CHAPTER ELEVEN
Nikolai
THE MOUNTAINS EN ROUTE to Zurich are as sculpted as Regina Bjorn’s high cheekbones, and yet the experience feels empty. Emotionally at least. Regina has done a damn good job of filling the airspace, making it clear that she knows a thing or two about screwing.
“It is, after all, the family business,” she chatters into the microphone with a giggle. We both wear helmets with headsets.
“Nothing about that innuendo is remotely appealing,” I mutter and grip the cyclical stick that gives me control of the aircraft.
My surly comment flies straight over her head. As does anything else I say for the rest of our time together—unless it’s an attempt to feign interest in her father’s company.
Screws.
By the time we return to the Royal Airfield, landing with the setting sun, I’m convinced that I’ve endured paper cuts more enjoyable than Regina Bjorn.
Kate paired me with this woman through her matchmaking service? What does this say about me and the persona that I have cultivated with such care? Has the shallow, arrogant, vain Prince Nikolai finally become Mr. Hyde, overriding the respectable Dr. Jekyll? Is the facade I’ve so long shown the world really the man I want to be? I’ve nearly convinced myself the mask is real. But when Kate looks at me, it’s as if she can see someone else. The person that I might have been if life hadn’t kicked me in the teeth with a stiletto then had my youngest brother drive it off a cliff.
The thought unsettles me, and I push it from my mind as we exit the helicopter. I escort Regina back to her driver. She still talks of—what else?—screws. In the last hours I’ve endured lectures about cap screws, machine screws, tag screws, setscrews and—I shit you not—self-tapping screws.
A few weeks ago I would have been able to turn the day’s conversation into an activity that required no words at all—unless it was Regina purring my bloody name. Now I hope those self-tapping wonders are Regina’s favorite because I don’t know anyone who could stay awake through one of her conversations long enough to get it up.
When I wish her good-night, I am not entirely convinced she notices.
The Rolls is parked in my usual spot. As I stride closer, eager to put distance between myself and the Heiress of Screws, I am surprised to hear music playing. It’s an American classic, “Sweet Caroline.” More to the point, the two people in the car are belting out the words—and X can apparently more than hold a tune. This man... I shake my head. He’s full of surprises. Not only is he an expert tattoo artist responsible for all the tribal ink on my body, he’s also a ninth-degree Grand Master black belt in Tae Kwon Do, and my on-again, off-again threesome wingman. Now he can harmonize better than Neil Diamond?
Sneaky fuck.
Who the hell is X? So often I’ve asked myself this, but it is to no avail. X has been my bodyguard since I reached maturity. I barely remember life without him. And yet I know nothing of him when he’s not in my immediate presence, while he knows all there is of me.
I guess he can add charismatic crooner to his résumé.
I open the door, and he and Kate both clam up, staring at me.
“I didn’t know you were back yet,” she says, clutching what appears to be a giant bucket of popcorn.
“You didn’t hear the chopper blades?” I inquire, lifting an eyebrow. I fly a Eurocopter Mercedes-Benz, the most pimped-out helicopter in the world, able to get high and fly fast. For one not to notice such an aircraft, well—what the hell could pry her interest from awaiting my arrival?
I scowl to myself. Perhaps I am the pompous persona I’ve cultivated.
“Sorry. It’s the Golden Oldies Hour on Royal Radio. Our favorite,” she said.
“Our?” My eyebrow goes higher.
“Sir.” X is matter-of-fact and unapologetic as he starts the engine. “Would you like to take a seat?”
“I’d like to know who you are and what you’ve done with my bodyguard,” I shoot back as an unexpected wave of possessive jealousy rolls between my clenched shoulder blades.
“Was your outing with Miss Bjorn satisfactory?” Kate asks, popping a piece of popcorn into her mouth with wide eyes.
“No. And where the hell did you get that?”
She pops another kernel into her mouth. “We went to the movies. They were showing the live action Beauty and the Beast at the discount theater and X had never seen it.”
“An oversight he must be happy to have rectified,” I snap.
Kate shrugs. “I was prepared to share with him my love of all things fast and furious, but the Disney classic won out. Apparently X is impressed by royalty. Me, not so much.” She bites back a grin, and all I can do is bite back my own rage.
X’s eyes shoot to mine in the rearview, and I glare out the window. Stupid to be jealous of my bodyguard. But the entire day I suffered with Regina Bore, he was with Kate. Enjoying himself. Enjoying her. I’ve shared women with X in the past, but this is one time that I don’t want to. I don’t want to share her with anyone. The idea of her with another man, even if I’m there as well, makes my stomach turn over as my fingers curl into themselves.
I stare back at her as white-hot possession shoots through me.
Mine.
The word is powerful and pure. My blood pounds with the echo. Mine. Mine. Mine.
This is the truth. And it’s time she knows it.
“X, to the palace.”
“I need to get back to the office,” Kate protests. “If your second date was another bust, then I need to review lucky number three and figure out a game plan.”
“I want to use the back entrance,” I continue as if she hasn’t spoken. A vague headache pounds in my temples. I want to drop the pretense for two seconds. I will never marry. I’m not made for the institution, and Kate is wasting her time.
That shouldn’t be my problem, but I don’t want her to leave. At least not yet. I want to enjoy the pleasure of her company a little while longer.
“Sir?” X asks, and I know what he really means. “Are you sure about this?”
No woman has ever accompanied me back to the palace, to my private quarters. Not until now.
I nod my head. “And make it fast.”
Kate
“Where are the king and queen this fine evening?” Nikolai asks X as we pull to a side of the palace I haven’t seen before.
“In Paris until tomorrow for the queen’s—” he coughs “—rejuvenation treatments.”
Nikolai grins at me. “Do you need to let your sister know you won’t be coming home this evening?”
I cross my arms and narrow my eyes. “I don’t have a curfew, Your Highness. But I do have work to do if we are going to make the perfect match, so I really should—”
“Stay,” he says, the grin fading, those gray eyes dark with something too intense to deny. Because I feel it too—have felt it since he left for Zurich despite the comfort of X’s presence and our day of distraction.
I won’t ask him why. Or what this means. I won’t let logic override the ache in my belly. I can do this and not endanger the business. I force myself to believe it because the word is already forming on my lips.
“Okay,” I answer.
Nikolai’s door opens, and X stands at the ready. The man is the epitome of stealth. I didn’t even realize he’d exited the vehicle.
Nikolai turns toward the opened door. “Miss Winter will be staying this evening, X.”
X nods. “A moment alone with your guest, please, Your Highness. I shall then escort her to your quarters.”
Nikolai laughs quietly. “A bit bold today, aren’t we, X?”
X nods but doesn’t crack a smile. “When it’s called for, Your Highness.”
Nikolai faces me again, gently grabbing my palm and bringing it to his lips. “See you soon,” he whispers, and then he’s gone.
Moments later my door opens, and X offers a hand to help me out of the vehicle.
“Let me guess,” I say, as he leads me through a small door and into a dimly lit stairwell. “You want to finish our Neil Diamond duet.”
No smile or any indication that only several minutes ago the two of us could have turned every chair on The Voice. Instead he simply holds out an arm for me to grab as we begin to ascend the steep stairs.
“The prince,” he says, “is very private.”
I snort.
“What the world sees in the media is what he wants them to see, Miss. And while I am not at liberty to divulge his past, I can say as much as this. Save for Victoria, the queen’s late daughter, no woman has ascended these stairs. Not before—and not since.”
There is no time for me to respond as we reach a small landing at the top, a tall oak door—partially ajar—before us. He nods for me to enter, and I do. I hear the door click shut behind me and turn to see X standing with his back to it, the faintest hint of a smile on his face. Then, as quick as a blink, he steps to his left, where soft curtains billow beside an open window—and he leaps through it like we aren’t on the third story of a palace.
I yelp.
Nikolai rounds the corner, a bottle of Moët in one hand, two crystal flutes in the other.
“Let me guess,” he says. “X took the window.”
My hand covers my mouth as I nod, imagining my silver-fox companion splattered against the brick pavers below.
Nikolai laughs and shakes his head. “He often prefers scaling the brick to the stairs. Sometimes I wonder who X was before he came here, but I’ve learned to not question the man’s abilities and thank the stars we’re on the same team.” He moves closer, his feet bare beneath the dark denim of his jeans and his now-wrinkled oxford unbuttoned. “He’s fine. I promise.”
“I’m not looking out that window,” I say, goose bumps raising the hairs on my bare arms. The sundress was perfect for the day, but now that the sun has set, I shiver in the open-air breeze. “I’ll take your word for it.”
Nikolai nods toward the direction from which he came.
“You’re cold,” he says. “Come. Let me warm you up.”
I follow him around a corner and note a small galley kitchen with dark marble counters, a sturdy wooden table—round—with four high-backed chairs beyond the breakfast bar. I don’t have time to take in the modest living space other than a baby grand piano against a floor-to-ceiling window beyond a leather couch. The next thing I know, I’m walking through another door and into my prince’s bedroom.
He sets the bottle and flutes on a night table and turns back to me. His strong hands run the length of my arms, warming me from the outside in. I let out a breath.
“Why am I here, Nikolai?” I can’t hold out any longer, my curiosity getting the best of me. My chest tightens at the thought of his answer.
He kisses my neck, and my head falls back. A small sigh escapes my lips.
“I don’t want to share you,” he says against my skin, his lips making their way up to my jaw, then my cheek.
“But I haven’t been—” I stop myself before telling him that I have not been with any other man since he first laid his hands on me—that for two years before that there hadn’t been anyone, either.
His mouth finds mine, and my lips part, inviting him in—craving the taste of him like I didn’t know I could.
“I don’t like that X got to see a side of you today that I’ve never seen.”
The sentence comes out almost as a growl, and my breath hitches.
“It was a movie,” I whisper. “Not a helicopter ride to another country for an intimate lunch.” I don’t regret the words—or laying my jealousy out before him, not when he is blatantly doing the same. I want him, more than I’ve been able to admit, and right now I’m ready to give him all of me in return.
He backs toward the four-poster ebony bed, red silk sheets pulled back to reveal the space where his body last lay. I grin against his lips.
“What?” he asks, feeling the change in my expression.
“No one comes in to clean? To make your bed, Your Highness?”
He sits on the edge of the mattress, pulling me close so I straddle his lap.
“No one enters other than those closest to me,” he says, his eyes dark with need. “And I want you closest, Kate. Tonight I want you more than anyone else.”
I answer him by unbuttoning his shirt the rest of the way and sliding it down his arms. He closes his eyes and breathes in deep as my fingers trace the lines of ink on his shoulder, as they circle the tattoo of a compass that rests above his heart.
“It’s beautiful,” I say, a slight tremor in my voice. “You’re beautiful, Nikolai.”
He opens his eyes and wordlessly lifts my dress over my head so I’m left in nothing but my white lace panties.
“You’re exquisite,” he says. Then he takes one of my breasts into his mouth. I arch against him. “Finer than any woman who bears a title.” His tongue swirls around the peaked nipple of my other breast, and I gasp. “Open your eyes and look at me,” he says, and I obey. “No matter what I do, you see me.”
I cradle his beautiful face in my palms. “I do.”
“And you want me,” he says.
I nod.
“Only me.”
I nod again, taking each of his palms in mine and pressing them to my breasts. “Only you.”
“I’ll win our wager,” he says with a grin. “I will not walk down the aisle.”
“You will marry,” I remind him and swallow back the reality of what that means.
“Not tonight, though.” He falls onto the bed, pulling me over him.
“No,” I say. “Not tonight.”