“Nothing,” he said, still smiling. As the limo moved down the ribbon of road, he turned his head to look at the beautiful Italian countryside. Brilliant golden sunlight brushed his face, dappled with the shadows of clouds passing across the blue sky. He was aware of every movement Irene made in the seat beside him, and relished the hot anticipation building inside him. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d wanted any woman so much.
In a few minutes, the limo and following SUV pulled up in front of an officious-looking Italian building clinging to the edge of a cliff, tightly between the lake and the main road through town. Without even waiting for the driver to open her door, Irene opened it herself and jumped out. Standing on the sidewalk, she blinked up at the building, then glanced back doubtfully.
“Are you sure this is the place?” she asked Sharif.
“It is the address.”
Hesitantly, she followed him into the building. The bodyguards hung back in the hall as Sharif and Irene found the small, gray, official-looking room where the ceremony for Falconeri and his housekeeper bride had just begun. Quietly, they took the last seats in the back, behind the rest of the guests, and watched the couple marry in the civil ceremony.
Even Sharif had to admit the bride looked radiant, in a simple cream-colored silk suit and netted hat, holding her cooing baby son in her lap. The groom looked even more joyful, if that were possible. The Falconeris were the only bright light in a rather gray room.
“They look so happy,” Irene whispered.
“It’s beautiful,” he agreed sardonically.
She flashed him a glance. “It’s different from the ceremony last night, that’s all.”
He gave a low laugh. “Last night was about romance. This is about marriage. The legal, binding contract.” A hollow feeling rose in his gut. “Trapping them. To each other. Forever.”
Irene’s eyes lifted in surprise. Then she scowled. Leaning over, she whispered in his ear, “Look, your royalness, I get how you’re deeply uninterested in any sort of emotion that doesn’t end up in a one-night stand, but seeing as Cesare is your friend—”
“My business acquaintance,” he corrected.
“Well, Emma is my friend, and this is her wedding. If you have any rude thoughts about marriage in general or theirs in particular, keep them to yourself.”
“I was just agreeing with you,” he protested.
She stared at him, then sighed. “Fine,” she said, looking disgruntled. “This setting isn’t completely romantic.”
Sharif looked at her.
“Unlike you, Miss Taylor,” he said softly. “You, I think, are the last truly romantic woman of a cold modern age.” He tilted his head. “You really believe, don’t you? You believe in the fantasy.”
She looked away, staring fiercely at the happy couple.
“I have to,” she said almost too softly for him to hear. “I couldn’t stand it otherwise. And just look at them. Look at what they have...”
Sharif looked at her. He saw the yearning on her face, the wistful, almost agonized hope.
As the bride and groom spoke the final words that would bind them together forever in the eyes of Italian law, Sharif silently reached for Irene’s hand and took it gently in his own. This time, he wasn’t thinking about seduction. He was trying to offer comfort. To both of them.
And this time, she didn’t pull away.
“NOW, THIS—” IRENE sighed, leaning back on the blanket as she felt the warm Italian sun on her face a few hours later “—is lovely.”
“Yes,” Sharif’s low voice said beside her. “Lovely.”
Just the sound of his voice made her heart beat faster. Opening her eyes, she looked at him, lounging beside her on the picnic blanket on the hillside. He’d abandoned his jacket on the way back to the villa. She’d intended to return with the rest of the guests, but he’d convinced her otherwise.
“You’re not going to make me go back alone, are you?” he’d asked. “And desert me for a bunch of people you don’t care about?”
She’d hesitated, and when she saw that Emma had already left the town in a luxury sedan with Just Married written in a sign on the back, she’d found it impossible to say no.
The truth was that she was starting to...like him. It didn’t mean anything, she told herself. After all, it was only natural that she’d find his company slightly more appealing than that of the rest of the wedding guests, none of whom she knew. Why wouldn’t she feel more relaxed around Sharif, especially now that he’d traded the formidable native dress of the Emir of Makhtar for a tailored European suit that made him look exactly like every other man?
Well. Maybe not exactly like every man. And maybe relaxed was not the precise word to describe her feelings around him.
Irene shivered.
Stretched beside her on the blanket, Sharif emanated sex appeal, looking impossibly handsome in a gray vest and tie and tailored gray trousers. She licked her lips as her eyes dropped to the sleeves of his white shirt, rolled up to reveal the dusting of dark hair over his tanned forearms.
Just seeing that much of his skin made a bead of sweat break between her breasts that had nothing to do with the warm Italian sun.
He lifted a dark eyebrow, and she realized she’d been staring. And cripes, had she just licked her lips?
“It’s...warm for November...isn’t it?” she said weakly.
His dark gaze looked amused. “Is it?”
“Haven’t you noticed?” She sat up abruptly on the blanket. She was relieved to see the rest of the wedding party and guests picnicking in the post-wedding luncheon farther down the hill. Golden sunlight danced across the field of autumn flowers, in the meadow on the Falconeri estate. Picnic lunches had been arranged for all of them by the picnic butler. Honest to God, a picnic butler. Shaking her head at the memory, Irene reached for the big wicker picnic basket. She licked her lips again, trying to act as if she’d been thinking about only food all the while. “You must be hungry. When I’m hungry, I can’t think about anything but cream cakes. You’re hungry, right?”
“Starving,” he said softly, his dark eyes tracing her. “And you’re right. When a man is hungry, everything else stops. Until his craving is satisfied.”
Irene had the sudden feeling he wasn’t talking about food. A tremble went over her body as she looked at him.
He gave her an innocent smile with his full, sensual lips.
No man should have lips like that, Irene thought. It shouldn’t be legal. She suddenly wondered what it would feel like to be kissed by those lips.
No! She couldn’t
