A pleasant surprise—she was awake.
He didn’t waste any time in opening the door and entering her room, finding her completely dressed and ready to begin her day. She wore an elegant gown of pale pink that was quite unlike her customary, ill-fitting dresses—perhaps it had been a gift from Princess Stasia. Her golden hair had been swept into a coil at her nape, a few curls free to frame her face. And Deus, she was lovely, even if he mourned the lack of skin on display.
He smiled, so taken with her that he could scarcely bear it. “Good morning, my dear. You are looking unspeakably gorgeous.”
An understatement. She was looking like a goddess. Like a woman he couldn’t wait to strip naked and pleasure until she was mindless. She was looking like the only woman he ever wanted for the rest of his life.
Eleanora dipped into a perfect curtsy. “Good morning to you as well. You needn’t flatter me, you know. We are already wed.”
“And you needn’t curtsy to me in private,” he countered, unable to resist going to her and taking her in his arms. “But I was hardly flattering you. I was simply telling you the truth.”
She settled against his chest with a rightness that couldn’t be denied. “I know I am quite plain. Not at all the sort of beauties to which you are doubtlessly accustomed.”
He had known many women who were, objectively speaking, quite beautiful. But he had never known a woman who affected him the way she did. Every part of her was a revelation.
“You are not at all plain,” he countered firmly, kissing the bridge of her nose. “I refuse to hear such nonsense from you again.”
She smelled like the bath they had taken together the night before, like a lush summer garden thanks to the Winters soap. It was intoxicating.Shewas intoxicating. His cock pulsed.
“The truth is not nonsense.”
“It is when it’s not the truth,” he countered effortlessly, wondering if he could persuade her to never leave this room.
They stared at each other, and then he couldn’t refrain from kissing her. His mouth took hers, and she kissed him back with gratifying urgency. He was awash in her, her scent, her taste.
He lifted his head reluctantly. “You’ve taken your tea already.”
“I’m accustomed to taking my tea when the servants take theirs.”
The reminder of the way she had been made to earn her bread irked him—he wished he had met her before she had embarked on her career as Miss Brett.
“I’ll feed Tierney’s ballocks to my pet alligator,” he vowed fervently. “You never should have been relegated to taking tea with servants below stairs.”
He regretted referring to the other man’s anatomy in such vulgar fashion at once, but he needn’t have worried over her missish sensibilities.
Her brow furrowed. “You have a pet alligator?”
Perhaps she didn’t know what the word ballocks meant.
“No.” He kissed the furrow on her forehead, smoothing it with his lips. “But I will find one just for that purpose.”
Eleanora giggled, and the sound was girlish and filled with light, and he wished he could somehow capture it so that he could hear it, again and again, and know that he was the source of that lighthearted mirth.
“You are positively outlandish.” There was no heat to her words.
This was what Nando wanted, this easiness between them. No weighty concerns of the outside world to intrude. It was just the two of them in a bedroom, lost in each other.
He grinned. “I like to make myself memorable.”
Another chuckle escaped her, merriment dancing in her blue eyes. “You are indeed memorable. No one could ever say otherwise.”
“I shall consider that a compliment of the finest order, my dear.” He grew serious, searching her gaze. “But you are a princess now, Eleanora. You needn’t wake at dawn with the chambermaids and the footmen. Sleep until noon if it suits you.”
“I expect it will take some time for me to grow accustomed to this new life I lead.” Her tone turned wistful.
“You are not regretting your decision to marry this mad prince already, are you?” he was quick to ask, not accustomed to feeling so lacking in confidence when it came to the women in his life.
Ordinarily, they lost their hearts to him. They chased him. They wanted him. Instead, he had been the one to lose his heart to Eleanora. The one to chase, the one to want. More than that, however, he understood that a great change had happened for her yesterday. She had gone from Miss Brett to Princess Eleanora, from being little better than a household domestic to being the mistress of a town house in her own right. The adjustment would perhaps be even more difficult when they returned to Varros, for she didn’t speak the language and he kept his apartments in the palace.
