did not enter into it, even though he knew it should. But as awful as he felt about betraying everything he had always held dear and in the highest esteem, Russell couldn’t find it in his heart to regret the sweetest, most stirring experience of his life.
He was the future king’s right-hand man and the future queen’s protector. He had failed at both. In the worst possible way.
Sitting up in bed, the sheet pooling around his taut waist, Russell dropped his head into his hands in a moment of despair and shame. The crime he was guilty of committing only continued to escalate in magnitude. He should have put a stop to this before it had gotten out of hand.
Before he had gotten out of hand.
Russell couldn’t bring himself to face Amelia. He was afraid of the hatred and loathing he would see there. Not only had he betrayed the prince, but he had taken something very precious away from Amelia.
“You’re a virgin,” he finally whispered. A sigh shuddered through his perspiration-soaked body. How did he begin to apologize? “Or were.”
Amelia stared at his muscular back, hardly breathing. He made it sound as if a death sentence had just been carried out. All women began as virgins. What counted was having a choice as to who would be the first. And she had made hers. She supposed it was her form of protest. She had no regrets.
Please, please don’t ruin this for me, she pleaded silently.
Amelia continued to lie there, looking at his back. Her body was still humming. Was this normal? She didn’t know, she had nothing to go by. All she knew was that, despite the slight moment of pain, the entire experience had felt incredibly wonderful.
“That was the unspoken part of the bargain,” she finally responded, reminding him. “That Reginald receive a virgin on his wedding night.” Her mouth quirked with a hint of cynicism. “I’m sure he’s already had more than his share of those, as well as the tried-and-true variety.”
Russell turned to look at her. He’d taken her silence to indicate loathing. At least she was talking to him. And she didn’t sound as if she were angry. He searched her face for some telltale sign. He reminded himself that Amelia had always had a sweet nature.
And he had taken advantage of that.
He curtailed the impulse to run his hand along her cheek. “I had no right—”
“No,” she agreed quietly, her voice low, “you didn’t.” She saw his shoulders tense and instantly knew what he had to be thinking. He was too honorable a man for his thoughts to be a mystery. Very lightly, she placed her fingers along his back. “Until I gave it to you.”
The very touch of her fingers brought another wave of longing to the surface. He did his very best to bank it down, making an oath to himself that he wouldn’t act on it, no matter what.
He looked at her over his shoulder. “I took advantage—”
“You took what I offered,” she corrected firmly with the confidence of a woman who knew her own mind. “And gave me something to remember.”
She was being kind, forgiving. The smile in her voice tortured him. He felt torn. Because as huge as his guilt was, as overwhelming as the burden of that act was even now proving to be, God help him, he wanted to do it again. To hold her soft, yielding body against his and lose himself in her. To make love with her until there was no air left in his lungs nor a shred of energy in his entire being.
His. Damn it all to hell, he had to stop thinking of himself, of what he needed. Of his own gratification. He needed to focus on what was best for the realm. For Amelia. For everyone else but him. That was what was important.
She was sitting up beside him. Her hair brushed along his arm. He felt heat traveling up his flanks, curling in his belly. Goading him on.
He needed to get this out of the way first. “Princess, I don’t know what to say. I—”
Moving her head slowly from side to side, Amelia pressed her fingers against his lips, trying to abort whatever disclaimer was to follow. Hearing the words would hurt too much.
She read his true feelings in his eyes and her heart warmed. “Please don’t apologize. I’m not sorry it happened. A woman’s first time should be memorable. It should be remembered with something other than a general sense of loathing.”
Very slowly, he drew her fingers from his lips, fighting the urge to kiss each one. Holding her hand in his, he looked at her for a long moment. There were things going on inside him, things that had no place in the role fate had chosen him to play. That his king had chosen him to play.
Why this woman? Of all the women in the world, why did he find himself so strongly attracted to this one? And why hadn’t he the strength not to give in?
“And was it?” he heard himself asking her.
Her mouth curved as her eyes smiled at him. “Vanity, Carrington?”
His expression was deadly serious, even if hers was not. “Concern, Princess.”
“Then you don’t have to be,” she told him. “Not anymore. Because it was wonderful.”
Her own expression grew more somber. She knew what they had done was serious. Not all that long in the past, they would have faced not just censure, but possibly death for what they had done. Even now, there was still a stigma attached to what had happened.
Knowing all that, she still wouldn’t have changed anything for the world.
“You’ve given me something to hold on to, to remember when Reginald comes to claim what he sees as his due.” She sighed, clasping her knees and bringing them up to her. “Why has the twenty-first century come to every corner of Gastonia except where it would count the most for me? I’m living a life that echoes the Middle Ages. I’m being bartered for a treaty.” Forcing a smile to her lips, she ran her fingers through his thick hair. Why couldn’t he have been the prince instead of Reginald? Then doing her duty would have been wonderful instead of odious. “This night may very well be the only true happiness I will ever know.”
Russell shifted toward her, his heart already trapped, even before his body entered the bargain. He tugged away the sheet that she had drawn around her breasts, his blood heating as he heard her soft intake of breath.
“The night isn’t over yet.”
Amelia felt the pull within her instantly and made no attempt to resist it. Instead, she gave herself up to the joyous thrill that rampaged through her body.
When his mouth came down on hers, she felt all points of her body igniting again, like flares being sent up into the night sky.
This time, there would be no surprises, this time, she knew what to expect.
Or thought she did.
But there was more to lovemaking than a repetition of the motions, more than just the anticipation of release, and the first and only lover she would ever welcome to her bed spent the night introducing her to all the wondrous ways a man could make love to a woman. And during the night, Amelia proved to be an able and eager student, not merely content to absorb but to test the boundaries of her knowledge and to see what it felt
