Prince of Scandal (10 page)

Well, tough! She hadn’t asked to be princess. He’d stampeded her into it. Now he could put up with the fact that she didn’t fit the mould.

She’d read his stern demeanour through the ceremony today. As if waiting for her to embarrass herself. Not even her carefully rehearsed lines, learned with Lukas’ help, had softened Raul’s severe countenance.

Had she really sought his approval? The notion of such neediness disturbed her.

Only once in the whole proceedings had his face softened. With the boy.

‘Why did we go over to that man in the crowd?’ She hadn’t even been aware of the question forming in her head.

Raul turned and a sizzle shot through her as their gazes collided.

Luisa slumped back against her seat, heart pounding as fire roared through her veins. How did he do that? Was it the same for all the women he bedded?

The idea was pure torture.

‘I wanted to make sure there was no trouble.’

‘Trouble?’ Luisa scrabbled for coherent thought.

‘He was complaining loudly about his son being uncontrollable. And about what a nuisance the dog was.’

‘You’re kidding!’ Luisa straightened. ‘Peter was a darling, but so serious, not uncontrollable. If anything he seemed too old for his years.’ She hadn’t understood everything he’d said but his gravity had struck her.

Raul shrugged but the movement seemed cramped. ‘Living with a judgemental parent will do that.’

It was on the tip of Luisa’s tongue to question Raul’s assessment, till she read a bleakness in his eyes that made her back off.

‘What did you say to his father?’ Raul had looked every inch the monarch, full of gracious condescension.

Again that shrug. A little easier this time. ‘I congratulated him on his fine son.’

‘Good on you!’

Startled green eyes met hers and for a moment Luisa lost the thread of the conversation.

‘And I invited both boy and dog to visit the castle, to renew the acquaintance.’

Luisa tried but couldn’t read Raul’s expression. Yet instinct told her why he’d done it. ‘You wanted to make sure he didn’t get rid of the pup?’

For an instant longer Raul held her gaze before turning back to the window and raising his hand in acknowledgement of the people thronging the road.

‘A boy should be allowed a dog for companionship. Don’t you think?’

His tone indicated the matter was of no importance. Yet she remembered Peter’s trembling fear and the nervous way he’d eyed his father. Raul had gone out of his way to speak to them when he hadn’t made time to glad-hand anyone else in the crowd, preferring to wave from a distance.

Luisa sensed the matter was anything but unimportant to Raul. The scenario had struck a chord with him.

Frowning, she realised she knew almost nothing about the man she’d married.

R
AUL’S
mother had died in childbirth, his father had been impatient with children and Raul didn’t have siblings. That was all Luisa knew, apart from the fact that he distanced himself behind a formidable reserve.

What did that say about him?

‘Did you have a dog when you were a boy?’

Raul shot her a surprised look as they drove through the castle gates.

‘No,’ he said finally, his expression unreadable. ‘Dogs and antique heirlooms aren’t a good mix.’

Luisa surveyed the enormous courtyard and thought of the labyrinth of terraces, walled gardens and moats around the castle. ‘There’s room enough outside.’

If
she
had a child she’d let him or her have a pet or three and find a way to protect the antiques.

Shock grabbed her throat as she realised she was imagining a sturdy little boy running across the courtyard with black hair and eyes as green as emeralds. Eyes like—

‘Are you ready, Luisa?’ She looked up to find Raul already standing beside the limousine, offering his hand. No way to avoid touching him without being pointedly rude. Yet, even braced for it, the shock that sparked from his touch and ran up her arm stunned her.

Raul gave no sign of anything untoward, which left her wondering again if it were she alone overreacting to last night’s intimacy. Sternly she told herself it was natural she’d respond
to the touch of her first ever lover. But when he tucked her arm through his and led her through the cavernous entrance, it was all she could do to repress the shivers of excitement running through her body. Being this close set desire humming through her.

‘Who did you play with?’ She sought distraction.

One dark brow winged up towards Raul’s hairline, giving him a faintly dangerous air.

‘I had little time for play. Princes may be born but they need to be moulded for the role too.’

Luisa stared, horrified. But his cool tone signalled an end to the subject and he picked up his pace, leading her swiftly towards the lift.

‘But when you were little you must have played.’

He shrugged, the movement brushing his arm against her. She breathed in the subtle scent of warm male skin.

‘I don’t recall. I had tutors and lessons from the age of four. Playtime wasn’t scheduled, though later sports were included in the curriculum.’

‘That sounds … regimented.’ She smothered her outrage and distress. Surely they could have allowed him some time to be a child! It reinforced her resolve not to risk having a baby. No child of hers would be treated so.

Raul punched the button for the lift. ‘My days were busy.’

Busy, not happy. The ancient castle was perfect for hide and seek and the fantasy games young children revelled in. Had he ever played them? Her heart went out to the little boy he’d been, so lonely, she suspected now.

Did that loneliness explain his aloof attitude? His formidable self-possession?

‘Did you see much of your father?’ She recalled him saying his father had been impatient with children. How had that impacted? She had no idea how royal households worked but she guessed no man became as ferociously self-sufficient as Raul without reason.

Her husband shot a warning look that shivered her skin. Luisa looked straight back.

The lift rose smoothly, so smoothly she knew it hadn’t caused the dropping sensation in her stomach that came with the word
husband.

‘My father was busy. He had a country to run.’

Luisa bit down hard rather than blurt out her sympathy. The doors slid open but Luisa didn’t move.

‘Do you mean he didn’t have time for you?’

She could almost see the shutters come down over Raul’s face, blanking out all expression. The suddenness of it chilled her. Yet, far from blanking her out, it made her want to wrap her arms around him. The image of Peter, the little boy in the market square, so quaintly formal, tugged at her heart. Had Raul been like that as a child?

Her own glorious childhood, filled with laughter and love, happy days on the river or riding the tractor with her dad, running riot with a couple of dogs and even a pet lizard were halcyon by comparison.

‘Why do you want to know?’

‘Why don’t you want to tell me? I’m your wife.’ She didn’t even stumble over the word. ‘It’s right I know you better.’ Yet it was like pulling teeth, trying to get him to open up even a little.

Raul stood still, his face taut and unreadable. Then she caught a flicker in his eyes that made her thighs quiver and her stomach tighten.

‘Just what I had in mind.’ His voice lowered to a deep resonance that caressed her skin. ‘Getting to know each other better.’ Raul tugged her into the carpeted hallway and she realised they stood in front of his suite.

The glint in his eyes was unmistakable. Desire, raw and hungry. Something feral and dangerous sent delicious excitement skimming through her.

Her eyes widened. No mistaking what he meant.

Sex.

It was in his knowing look. In the deep shuddering breath that expanded his wide chest, as if he had trouble filling oxygen starved lungs.

Luisa waited for outrage to take hold. For pride to give her the strength to shove him away. Indignation didn’t come. It was excitement that knotted her stomach. Desire that clogged her throat.

He’d introduced her to pleasure and she was too inexperienced to hide the fact that she craved more.

Raul must have read her feelings for his lips curved in a smile that made her pulse jitter. Wordlessly he shoved open the door, pulled her in and against him as he leaned back, closing the door with his body.

Fire exploded in her blood. Last night she’d loved the heavy burden of him above her. Now she wanted to arch into him and revel in the hard solidity of his big frame. It was weak of her but she couldn’t get enough of him.

She shoved aside the memory of this morning’s desolation, and the suspicion that his desire now masked a determination to stop her prying into his past.

At this moment it was Raul’s passion she wanted. Perhaps because of the emptiness she’d glimpsed in his eyes when he’d spoken so casually about a childhood that to her sounded frighteningly cold. Did she doom herself to a similar loneliness, marrying him?

Yet it wasn’t fear that drove her. Or simple lust.

Her heart twisted as she realised she wanted to give herself to her husband in the hope of healing some of the deep hurt she’d seen flicker for a moment in his eyes.

‘Luisa? Do you want this?’

‘Yes.’ She didn’t try to hide from his searching gaze.

When he lowered his head to graze the side of her neck with his teeth the air sucked straight out of her lungs. Thought disintegrated as she sank into pleasure.

She opened her eyes and groaned as he bit into the sensitive flesh at the base of her throat. Her hands clenched at his shoulders as his hands skimmed her jacket, undoing it and her shirt and spreading the open sides wide.

‘You were magnificent this morning.’ His voice was a low, throaty purr as he stripped off her jacket then kissed the upper
slope of her breasts as he shoved her blouse off. Her skirt followed moments later and she shivered in sensual delight as he ran his big hands over her hips.

‘I just did what was expected.’ Yet she felt a tiny burst of pleasure at his words. Having accepted her new role, she was determined to do it well.

She sighed as he fastened his mouth on her lacy bra, sucking hard till the nipple stood erect and darts of liquid fire shot to her core.

Convulsively she shuddered, cradling him close, overwhelmed by the sudden need to embrace him and comfort him. This big man who needed no one.

He lifted his head and met her eyes. His own were shadowed, as if he veiled his thoughts. The knowledge pained her. He worked so hard to maintain his distance. Had he never learned to share anything? Was she crazy to think they could make this work?

Then his mouth descended and he swung her up in his embrace. Heat surrounded her. Hard-packed muscle. The steady beat of his heart.

By the time he lowered her to the bed and stripped both their clothes with a deftness that spoke of practice and urgency, Luisa’s thoughts had almost scrambled.

‘Contraception!’ she blurted out as she sank beneath him. ‘I don’t want to get pregnant.’

His brows rose. ‘We’re married, Luisa. Having a child is a natural outcome.’

She shook her head. Despite the wonderful weighted feeling of his lower body on hers, this was too important.

‘No. I’m not ready.’ She gulped down air and tried to order her thoughts. ‘It’s been too fast.’

For what seemed an eternity Raul stared, as if seeing her for the first time. Finally he nodded and rolled away, reaching for the bedside table.

When he turned back he didn’t immediately cover her body with his.

For a man who’d married her out of necessity he had a
way of making her feel the absolute focus of his world. As if nothing existed but her. His total concentration, the intensity of his gaze, the knowing, deliberately seductive touch of his hands on her body, were exhilarating.

Raul’s gaze softened with each circling stroke and she felt something shift deep inside. She arched into his touch and her pulse pounded in her ears. When he leaned close his breath was an erotic caress of her sensitive ear lobe that sent sparks of heat showering through her.

‘Come for me, Luisa.’ His fingers delved and a ripple of sensation caught her. ‘Give yourself up to it.’

Gasping, she focused on him, feeling the dip and wheel of excitement while the intense connection sparked between them. His set face, his mouth, no longer smiling but stretched taut in concentration. The furrow on his brow, his eyes …

Out of nowhere the orgasm hit, jerking her body and stealing her breath. Heat flared under her skin as he dipped his head to take her mouth in a long, languorous kiss that somehow intensified the echoing spasms.

Spent at last, she sank back into the bed.

Now he’d come to her. Dreamily she smiled, her inner muscles pulsing in readiness. Despite her exhaustion, it was Raul she wanted. The hollow ache inside was proof of that.

He moved, but not as she’d expected. Shocked, she saw him settling himself low, nuzzling her inner thighs.

‘No! I want—’

His kiss silenced her. She shouldn’t want more after the ecstasy that still echoed through her, but the caress of Raul’s tongue, his lips, sent need jolting through her.

That was only the beginning.

Dazed, Luisa gave herself up to new caresses, new sensations that built one on the other till all she knew was Raul and the pleasure he wrought in her malleable, ever eager body. The taste of him was on her tongue, his scent in her nostrils as she grew attuned to his touch and the deep approving rumble of his voice.

Blindly she turned to him as finally he took her for himself,
his rampant hardness a contrast to her lush satiation. She breathed deep, taking his shuddering, powerful body into hers as she seemed to absorb his essence into her pores.

Raul cried out and pleasure drenched her at the sound of her name in that raw needy voice. Instinctively she clutched him protectively close.

Raul lay completely spent, only enough strength in his body to pull Luisa close, her body sprawled over him.

He told himself the post-coital glow was always this intense, but he knew he lied. From the moment he’d bedded his wife he’d known the sex was different.

Why? His brain wouldn’t leave the question alone.

Because she didn’t meekly comply with his wishes? Because, despite agreeing to marry, she was still her own woman, not like the compliant lovers who gave whatever he wanted because of what he could provide in return?

With Luisa he had the thrilling, faintly disturbing sense that he held a precious gift in his arms.

She was far more than a warm body to sate his lust.

This was unknown territory. Or, if he were honest with himself, a little too like the feelings he’d discovered in his youth, when he’d believed in love. The thought should terrify him. He was well past believing in such things.

His lips quirked ruefully. That was why he’d seduced his wife as soon as they’d got back from the civic ceremony. Not just because he wanted her, but to stop himself puzzling over what she made him feel.

And to stop her questions. His hand clenched in the silk of her hair and she shifted delectably, soft flesh against his. Was it possible he’d used sex to avoid talking about his past? Even something as simple as his childhood?

Was he really such a coward?

His life was an open book. It had been pored over and dissected by the media for years. Yet the discomfort he’d felt answering Luisa’s questions surprised him.

As did the unfamiliar need to open up to her. To share a little of himself.

He frowned. It was absurd. He didn’t need a confessor or a confidante. There was no need for conversation. Yet deep down he knew he lied.

Perhaps because of the sense that he owed her for agreeing to marry?

Whatever the reason, when she shifted as if to move away, he slipped a restraining arm around the curve of her waist and cleared his throat.

‘My father was interested in me only as heir to the throne.’ His voice sounded husky. Raul told himself it was the aftermath of that stunning climax.

‘That’s awful.’ Her words were murmured against his chest. She didn’t look up. Somehow that made it easier.

He shrugged. ‘Staff raised me. That’s the way it’s always been in the royal household. He dropped by just enough to remind me I had to excel to be ready to wear the crown one day.’

‘And you wonder why I’m not ready for children!’

Shock smote him. He’d spoken blithely about the possibility of pregnancy, but the reality hadn’t sunk in. Luisa, pregnant with his child …

‘No child of ours would be raised like that.’ Certainty firmed on the words.

‘Really?’

Raul nodded. He’d spent years adhering to tradition as he fought to stabilise the monarchy and the nation, working behind the scenes as his father’s focus narrowed to pleasing his capricious young wife. It had been Raul who’d tried to redress the damage after the fiasco with Ana.