She nods. “It’s velvety, full, rich…” She looks up at me. “Caressing.”
My inner ogre purrs.
“I need a drink,” she announces suddenly, and strides to the mulled wine stall under a big tree.
We line up. While we wait, a soft lump of heavy snow falls off a low-hanging tree branch onto her head. I shake it from her hair. She laughs.
God, she’s lovely!
Our turn comes. I get us two cups of warm, fragrant wine. We drink it in silence without looking at each other.
“Want to see more stalls or attractions?” I ask her.
“I want to show you something.”
“OK, go on then.”
“It’s in my room.”
We stare at each other.
I can read in her eyes what she has in mind, and there is nothing, absolutely nothing I want more.
But I shouldn’t. Aside from my almost engaged status, giving in to my lust for her is wrong. Terribly wrong. Elise is too genuine, too precious to treat like a disposable conquest. And, at the same time, she’s too far beneath me. As a foreign commoner and sister to a jailed crook, she’s utterly unsuited to be my girlfriend, no matter how briefly.
As for considering her for the role of a crown prince’s wife—the future reigning princess—it would be an insult to the principality, my subjects, and my ancestors.
She screws up her face. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s come over me, and why I’m acting like this… You’re married, right?”
“No.”
“Engaged to be married, then.”
“No.”I haven’t proposed yet.
“In a serious relationship, living together?” Her eyebrows inch closer together at my silence. “Dating?”
“Well, no.”
It’s the truth.Heidi and I haven’t had a single date. But I can’t explain to Elise the understanding we’ve reached without revealing who I am, how things tend to work in the circles I move in, and how transactional my relationship with Heidi is.
Elise’s eyes widen. “You’re gay.”
“No.”
She scratches the back of her head and pulls a face. “You’ve taken a pledge of abstinence?”
Why do I find her so damn appealing?
It must be the combination of wine, residual fatigue, and worry for my men simmering in the back of my mind. Maybe the festival atmosphere, too. Yes, that explains it.
I offer her a part of the truth, “I worry for Darrel and Jordan.”
“There’s a bunch of well-trained and well-equipped people looking for them right now,” she says. “All you can do is wait.”
“I know. It makes me feel helpless, and I hate that feeling.”
“Then let’s take your mind off it.” She settles a hand on my chest. “Let’s finish what we started last night.”
