Romancing the Crown: Max & Elena: The Disenchanted Duke

Lying back down, she realized that he’d propped himself up on his side and was looking at her. A jittery feeling snaked its way through her body. And then Max moved closer to her until the top of his torso was almost directly over her. Her heart began to hammer harder than she was happy about, the beat keeping abreast of the throbbing in her pulse.

She needed him back in his space, not invading hers. “Unless you’re looking to pick bullets out of your teeth, Ryker, I’d back off right now if I were you.”

Max heard the slight thread of tension in her voice, felt the crackle of electricity between them. “You need to relax, Rivers.”

The jerk was being condescending, as if he could read what was in her mind. How could he? She couldn’t even read what was in her mind right now. Except that she didn’t want him so close to her. “And you need to back off, Ryker. Now.”

He didn’t move a single muscle. “Is that a challenge?”

Was she going to have to fight him off after all? Every muscle in her body tensed. “If that’s what it takes to get you back on your side.”

She had pretty eyes, Max thought. Even when they darkened. He’d never been partial to blue-gray before. “You know, as a young boy, I could never resist a challenge. My mother said I was a constant source of worry for her.”

His mother used to despair, he remembered fondly, that he would die an early death, led there by his own recklessness. Instead she had been the one to die too early, through no fault of her own.

“At least you had a mother,” Cara heard herself murmuring, her voice hardly audible above the rushing noise in her ears.

She knew she should push him away, knew that all it would really take would be one quick turn and a well-placed flexing of her knee and any impromptu moves on his part would be summarily terminated.

But curiosity got the better of her. Curiosity and a strange physical pull that crept out of nowhere and presented itself to her with his name on it. Desire unfolded within her like a deck of cards being fanned out before a magic trick took place.

“You have a death wish.” Her lips practically touched his as she uttered the declaration.

“Maybe.”

And maybe he just had an insatiable thirst to discover what it felt like to kiss her. An insatiable thirst that wouldn’t be quenched until he found out on his own what her lips tasted like.

And then he wasn’t speaking any longer and neither was she.

Contact occurred and the air around them suddenly became even warmer than it already was, its edges singeing the instant their lips met.

He gathered her to him. Or perhaps she pulled him in toward her. The logistics weren’t clear. They overlapped. All that mattered was that they occurred.

He tasted of something dark and sweet and compelling. She felt like she was a dried flower getting its first taste of summer rain with the promise of more lingering in the air.

Cara wound her arms around his neck, telling herself she was anchored in reality so it was all right if, just for the moment, she lost herself in this sensation. Purely for reasons of edification. A woman always had to know exactly what she was up against.

Max felt Cara’s heart hammering against his chest as he drew her still closer against him, felt the heat of her body infiltrate his.

Or maybe that was his heart suddenly going into double-time. He couldn’t tell. He’d done this simply on a whim, because he couldn’t resist certain challenges, just as he’d told her. But once he’d thrown his hat in the ring, he found himself being sucked in completely as he reached to retrieve it.

If he’d had socks on, she would have knocked them off. Or at least curled them.

What he was entirely certain of was that Cara Rivers had created this itch, an itch so intense, it was almost impossible to scratch.

Or to bury.

But he knew he had to. Business and this kind of thing really didn’t mix.

More’s the pity.

Okay, time was up. It was time to come up for air, Cara’s brain pleaded, before it became completely oxygen deficient.

With more than a little effort, Cara finally managed to wedge her hands against his chest. She pushed with all her might, which, to her surprise, had decreased considerably. Still, she did manage to create a very small space between them.

She could only pray she didn’t sound as breathless as she felt. “Curiosity satisfied?”

She certainly didn’t pull any punches, Max thought. A smile curved his mouth. He ran the back of his knuckles slowly along the silky skin of her face and watched her eyes widen before she got better control over herself.

“Not in the least. Whetted, actually.”

“Too bad,” Cara said, finding a ribbon of strength to tap into. She pushed him back even farther, then struggled up into a sitting position. “Because that’s all she wrote.”

Intrigued, Max drew his thumb along her bottom lip, allowing his mind to wander a little further. Watching her veiled reaction in her eyes. There was a complete untapped vein of sensuality right before him.

“I don’t think so.”

“I’m not interested in what you think, Ryker. Just in what you do. And for your own well-being, what you should do is go lie down on your side of the bed.” She felt under her pillow and produced her gun. She pointed it at him, leaving the safety on. “Now.”

He didn’t believe in forcing himself on someone. Especially someone with gun, safety or no safety. Besides, the world seemed to be just the slightest bit tilted at the moment. Just like in the bar last night. Except that this time, he hadn’t been deliberately drugged by anything. Only her.

He struggled not to show Cara that he was searching for his bearings and that she was the cause of this disorientation.

“I never argue with a lady.”

“Hah,” was her only response. What a crock. He’d argued with her the better part of the time they’d been together.

With exaggerated movements, she turned her back on him and punched up her pillow. She knew damn well that she wasn’t going to get any sleep tonight. But that was all right. Not sleeping fit in with her plans.

Several minutes went by. Max found that his curiosity hadn’t abated. “What did you mean by that?”

She sighed. It was obvious that the man wasn’t going to just peacefully drop off to sleep. He was going to give her trouble.

So what else was new?

She kept her back to him, feeling it was a lot safer that way. “Mean by what?”

“That at least I had a mother.”

He would have picked up on that, she thought in annoyance. Why had she let that slip? “I wasn’t speaking in tongues.”

There was something defensive in her voice. His curiosity peaked, he turned around, only to find himself looking at her back. He squelched the impulse to turn her toward him. No use borrowing trouble. “Didn’t you have a mother?”

She didn’t bother suppressing a sigh. The man was making things difficult for her on a whole host of levels. She tried to ignore the restlessness she felt, the kind she couldn’t put a name to but bothered her nonetheless. “Are you getting paid extra to annoy me?”

“I’m not getting paid to do anything at all with you,” he told her mildly. “For the record, I was just being curious.”

“Well, don’t be.”