The Royal House Of Karedes: Two Kingdoms. Marion Lennox

      He grinned. Such a ruggedly beautiful face, she thought wildly, made even sexier by that quick devil’s smile.

      “An impressive legal term,” he said. “But incorrect. The penalty to which you’ve agreed has nothing to do with a loan.”

      “Damn it,” she exploded, “do not play word games with me! I know what usury means. And I know what this contract is.

      Unconscionable. Immoral. Cruel and mean-spirited and—”

      “And enforceable.”

      “You cannot coerce a woman into—what was your phrase? Into warming your bed!”

      Suddenly, he was standing much too close. She stumbled back but his big hands were already framing her face and lifting it to him.

      “There’s not a word that even hints of coercion in that contract,” he said softly. “You signed it of your own free will.”

      “How can you do this?” she said shakily. “Don’t you have any scruples?”

      He laughed softly. “An interesting question, coming from you.” His smile faded; his gaze dropped to her lips. “One month, agapi mou. That’s all it will be. One month of being in my bed. Of spending the nights with me deep inside you.” His lips twitched, as if he’d made a joke, but his eyes were so dark they seemed bottomless. “I can endure it, if you can.”

      His words made her blush. How could he joke about the devil’s bargain he was forcing on her?

      “I hate you,” Maria snapped.

      Alex grinned. “Hate me all you like, sweetheart. It’s not your heart I’m after.”

      No, she thought, no, it wasn’t. And that was fine because her heart would never be part of this arrangement.

      “Understand something, Your Highness,” she said, searching for and finding a way to salvage one tiny bit of pride. “Being in your bed is one thing. Participating in what happens there is not something you can ever expect.”

      His teeth flashed in a quick smile. “A challenge?”

      “A statement of fact.”

      “A challenge,” he said flatly. “One I am happy to accept.”

      He bent his head, brushed his lips over hers. His mouth moved against hers again and again in the lightest of kisses. She wanted to lean into him. Wanted to close her eyes, part her lips, clasp his head and bring it down closer to hers…

      I feel nothing, she told herself.

      And wished to God it were true.

      What in the name of Chronos was she doing? Was she packing everything she owned? Jeans. T-shirts. Sweaters. Sneakers and sandals and, hell, another pair of jeans.

      Alex looked at his watch, scowled and shook his wrist. Was the damned thing working? Impossible that only five minutes had passed since she’d first turned on her heel, marched away from him and dragged a suitcase from a corner of the loft.

      The loft. Her loft. His lip all but curled. He’d been in Manhattan lofts before. Soaring ceilings. Enormous windows. Brick walls and polished wood floors. Furniture from Scandinavia that made the most of all that open space.

      Maria’s loft lacked only whatever machines had once been installed here. Raw space, New York realtors called it, and made it sound as if that was a good thing—which, he supposed, it was if you intended to transform it into something habitable.

      This was not habitable.

      The floor was wood but the finish had long since worn away. The walls were brick. Not warm brick, just brick. Old, dark, depressing. The ceiling soared, all right. It soared straight up to an intimidating tangle of pipes and electrical lines.

      As for furniture… there were a couple of work tables. Some cabinets and benches. Boxes. More boxes. And, in this end of the room, farthest from the entry door, a screen that he assumed concealed the bathroom, or what passed for a bathroom, and in front of that, a bed.

      Maria’s bed.

      Neatly made. Simple. Almost convent-like in appearance…

      A double bed.

      Alex’s jaw tightened.

      His own bed—his beds, considering the number of homes he owned—his beds were always king-sized. A bachelor’s necessity, his brothers called them. Plenty of room for a man and a woman and hours of hot sex.

      But a double bed might have advantages.

      There’d be little space in which to sprawl while the lovers in Maria’s bed took some needed rest. They would have to sleep on their sides, spoon fashion, she with her backside tucked into his groin, her spill of wild, sexy curls tucked beneath his chin. He would wake during the night, feel the heat of her against him and his sex would engorge, fill with heat, throb as he shifted his weight, as she backed up to him, as she awoke and drowsily whispered his name while he sought her moist entrance, while he pistoned within her until she cried out…

       Skata!

      He was watching Maria pack and turning himself on.

      How could she have that much power over him? He didn’t like it, not one bit. Men were the ones who held power and if that marked him as old-fashioned, so be it.

      He had surely made the right move. Taking her to his bed as often as he wished would purge her from his system. And no matter what she said, she would not be unwilling for long. She could talk about not wanting him all she liked but when he touched her, all that staunch denial fled. To hell with the fact that she despised him. He felt the same about her. What he’d told her was true enough.

      Sex had nothing to do with emotion.

      As for her threat not to react in his bed… A lie. A magnificent lie. He knew a thousand ways to make her react. His mouth at her breasts. Between her thighs. On her clitoris…

      “Damn it,” he growled, and strode toward the bed on which her suitcase stood open. “That’s enough!”

      She swung toward him. “What?”

      “Perhaps you have forgotten what my country is like,” he said through his teeth. “It is not the wilderness. We have shops.”

      The understatement of the year, Maria thought. Ellos had all the shops that made Fifth Avenue paradise and dozens more. Unfortunately, it had the prices to go with them. She wouldn’t have the money to step through those doors until she completed this commission. One new outfit, she’d been in debt for life.

      Not that that was a possibility. The outfit she’d worn today had pretty much melted her credit card.

      “Excuse me,” she said with enough sugar in the words to cause diabetic coma, “but I’m not done.”

      “You are done,” he said grimly. “You’ve packed enough for ten women.”

      What she’d done was pack enough for one woman who had no idea what the weather was like halfway around the world this time of year. Yes, she could ask him, but that would be a show of weakness. Stupid, perhaps, but that was the way she felt.

      So she’d taken jeans. T-shirts. Sandals. Hiking boots. Sweaters. She’d considered something dressy, but what for? She would not be going out in the evenings.

      She would be going to the prince’s bed.

      She stared at him as he closed the suitcase. She hated him as a woman; as an artist, she couldn’t help but admire him. Well, no. Not him. Not Alexandros Karedes. What she admired was his long, leanly muscled body. His wide shoulders and broad chest. Narrow hips and long legs. The black-as-midnight hair, the dark eyes, the face that Praxiteles might have chiseled from the finest marble.

      He was even more beautiful nude.

      She remembered that. The