whatosever to do with the things that were expected of him, the things he expected of himself. He had been meant to marry a woman like his own mother—one of the exquisite Khatanian girls who had been trotted out before him at every social opportunity since he was a boy, each more perfect than the last, each competing to show herself to be the most obvious choice for Azrin’s future queen.
They were indistinguishably attractive, impeccably mannered and becomingly modest. They were all from powerful, noble families, all raised with the same set of ideals and expectations, all bred to be perfect wives and excellent mothers, all taught from birth to anticipate and tend to a man’s every passing whim—and if that man was to be their king? All the better.
Instead, he’d met Kiara in a crowded little laneway in Melbourne. He had been walking off his jet lag as he prepared for a week’s worth of meetings with some of the city’s financial leaders. He’d ducked into one of the narrow alleys that snaked behind a typical Melbourne street featuring a jumble of sleek modern skyscrapers and Victorian-era facades, and had found his way to a tiny café that had reminded him of one of his favorite spots in Paris. His bodyguard had cleared the way for him to claim a seat at one of the tiny tables overlooking the busy little lane—perhaps a touch overzealously.
“I think you’ll find it’s customary to pretend to apologize when stealing a table from someone else,” she had said, a teasing note in her voice that made her sound as if she was about to bubble over into laughter. As if there was something impossibly merry, very nearly golden, inside her just bursting to come out. That had been his first impression of Kiara—that voice.
Then he’d looked up. He’d never been able to account for the way that first look at her, when she’d been a stranger and speaking to him as if she found him both unimpressive in the extreme and somewhat ridiculous—not something that had ever happened to him before—had struck him like that. Like an unerring blow straight to the solar plexus.
First he’d seen that mouth. It had hit him. Hard. He’d seen her brown eyes, much too intelligent and direct, with the same arch look in them that he’d heard in her voice. He’d had the impression of her pretty face, her hair thrown back into a careless twist at the back of her head. It had been winter in Melbourne, and she’d dressed for it in boots and tights beneath some kind of flirty little skirt, and a sleek sort of coat with a bright red scarf wrapped about her neck. She had been all edges and color, attitude and mockery, and should not have attracted or interested him in any possible way.
“But as you and your entourage are fairly bristling with self-importance,” she’d continued in that same tone, waving a hand at his bodyguard and himself with an obvious lack of the respect he’d usually received, which Azrin had found entirely too intriguing in spite of himself, “I can only assume that you see café tables as one more thing you are compelled to conquer.” She’d smiled, which had not detracted from her sarcasm in any way. “In which case, have at. You clearly need it more than I do.”
She’d turned to go, and Azrin had found that unbearable. He hadn’t allowed himself to question why that should be, or, worse, why he should feel compelled to act on that unprecedented feeling.
“Please,” he’d said, shocking his usually unflappable bodyguard almost as much as he’d shocked himself—as Azrin was not known for his interest in sharp-mouthed, clever-eyed girls who took too much pleasure in public dressing-downs. “Join me. You can enumerate my many character flaws, and I will buy you a coffee for your troubles.”
She’d turned back to him, a considering sort of light in her captivating eyes, and a smile moving across that generous mouth of hers.
“I can do that alone,” she’d pointed out, her smile deepening. “I’m already doing it in my head, as a matter of fact.”
“Think of how much more satisfying it will be to abuse me to my face,” he’d said silkily. “How can you resist that kind of challenge?”
As it turned out, she couldn’t.
Azrin had spent the rest of the afternoon trying to convince her to join him for dinner at his hotel, and the rest of his time in Melbourne trying to persuade her to go to bed with him. He’d managed only the dinner that night and then a week of the same, and he was not a man who had before then had even a passing acquaintance with failure of any sort.
He hadn’t known how to process it. He’d told himself that had been why he’d been so unreasonably obsessed with this woman who had treated him so cavalierly, who had laughed at him when he’d tried to seduce her, and yet whose kisses had nearly taken off the back of his head when she’d condescended to bestow them upon him.
“You want the chase, not me,” she’d informed him primly on his last night in Melbourne.
She had just stopped another kiss from going too far, and had even removed herself from Azrin’s grasp, stepping back against the wall outside the door to her flat, into which she’d steadfastly refused to invite him. Again.
He’d had the frustrating suspicion that she was about to leave him standing there.
Again.
“What if I want you?” he’d asked, that wholly unfamiliar frustration bleeding into his voice and tangling in the air between them. “What if the chase is nothing but an impediment?”
“What a delightful fantasy,” she’d replied—though he already knew that was not quite true, that careless tone she adopted. “But I’m afraid that your great, romantic pursuit of me will have to take a backseat to my graduate studies. I’m sure you understand. Dark and brooding princes tend to turn out to be little more than fairy-tale interludes, in my experience—”
“You have vast experience with princes, do you?” His tone had been sardonic, but she’d ignored him anyway.
“—while I really do require my Masters in Wine Technology and Viticulture to get on with my real life.” She’d smiled at him, even as he’d registered the way she’d emphasized the word real. “I’ll understand if you want to throw a little bit of a strop and sulk all the way back to your throne. No one will think any the less of you.”
“Kiara,” he’d said then, unable to keep his hands off her, and wanting more than just the simple pleasure of his palm over the curve of her upper arm, which was what he’d had to settle for. She was not for him—he’d known that—but he’d been completely incapable of accepting it as he should. “Prepare yourself for the fairy-tale interlude. I may have to go to Khatan tomorrow morning, but I’ll be back.”
“Of course you will,” she’d said, smiling as if she’d known better.
But he’d come back, as promised. Again and again. Until she’d finally started to believe him.
He watched her now, his unexpected princess, as she climbed from the shower and wrapped herself in one of the soft towels. She smiled at him, and he felt something clench inside of him. She had never wanted to be a queen. She hadn’t even wanted to be a princess. She’d wanted him, that was all, just as he’d wanted her. Perhaps it had been foolish to imagine that that kind of connection, that impossible need, could be enough.
But foolish or not, this was the bed they’d made.
And now it was time to lie in it, whether he liked it or not. Whether she liked it or not.
Whether he wanted to be the King of Khatan or not— which had never mattered before, he reminded himself sharply,
