The Mills & Boon Stars Collection. Cathy Williams

like that either.

      He could feel her contracting around him as his body jerked like a puppet whose strings had been cut, and only when nature had finished with him and emptied him of all his seed did he have the strength to pull out. To roll away from her and close his mind to the rapturous look on her face as her eyelids fluttered to a close. To ignore the ruffled hair and dreamy expression of someone who had just experienced sex for the first time. Because although he wanted to lick her breasts and slide his hand between her thighs again and make her come all over his fingers, he didn’t intend touching her until she’d given him some kind of explanation.

      A virgin! Dazedly, he shook his head. Whoever would have guessed it, when she’d agreed to have casual sex without any degree of hesitation? She’d been so up for it that they could have done it in the swimming pool. Or in the garden. If he’d laid her out on the kitchen table where she buttered bread each morning, he reckoned she still would have given him the green light. Why, she’d acted like someone completely at ease with her own sexuality—right up to the moment when he’d thrust inside her and she’d made that broken little cry. Why the hell hadn’t she told him she was innocent—and at least given him the option of whether or not he wanted to be the first?

      And yet it had been amazing, hadn’t it? The most amazing sex he could remember?

      Pushing away the rogue thought, he didn’t speak until he was certain his words would come out as measured and controlled. But even then his throat felt constricted and he could feel another rush of heat to his groin as he remembered easing into her slick tightness.

      ‘You’re certainly a woman of surprises,’ he said. ‘You don’t happen to have any more hidden up your sleeve?’

      Sophie froze as she realised it was probably the most astute question he could have asked in the circumstances. What would he say if he realised what else she wasn’t telling him? She kept her eyes shut, not daring to open them, afraid of what they might reveal—when she wasn’t even sure herself. She felt...what?

      She swallowed.

      Complete? Yes. Satisfied? Very. She felt shy yet strangely confident, because she’d done it and it had worked. She’d had sex! She’d had an orgasm! Underneath all the glitz and the unusual upbringing, she was no different from any other woman—and that thought gave her hope for the future. It made her feel strong. As if she was capable of pretty much anything she set her mind to. And Rafe had touched her as she’d always dreamed a man might do. Not in a reverential way. Not treating her as if she were made of porcelain or making her acutely aware of her ‘blue blood’—but treating her just like a woman. And before he’d made love to her, he’d hugged her, hadn’t he? Held her close. He’d picked her up and carried her. Cradled her tight against his wet chest—and that had blown her away nearly as much as the sex, because she wasn’t used to physical contact. Even as a child, her parents had never been demonstrative. The Queen used to appear before dinner—all dressed up in her finery—and one of the palace nannies would troop the royal children in for a quick kiss goodnight. Why, she’d been touched more tonight than in her entire life.

      Sophie sighed as she wriggled against the rumpled bedsheet, not sure whether she wanted to slide beneath it with her happy, private thoughts, or to dance around the room in celebration. But what she wanted most of all was to tiptoe her fingers over Rafe’s silky flesh and have him kiss her again. She wanted him to wipe that curiously judgemental expression from his face—because what did it matter that she’d never had sex before? She wondered what the etiquette for dealing with a situation like this was and how ironic that she, an expert in etiquette, should be at such a loss.

      Well, she wasn’t going to cower away like someone who was ashamed, because she wasn’t. Maybe she should just let him know how much she’d enjoyed it and then maybe he would do it to her all over again.

      She felt liquid heat pooling low in her stomach as her eyelashes fluttered open and she was unprepared for the punch of emotion she felt as she looked at him—the man who up until a few minutes ago had been deep inside her. He looked the same, and yet he seemed different—but then she’d never seen him naked in the moonlight before, or softened by the intimacy of sex. Her gaze drifted over his powerful dark body, outlined against the rumpled white sheets, because surely what had just happened gave her the right to study him like this. Something melted deep inside her as she felt her heart skip a beat. How was it possible to want him again so quickly—and did he want her, too?

      Her tongue slid out to moisten her lips. ‘That was—’

      ‘Don’t tell me.’ His voice was a hard and cynical drawl. ‘Amazing? Wonderful? Women usually say it was the best sex they’ve ever had, although I suppose in your case that would be difficult to gauge since it’s the only sex you’ve ever had.’

      Sophie went very still, thinking he must be making a joke—and a joke in very poor taste—to discuss his other lovers at such a sensitive time. But as her eyes sought his face she could see no trace of humour there and she realised that he seemed irritated. Disenchantment whispered over her but she didn’t show it—grateful for years of social training, which meant she was able to return his gaze with a cool impartiality. ‘You sound disappointed, Rafe. Do you have a problem with the fact that I was a virgin?’

      ‘Only the same kind of problem I might have if I took a ride in a car with somebody who hadn’t bothered to tell me they were a learner driver.’

      His cutting words shattered the last few traces of bliss and Sophie stared straight ahead at the unfamiliar wall of the moonlit bedroom. ‘Thanks for the comparison,’ she said flatly.

      ‘Why the hell have you never had sex before?’ he demanded. He shook his head in disbelief. ‘You’re young. You’re beautiful. You were clearly up for it. And this is the twenty-first century.’

      Sophie swallowed. Now was the time to come clean. To say what she would need to repeat at least once, because he would think she was making it up.

      You might have been living in the twenty-first century, but I certainly wasn’t. Because I was born a royal and betrothed to one of the world’s most eligible men and part of the deal was that I would go to him as a virgin on my wedding night.

      And then what?

      A nightmare, that was what. Once she’d convinced him she wasn’t a complete fantasist, she would be obliged to dredge up a past she was trying to move on from. She would be forced into a truth she didn’t want to have to face—that she was a princess with an unknown future. And even worse—what if he suddenly became very interested? True, he didn’t seem the type—but you never really knew. Lots of people were turned on by palaces and crowns and a status which couldn’t be bought, or earned. And wouldn’t it only reinforce her plummeting self-esteem if he decided he wanted her for what she was, rather than who she was?

      Suddenly she was filled with an overwhelming desire to temper his arrogance. To see if she could unsettle him for a change. ‘Maybe I was just waiting to meet the right man,’ she said innocently, watching as he sat up in bed, quickly covering the lower part of his body with the rumpled bedsheet. But not before she’d noticed that he was aroused again and for some reason that gave her a fleeting feeling of triumph.

      ‘I think we’d better get one thing clear, Sophie,’ he said as a pulse worked frantically at his temple. ‘The sex we just had was amazing. More than amazing—especially as it was your first time. You don’t have enough experience to know that, but let me assure you it’s true.’ He paused, as if picking his words carefully. ‘But the fact remains that I’m not in the market for any kind of commitment. I meant every word of what I said to you in the pool. This changes nothing.’

      She widened her eyes. ‘Oh?’

      ‘I don’t want you having any unrealistic expectations, that’s all. I’m not the kind of man who is blown away by the fact you were a virgin—I don’t have some primitive, chest-thumping desire to shout it from the rooftops. It doesn’t mean anything to me and neither do you. Sorry to be so blunt, but it saves any kind of misunderstanding. I’m not looking for a partner and even if I was, that