A MOMENT AGO Maddi had been so angry with this man and now... Now she was ready to dissolve in a pool of lust at his feet. If he hadn’t looked genuinely contrite for accusing her of being some sort of gold-digger she might not still be here. But she’d had the very real sense that whatever she’d said had triggered him into a response he’d given many times before.
With his other lovers.
Maddi pushed that toxic thought down. She was no different from them—she knew that. But right now she didn’t care, because she wanted him. Desperately. She wanted him to be her first lover.
When he’d joked that not everyone was as pure as her just now she’d nearly given herself away. Spectacularly. Would he know she was a virgin? Surely by now it wouldn’t be that obvious?
His hand dropped from her jaw and, without taking his eyes off her face, he undid his bow tie and drew it off, throwing it aside. He undid the top button of his shirt. She saw dark skin, a hint of hair.
She almost whimpered. But a sliver of doubt sneaked in like a cold breeze, dousing her feverish desire. More than a sliver. She wasn’t ready for a man like Aristedes. He had the wrong idea about her. He obviously thought she was experienced. A woman of the world. The kind of woman who would nonchalantly go to his room with him and be able to do things that would please him...
Because she would want to please him.
But how could she possibly please him?
The fear of disappointing him was acute.
She forced herself to meet his eye. Regret was already burning her insides like bile. ‘I’m so sorry, Aristedes... I’m truly not playing any games... I just think this isn’t a good idea.’
His face was suddenly expressionless. His eyes shuttered. He said nothing for a long moment and then he took a step back. ‘As you wish. If you change your mind, you know where I am.’
He turned and walked towards his bedroom suite and Maddi fled back to her rooms before she changed her mind. She went inside and leaned against the door.
What she’d just walked away from was seismic.
Ari saw her.
She knew he did. Even if his cynicism had got in the way briefly. And he wanted her, which was intoxicating.
For her whole life Maddi had felt somewhat invisible. She’d been acutely conscious of her mother’s sadness, and conscious that it had to do with her. So she’d tried to make herself smaller, so as not to cause any more sadness.
She’d learnt not to ask too many questions about her father, but had pored over his image online and that of her half-sister, fascinated by their resemblance while knowing that they were a world apart.
It had always hurt to know that her sister had had a relationship with their father. There was a picture that Maddi had come across online, of her sister and father on a boat, fishing. Laia was about ten years old, laughing up into the King’s face. He was smiling down at her indulgently. Maddi had printed it out and kept it for years—a bittersweet reminder that he hadn’t wanted to know her.
When she’d told Laia about it, Laia had cried.
Maddi kicked off her shoes and padded barefoot over to the dressing room, removing her jewellery and putting it back carefully in the boxes. The diamonds twinkled at her benignly.
She felt keyed up. Restless. About as far from being able to sleep as it was possible to feel. She looked at herself in the mirror. Flushed cheeks. Wide eyes. Yearning. Aching. Pulse throbbing. Still.
She couldn’t believe she’d stood up to the King like that. Called him out on his cynicism. And he’d admitted he was wrong. It had been exhilarating.
She wanted him.
Would it really be so selfish to savour this moment of someone really seeing her. Appreciating her? To take this one thing for herself, ready or not? To give her innocence to the man who had already fulfilled her fantasy of what a passionate awakening might feel like?
Sooner or later she would have to leave here. She would never see Aristedes again. Because she knew his marriage with Laia would never happen. Laia would persuade him to agree to a more modern peace agreement—Maddi knew she would. And he would weather this change in his plans and get on with his life, choose a new bride of royal blood...sire his heirs. He might want his Queen. He might even fall in love with his Queen, in spite of his cynical arrogance.
You have royal blood, whispered a voice.
Maddi went still. She was a princess. Albeit very much in secret. But suddenly she couldn’t stop thinking of the tantalising possibility of telling Ari that she was also a princess of Isla’Rosa. That perhaps he might agree to switch marrying Laia for Maddi.
She caught her expression in the mirror, smiling moonily at herself, and immediately stopped and scowled. What on earth was wrong with her? She’d met the man scarcely a week ago and, yes, she had a crush on him, but was she really fantasising about offering herself up to him as a substitute royal wife? Before the people of Isla’Rosa even knew she was a princess? Offering herself up to a man who was cynical and jaded? Who had admitted that he was more than happy to have a marriage in name only. To breed the next generation with no hint of scandal or drama.
She wasn’t ready to be a queen! She could barely get her head around being a princess. And who was to say he would choose her even if he knew she was of royal blood?
Her blood curdled at the thought. Rejection. All over again. She wouldn’t risk that for anyone.
Maddi might have sown doubts in his head about his marriage to Laia, but there was no way she could risk revealing her full identity in case he used it against her. To lure Laia out of hiding. Or, worse, to create a scandal in Isla’Rosa by revealing her identity to the people before Laia had had a chance to do so.
It was Laia’s narrative to control, revealing Maddi’s true heritage as her half-sister, and Maddi would not betray her wishes. After all, she was loyal to Isla’Rosa too.
But in the meantime Maddi couldn’t deny that she did want something from King Aristedes. Now more than ever. Because she fully realised how finite this was. And how much he would potentially hate her when he found out who she really was. That she’d been hiding her identity as a princess.
He wouldn’t understand that she was still getting used to the concept. It wasn’t as if she took it for granted. She knew that until Laia actually acknowledged her birth in front of the people of Isla’Rosa she wouldn’t feel as if she truly was of royal blood.
And that betraying little fantasy she’d had of him choosing her to be his Queen instead of Laia? It would be buried deep down, where she’d buried all her very secret fantasies that perhaps things might be different for her, that she might experience a great love some day, even though she’d ruined her mother’s chances for love.
So for now she was still a regular person, and suddenly things were very clear. Maddi knew she would always regret not taking the chance to be with Aristedes. To know his touch. To surrender her innocence to him. To let him be the one to initiate her in the ways of being a woman.
Maddi stopped thinking. She turned from the mirror and walked back to the door, opened it and walked out. Guided by sheer desire, Maddi retraced her steps back down the corridor and to Aristedes’s rooms.
The guards were outside. Wordlessly, one of them opened the door. Vaguely Maddi computed this, and what it must mean.
He’d told them to let her in if she came back.
Maddi went into the suite. There were a few lamps throwing out golden light. It was silent. She saw a light coming from the bedroom area and walked over, barefoot.
She stood in the doorway and saw Aristedes’s clothes draped haphazardly over a chair. It was only then that she registered the steam coming from under another door. The bathroom. And then he emerged, looking down as he tied a knot in the towel slung low on his hips.
He was bare-chested, and Maddi’s gaze was glued to that area. The well-defined pectorals. A light smattering of dark hair. The six-pack that looked as if it had been painted in shade and light by Michelangelo. Not an ounce of spare flesh. His skin was still damp. Gleaming.
Then he spoke. ‘Are you really here?’
Maddi looked up. He’d seen her. He was frowning. Hair slicked back. The bones of his face stark and beautiful.
She nodded. ‘I... I think so.’
‘Come here.’
Maddi walked over, the dress pooling around her bare feet, softly swishing against her legs. She stopped about a foot away from Aristedes. He reached out and traced a finger down her cheek. Took a length of hair and let it run through his fingers.
‘You’re real...’ he breathed.
It soothed something inside her that he wasn’t behaving as if he’d just been waiting for her inevitable return. He looked as stunned as she felt to be doing this.
Unable to resist the temptation, she reached out and placed her palm flat against Aristedes’s chest. It was warm and hard. His heart thumped under her hand. Strong. Her little finger grazed a nipple and he sucked in a breath, putting his hand over hers, trapping it.
He reached for her with his other arm, pulling her closer. He looked down. ‘Barefoot?’
She nodded. He smiled. She melted inside. Then he cupped her face in his hands and tilted it up, his gaze roving over her features hungrily for a few seconds before his mouth touched hers. A light kiss at first. A testing...a tasting. But Maddi was hungry. She moved closer and wrapped her arms around his neck, bringing their bodies flush together.
She could feel the heat from his body seeping through the thin material of the dress. Her breasts felt heavy.
The kiss changed and became harder. One of Aristedes’s hands caught the back of her head and an arm wrapped around her back, holding her. Which was good, because she wasn’t sure her legs were still working.
The kiss became deeper and more explicit, stoking the fire in Maddi’s blood. Tongues tangled. She bit his lower lip gently, experimentally. It was firm. She soothed it with her tongue and Aristedes growled low in his throat.
He pulled back. Maddi opened her eyes. Everything was blurry. He slowly came back into focus and the look on his face made her gulp. He looked...ravenous. She felt a moment of insecurity—should she tell him she wasn’t exactly experienced? But then she imagined him looking shocked, and then maybe disgusted... Selfishly, she didn’t want to risk it.
Surely he wouldn’t notice?
He moved back slightly and said, ‘Turn around.’
Maddi did, and felt him move her hair so that it fell over one shoulder, baring her back. Instead of going straight for the zip, she felt him trace her shoulder blades and then down the centre of her spine to the top of her dress.
She bit her lip to stop a shiver of pure desire. She was dealing with a maestro here, which was immediately intimidating but also reminded her that he’d had lots of practice. And that reminded her that in comparison she was hardly likely to make an impression, no matter how much he might want her.
Her mind spiralled right up until his fingers found the zip and started to pull it down. Then she stopped breathing.
His hands brought the zip all the way down to just above her buttocks. The dress fell away from her breasts. He tugged it gently over her hips and it dropped in a soft swish of silk and chiffon layers at her feet.
Now she wore only a strapless bra and matching lace panties. Aristedes walked around her and stopped in front of her. She couldn’t look at him. He tipped up her chin with a finger.
‘Breathe, Maddi.’
She sucked in a breath and it went straight to her head. Meanwhile, Aristedes’s gaze was moving down, over her chest to her belly and waist, her hips, thighs, legs... She felt his touch like the lick of a flame, leaving sparks wherever it landed.
He looked back up. ‘You are more than I could have imagined...’
Maddi swallowed. ‘So are you.’
She wanted to touch him again, but she was shy. She curled her hands into fists at her sides.
He took one of her hands and uncurled it. Then he stepped close and reached around her to unsnap her bra in a movement so slick and deft that she only realised what he’d done when a tiny breeze skated over her bare flesh.
Her bra lay on the ground.
Aristedes’s gaze got even hotter.
Maddi could feel her nipples puckering into tight buds. He came close again and cupped her breasts in his hands, taking their weight. She had to put her hands on his arms to stay standing. A tremble was starting up somewhere near her knees and travelling up her body, uncontrollable.
Aristedes’s thumbs found her nipples and grazed them, back and forth. Maddi gripped his arms tight.
‘Aristedes...’
She wasn’t even sure what she was asking for. An end to the torture? For it never to stop?
‘I told you...call me Ari.’
She looked at him. Her eyes were heavy-lidded. She felt like a cat, wanting to push herself into his hands, begging for heavier petting.
‘Ari...’
He lifted his gaze from her breasts. ‘Hmm...?’
‘I...’ She literally couldn’t articulate what she needed.
He seemed to take pity on her. He led her over to the massive bed and instructed her, ‘Lie back.’
Maddi did. Glad not to have to try and stay standing when she was about to collapse into a puddle at his feet. She looked at the towel around his waist and the prominent bulge. Heat throbbed between her legs. Slick.
He came down over her on his arms. Muscles tensing and bunching. She couldn’t help it. She had to touch him. She ran a hand over his chest again, her fingers tracing muscles, her nail snagging on a nipple.
Ari’s head lowered and his breath feathered against the skin near her jaw. He pressed a kiss there, and then trailed kisses down her neck to her shoulder. Down further. She tensed when he came to rest beside her. He cupped one breast again, and flicked out his tongue against the sensitive peak. Maddi’s back arched at the exquisite sensation. Then he surrounded it with his mouth and the sucking, dragging heat almost sent her into orbit. His other hand moved over her ribcage and down, over her belly, to the top of her lacy briefs.
Maddi couldn’t think. She wanted so many things. All at once.
There was a faint ripping noise and Ari had dispensed with her underwear. Now she was completely naked. At his mercy. Begging him with incoherent words... His hand moved between her thighs, pushing them apart gently and then exploring through the heat right into the centre of her body, where she ached the most.
Ari said something that Maddi couldn’t understand, but it sounded guttural. Then he took his hand away saying, ‘I have to taste you...’
She let out a little whimper and lifted her head to see Ari taking her thighs and spreading them wide. Looking at her with such hunger that it sent a fresh wave of lust through her.
Then he moved down and pressed kisses along each thigh, higher and higher, until he reached the apex of her legs, where she was weeping with heat. He put his mouth to her, exploring that heat. His tongue laved her secret folds and Maddi was done...
She was so far beyond any realm of what she had thought might happen that when Ari flicked his tongue against her she came in a wild rush of climaxes that seemed to go on for ever, rolling like waves through her whole body.
When the storm had ebbed away, she could feel little after-tremors still rippling deep inside her. She lifted her head and saw Ari standing looking at her. Eyes burning like obsidian.
He flicked the towel off his waist and Maddi looked down. A sound came out of her mouth that she had no control over. He was...magnificent. A virile male in his prime. She could feel her body weeping for him all over again.
He opened a drawer in a console by the bed and she watched as he sheathed himself with protection.
Good, she thought dimly, because any hope I had of being responsible or sane has long since left the building.
He came down over her on his hands again. Moved between her legs. Maddi’s heart rate was triple its normal speed, and even though she’d just climaxed, she could feel tension coiling tight again.
Ari put his hand on her, just above her chest, and trailed it down over one breast, then the other, reigniting the fire with little more than a touch. His hand moved down over her belly, which quivered at his touch, and between her legs.
His eyes flared. ‘You’re so responsive, amada.’
Maddi wanted to beg. But just as she was about to open her mouth Ari took his hand away and moved himself between her legs. She could feel him there, about to breach her body, and she moved slightly, hips circling.
In the next second he had thrust into her, in one devastating movement, stealing her breath and her soul. She gasped and put her hands on his hips, momentarily resisting his body. He was big. She felt so stretched. It bordered on being painful.
Ari stopped and said, ‘Maddi...?’
She knew instinctively that the pain would only be alleviated if she moved—and she did. Ari sank in deeper. He moved slowly at first, out and then in, letting their bodies get used to one another, sliding and slick. He gathered pace and Maddi no longer felt any discomfort. Only a need for more.
And then he was there, hitting the spot that finally gave her some relief, and the building tension was spiralling out of control, too fast for Maddi to hold on. She couldn’t stop the fall, nor the onslaught of another wave of pleasure so intense that she cried out, over and over again, hands clasping Ari’s shoulders, legs wrapping around his hips as if that might contain it somehow.
Ari’s own movements became more frenzied, and eventually he stilled as the storm went through him too. She could feel it in her body and could only absorb it, too spent to do anything else.
Ari extricated himself from Maddi’s embrace—exquisite torture—and lay back on the bed beside her. Her eyes were closed, lashes long on her cheeks. Dark hair was spread around her head. Her body was still flushed. It was the most erotic sight he’d ever seen.
What had just happened had been the most profound experience. He tried to deny it—but he struggled to remember a time when a woman had turned him on so much that the entire world might have fallen away and he wouldn’t have noticed or cared.
In a bid to try and make his brain start functioning again, he got out of the bed and went over to his French doors, opening them silently and stepping out onto the terrace. It was completely private here. The night air—cool and fresh—made his skin prickle. He sucked in the salty tang of the sea air.
He heard a noise behind him and turned around to see Maddi stir. She came up on one elbow, looking sexily dishevelled and very well loved.
He moved back to the doorway and she saw him. He watched how her gaze travelled down and widened on the part of his anatomy already responding again. As if he hadn’t just died a small death.
But he wasn’t going to indulge again now, much as he might like to. The woman who had turned his world upside down from the moment he’d laid eyes on her and assumed she was someone else, was still hiding secrets.
Maddi felt ridiculously shy, considering what had just happened. She couldn’t quite wrap her head around it. It was too huge, too seismic.
Ari was standing by the door that led outside to the terrace. The cool night breeze traced over Maddi’s skin, making it pucker. He was naked. And it was hard not to be distracted by that amazingly powerful body. She couldn’t imagine standing naked in front of him like that, but he was completely unashamed.
Then he came towards the bed and held out a hand. ‘Come on.’
Maddi let him pull her up from the bed, a little bemused. Her head was still feeling fuzzy after an overload of pleasure.
He led her into the bathroom and leant into the shower, turning it on. Steam soon filled the space. Ari stepped in and pulled her with him. The powerful spray covered them both and Ari put her in front of him. He poured some soap into his hands before running them all over her body. She was glad she was facing away from him, because she hadn’t expected this.
She didn’t know what she’d expected, because she hadn’t thought that far ahead, but it wasn’t this...this tender, post-coital ablution.
He massaged shampoo into her hair and worked his hands over her scalp, long fingers moving slowly and rhythmically. She wanted to lean back against him and slide to the floor at his feet. But then he rinsed the soap from her body and her hair and turned off the shower. The heat and steam dissipated. Ari wrapped a large towel around Maddi’s shoulders. Then he got another towel and handed it to her for her hair.
They hadn’t spoken a word.
He rubbed himself dry briskly and Maddi wrapped up her long hair in a towel, turban-like, and secured the other towel under her arms, tying it in a knot.
Ari went into the bedroom, and when Maddi followed him he was pulling on a pair of loose sweats. They hung low on his hips.
He looked at her across the room, and then he said, ‘Why didn’t you tell me you were a virgin?’