Searching For Her Prince

As they both sampled their tarts, he asked her, “Have you seen anything of the city?”

“Nothing but the airport,” she said with a sigh. “During the taxi ride from the airport to the hotel, I had to hold on to the seat in fear for my life, so I haven’t dared take another one. After the warnings the queen gave me about big American cities, I didn’t think it was a good idea to go out alone at night.”

“Chicago’s a wonderful city, Amira. You should see some of it.”

“I’m not really here for a vacation.”

She’d eaten her tart as delicately as any lady, but her beautifully curved upper lip was smudged with a dot of whipped cream. He couldn’t help leaning toward her and sliding his thumb over the spot. Her deep-violet eyes became wider, and her intake of breath at his touch told him she was affected by it. He was, too.

His voice was husky as he explained, “Whipped cream,” and brought his thumb to his own lips and licked the sweet topping.

They gazed at each other, lost in the moment. The thrum of sexual awareness between them practically filled the room.

Her cheeks became flushed and her lashes fluttered down as she demurely cast her eyes at what was left of her tart.

“Amira?” he asked.

She looked up at him once more.

“How old are you?”

“I’m twenty.”

That’s what he’d suspected. But he’d also guessed she was a very innocent twenty. Not at all like Rhonda. The familiar pain, guilt and blame rushed in with the remembrance of his fiancée. For two years he’d hardly looked at women. For two years he hadn’t wanted the responsibility of a relationship…and he wasn’t contemplating a relationship now, he told himself. Amira would be going back to her island. After next week’s vacation, he’d be returning to mergers and interest rates and building a new hotel in St. Louis. But for the next few days…

Amira sipped the coffee the waiter had brought with dessert. He’d noticed her load it down with cream and sugar.

As she returned her cup to the saucer, she couldn’t stifle a yawn. “I’m so sorry,” she said embarrassed. “I think I’m still adjusting to the time change.”

“Nothing to be sorry for. How are you feeling?”

“Wonderfully satisfied. Everything was delicious.” She took her purse from the table where she’d laid it. “You must let me pay for this.”

“Nope. It’s my treat. You saved me from another dinner alone.”

“Do you have dinner alone a lot? Never mind,” she said with a flutter of her hand. “That’s none of my business.”

Her chagrin was enchanting. She was definitely a proper lady. “For a long while now, I’ve had lots of dinners alone. By choice. I put in a long day and just want peace and quiet in the evening.”

“What do you do?”

He didn’t want to lie to her, but he didn’t know what she knew about Marcus Cordello, either. He answered vaguely, “I work in finance.” To forestall her asking any more questions about his work, he laid down his napkin and stood. “I have a meeting in half an hour, but before I leave the hotel, I want to see you safely to your room.”

“That’s not necessary.”

“It’s very necessary.” He wanted to make sure her lack of food had been her only problem, and she wasn’t hiding a more serious condition as Rhonda had.

Amira gave him a smile that made him feel ten feet tall as she acquiesced. “All right. An escort will make me feel as if I’m back home.”

“You have a bodyguard?”

“Not as the queen and king do. But when I go out at night I have a chauffeur, and when I attend public functions I have an escort from the Royal Guard.”

“Do you feel as if you’re always being watched?” he asked, knowing he could never give up his freedom like that.

“I’m used to it, so it doesn’t seem out of the ordinary.”

A few minutes later Amira was following Brent from the room, feeling as if this dinner had been a milestone in her life. She’d never had dinner alone with a man before. She’d never felt the sizzling attraction she felt toward this man. When his finger had touched her lip…heat had seemed to fill her and she’d been unable to look away from his green eyes. Fantasies had crowded her head and she’d known she shouldn’t entertain them.

Yet as the dining room door closed behind them, Brent took her hand and secured it in the crook of his arm. “To keep you steady,” he said with a wink.

The fine material of his suit was smooth under her fingers, and she could feel his muscled strength underneath.

When they stepped into the elevator and the doors swooshed shut, intimacy seemed to surround them. She peeked up at Brent and saw he was gazing down at her.

“What floor?” he asked, his voice deep and low.

“Twelve,” she answered. Her mouth was suddenly dry, and her heart was beating much too fast.

When the elevator stopped on the twelfth floor, they stepped out onto plush wine carpeting. They passed marble-topped mahogany credenzas, Victorian-style velvet-covered chairs and arrangements created from fresh flowers.

Amira pointed out her room number. “Would you like to come in?” As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she felt flustered, not knowing why she’d asked him. Somehow it had just seemed the polite thing to do!

Brent hesitated. “Just for a few moments.” Then he took the key card from her hand and unlocked her door. Opening it, he let her precede him inside. She was close enough to him to smell his cologne, to see the scar on the right side of his brow, to know that being alone with him in her room had been a foolish decision to make.

The small foyer led into a large room with a king-size bed, dresser and chest on one side, and a sitting area with a love seat, chair and entertainment center on the other. A maid had obviously cleaned the room and made the bed, but Amira’s pink-and-green-satin nightgown lay folded on the side of the bed so she wouldn’t have to look far for it.

Brent’s gaze seemed riveted to the satin garment and the king-size bed. “You do know, Amira, it’s not a good idea to invite strange men into your room.”

“I’ve never done it before.” Her experience with men was indeed limited. At seventeen she’d thought she’d been in love with the gardener, but after an uncomfortable groping session, she’d realized he was only concerned with getting her into bed. That had been her only “intimate” experience with a man.

Now Brent was looking down at her with a flare of heat in his eyes that seemed to consume her. Everything disappeared except Brent Carpenter and the longing inside her. He lowered his head very slowly. Then his lips covered hers and his arms enfolded her in an exciting embrace.

Swept away. Now Amira knew what the phrase meant. Nothing but his kiss mattered. The taut heat of him, the trace of his cologne lingering at the end of the day and his musky male scent brought to her mind visions of both of them naked, sharing a bed. Passion she’d dreamed about, but never known seemed within her reach.

Instinctively her arms moved up to circle his neck, and he pulled her tighter against him. The amazing maleness of his body almost shocked her, but the shock gave way to pure pleasure as his tongue slid along the seam of her lips, coaxing them apart.

She wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do, and he seemed to sense that because he murmured, “Open your mouth to me.”

She didn’t even think of denying his husky command. She wanted to know more about desire, more about becoming a woman, more about Brent. Something inside whispered that this man could teach her everything.

The tantalizing invasion of his tongue sent her senses reeling. Licks of fire seemed to reach deep into the center of her, and she became frightened by it, frightened by her reaction to him. She’d never met a man this sensual or this compelling.

Suddenly her hands were on his chest and she was pushing away. “I can’t,” she said as she looked up and saw the deep desire intensifying the green of his eyes.

What would he do? Would he be angry? He was in her room. What would her mother think about her daughter having a meal with a stranger and sharing a kiss before she really even knew the man? What would the queen think? Had she put herself in harm’s way? Would her life be irrevocably changed?

She stood frozen with the fear of everything that could happen.