course they matter,’ Marco stopped her sharply. ‘And it was in part to protect them, and you, that I decided not to inform you of the change in my circumstances when my grandfather first announced that he intended to step down from the throne and hand it on to me.’
‘To protect me?’ Emily almost choked on her fury. ‘Hand on the throne? Don’t bother continuing, Marco. No wonder you told me when you first took me to bed that all you wanted was sex. You knew that was the only kind of relationship there could ever be between us! You knew that one day you would be Niroli’s king. No doubt you are expected to marry a princess. Is she picked out for you already, your royal bride?’
‘No.’
Emily shrugged disdainfully. ‘There’s no point in replying because, whatever you say, I can’t believe you, not now.’
‘Emily, listen to me. This has gone far enough. You are being ridiculous. I know you have had a bit of a shock, but…’
‘A bit of a shock? A bit of a shock?’
When she whirled round and headed for the door, Marco demanded, ‘Where are you going?’
‘To pack my things,’ Emily told him fiercely. ‘I’m leaving, Marco, right now. I can’t and won’t stay here with you. I feel I don’t know you any more, and right now I don’t really want to.’
‘Don’t be stupid. Where will you go? This is your home.’
‘No, this is your apartment, it has never been my home. As to where I will go, I have a home of my own—remember?’ she challenged him.
Marco frowned. ‘Your house in Chelsea? But your assistant is living there.’
‘She was living there, but she moved in with her new partner at the weekend, not that it or anything else in my life is any business of yours, Your Highness. Or should it be Your Majesty?’
‘Emily.’ He reached for her but she started to pull away from him, a look of angry contempt in her eyes that infuriated him. She had accused him of deceit and duplicity, but what about her actions? What about the fact that she had gone through his private papers behind his back? Her accusations had stung his pride, and now suddenly recognising that control of the situation had been taken from him and that she was about to walk out on him awakened all his most deeply held, atavistic male feelings about her. She was his—his until he chose to end their relationship.
Emily’s eyes widened in mute shock as his fingers closed round her wrist, imprisoning her, and she saw the familiar look of arousal darkening his eyes. ‘Let go of me,’ she snapped. ‘You can’t really expect…’
‘I can’t really expect what?’
He wasn’t going to let her go, Emily realised. She felt a quiver of sensation run down her spine—and it wasn’t fear.
‘What is it that I can’t expect, Emily?’ he repeated silkily. ‘Is it that I can’t expect to take you to bed any more—is that what you were going to say? That I can’t expect to touch you or hold you?’
She had edged towards the study door as he’d advanced, but before she could open it and escape Marco reached past her, kicking it shut. Then, he placed his hands on it either side of her so that she was caught between the door and him. A telltale spiral of excitement was sizzling through her, its presence within her reminding her of the early days of their affair, when just to know that Marco wanted her and intended to have her was enough to leave her quivering on the edges of erotic need and surrender. Just as she was doing now. She tried to vocalise her denial, not just of her own arousal but also of Marco’s intentions, but the words were locked in her throat. Beneath the soft wool of her sweater she could feel the growing hardening of her nipples and the desire-heavy weight of her breasts. How long had it been since she had felt like this? How long had it been since Marco had shown her this side of himself? So long that she couldn’t remember? So long that, because it was happening now, she couldn’t resist his allure?
Her heart jerked around inside her chest as though it were suspended on a piece of elastic. The ache in her breasts curled down through her belly to taunt her sex and tease from it a throbbing pulse of excitement and longing. She realised that she should be horrified by the way she was reacting to him, in view of what she had now discovered, horrified and determined not to let him touch her, sickened by the thought of him touching her. But she also knew that she wasn’t; instead she wanted him with a physical intensity that held her fast in an unfamiliar, almost violent grip.
‘Is that what you wanted to say to me, Emily—that I can’t make you want me any more, that I can’t arouse you, that I can’t do this…?’ He lifted his hand and stroked a fingertip down the side of her neck and along her collar-bone, making her shudder in violent erotic delight. He had moved closer to her, so close that she could smell the familiar scent of his cologne and the aroused heat of his body. Was it that, with its powerful but subtle message of male sexuality, that was turning her boneless with aching longing for him, even while her mind was telling her that she should resist him, and that this was no way for her to behave if she truly wanted him to believe what she had said?
She should say something, tell him to stop; tell him that there was no point in this for either of them. But she knew that she wouldn’t, just as she knew that some deep-rooted female part of her wanted this show of male dominance from him, wanted her own sense of fierce surging excitement, wanted and needed the pure, fierce searing heat of the mutual lust they had conjured up out of nowhere. She could quite easily have pushed past him, Emily knew, and she knew too that Marco would not try to stop her if she did. But the reality was that she didn’t want to… The reality was that her body was possessed by an incendiary mix of anger and desire that took fire from Marco’s determination to confront her with her own acceptance of his power to arouse her.
‘But that would be a lie, wouldn’t it?’ Marco challenged her softly as he continued his relentless sensual assault, his lips brushing the bare flesh of her throat in between each word, imprisoning her in her own wild arousal.
‘Wouldn’t it?’ he insisted as he slid his hand beneath her sweater and freed her breasts from the constriction of her bra. A low moan of unappeased longing bubbled in her throat as he fed her craving for his possession.
‘You want more?’ he demanded, his voice thickening and softening.
‘No!’ Emily lied. She could feel his hand cupping her breast and his fingertips stroking deliberately against her nipple again. She knew she couldn’t hold out much longer against the dammed-up force of her own need. With a low sound of surrender, she reached blindly for him, drawing his head down towards her own, her lips parting for his kiss and the swift, exultant victory of his tongue.
She could feel the thick hardness of his manhood pressing against her body. In her mind’s eye she visualised his naked body, familiar now after their years together, seeing behind her closed eyes the thick sheathing of smooth flesh over rigid muscle, where it rose from the dark silky thickness of hair. She could almost feel the smooth warmth of him, so enticingly supple to her touch, and so responsive to the caress of her fingers and her mouth. Fresh longing seized her. Impetuously she reached down between their bodies to touch him, spanning his length with the spread of her fingertips, and then stroking his thickness. A deep purr of satisfaction gathered in her throat as she felt him stiffen further and then pulse, becoming a moan of out-of-control urgency when she felt him tugging at the fastening of her skirt.
Not even in their early days together had she experienced this degree of intense need, she
