‘Yes.’
Of course she knew. His thoughts whirled round like a child’s spinning wheel. When? When she had opened her eyes after her fever? Or even before that? Maybe she had known all along. Maybe he had completely misjudged her and she was an avid reader of those tacky tabloid newspapers that delighted in printing snatched photographs of him.
Maybe she hadn’t been able to believe her luck when she had opened her eyes to discover just who it was who had rescued her.
Had all this been planned and his first instinct the right one? That she was nothing more than a beautiful decoy, groomed to capture a prince? His body tensed. ‘When did you find out?’
With a mounting sensation of disbelief she stared at him, hearing the cold shot of accusation in his voice. ‘When do you think?’
Now he began to wonder whether their innocent and frantic coupling on the sofa had not been so innocent, after all. What if there had been photographers lurking in the undergrowth? Photographs now in existence that might now find their way onto some sick home-movie site on the Internet? The realisation of just how foolhardy he had been made his blood run cold.
‘I don’t know,’ he said icily. ‘That’s why I’m asking.’
She had gone in on the attack and now she felt stung to defence. How dared he? How dare he? ‘You think I knew all along, don’t you?’
He hid his turbulent thoughts behind the icy mask that was second nature to him. ‘Did you?’
Her eyes opened very wide. ‘And you think that’s why I went to bed with you?’
‘Was it?’
If she had thought that she felt sick before, then nausea had just entered a whole new dimension. He could think that of her?
But why shouldn’t he? She had behaved like a tramp! She had nearly slapped him before, but she could not and would not attempt to do so again. Why, in the light of what she now knew, he might have her arrested for some kind of treason!
The truth came babbling out of her mouth like a hotspring. ‘I didn’t have a clue who you were, if you must know! I thought you were just some guy who worked for a rich man.’ Her eyes shot emerald fire at him. ‘Why wouldn’t I? Princes aren’t exactly thick on the ground.’
He realised that he had wounded her with his stubborn, arrogant pride. He wished he could take the words back, but he couldn’t, and so instead he moved towards her, his hands outstretched in a gesture of peace. ‘Gabriella—’
‘The name I use,’ she said furiously, ‘is Ella—just as yours is Nicolo. That’s the reality. And the two people who made the mistake of getting close were not real. You were playing out some sort of fantasy, so let’s just leave it at that, shall we?’
Her perception rocked him almost as much as the certain knowledge that this was something his easy charm could not fix. Not if the raging look on her face was anything to go by.
‘What if I told you that I didn’t want to leave it?’ he questioned softly.
Her answering look was contemptuous. ‘Presumably you’ve spent your whole life getting exactly what you want?’
He had the grace to shrug.
‘Well, this time you’re not! I want you to go now, and I don’t want ever to see you again.’ She sucked in a hot, dry breath, afraid that she might do something regrettable—like burst into noisy tears of humiliation. Far worse than the crushing realisation that he had led her on—fooled her with some game of make-believe—was the hurt she felt inside. She had been blown away by him, she had given him something of her heart as well as her body, and now there must be painful surgery to reclaim that little piece of her heart. ‘Because I don’t enjoy being made a fool of.’
Damn her for her insolence! For daring to talk to him in this way! He should turn on his heel, walk away and forget all about her. ‘That is what you want?’ he asked in a low voice.
‘Shall I say it in French?’ she mocked. ‘Or Italian? Or Spanish? Will that help you understand a little better?’
Her anger had loosened her up enough so that he was able to take her off guard, whispering the tips of his fingers down over the silken surface of her cheek and noting the immediate tremble of her lips, the darkening of her eyes, with a strange and heady triumph.
For it was second nature to him to fight for what he wanted—to prove to himself that he was capable of getting it on his own merits, and not by relying on the entitlements that accompanied a mere accident of birth.
‘Muy bien,’ he murmured, lapsing instinctively into the tongue spoken by his ancestors—Spanish Conquistadors who had fought so long and so hard for Mardivino. ‘I will leave you now, Gabriella, and you can reflect on your folly at leisure. For folly it is.’ His eyes glittered with the light of battle. ‘You are fighting a battle with yourself for no reason, because you still want me as much as I want you.’
‘You really are living in fantasy land!’ she declared witheringly.
The heat of desire beat through him. ‘You will be mine again,’ he promised silkily, crushing her fingers to his lips before turning on his heel and slamming his way out of the house.
CHAPTER SEVEN
ELLA stared at the letter as if it was contaminated.