The Christmas Love-Child

He suddenly wanted to peel away the deceptive layers of the little secretary’s plain clothing. To see her true beauty. To see her naked in his bed. To feel her lush curves against his body and see her bright, unadorned face breathless in the soft pink light of dawn.

Beneath his gaze, her pale cheeks went slowly red, like the blood-colored sun burning through the thick morning mist on the wide snowy fields of his Dartmoor estate. He watched as she nervously licked her full, pink, heart-shaped lips. Her white, even teeth nibbled at her lower lip, followed by a small dart of her tongue to moisten each corner of her mouth.

He felt himself go hard watching her.

He prayed she’d refuse his honest offer of money. Then he could just take her. Without conscience. Without remorse.

“The Leighton boutique is on Bond Street,” she stammered, caught in his gaze.

He gave a predatory smile. “My driver knows the way.”

“Of course he does. You date so many women, I bet you go there a lot.” She turned away, blinking fast as she stared out the window. Beneath her breath, she added wistfully, “It must be nice to never worry about money.”

A sudden memory went through Maksim of the bone-chilling winter when he’d turned fourteen. There’d been no heat in their tiny apartment; his mother had been laid off from her temp job. Three-year-old Dariya had been shivering and crying, and their desperate mother had taken her to a shelter to get warm. Wanting to help, he’d cut school to sell newspapers on the street in Philadelphia. Freezing rain soaked through everything. It had taken three days afterward for Maksim’s coat to dry—three days of winter so cold it left his skin the color of ash. Three days of a wet, icy wind that seeped beneath his clothes and left him shaking till his teeth chattered.

Three days of hiding the wet coat from his mother, knowing that she would insist on giving him her own, that she’d go without a coat herself as she trudged the distance between employment agencies, desperate to find a job, any job.

Those three days had taught him the most valuable lesson of his life.

Money made the difference between a good life and no life at all.

Money fixed anything. Money fixed everything.

And you didn’t get it by being nice.

“What a fairy-tale life,” the girl whispered, staring out the window at all the well-dressed shoppers on Bond Street, the expensive cars, the festive decorations and lights of Christmas. “A perfect fairy-tale life.”

Looking at her wistful beauty, Maksim suddenly had the strong desire to tell this naive girl the truth about his ruthless soul.

But he didn’t. She’d learn it soon enough.

She’d learn it the hard way.

Grace Cannon would tell Maksim what he needed to know. He would try to buy the information. If that didn’t work, he’d seduce it from her. Or maybe, he thought suddenly as he looked down at her, he would seduce her anyway.

He would show this little secretary a kind of romance she’d never seen before. Luxury on a grand scale. He would be lavish. He would kiss her senseless. And like every woman before her, she would fall.

He would make her talk.

He would take her body.

Then…he would drop her.

A man didn’t get rich—or win—by being nice.

CHAPTER THREE

ELEGANT shops always made Grace uncomfortable, and the Leighton boutique was the snootiest shop on Bond Street.

She could feel herself tensing up the moment she walked through the door, past grim-jawed security guards in suits like FBI agents. They gave her a hard stare, and she had the sudden feeling they were waiting for her to make one false step so they could take her down as a warning to other broke secretaries who might try to venture inside this rarefied, exclusive world.

Grace swallowed, looking around the elegant primrose-colored boutique. Buying the lingerie the first time had just about killed her. Buying it on behalf of the man she loved, as a gift for another woman—in such a teensy, tiny size, to boot—was just another painful reminder of the fact that Alan had chosen Lady Francesca Danvers over her. The moment Alan had met the beautiful, wealthy aristocrat, he’d forgotten all about the drunken kiss he’d given Grace just the previous night.

It had been Grace’s very first kiss. But for him it had been instantly forgettable.

“Back again, I see,” the snooty salesgirl sniffed. She looked dismissively from Grace’s worn, wet coat to her scuffed-up boots. “Here to do more Christmas shopping for your boss?”

“I, um, yes.” She swallowed. “I need more lingerie. The same exact one. I lost—”

But as she spoke, the salesgirl’s eyes moved over her shoulder as someone new entered the shop.

Grace didn’t need to look around to know it was Maksim. She knew from the immediate electricity in the room. She knew from the thousand watts that lit up the salesgirl’s face as she nearly knocked Grace over in her haste to cross the marble floor. Reaching toward him. Wanting him like every woman in London.

Every woman except her, Grace told herself. He was dangerous and handsome and powerful, and he was her enemy. She didn’t want him. She didn’t.

“Your Highness! Such a pleasure to see you again,” the brunette cried. “We have plenty of new stock—I’d love to show it to you!”

It was painfully obvious to Grace what the salesgirl would really love to show Maksim. For no good reason she felt herself get tight and tense all over. She turned away, used to feeling invisible. In her job, on the street, living alone in a foreign country…invisible. Alone.

Then she felt a strong masculine hand on her shoulder.

“You will start by getting my beautiful friend a replacement of the lingerie she bought,” Maksim said to the salesgirl. He looked down at Grace. “Then—you will get her anything else she desires in the store.”

“Yes, of course, Your Highness,” the salesgirl gasped, her mouth a round O as she looked at Grace with new respect.

His steel-gray eyes and the touch of his hand caused a flash of heat to spread through her body.

“I splashed you with my car,” he said. “It was an unforgivable rudeness. The least I can do is buy you new clothes. A new coat.”

Grace stared at him, warmth cascading all over her. A moment before, she’d felt so invisible and cold, but with one touch he made her feel alive. With one word he’d made her feel she had value in the world.

“Anything you want, Grace,” he said softly, stroking her cheek. “Anything at all. It will be my deepest honor to provide.”

A shudder of longing went through her. Her face turned involuntarily toward his touch, and his hand cupped her cheek. She tried to pull away from him, but her feet weren’t working properly. Neither was the rest of her.

Except for her breasts which started to ache, sending sizzles of longing down to her deepest core.

And at that moment Grace started to realize how dangerous the dark prince truly was.

She licked her lips. “Thank you, but I couldn’t possibly accept.”

His hand traced lightly down her neck to her shoulder, to her coat. “Why do you hide in these clothes, Grace? Why are you afraid to show the world your beauty?”

He really thought she was pretty? It hadn’t just been flattery? Her mind was spinning a million directions at once, and as long as he kept touching her she couldn’t think straight. “I—”

“This would look lovely on you.”

He touched a lovely pink nightgown displayed on a white headless mannequin. The silk and lace were the blush color of a spring rose, and while the low-cut neckline was covered in lace, the rest of the fabric went elegantly to the floor.