His Royal Pleasure

“No?”

Katherine sighed, then said reluctantly, “This is embarrassing. I don’t know you, but I feel like I should. You remind me of someone, but I can’t remember who.”

For a second he froze, wondering if she’d seen a publicity photo of him. He forced a casual shrug. “Someone you knew when you were young?”

“No,” she admitted.

Alex wondered at the sudden color in her cheeks. “Is it my face?”

She looked trapped. “Yes, your face and your…”

“My what?”

“Your eyes.”

“And?”

Maybe if she said it out loud, the strange feeling would go away. “And your body. It’s ridiculous. I know. It’s insane, but I have this feeling that I’ve known you…” She lifted her hands, searching for the word she couldn’t bring herself to say. And there was no way on God’s green earth she’d tell him about the music.

Alex smiled. “Intimately.”

“But we both know it’s not possible,” she went on quickly, not liking the satisfaction she heard in his voice. “I’ve never met you. You’ve never met me. It’s just—”

He touched her, and her mile-a-minute denial cut off. Her vocal cords jammed. He cupped her chin, gently encouraging her to meet his gaze, and Katherine knew she was in major-league trouble.

“If I had met you, mon amie, I couldn’t have forgotten. Perhaps we met in another life.”

“I, uh, I don’t really believe in reincarnation,” she managed breathlessly.

“Neither do I.” His face grew serious. “But there are other ways—dreams, fantasies.”

Katherine squished her eyes shut, fighting his words and the images he provoked. “I don’t have a lot of time for dreams or fantasies.”

“Fantasies make time for themselves.”

He wrapped his warm hand around her waist, and she thought she’d faint. Oh, God, she didn’t want to make a fool of herself. She’d done such a good job of it before. She clenched her jaw.

“I dreamed of you,” he said. “I dreamed I tasted your smile. I made love to your mouth for a day and a night, because I couldn’t stop. Then I brought you so close, there was nothing between us.”

Keeping her eyes closed, she felt him lower his head, felt his warm breath, got dizzy over his heat and strength. The melody began again, so sweetly it hurt. She waited, dreaded, wished.

His mouth barely whispered against hers in an openly erotic touch that coaxed and threatened and sent her pulse into triple time. She saw herself falling down deep into a well that never ended. No safety net. No coming back.

It scared her spitless. Katherine jerked back, her eyes flying open. “No!”

“No?” he repeated, as if he were unfamiliar with the meaning of the word.

“N-o-o.” She drew it out so he wouldn’t miss it, and she was beginning to think she needed some practice with that word herself. She was going to need ice for the burn marks where he’d touched her. “This weird feeling will go away,” she insisted. “It’s not real, and we don’t need to act on it.”

“Not real.”

Her insides still felt like a five-alarm fire. “Exactly. It’s good that we both understand. It’s perfectly clear.” Clear as mud, she thought. Without a hint of conversational finesse, she forced the conversation back to business. “Is there a problem somewhere on the campground? Or did you have a question?”

He paused, studying her, and she knew she hadn’t fooled him. Such dark, perceptive eyes Al Sanders had. She waited out the uncomfortable silence, hoping he’d relent.

“Do you know anything about a balloon battle?” he finally asked.

Katherine laughed in relief and nodded at his quizzical expression. “Yes.” She checked her watch. “Oops, we’d better hurry or we’ll be late. Wednesdays at two o’clock sharp, all the kids and some adults engage in a water-balloon battle.”

Grateful for something to break the spell, she grabbed some bags of balloons from a drawer and led the way out of the office.

“A game,” Al concluded.

“Sort of.”

“And what is the objective?”

Katherine came to a stop on the wooden front porch of the rec building and looked at him. “You’ve never been in a water-balloon battle?” When he shook his head, she made a tsking sound. “The objective of a water-balloon battle is to get everyone wet and to laugh a lot.”

“But who wins?”

“No one.”

“Then why?”

“For fun,” she said, wondering why the concept seemed foreign to him. “Like making mud pies when you were three.”

Alex looked at her blankly. Mud pies?

“Seeing who can do the worst belly flopper off the side of the pool?”

His German swimming instructor had allowed only perfect dives. He shook his head.

Katherine was determined to find common ground. “Who can blow the biggest bubble-gum bubble?”

Alex’s lips twitched at that. He could just imagine the appalled expression on his etiquette instructor’s face if the future ruler of Moreno had suggested a bubble-blowing contest. “Try again.”

“Okay. Last one. Little boys are famous for this. Who can spit the farthest?”

He laughed out loud. “You’re joking.”

Katherine smiled, liking the rare sound of his deep chuckle. “No. And if you’ve never done any of those things, you’re either an alien or you were raised in a bubble.”

He felt his grin fall, remembering the scandal that had rocked his childhood. “You could be right.”

The turbulence in his dark eyes tugged at her. Al obviously knew how to have the adult brand of fun. He was an expert at everything from sailing and charming conversation to seducing a woman. But he seemed lost when it came to carefree, silly, childlike fun. It made her wonder what he’d missed. It made her care. She deliberately kept her tone light. “An extraterrestrial. The kids’ll love it. Well, get ready for a new experience.”

About thirty kids, some of them over thirty years old, stood in the grassy area set aside for outside recreational games. They wore bathing suits and were screaming for blood.