,” he said. The words carried great weight, depth, as though they’d lived in him for years, playing on Repeat. Words that were well-worn in his mind, if not on his tongue.

  “I told you to tell me something you hadn’t told anyone,” she said. “I didn’t tell you to lie to me.”

  “It’s true. Would a man of honor give up the care of his ailing wife to nurses when money allowed it? Would he take job after job, earn more and more money, partly to relieve his responsibility? Because I did. This house … this house was a place for me to come in between some of my jobs. So I could be alone. So I didn’t have to see her like that. Alive but not. Caught between the living and the dead and part of neither. I felt as though I was caught there too. And I felt plenty sorry for myself.”

  “That doesn’t mean you weren’t honorable. You put everything on hold for her. Honored your marriage vows.”

  “And I resented them sometimes,” he said, an edge in his tone, as though he was desperate to prove he was right.

  “So? I resent my life.”

  “You are right though, about your life. You didn’t choose it. I chose mine. And no, it didn’t pan out how I planned, but I chose to take Marina away from her family. To marry her when I knew that meant she would lose them.”

  “Why undermine what you did?” she asked. “Why try to make it seem like it doesn’t matter? It did. And who can blame you for needing a break from it?”

  “Because I don’t deserve a pat on the back for how I acted after a disaster that was of my own making.”

  “You still blame yourself?”

  “Of course.”

  “You aren’t God, Makhail Nabatov, though I’m sure part of you likes to think so.”

  “So is that who I blame then? God? Would that solve my problems? If I could wash my hands of it all and claim divine intervention?”

  She shook her head. “No. If you have to blame someone, blame the driver of the other car. Blame doesn’t help. It doesn’t get anyone anywhere. It … I have another brother, you know.�
��

  He stiffened. “Yes, I saw something about him, briefly, when going over your information.”

  “You won’t find very much about Alexander. Because he won’t come back to Kyonos. My father, in his search for blame after the death of my mother, chose Xander as the scapegoat. I think even Stavros believes it. It’s very likely Xander does too.”

  “How?” Mak asked.

  “Because Xander was driving the car when it crashed, with my mother in it. They were out driving along the beach because Xander wanted to learn to drive and my mother lived to accommodate him. Xander was always the fun one, the impetuous one. He was very like my mother, you know. But it was such a normal thing. She took her son out for a drive. That’s all. Like you, they encountered a driver who wasn’t paying attention. Would you blame Xander?”

  “No. But it’s different.”

  “It’s not.”

  He shifted and turned her, making the water spray around them. “You are stubborn,” he ground out.

  She leaned in and kissed the tip of his nose. “I know. And so are you. But you have to let it go, Mak. How long will you carry the pain with you?”

  His dark eyebrows locked together. “I don’t know how to let go. If I let go, it’s like she never existed.”

  Eva shook her head. “Don’t forget her. But remember her smile. Remember what you loved about her.”

  He winced. “Love is not my favorite memory.” He trailed his fingers over the damp line of Eva’s collarbone. “But I can remember her smile.”

  “Good. Hold onto that.”

  He studied her for a moment. “You’re the only woman I’ve ever met who would ask her lover to think of the face of another woman.”

  “She was your wife. I respect that. You … whether you want to remember it or not, you loved her.”

  “I have called you many things, not all of them flattering. But now, I just want to say that you are the most amazing woman I have ever met,” he said.

  Tears filled her eyes and she hoped he wouldn’t notice. Hoped the water droplets on her skin would help conceal them. “You’re the most amazing man I’ve ever met. So maybe we’re even.”