The Ice Prince. Sandra Marton

      The Orsini Dynasty continues with:

       THE ORSINI BRIDES

       Two Sicilian sisters, two powerful princes— two passionate, tempestuous marriages!

      The Orsini name is synonymous with power

      in Sicily, and no ordinary man could possibly

      capture the heart of an Orsini woman—

      at times like this, only a prince will do!

      Sparks fly when Anna Orsini meets

       THE ICE PRINCE Draco Valenti

      Coming soon: Isabella’s story

      Also in this series:

       The Orsini Brothers

      RAFFAELE:

       TAMING HIS TEMPESTUOUS VIRGIN

      DANTE:

       CLAIMING HIS SECRET LOVE-CHILD

      FALCO:

       THE DARK GUARDIAN

      NICOLO:

       THE POWERFUL SICILIAN

      About the Author

      SANDRA MARTON wrote her first novel while she was still in primary school. Her doting parents told her she’d be a writer some day, and Sandra believed them. In secondary school and college she wrote dark poetry nobody but her boyfriend understood—though, looking back, she suspects he was just being kind. As a wife and mother she wrote murky short stories in what little spare time she could manage, but not even her boyfriend-turned-husband could pretend to understand those. Sandra tried her hand at other things, among them teaching and serving on the Board of Education in her home town, but the dream of becoming a writer was always in her heart.

      At last Sandra realised she wanted to write books about what all women hope to find: love with that one special man, love that’s rich with fire and passion, love that lasts for ever. She wrote a novel, her very first, and sold it to Mills & Boon® Modern™ Romance. Since then she’s written more than sixty books, all of them featuring sexy, gorgeous, larger-than-life heroes. A four-time RITA® award finalist, she’s also received five RT Book Reviews magazine awards, and has been honoured with RT’s Career Achievement Award for Series Romance. Sandra lives with her very own sexy, gorgeous, larger-than-life hero in a sun-filled house on a quiet country lane in the north-eastern United States.

       Dear Reader

      Welcome to the world of the Orsini family.

      Cesare Orsini is rich and powerful. He commands men who would give their lives for him. He has a quiet, dutiful wife … and four sons and two daughters who refuse to be quiet or dutiful!

      You’ve met Raffaele, Dante, Falco and Nicolo—the Orsini brothers. You were with them as they reluctantly carried out missions meant to clear Cesare’s conscience before he dies, or so he claims. You were there as they fell in love with the women who would forever change their lives. And then you wrote to me, in extraordinary numbers, asking me to tell the stories of the Orsini sisters, Anna and Isabella.

      I’m delighted to tell you that I have!

      You’ll meet Anna first. She’s an attorney who defends the poor and powerless. She’s spirited and beautiful, and she’s dealt with enough men like Prince Draco Marcellus Valenti to despise him on sight. Draco is rich, good-looking and arrogant. He’s drawn by Anna’s beauty but she’s infuriatingly independent. What man would want a woman like that? Still, neither can deny the hot, wild physical attraction that catches fire the night they meet though by the time the night ends, they’d just as soon never see each other again.

      Fate has other ideas.

      It turns out that Draco and Anna are opponents in what might become an ugly international war. They’re both up for the battle … especially if it’s going to be fought in Draco’s bed.

      I hope you enjoy reading THE ICE PRINCE as much as I enjoyed writing it!

      With love,

       Sandra

      The Ice Prince

      Sandra Marton

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      CHAPTER ONE

      THE first time he noticed her was in the Air Italy VIP lounge.

      Noticed? Later, that would strike him as a bad joke. How could he not have noticed her?

      The fact was, she burst into his life with all the subtlety of a lit string of firecrackers. The only difference? Firecrackers would have been less dangerous.

      Draco was sitting in a leather chair near the windows, doing his best imitation of a man reading through a file on his laptop when the truth was he was too sleep-deprived, too jet-lagged, too wound up to do more than try to focus his eyes on the screen.

      As if all that weren’t enough, he had one hell of a headache.

      Six hours from Maui to Los Angeles. A two-hour layover there, followed by six hours more to New York and now another two-hour layover that was stretching toward three.

      He couldn’t imagine anyone who would be happy at such an endless trip, but for a man accustomed to flying in his own luxurious 737, the journey was rapidly becoming intolerable.

      Circumstances had given him no choice.

      His plane was down for scheduled maintenance, and with the short notice he’d had of the urgent need to return to Rome, there’d been no time to make other arrangements.

      Not even Draco Valenti—Prince Draco Marcellus Valenti, because he was certain his ever-efficient PA had resorted to the use of his full, if foolish, title in her attempts to make more suitable arrangements—could come up with a rented aircraft fit for intercontinental flight at the last minute.

      He had flown coach from Maui to L.A., packed in a center seat between a man who oozed over the armrest that barely separated them and an obscenely cheerful middle-aged woman who had talked nonstop as they flew over the Pacific. Draco had gone from polite mmms and uh-huhs to silence, but that had not stopped her from telling him her life story.

      He had done better on the cross-country flight to Kennedy Airport, managing to snag a suddenly available first-class seat, but again the person next to him had wanted to talk, and not even Draco’s stony silence had shut him up.

      For this last leg of his journey, the almost four thousand miles that would finally take him home, he had at the last minute gone to the gate and, miracle of miracles, snagged two first-class seats—one for himself, the other to ensure he would make the trip alone.

      Then he’d headed here, to the lounge, comforted by the hope that he might be able to nap, to calm down, if nothing else, before the confrontation that lay ahead.

      It would not be easy, but nothing would be gained by losing control. If life had taught him one great lesson, that was it. And just as he was silently repeating that mantra, trying to focus on ways to contain the anger inside him, the door to the all but empty first-class lounge swung open so hard it banged against the wall.

       Cristo!

      Just what he needed, he thought grimly as the pain in his temple jumped a notch.

      Glowering, he looked up.

      And saw the woman.

      He disliked her on sight.

      At