Temporarily His Princess

Four

“Impossible!”

Vincenzo cocked his head at his valet’s stupefaction. The fondness Alonzo always stirred in him relaxed lips that had been spastic with tension since his conversation with Glory last night.

Even over the phone, she’d seeped under his skin and into his system and confounded his common sense. He shouldn’t have called her in the first place. But he’d been unable to stop. The indiscretion alone had been enough to expose his condition, but he hadn’t left anything to her imagination, had told her in exhaustive detail he was burning for her.

Then at the first tinge of disappointment and indignation in her voice, he’d offered anything at all in hope of erasing it. He’d taken back every precaution his mind—not to mention his attorney—insisted were indispensable to protect him.

He jerked back to the moment as Alonzo, in a totally uncharacteristic action, grabbed him by the shoulders.

“Are you teasing me? Because I was lamenting the other day that it seemed both of us would end up shriveled-up bachelors? But…you never joke.” Alonzo’s vivid green eyes widened. “Dio. You mean it. You are getting married.”

He hadn’t told Alonzo why, or how. For reasons he wasn’t up to facing, he wanted Alonzo to think this was real. And to treat the whole thing accordingly. To treat Glory accordingly.

“When? How?” Alonzo grabbed his own head in dramatic disbelief. “You met a woman, fell in love with her, decided to marry her, asked her and had her agree without my knowledge?”

That would have been an impossibility, indeed. Alonzo was almost his shadow, had been indispensable to him since his teens, even before he lost his parents, smoothing out his daily life, anticipating his needs and providing him with hassle-free, meticulous support and problem solving in everything that didn’t involve work and most things that did. He’d only gotten Glory’s visit under Alonzo’s radar because he’d sent him on some needless errand. Not that Alonzo would have recognized her. In a weird coincidence, Alonzo had taken his one and only prolonged leave of absence during Vincenzo’s affair with Glory. It was probably the reason she’d been able to breach him that totally….

Oh, who was he fooling? He’d been the one and only reason. He’d left himself wide-open to her. And as she’d shrewdly commented, he was doing it again.

Clearly unaware of his turmoil, Alonzo pursued his own perplexity. “But most important, who?” Alonzo grimaced as if at an unsavory thought. “Please, don’t tell me it’s one of those women you parade for the paparazzi!”

This was another of the privacies that only Alonzo was privy to. That Vincenzo’s reputation had been manufactured. By him. To keep hopeful and gold-digging women away. To keep women away, period. He’d found a ruthless playboy’s image much more effectively off-putting than a reclusive scientist-prince’s. Around a year after breaking up with Glory, he’d started hiring “escorts” wherever he went, to paint the image he wanted.

Not that he hadn’t been with women outside his propaganda campaign. He’d tried. If not for long. After a few encounters had ended with him being unable to…rise to the occasion, he’d given up. Alonzo had even once asked if Vincenzo had changed his mind about his orientation, asking if he could take the glad tidings to the gay community that Vincenzo might be on the market soon.

Alonzo had been scandalized when Vincenzo had told him he’d just decided to take an open-ended leave of absence from sex. According to Alonzo, that was the most unnatural thing he’d ever heard. A virile man in his prime owed it to the world to give and receive pleasure to and from as many people as possible. Since he had no partner, of course.

But that had been the problem. While Vincenzo didn’t have a partner, his body didn’t know that. It had already been imprinted with Glory’s code. And though his mind had rejected her, there’d been no reprogramming his body.

Now he decided to tell Alonzo what would appeal to the hopeless romantic in him. What had been true, if he didn’t mention the parts that made it also ugly and painful.

“Her name is Glory Monaghan. She’s an American who was once my executive consultant, and now she’s consulting for major humanitarian operations. I fell in love with her during that time you went with Gio to Brazil. It ended…badly. Then Ferruccio slammed me with a royal decree to get married to clean up my image so I can be Castaldini’s representative to the United Nations. And after all these years, and in spite of the way we parted, she was the only one I could think of. I sought her out again and found her hold on me is stronger than ever. Things…developed, and now…I’ll marry her.”

Alonzo’s eyes, which had been reddening as he listened, now filled. “Oh, mio ragazzo caro! I have no words…no words…”

Vincenzo wondered if he’d ever get used to Alonzo calling him “dear boy.” And he wondered if he was making a mistake by hiding the nature of his impending marriage.

Alonzo interrupted his heavy musings by doing something he hadn’t done since Vincenzo was twelve. He pulled Vincenzo into a fatherly hug. Alonzo had been that to him, even more than his real father, though Bernardo D’Agostino had been an exceptional father, too.

Vincenzo accepted Alonzo’s distraught joy, only wishing it was founded on something genuine, already starting to regret that he’d misled him.

Before he could make qualifications that would temper Alonzo’s delight and expectations, and his subsequent letdown when things came to an inevitable end, Alonzo pulled back with a look of absolute anxiety on his face.

“Please tell me you’re giving me enough time to prepare!”

Vincenzo shook his head, his lips once again tugging at how passionately Alonzo felt about everything. “Anyone hearing you would think it’s your wedding, Alonzo.”

“If only!” Alonzo’s eyes filled with mockery and not a little resignation. “If Gio hasn’t popped the question in fifteen years, he isn’t about to do so now.”

And for that, Vincenzo considered Giordano Mancini a major ass. Everyone knew Alonzo was his partner, but Giordano seemed to think that if he didn’t openly admit it and didn’t live with him he would avoid the prejudices that plagued same-sex relationships. As a businessman who came from a deeply traditional family, everyone turned a blind eye to his sexual orientation as long as he wasn’t blatant about it.

Which outraged Vincenzo to no end. He considered Giordano a coward who shortchanged Alonzo to protect himself. So same-sex marriages were still not accepted in Castaldini, but Vincenzo had told Gio he’d stand up for them, make sure everyone showed them every respect and courtesy, personally and professionally. His assurances hadn’t been enough for Gio, and he’d convinced Alonzo that they didn’t need a certificate or the world’s acceptance to be happy. Or at least, Alonzo pretended to be convinced so he could stay with the man he loved. But his reaction now proved that he still yearned for the validation of his beloved’s public proclamation, and the delight of preparing a ceremony to celebrate their bond.

Vincenzo’s gaze settled heavily on Alonzo. Everyone thought Vincenzo couldn’t be more different from the man, fourteen years his senior, who’d been his closest companion since he was ten. Only he knew how similar they were where it mattered. They were both detail-oriented and goal-focused. But most important, they suffered from the same fundamental ailment. Monogamy. The one thing stopping him from telling Alonzo to kick that guy out of his life was that Gio was equally exclusive.

At least so far. Vincenzo had made certain. If that ever changed, Gio wouldn’t know what hit him.

“But it’s worse.” Alonzo’s exclamation interrupted Vincenzo’s aggressive thoughts. “It’s your wedding. Do you know how long I’ve waited for this day?”

“I can subtract, Alonzo. Since you started droning that I should get married when I wasn’t yet twenty. It’s been two decades since you started longing to plan the elusive day.”

“But it’s elusive no more! I could kiss King Ferruccio for pushing you to make the decision.”

“You just want to kiss Ferruccio under any pretext,” he teased.

After that, Alonzo deluged him with questions, milking him for info on dates, preferences, Glory and everything besides, so he could start preparing the “Wedding of the Century,” as he was adamant it would be. He insisted he’d have to get his hands on Glory ASAP so he’d get her input, and construct the perfect “setting” for Vincenzo’s royal jewel.

Alonzo only left him alone when he told him of his ring-picking mission, for which he’d yet to prepare.

Alonzo almost skipped out of the room in his excitement about the million things he had to arrange and the prospect of his prince getting a princess at last.

Once alone, Vincenzo attacked planning the perfect ring rendezvous with as much single-mindedness as he did his most crucial scientific or business endeavors. But even with his far-reaching influence, it still took hours to prepare things to his satisfaction, leaving only two before his self-imposed appointment with Glory.

He rushed into his bathroom, ticking off the things he needed to do. To get ready for her.

Lust and longing seethed in his arteries as he entered the shower cubicle, letting the hot water sting some measure of relief into his tension. Not that it worked. He felt about to explode, as he had when he’d called Glory. He’d felt he might suffer some lasting damage if he didn’t spend the rest of the night all over her, inside her, assuaging the hunger that had come crashing to the fore at renewed exposure to her.

But although he was still in agony, he was glad she’d resisted him, and that he’d backed off. And he was fiercely satisfied that his domineering tactics had made her push back. This was how he wanted it, wanted her, giving him the elation of the struggle, the exhilaration of the challenge. And she’d done that and more. She’d asked to pick her ring.

Suddenly, something that had been clenched inside him since he’d lost his dream of a life with her unfurled. The plan he’d started executing only twenty-four hours ago had been derailed. It had taken on a life of its own. He no longer had the least control over it or himself.

And he couldn’t be more thrilled about it.

She’s bewitched you all over again.

He smirked at that inner voice’s effort to jolt him out of his intentions. It failed. He didn’t care if she had. All his caution and self-preservation had only brought him melancholy and isolation. He was sick of them, of knowing that without her, he’d feel this way forever. It had taken seeing her again to prove that she was the only thing to bring him to life.

It might feel this way, but it’s an illusion. It has always been.

He still didn’t care. If the illusion felt that good, why not succumb to it? As long as he knew it was one.

What if knowing still won’t protect you when it ends?

He frowned at the valid thought.

But no. Anything was better than the rut he was in. Apart from those months he’d had with her, all he’d done since he could remember was research, perform his business and royal duties, eat, exercise and sleep. Rinse and repeat in an unending cycle of emotional vacuum. Alone.

But when he had her again, he wouldn’t be alone anymore. And he’d slake that obdurate sex drive of his with the only one who fueled and quenched it, who satisfied his every taste and need. For a year.

What if it isn’t enough? What if you start this and sink so deep you can’t climb out again? Last time you almost drowned. You barely survived, with permanent damage.

So be it. He was doing this. Letting go and gorging on every second of her. At whatever risk. He’d never have a real marriage, anyway. His only chance of that had been with her. Now that he’d already experienced the worst, he’d be prepared. At the end of the year, if he still wanted her as unstoppably as he did now, he’d negotiate an extension. And another, and another, until this unquenchable passion died out. It had to be extinguished at some point.

What if it only rages higher until it consumes you?

No, it wouldn’t.

You’re only hoping it won’t. Against all evidence.

So what if it did consume him? After six barren years of safeguarding his emotions until they atrophied, of expanding his achievements until they’d swallowed up his existence, not to mention being bored out of his mind and dead inside, maybe it was time to live dangerously. Maybe being consumed wasn’t such a bad idea. Or maybe it was, but so what?

He couldn’t think of a better way to go.

And as long as he took her with him, he couldn’t wait to hurl himself into the inferno.

*

Though she’d been counting down seconds, Glory’s heart still rattled inside her rib cage like a coin inside an empty steel box when her bell rang at five o’clock sharp.

Smoothing hands damp with nervousness over the cool linen of her pants, she took measured steps to the door.

The moment she pulled the door open, she felt like she’d been hit by a car. And that was before she realized how Vincenzo looked. Exactly how he had looked the first time he’d shown up on her doorstep.

Her head spun, her senses stampeded with his effect now, with the reliving of his influence then.

A deepest navy silk suit, offset with a silver-gray shirt of the same spellbinding hue as his eyes, hugged the perfection of his juggernaut body. The thick waves of his hair were brushed back to curl behind his ears and caress his collar, exposing his virile hairline and leonine forehead. He even smelled of that same unique scent. Pine bodywash, cool sea-breeze aftershave, fresh minty breath and the musk of his maleness and desire. His scent was so potent, she’d once believed it was an aphrodisiac. Her conviction was renewed.

Had he meant this? To show up on her doorstep like he had that first day, only a minute after she’d said yes, making her realize he’d been already there? Dressed and groomed exactly like he had been then? The only difference was the maturity that amplified his beauty.

But there was another difference. In his vibe. His glance. His smile. A recklessness. A promise that there would be no rules and no limits.

Vincenzo? The man who had more rules and limits than his scientific experiments and developments? The prince who was forcing her to marry him to abide by his kingdom’s social mores?

Maybe her perception was on the fritz. Which made sense. Vincenzo had always managed to blow her fuses. In spite of everything, all she wanted now was to drag him inside and lose herself in his greed and possession, have him reclaim her from the wasteland he’d cast her into, devour her, finish her…

“Ringrazia Dio for that way you look at me, bellissima….” He walked her back until he had her plastered against the wall. The sunlight slanting into her tiny but cheery foyer dimmed as his breadth blocked out the sun, the world. His aura enveloped her, his hunger penetrating her recesses, yanking at her. “As if you’re starving for a taste of me. It would have been excruciating being the only one feeling this way.”

Exactly what he’d said to her that first time.

He was reenacting that day.

That…that…bastard! What was he playing at?

Fury jerked her back from her sensuous stupor, infusing her backbone and voice with steel as she glared up at him. “You would have saved yourself the trip if you’d read my messages.”

His hand moved, making her tense all over. His lips tugged as he touched her hair, smoothing it away from her cheek until she almost snatched his hand and pressed it against her flesh.

Then he made the feeling worse, bending to flay her with his breath and words. “Oh, I read them. And chose to ignore them.”

“Your loss.” She almost gasped. “Their contents stand, whether you sanction them or not. I’m not going anywhere with you. Just give me whatever ring you have.”

He withdrew to pour a devouring look down on her. “I would have gotten one if you’d said yes early this morning.”

“Fine. When you get one, send it with one of your lackeys. And email instructions when you require I start advertising your image-cleansing campaign and wearing your ‘brand.’”

His gaze melted her on its way down her body, taking in her casual powder-blue top and faded jeans, appreciation coloring the hunger there. “I see you believe you won’t go out with me as you’re not dressed for the occasion.”

“There is no occasion, so I’m dressed in what suits a night at home. Alone.”

This time, when his hand moved, it made contact with her flesh. A gossamer sweep with the back of his fingers down her almost combusting cheek. “You need to know that there are column A matters that are not open for negotiation. And then there are column B ones, where we either negotiate, or you can have whatever you like. Picking your ring is smack dab in column A.”

Struggling so she wouldn’t sink her teeth in his hand before dragging it to her aching breasts, she said, “Wow. You can even make a supposedly gallant gesture coercion.”

“And reneging on our agreement is passive aggression.”

“What agreement? You mean my stunned silence at your audacity in making an appointment without asking if I’m free?”

His pout was the essence of dismissal. “You’re on vacation. I checked.”

“I have a life outside of work. A personal life.”

His self-satisfied grin made her palm itch for a stinging connection with his chiseled cheek. “Not anymore. At least, none that doesn’t involve me. Do get done with this tantrum so I can take you to pick your ring.”

“It’s you who’s throwing a tantrum by insisting I pick it. Far from casting doubt on your impeccable taste when I asked to pick it, I was just trying to make a point, which I now see is pointless. I don’t have any choice and pretending to have one in worthless stuff is just that—worthless. I’ve admitted it and moved on. So you don’t have to prove your largesse by letting me grab a bigger rock, which is clearly what you think this is about.”

All teasing evaporated from his eyes. “That didn’t even cross my mind. I only want your taste not mine to dictate everything that will be intimate and personal to you.”

“Wow. How considerate of you,” she scoffed. “We both know you don’t give a fig’s peel about my opinion. And what intimate and personal things? This ring, and anything else you provide me with, is just a prop. What do I care what you deck me in? It’s my role’s costume and I’m returning everything at the end of this charade. And speaking of returning stuff, just so you’re not worried I might ‘lose’ anything, or that you’ll have to pay a steep premium on insuring it, just get me imitations. No one will dream anything you give me isn’t genuine. And it would befit the fakeness of the whole setup.”

The darkness on his face suddenly lifted. His eyes and lips resumed their provocation. “I must have been speaking Italian when I said this is nonnegotiable. Must be why we’re having this breakdown in communications.”

“Since I speak decent Italian—” she ignored his rising eyebrows; she wasn’t telling him how and why she did “—it wouldn’t have mattered which language you used. No is still my answer. It’s the same in both languages.”

His contemplation was now smoky, sensuous. “No is unacceptable. Are you prodding me into…persuading you?”

Knowing what kind of persuasion he’d expose her to, she slipped past the barrier of his bulk and temptation, staggered to her foyer’s decorative storage cabinet and picked up the prenup. Her hands trembled as she turned and extended it to him.

He took it only when she thrust it against his chest, didn’t even look at it, instead staring at her in that incapacitating way of his, his eyes like twin cloudy skies.

“I signed.” Her voice was too breathless for her liking.

“I gave it to you to read. Signing would have been in duplicates, with both our legal counsels present.”

She shrugged, confused at the note of disapproval—or was it disappointment?—in his voice. “Send me your copy to sign.”

His gaze grew ponderous, probing. “Does that mean you didn’t find it excessive?”

She huffed bitterly. “You know your Terms of Submission leave excessive in another galaxy. You only stop short of making provisions that I turn over the tan I acquire during my time in Castaldini.”

“Then why did you sign? Why didn’t you ask for changes?”

“You said it was nonnegotiable.”

“I thought you’d have your attorney look at it, who’d tell you there’s nothing in the world that isn’t negotiable. I expected an alphabetized list of deletions and adjustments.”

“I don’t want any. I don’t want anything from you. I never did. If you thought I’d haggle over your paranoid terms out of indignation or challenge or whatever, then you know nothing about me. But I already know that. You didn’t consider me worth knowing, and I don’t expect you to start treating me with any consideration now, when I’m just your smokescreen. So no, I don’t care how far you go to protect yourself. This is what I want, too. It makes sure I’m out of your life, with no lingering ties whatsoever, the second the year is up.”

Silence crashed in the wake of her ragged words.

Then he drawled, deep and dark, “A year is a long time.”

Her pent-up breath rushed out. “Tell me about it. I just want to start serving my sentence with as little resistance as possible, so it will pass with as little damage as possible.”

This time his gaze seemed to drill into her, as if to plumb the depths of her thoughts and emotions.

And she felt that he could read and sense everything she was thinking and feeling. Which was another new thing.

In the past, she’d always felt this…disconnection, except in the throes of passion. He’d been the classic absent-minded scientist, with his research occupying his fundamental being, only his superficial components engaged in everything else. Now it felt as if his whole being was tuned in to her. And that only deepened her confusion. What was he after?

Just as she tried to activate a two-way frequency to read him, he turned away, laying the prenup on her cabinet before turning back to her in utmost grace and tranquility.

“I’ll wait while you put on something suitable for this momentous occasion. Any more stalling and I’ll do it myself. I probably should since it’s for my pleasure. I can also undress you first, for our pleasure. I remember in vivid detail how you used to enjoy both activities.”

The avid look in his eyes said he’d carry out his silky threat at the slightest resistance. She couldn’t risk it, since she might end up begging him not to stop at undressing her.

Exasperated with both of them in equal measure, her glare told him what would give her utmost pleasure now. Giving his perfect nose some crooked character.

Mumbling abuse, she stormed to her room, with his laughter at her back, sending her temperature into the danger zone.

Half an hour later, when loitering drove her to screaming pitch, she exited her room. She found him prowling her living area like a caged panther.

He stopped in midstep, taking in her new outfit. Or her old one. The cream skirt suit with a satin turquoise blouse was…adequate. Even with stilettos and a purse coordinating with her blouse, it was nowhere near glamorous. But it was the only outfit she’d kept from her corporate days. Her wardrobe now consisted of a minimum of utilitarian clothes. Otherwise she would have never picked this suit. It was what she’d worn to her job interview with him. What she’d gone out with him in when he’d insisted on not wasting time changing. Fate was conspiring for her to take part in his déjà vu scenario.

She couldn’t tell if he remembered the suit, since that devouring look he’d had since they’d met again remained unchanged.

Before he could say anything, she preempted him. “In case you find this lacking, too, tough. This is my one and only ‘momentous occasion’ outfit. You’re welcome to check.”

“It is a ‘momentous occasion’ outfit indeed. If only for being…nostalgic of one.” So he remembered. Figured. He had a computer-like mind. Their time together must be archived in one of his extensive memory banks. “But we must do something about your wardrobe deficiencies. Your incomparable body must be clothed in only the finest creations. The masters of the fashion world will fall over each other for the chance to have your unique beauty grace theirs.”

She just had to snort. “Uh…have you been diagnosed with multiple personality disorder yet? Incomparable body? Unique beauty? What do you call the persona that thinks that?”

He started eliminating the distance between them, intent radiating from him. “If I never told you how I find you breathtaking down to your pores, I need to be punished. Which you are welcome to do. In my defense, I was busy showing you.”

“Yeah, before you showed me the door, and told me how interchangeable you found me with any female who wasn’t too hideous but meek and willing enough.”

“I lied.”

His gaze was direct, his words clear, cutting.

Disorientation rolled over her. “You—you did?”

His nod was terse, unequivocal. “Through my teeth.”

“Why?”

His lids squeezed, before he opened them, his gaze opaque. “I don’t want to go into the reasons. But nothing I said had any basis in truth. Let’s leave it at that.”

“And to hell with what I want. But then, you’re getting what you want no matter what I desire or what it costs me. Why do I keep expecting anything different? I must be insane.”

He seemed to hold back something impulsive. An elaboration on his cryptic declarations?

But she needed something. Anything. If what he’d said to her, the words that had torn into her psyche like shrapnel all those years ago, had all been lies, why had he said them? To push her away? Had she been clinging so hard that he’d panicked…?

No. She wasn’t rationalizing that son of a bitch’s mistreatment. There was no excuse for what he’d done to her. And now he was doing worse. Reeling her closer even as he pushed her away. Confounding her then leaving her hanging. Depriving her of the stability of hating him, the certainty of why she did.

His eyes were blank as he took her coat from her spastic grip, disregarding her bitterness. “We’ll have dinner first.”

She sullenly let him help her on with her coat, moving away as his arms started to tighten around her. “You’re not worried about putting cutlery in my reach?”

His gaze melted with an indulgence that hurt and confused her more than anything else. “I’ll take my chances.”

“You really expect me to eat after…all this?”

“I’ll postpone serving dinner until you’re very hungry. By then, I also hope your appetite for food will overpower that of poking me in the eye with a fork.”

With a look that said fat chance, she preceded him out of her condo.

She ignored him as he tried to hand her into the front passenger seat of a gemlike burgundy Jaguar he had parked in her building’s garage. He gave up acting the gallant suitor and walked around to take the wheel.

So. No driver, no guards. He wasn’t making their liaison public yet. Because he hadn’t expected her to sign the prenup, hadn’t considered it a done deal? No doubt he’d planned to coerce her some more during this “momentous occasion” until she did. She wondered what recalculation was going on inside that inscrutable mind now that she’d made further manipulation unnecessary.

During the drive, she sat barely breathing or moving so his scent and presence wouldn’t scramble her senses even more. Then observations finally seeped into her hazy mind.

They were leaving the city.

When she was certain this was no roundabout way to any restaurant or jeweler, she forced herself to turn to him.

“Where are we going?”

Still presenting her with the perfection of his profile, he smiled. “To the airport.”