Playing the Royal Game

Nor did he glance over to the table of women who had fallen rather silent as he peeled off the black garment to reveal a crisp white shirt that set off his olive skin. There were no horrible surprises beneath his jacket, just a toe-curling moment as he tucked his shirt in a little, and Allegra again breathed in the scent of him, wanted another glimpse of that smile. But it had retreated now and he gave her the silence she’d insisted on and just sat and stared beyond her and out of the window, his index finger idly circling the top of the glass. Maybe it was too much champagne, or maybe he knew exactly what he was doing, maybe he had a doctorate in suggestive flirting, because for a bizarre moment she wished she were beneath his finger, wished it was her that he idly stroked.

‘Sorry.’ He misinterpreted her shifting in discomfort. ‘I’m not much company—today has been a harder one than I expected.’

‘Was it someone close?’ she asked, for it was clear he had been to a funeral.

‘Not really.’ He thought for a moment. ‘He works for me, or rather he did—Charles. We were, in fact, here last week for his retirement.’ He glanced around the room clearly remembering.

‘I’m sorry.’

‘For what?’

‘That’s just what you say, isn’t it,’ Allegra responded, wishing he wouldn’t make her cheeks burn so, wishing he didn’t make her over-think every last word.

‘He wasn’t a friend,’ Alex said, and topped up his champagne. ‘Really, I hardly knew him—you don’t have to be sorry.’

‘Then I’m not!’ She blew up her fringe with her breath, gorgeous to look at he may be, but he really was rather hard work. ‘I’m not in the least sorry that you’ve been to a funeral and that you’re feeling a bit low. Funerals do that…’ she added. ‘Even if you hardly know the person.’

‘They don’t bother me,’ Alex said. ‘And believe me, I’ve been to many.’ And then he conceded. ‘Well, usually they don’t get to me.’

She wasn’t going to risk saying sorry again.

‘So what’s your excuse?’ He looked up from his glass. ‘Or do you regularly sit nursing a bottle of champagne in the afternoon.’

She actually laughed. ‘Er, no. I lost my job.’ He didn’t fill the silence, he didn’t offer condolences as anyone else would; he just sat until it was Allegra who spoke on. ‘Or rather I just walked out.’

‘Can I ask why?’

She hesitated, and then gave a tight shrug. ‘My boss, he…’ The blush on her cheeks said it all.

‘Not in your job description?’ Alex said, and she was relieved that he got it. ‘There are avenues for you… tribunals.’

‘I don’t want to go down that route,’ Allegra said. ‘I don’t want…’ She didn’t finish what she was saying, not quite comfortable to reveal who her family was, so she moved on without elaborating. ‘I thought I’d easily get another. It would seem I was wrong. Things really are tough out there.’

‘Very tough,’ Alex said, and though she had been looking at him, she flicked her eyes away, bit down a smart retort, for what would a man like him know about tough times?

‘I’m very conscious of my responsibility,’ Alex explained, something she had never really considered. ‘If I screw up…’ She felt the tension in her jaw seep out just a little. ‘I employ a lot of people.’ He did what for him was unusual, yet he did not hesitate; he went into his jacket and handed her his card.

‘You just found another job.’

She looked at the name—Santina Financiers—and of course she knew who he was then: Alex Santina. His companies seemed to ride the wave of financial crisis with ease. He was all over the business magazines, and… She screwed up her forehead, trying to place him further, for she had read about him elsewhere, but half a bottle of Bollinger on a very empty stomach didn’t aide instant recall.

She looked at the card and then back to him, to liquid brown eyes and the smile that was, frankly, dangerous. There was a confidence to him, an air of certainty—and she knew in that moment why he was so completely successful. There was an absence of fear to him; there was no other way she could describe it. ‘You don’t even know what I do for a living.’

His mind was constantly busy and he tried to hazard a guess. He doubted fashion—he’d seen the sensible tweed trousers that were beneath the table. And it wasn’t make-up—she wasn’t wearing a scrap. He could see the teeny indent at the bridge of her nose from glasses….

‘Schoolteacher perhaps?’ Alex mused, and he saw her pale neck lengthen as she threw her head back and laughed. ‘Librarian…’ She shook her head. ‘Let me guess,’ he said. Was it ridiculous that he was vaguely turned on as he tried to fathom her? He looked into eyes that were very green, a rare green that took him to a place he hadn’t been in ages, to long horse rides in Santina, right into the hills and the shaded woods, to the moss he would like to lie her down on. No, he wasn’t just vaguely turned on; he saw the dilation of her pupils, like a black full moon rising, and maybe he knew what she did, because there was comfort there in her eyes, there was deep knowing too, and he wanted to stay there. ‘Those phone lines—’ he moved forward just a little ‘—when people don’t know what to do…’ He saw her blink, could feel the warmth of her knee as he brushed against it. ‘They ring you?’

‘No.’ She didn’t laugh at this suggestion, she hardly dared move, because she could feel his leg and wanted it to stay there, wanted to lean across the table and meet his mouth, but she snapped herself out of it, pulled back in her seat and ended whatever strange place he had just beckoned her to. ‘I work in publishing—I’m a copy editor. Was,’ she added. She wanted to signal the waitress, wanted a glass of water, hell, she’d take the jug and pour it over herself this second.

‘I’m sure I could find you something….’

That really would be out of the frying pan and into the fire, Allegra thought, offering him back his card with a shake of her head. But her hand trembled slightly as it did so, because what a lovely fire it would be to burn in.

‘I’ll find something.’

‘I’m sure you will,’ Alex said. ‘Keep it. You might change your mind.’

‘Do you normally go around hiring your staff in bars?’

‘I leave the hiring to others. If you ring that number you would only get as far as my assistant, Belinda. I can tell her to expect—’

‘That won’t be necessary,’ Allegra interrupted. ‘I’m just talking, not asking for a solution.’

‘It is how my brain works,’ Alex admitted. ‘Problem—solve it.’

‘When sometimes all you have to do is listen.’

She watched as he visibly wrestled with such a suggestion, guessed that this man was not used to sitting idly by in any situation, that he was more than used to coming up with a rapid solution. But as he took another drink and stared out to the bar where he had stood with his colleague last week, perhaps it dawned on him then that not everything came with a solution, and he gave a small nod. ‘Charles had many plans for his retirement—he was talking about them last week. I guess it got me thinking.’

Allegra nodded.

‘All the things you want to do,’ he continued, ‘intend to do… cannot do.’

‘Cannot?’ Allegra asked, because surely a man like Alex could do anything he wanted. He had looks that opened doors, and from his name, from the cut of his hair to the beautifully shod feet, she knew it wasn’t his finances that would stop him.

‘This time next year…’ He was unusually pensive, not that she could know, but now, this afternoon, he felt as if time were running out. ‘I’ll be married.’

Allegra gave him a very wide-eyed look. ‘If you’re engaged then you should not be joining women in a bar and sharing a bottle of champagne with them. Shouldn’t be…’ She halted, not wanting to voice the word, because for a little while there they’d been flirting—not even flirting, far more than that. It had felt as if they had been kissing. She really was going now anyway; he’d nearly finished the bottle. And maybe it was an overreaction to leave so hastily, but there was something about him that screamed warning. Not that he was inappropriate, more the wander of her own thoughts, because his mere finger on a glass had had her mind wandering. Something about him told her he’d make it terribly, terribly easy to break very firm rules.

‘Don’t leave…’ As she put down the note his fingers pressed over hers, wrapped them around the bill and held them a fraction. It was first contact and it was blistering; she could feel the heat from his fingers warm not just her own but race, too, to her face. ‘I’m not in love… I’m betrothed.’

‘There’s a difference?’ She smarted, though she was curious as to his unusual choice of word. She’d never heard a man, never heard anyone, describe themselves as betrothed. What was the difference?

‘God, yes.’

Go, her mind told her, just turn around and go! Except his hand was still curled around her fingers and there was sudden torture in the dark eyes that held hers.

‘I am Crown Prince Alessandro Santina.’ He was too weary to dodge the facts and so rarely wanting of conversation, strangely willing to reveal his truth. ‘I have been told I am to return and fulfill my duties.’

She could not have known just how many times she would replay that moment—could never have guessed how often she would look back to the very last time that she could simply have walked away.

She didn’t though.

Despite herself, Allegra sat and heard the rest.

CHAPTER TWO

‘SHE was chosen for me.’