Perhaps she should.
She should be more suspicious of him, after all. And he had to remind himself, every time he saw past her snarling ice-queen exterior to the vulnerable woman beneath—every time he wanted to take her in his arms, kiss her, tease out more glimpses of whoever she was when she wasn’t in desperate pain—that even though he was her mate, he couldn’t do any of that.
He had to keep her safe. And the best way to do that was to make sure that when he left her, she didn’t feel as though she’d lost anything worth keeping.
The frosty, barbed-wire distance between them needed to stay that way.
He tilted his head to one side. “And yet here we are. If you didn’t plan this … What if they did?”
Her eyes flashed. He half-expected to see her lioness in them, like Eloise on the waterfront, but the rage burning behind them was purely human. “Then I had better find out whotheyare.”
10
Francine
Dinner was held in the Starlight Lounge, overlooking the outdoor pool—the idea of swimming as they sailed closer to Antarctica made her shiver—and with a glass ceiling that showed off exactly how few stars were peeking through the solid cloud cover that night.
Francine was wearing a sleek champagne gown that was cut to seem a breath away from falling off her body. She hadn’t thought about it until she noticed Julian was barely able to look at her.
He’d stayed in the suite. Doing what, she could only imagine.
Or not, she thought hurriedly, remembering the surge of black in his sea-green eyes as she stepped out of her bedroom, the dress so light around her it felt as though it had less substance than a gentle breeze. Perhaps she shouldnotimagine what he might be doing. Because the thought of him dealing with that sudden, unbidden tidal wave of lust, alone in their rooms…
God almighty. She should have had that drink after all. More than one drink.
“No bodyguard?”
Eloise’s voice broke through all the things she was not imagining.Thank you, she thought silently, and then raised an eyebrow at her friend. “At dinner? Oh, dear. Don’t tell me I should expect to be in danger on this little trip?”
They both laughed, and the heat building between her legs disappeared like she’d sat in a snowdrift. Because the answer was yes. Yes, she should expect everyone else on this ship—hership—to kill her the first chance they got.
What the hell had she gotten herself into?
Eloise tucked Francine’s arm through hers. “Let me introduce you to everyone.”
“Introduce me? What, no more old friends hiding in the woodwork?”
Eloise shot her an odd look. “Not all of us want to pick off ourentiresocial circle, Frankie.”
“Maybe you need more ambition.” Her stomach clenched despite her breezy words.
Picking off her social circle?
Did Eloise know what had happened with Grant and his mate?
And if she knew that, what else did she know?
Cold washed over her, a prickling shawl of discomfort as Eloise introduced her to the other guests, a dozen or so of them, a mixture of singles and couples. Francine tried to distract herself by matching them to the ship’s suites. A French couple in their forties, the Tourneurs, pale-haired and pale-eyed and with something feathery about them that made her think of carrion birds. Would they enjoy the verticality of the Night Suite, with its open central lounge and half-dozen nooks and hidden doors arranged around three mezzanine levels? The Sunrise Suite wasits pair on the other side of the ship—just as dizzyingly vertical but styled with florals and a water feature instead of the dark stone of the Night Suite. Maybe Eloise had put the sharp-boned Mrs. Smith in there—or perhaps in the dryer Summer rooms, with the sandstone. It depended on whether the snake lurking in her watchful eyes was tropical or preferred desert environments. Mrs. Smith was the oldest guest, in her seventies.
She and Eloise were among the youngest.
“You must be the famous Francine Delacourt.”
Eloise had been tugging her towards two florid men who were in the middle of grandstanding about something—presumably she wanted to move their attention to grandstand over Francine and herself, or maybe she didn’t want the first dinner of the cruise to be overshadowed by a brawl. At the deep Greek-accented voice, she stopped.
“Niki!” Eloise said, all delight.
“Were you going to leave me until last? I hope not.”
