hall, past the dining room, to the kitchen. She took a deep breath and put the lamp base to her shoulder, as if it was a bat she might swing.
She went through the door and saw a dark shape huddled by the fridge. She squinted, her heart thudding crazily. Too big to be a raccoon. Wolverine? Small bear? What had the storm chased in?
“Get out,” she cried, and lunged forward.
The dark shape unfolded and stood up. It wasn’t a bear! It was a man.
“Oh!” she said, screeching to a halt just before hitting the shape with her heavy brass weapon. She dropped the lamp. The weight of it smashed her toe, and she heard the bulb break. She cried out.
The shape took form in front of her in less time than it took to take a single breath. It was Prince Luca. He took her shoulders in firm hands.
“Miss Albright?”
What kind of dark enchantment was this? Where a bear turned into a prince? Where his crisp scent enveloped her and where his hands on her shoulders felt strong and masterful and like something she could lean into, rely on, surrender some of her own self-sufficiency to? The pain in her foot seemed to be erased entirely.
She bit back a desire to giggle at the absurdity of it. “Oh my gosh. I nearly hit you. I’m so sorry. Your Highness. Prince Luca. I could have caused an international incident!”
He didn’t seem to see the humor in it. His handsome face was set in grim lines. His eyes were snapping.
Somebody else had eyes like that when they were annoyed. Who was it?
“What on earth?” he snapped at her. “You were going to attack what you presumed to be an intruder? Who would come through this storm to break into your kitchen?”
“I wasn’t thinking a human intruder. I was thinking it might be a bear.”
“A bear?” he asked, astounded. He took his hands from her shoulders, but his brow knit in consternation.
“It wouldn’t be the first time.”
“Seriously?” His face was gorgeous in the near darkness, and his voice was made richer by the slight irritation in it.
“It’s not unheard of for them to get inside. Or other creatures. Storms, in particular, seem to disorient our wild neighbors in their search for food and shelter.”
His brows lowered over those sinfully dark eyes. “I meant seriously, you were going to attack a bear with—” He bent and picked it up. “What is this?”
“A lamp base.”
“It is indeed heavy.”
“As I found out when I dropped it on my foot.”
“It seems impossibly brave to attack a bear with a lamp. Or anything else for that matter.”
“I may not have thought it through completely.”
“You think?” He set the lamp base carefully aside.
“On the other hand, I’ve lived here all my life. I’ve learned you have to deal with situations as they arise. You can’t just ignore them and hope they go away.”
“It was extraordinarily foolish,” he said stubbornly.
“You obviously have no idea what a bear can do to a kitchen in just a few minutes.”
“No. And even though Casavalle has missed the blessing of a bear population, I have some idea what it could do to a tiny person wielding a lamp as a weapon in the same amount of time.”
Did he feel protective of her? Something warm and lovely—suspiciously like weakness—unfolded within her. She saw the wisdom of fighting that particular weakness at all costs.
“Let’s make a deal,” she said, and heard a touch of snippiness in her tone. “I won’t tell you how to do your job, if you don’t tell me how to do mine.”
He was taken aback by that. Obviously, when he spoke, people generally deferred. Probably when he got that annoyed look on his face, they began scurrying to win back his favor. She just pushed her chin up a little higher.
The Prince shoved his hands in his trouser pockets and rocked back on his heels and regarded her with undisguised exasperation.
“Are you all right, then?” he asked, finally.
“Oh sure,” she said, but when she took a step back from him, she crunched down on the broken bulb, and let out a little shriek of pain.
To her shock, with no hesitation at all, Prince Luca scooped her up in his arms. Imogen was awed by the strength of him, by the hardness of his chest, by the beat of their hearts so close together. His scent intensified around her, and it was headier than wine: clean, pure, masculine.
The weakness was back, and worse than ever!
“There’s more broken shards over here,” he said, in way of explanation, “and it’s possibly slippery, as well. I dropped the soup bowl.”
“That’s the sound that made me think there was a bear in here.”
“Ah. Well, let me just find a safe place for you.”
As if there could be a safer place than nestled here next to his heart! An illusion—the way she was reacting to his closeness, being nestled next to his heart was not safe at all, but dangerous.
He kicked out a kitchen chair and set her in it. He slipped a cell phone from his pocket and turned on the flashlight, then knelt at her feet.
“You should try and save the battery,” she suggested weakly.
He ignored her, a man not accustomed to people giving him directions. “Which foot?”
“Left.”
Given the stern look of fierce concentration on his handsome face as he knelt over her foot, he peeled back her sock with exquisite gentleness. He cupped her naked heel in the palm of his hand and lifted her foot. Her heart was thudding more crazily now than when she had thought there was a bear in her kitchen!
“Miss Albright—”
“Imogen, please.” Given the thudding of her heart and the melting of her bones, that invitation to more familiarity between them was just plain dumb.
“Imogen.” His voice was a soft caress, and his tone was one that might be used to reassure a frightened child. Perhaps he could feel the too-hard beating of her heart and had mistaken it for pain and fear instead of acute awareness of him?
“There seems to be a bit of blood here.” He leaned in closer, so close that his breath tickled her toes and made her feel slightly faint. “And just a tiny bit of glass. I think I can remove it with tweezers, if you can point me in the direction of some. A first aid kit, perhaps?”
“On the wall over there.” Her voice, in her own ears, sounded faintly breathless, as croaky as a frog singing a night song.
