that he was no stranger to the matrimonial intentions of women, and their eyes had met in a shared moment of unwilling complicity until she had looked away, feeling awkward and slightly flustered.
But something had happened in that split second of silent communication. Something she could never entirely understand. He had dumped the blonde soon afterwards and laid siege to Lisa—in a whirlwind of extravagant gestures and sheer determination to get her into his bed. He had turned all that blazing power on her and at first she’d thought she had been dreaming—especially when she’d discovered that he was a prince. But she hadn’t been dreaming. The amazing flowers which had started arriving daily at her workshop had borne testament to his wealth and his intentions. Lisa had tried to resist him—knowing she had no place at the side of someone like him. But it had turned out he hadn’t really wanted her by his side—he’d just wanted her writhing underneath him, or on top of him, or pushed up against a wall by him, and in the end she’d given in. Of course she had. She would have defied any woman to have held out against the potent attraction of the Mediterranean Prince.
They had dated—if you could call it that—for six weeks. Weeks which had whizzed by in a blur of sensuality. He’d never taken her to any of the glitzy functions featured on the stiff cards which had been stacked on the marble fireplace of his fancy house, which she had visited only once, under the cloak of darkness. He had been reluctant to be anywhere which didn’t have a nearby bed, but Lisa hadn’t cared. Because during those weeks he had taught her everything he knew about sex, which was considerable. She had never experienced anything like it—not before, and certainly not since.
The memory cleared as she realised that he was standing in her shop, still exuding that beguiling masculinity which made her want to go right over there and kiss him. And she couldn’t afford to think that way.
‘So you were just passing?’ she questioned politely as she bent and picked up her fallen needle.
‘Well, not exactly,’ he said. ‘I heard in a roundabout way that you’d moved premises and was interested to see how far up in the world you’ve come. And it seems like you’ve come a long way.’ His eyes glittered as he looked around. ‘This is quite some change of circumstance, Lisa.’
She smiled. ‘I know.’
‘So what prompted the transformation from edgy designer to becoming part of the establishment?’
Lisa kept her expression neutral as she met his curious gaze and even though she owed him no explanation, she found herself giving him one anyway. He probably wouldn’t leave until she told him and she wanted him to leave, because he was making her feel uncomfortable standing there, dominating her little shop. ‘I was selling stuff online and from my workshop—but it was too far out of the city centre to appeal to the kind of women who were buying my clothes.’
‘And?’
She shrugged. ‘And then when the opportunity came up to lease a shop in this area, I leapt at the chance.’ It had been a bad decision of course, although it had taken her a while to see that. She hadn’t realised that you should never take out an expensive lease unless you were confident you could meet the charges, and she’d chosen a backer who didn’t know a lot about the fashion industry. But she had been buoyed up and swept away on a wave of acclaim for her dresses—and had needed a new project to fill the void left in her heart after Luc had gone. And then when her sister had announced she was going to have a baby, Lisa’s desire to increase her income had become less of an ego-boosting career move and more of a necessity...
He was looking around the shop. ‘You’ve done well,’ he observed.
‘Yes. Very well.’ The lie slipped with practised ease from her tongue, but she justified it by telling herself that all she was doing was protecting herself, though she wasn’t quite sure from what. And everyone knew that if you talked yourself up, then people might start to believe in you. ‘So what can I do for you?’ She fixed him with her most dazzling smile. ‘You want to buy a dress?’
‘No, I don’t want to buy a dress.’
‘Oh?’ She felt the unsteady beat of her heart. ‘So?’
He glittered her a smile. ‘Why am I here?’
‘Well, yes.’
Why indeed? Luc studied her. To prove she meant nothing? That she was just some tousle-haired temptress who had made him unbelievably hot and horny—before she’d shown him the door.
But wasn’t that what rankled, even now? That she had walked away without a second glance—despite his expectation that she’d come crawling back to tell him she’d made the biggest mistake of her life. His pride had been wounded in a way it had never been wounded before, because no woman had ever rejected him—and his disbelief had quickly given way to frustration. With Lisa, he felt like a man who’d had his ice cream taken away from him with still half the cone left to lick.
As his gaze roved over her, the sheer individuality of her appearance hit him on a purely visceral level. He had dated some of the world’s most desirable women—beautiful women whose endlessly long legs gave him the height he preferred in his sexual partners. But Lisa was not tall. She was small, with deliciously full breasts which drew a man’s eyes to them no matter what she was wearing, or however much she tried to disguise them. She was none of the things he usually liked and yet there was something about her which he’d found irresistible, and he still couldn’t work out what that something was.
Today she was wearing a simple silk dress of her own design. The leafy colour emphasised the unusual green-gold of her eyes and fell to just above her bare knees. Her long, curly hair was caught in tortoiseshell clips at the sides, presumably in an attempt to tame the corkscrew curls. Yet no amount of taming could disguise the colour of her crowning glory—a rich, shiny caramel which always reminded him of hazelnut shells. A glossy tendril of it had escaped and was lying against her smooth skin.
But then he noticed something else. The dark shadows which were smudged beneath her eyes and the faint pinching of her lips. She looked like a woman who was short on sleep and long on worry.
Why?
He met question in her eyes. ‘I’m often in this part of town and it seemed crazy not to come in and say hello.’
‘So now you have.’
‘Now I have,’ he agreed as his mind took him off on a more dangerous tangent. He found himself remembering the silken texture of her thighs and the way he had trailed slow kisses over them. The rosy flush which used to flower above her breasts as she shuddered out her orgasm. And he wondered why he was torturing himself with memories which had kick-started his libido so that he could barely think straight.
His mouth hardened. Soon his life would follow a predictable pattern which was inevitable if you were born with royal blood. Yet some trace of the man he would never be called out to him now with a siren voice—and that siren’s name was Lisa Bailey. For this was the woman who had fulfilled him on almost every level. Who had never imposed her will on him or made demands on him as so many women tried to. Was that why the sex had been so incredible—because she had made him feel so free?
And suddenly the self-imposed hunger of his two celibate years gnawed at his senses. An appetite so long denied now threatened to overwhelm him and he didn’t feel inclined to stop it. What harm could there be in one final sweet encounter before he embraced his new life and all the responsibilities which came with it? Wouldn’t that rid him of this woman’s lingering memory once and for all?
‘I’ve
