‘But we know you didn’t.’
‘Of course I didn’t, but this article is dangerous for you. You can’t take it lightly.’
‘I haven’t,’ Cesar assured her.
His eyes were cool and calculating. She knew instinctively that he would be reviewing plans he’d already made. Why didn’t he share those plans with her? This cut right to the heart of why she wanted more from their relationship.
Her pulse jagged as Cesar shifted position, but it was only to ease his massive shoulders in a careless shrug. ‘So everyone knows,’ he observed, lips pressing down. ‘What of it? Does it embarrass you to be linked to a prince? Or would you rather not be linked to me?’
‘That’s not it at all,’ she protested, shaking her head with frustration.
‘Then how about this?’ He pinned her with his black stare. ‘What if that prince asked you to marry him? Would you be mortified? Or relieved?’
‘Relieved?’ she asked incredulously. In her fantasies perhaps! ‘I’d be horrified.’
Cesar’s eyes narrowed. ‘Should I be insulted?’
He didn’t look insulted. Hand pressed to his chest, and with his black eyes scorching her face into an even hotter shade of red, Cesar appeared to be amused.
‘I take it you’re joking?’ she said on a dry throat.
‘Am I?’
Cesar managed to imbue those two words with so much heat and promise her body went wild. Her mind, however, was by now firmly back on track. ‘If I were a drinker I’d ask for another brandy. I could never be princess material. You need someone—’
‘What?’ Cesar queried. ‘Someone like me, do you mean, from a rarefied background raised on a diet of riches and privilege, while you were a raggedy tomboy, dragged up in a stable? It may surprise you to know I was an urchin, filthy and starving, plucked off the streets of Rome after being abandoned by my birth mother. I have a wonderful woman to call my mother, and to thank for hunting me down. The Queen saved me. It’s as simple as that.’
Nothing about Cesar was ever simple, Sofia reflected, though she kept silent as he talked on. ‘The Queen is the only real mother I’ve ever known. Her heart was big enough to make a home for the bastard son of her handmaid and the King, and she went on to bring me up as her own.’
For once Sofia was lost for words. Cesar had never opened up about his past. However bad things got between them, the fact that he had chosen her to confide in meant a lot. ‘I had no idea,’ she said softly.
‘About so many things,’ Cesar confirmed, ‘such as you can trust me with your life. Which brings me to repeat my question: Will you marry me?’
‘I have to understand why you’re asking me first,’ she admitted.
‘What is there to understand?’
‘I understand why you bottle up your emotions, Cesar. To be abandoned at such a young age was bound to have repercussions—’
‘I don’t want to talk about me. I want to talk about you,’ he insisted.
‘By not talking about how you feel inside, you’re letting the past win.’
‘The past is the past. I’ve treated you badly.’
‘And now I deserve a reward?’ she asked, frowning.
‘You’re not one of my horses.’
‘I’m glad you realise it.’ A smile crept through.
‘We’re making progress?’ he suggested.
‘If you can express your feelings...’
‘I do feel lots of things—especially when it comes to you. I feel lust, passion, frustration, tenderness...but most of all I feel an overwhelming certainty that I can’t share my life with anyone but you. I love you, Sofia, with all my heart, my soul, and my body too. Marry me and let me keep you safe for ever.’
‘You love me?’ she whispered.
