Beauty and the Reclusive Prince / Executive: Expecting Tiny Twins. Barbara Hannay

temptation to let herself relax in his arms again, to press her cheek against his chest and listen for his heartbeat. The moon was out again, sending beams in through a window just over their heads. What could be more romantic than to wrap herself in his arms and…?

      Fanciful nonsense, of course. None of that could happen or would happen. She hadn’t had such silly daydreams since she’d been a preteen and had been mooning after a boy named Romano Puccini. Bad things usually followed when you let your emotions run away with you. At least, that had been the lesson she had learned that long-ago summer.

      “That’s the second time tonight you scared me out of my wits,” she told him accusingly.

      “And that’s the second time tonight I found you sneaking around where you shouldn’t be,” he shot back at her.

      She tossed her hair, hooking the mop of it behind her ear with one quick swipe of her hand. “That’s only true if you are the one who gets to set the rules of where I may or may not go.”

      He moved closer. Even in the dark, she could see the outline of his scar clearly. It was a slash of silver across his moonlit face. Eerie…otherworldly…and somehow alluring.

      “And why wouldn’t I set the rules?” he said firmly. “It’s my house, remember?”

      She looked up into his eyes. They seemed to glow in the dim light. “But you forget—I’m only passing through.”

      “Trespassing through, you mean.”

      Well, she had to give him that one. Suddenly she was so very tired.

      “You know, I…I just want to go home.” There was a quaver in her voice that she regretted, but, still, it was only the truth.

      He took her hand, still looking down into what he could see of her face. “We all want things we can’t have.”

      The hint of desolation in his voice hit her hard and stopped her from taking offense. An unexpected wave of sadness swept over her. She wanted to reach for him, to help him somehow. But then she remembered—he was the prince. What in the world could she do to comfort a man like this?

      “Come back to the Blue Room and let Marcello take a look at you,” he ordered, beginning to lead her that way. “After all this, we might as well go through with it.” He glanced down at her as she walked beside him. “Then I’ll have someone drive you home.”

      She sighed. She hated to admit how tempting it seemed to just follow wherever he led. She was going to have to work on that. A little strength of character—a little more confidence in her own strength—that was what she needed.

      “My car is…is down by the south wall.” She flushed as she said the words. Oh, how guilty she sounded.

      When he replied, he sounded bemused, but satirical. “So you drove yourself out from the village, parked along the wall, and then what? Did you vault over?”

      “Not quite.” She hesitated, but she didn’t want to tell him that she’d sneaked in exactly where her father had been sneaking in for years. Only her father had the good sense to do it in daylight, and he’d never been caught.

      “Not going to say, are you?” he said, sounding cynical again, as though he really did consider her an outlaw in his world. “You’re going to keep it a secret. That way you can keep your options open for sneaking in again.” He tugged on her hand, leading her around a sharp corner. “But I would advise against that, Isabella Casali. I think we’ll have to let the dogs patrol twenty-four hours a day from now on.” He glanced back at her. “I don’t want you anywhere near that river.”

      That surprised her. She would have expected him to say he didn’t want to risk any more interruptions to his own life and peaceful existence, not to her welfare. But maybe she was taking his words too kindly. Of course, that was exactly what he meant. After all, if she got hurt, he would have to deal with it. Still, there was something in his tone when he mentioned the river that gave her pause.

      He stopped just outside the door to the Blue Room and stared down at her. For the first time the light was good enough for him to see what had happened to her face.

      “My God! Maledizione!” His hands cupped her face, tilting it up so that he could see it fully. “You seemed a little bruised before, but this…”

      “It’s okay,” she said, gazing up at him in wonder. He was so close. The sense of his male presence overwhelmed her. For a few seconds, she felt a wave of emotion sweeping away her common sense, and suddenly she wanted his kiss more than she’d ever wanted anything else in her life.

      And that in itself was like a splash of cold water on her face. What was she thinking? She wanted to turn away so that he wouldn’t read her guilty secret in her eyes, but he was staring so hard, from so close.

      “I…I’m okay.”

      “It’s hard to see something so fresh and lovely marred this way,” he said as though it really did pain him. His voice was cool and it was evident that this was a philosophical problem and nothing to do with him personally. But at the same time his gaze ranged over her face as though he were memorizing every line, every dimple. “You’re just so…so…” His voice faded without saying the word, whatever it was meant to be.

      And then he kissed her. Like a moth to the flame, he couldn’t stay away. It was a light kiss, barely a touching of his lips to her forehead, right above her blackened eye. She gasped as she felt him, but at the same time she knew he’d done it in a strange way as though to erase the damage, make it go away. He seemed to have an obsession with avoiding harm. That had to be it. It didn’t feel personal. His gaze still looked as hard and cold, his bearing was still just as arrogant.

      But still—he kissed her.

      “Is this going to take much longer?” said the deep, masculine voice of a tall man standing in the doorway, cutting into the magic of the moment. “Because I could go back to my room and get a few winks in and you could call me down later.”

      Isabella gulped in dismay, but the prince only straightened, giving his cousin a brief look of outraged dignity. It was obvious their relationship was maintained with a closeness that was disguised by a lot of good-natured mockery.

      “Isabella, this is Marcello Martelli, my cousin.”

      “I’m pleased to meet you, Isabella,” Marcello said, shaking her hand briskly. “This shouldn’t take too long, nor be too painful.”

      Marcello was young and very handsome. In fact he looked very much like what she assumed Max would look like without the scar. She couldn’t help but give him a big smile in answer to his friendly greeting. Here he was, barefoot and in jeans and a T-shirt—looking for all the world like any of the young men she knew in the village would look if you knocked on their door after midnight. He had the ruffled hair and the sleepy eyes as well.

      “You fell into the river, I hear,” he said, leading her in to sit on the antique couch. His gaze flickered back and forth between her and Max as though he didn’t completely buy it.

      “Yes,” she told him earnestly.

      “But luckily Max came along in time to…to rescue you.”

      She turned and looked at where the prince was standing back in the shadows just in time to see him turn away as though angry at what his cousin had just said. She frowned. Why would he do that? Did he realize what a part he’d played in creating her unfortunate incident? Maybe he needed a reminder.

      “Is that the way he tells the story?”

      Marcello grinned at her. “How do you tell it?”

      She gave Max an arch look sideways. “Here’s how I remember it. I was strolling along on the hillside when suddenly something that looked like a dark avenging angel came galloping down on me and I ran for my life. My foot slipped. I tumbled into the river.” She shrugged. “A simple tale, really,” she said.

      “And all Max’s