She had fallen asleep in his arms, and as she’d drifted off she’d found herself thinking that she had never felt more comfortable with anyone in her life.
Comfortable was something she didn’t feel right now as he half dragged her across the room; if she could, she would happily have crawled out of her skin. But pulling away would have made her look even more conspicuous.
He came to a halt in one of the deep window embrasures where the half-drawn curtains gave it an element of privacy that Chloe could have done without.
She immediately pulled away, retreating as far as physically possible. He countered her action by raising one sardonic brow.
Chloe embraced the anger that prickled through her with something approaching relief, while simultaneously ignoring the worrying excitement that popped like champagne bubbles in her bloodstream, making her feel light-headed, which probably made the little head toss with attitude she gave a mistake, but she did it anyway.
‘What the hell do you think you are you doing?’ she muttered under her breath.
The silky fair hair that streamed down her slender back settled into attractive waves around her face. As he watched the process he suddenly remembered it had taken a long time to gather it all up in his hand and each time his fingers had brushed her skin she had shivered.
Good question, Nik.What the hell was he doing?
He said the first thing that came into his head. ‘So you’re a royal of where?’
‘Do you mind? I was having an important conversation back there!’
He shrugged his magnificent shoulders. ‘So have a conversation with me.’ So I can look at you. ‘And if by important you mean you were about to get a donation for whatever charity it is... I’ll double it,’ he said casually.
She expelled a hissing sigh. ‘Am I meant to be impressed by your altruism, seeing as you don’t even know what the money is for?’
‘Does it matter?’
She gritted her teeth and fought the impulse to slap him—anything that would break through his armour of sheer selfishness.
‘Clearly not to you!’ she countered contemptuously.
‘You still haven’t told me...’
‘Told you what?’
‘Royal how?’
She gave a growling sound of aggravation through her clenched teeth. ‘My family,’ she said finally in a bored, reading-the-telephone-directory voice, ‘lives on East Vela; it’s an island.’ Most people didn’t have a clue where it was, though most had watched the recent royal wedding on the television.
Nik proved a little more informed.
‘The Vela that has just been reunified.’
She nodded.
‘So where do you fit in?’
Chloe used her stock reply. ‘I’m the sister who hasn’t married the future King.’
‘Lucky you.’
It was not the usual stock response and Chloe bristled defensively at the slightest suggestion of criticism of her brother-in-law. ‘Lucky me? Most people envy my sister!’
‘Do you?’ The speed with which she had jumped to the man’s defence made him wonder if there wasn’t a personal element to her reaction, and the possibility tugged his lips into a cynical sneer.
The sheer unexpectedness of his response made Chloe blink and shake her head. ‘What sort of question is that?’
He ignored the spiky question and reverted to his original comment. ‘I meant lucky because a queen with any kind of history has to be a nightmare for the PR people-lovers with kiss-and-tell stories coming out of the woodwork,’ he explained, pointing out the obvious.
She was tempted, but only for a moment, to retort that her only lover was more concerned about keeping a low profile than she was, so that was problem solved. But what would he say if he knew that? The question circling in her head jolted her back to her usual common-sense mode.