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He tucked her into the backseat of the luxurious town car and settled in next to her, his heavy masculine presence overwhelming in such close confines. She almost jumped out of her skin when he leaned forward, brushing her arm and setting off a throng of iron-winged butterflies in her stomach. But he only pressed the button to raise the dividing panel between the driver and the back, lingering far too long for such a simple task.
The car slid smoothly away from the curb and flowed into traffic.
“Where are you taking me?” she croaked and cleared the awareness and heat from her throat. “Some place trendy and hip?”
“Not on your life. I’m not sharing you with hordes of paparazzi and gawkers.”
Oh. “Are your bodyguards in another car? They’re never far away unless you’re working.”
He squeezed the hand he was still holding. “Worried? I’ll keep you safe.”
Without a doubt. It was what he did. Most people ignored those in distress, but he reveled in protecting people. Always had.
They chatted about inane topics such as Dallas weather, but thankfully, he did not mention football. The only sport he’d ever followed was Formula 1 racing, but he respected her complete boredom with cars looping a track and seldom talked about it.
“We’re here,” Finn pronounced as the car stopped under a tree.
Juliet took in the scene through the window. Beyond the roadway lay a secluded private park, where a single table and chairs had been set out with a perfect view of the sunset. A man in a tall white chef’s hat stood off to the side, chopping with a flashing knife on a temporary work surface.
“Nice,” Juliet acknowledged with a nod and peeked up at Finn from under her lashes. “Out of curiosity, what would you have done if it was raining?”
“We’d get wet. Or we’d ride around and look for a drive-through with decent takeout and eat in the car.”
She smiled at his pragmatism. He’d never let a little thing like a change of plans put a hitch in his stride. “Then I’m glad it’s a clear night.”
His answering grin warmed her neglected parts far past acceptability.
“After the obscene amount of money I paid to rent this park for the night, including an added fifteen percent to buy out the existing reservation, it wouldn’t dare rain.”
No, it wouldn’t. Rain didn’t fall on the head of the privileged. Once, he’d made her feel as if the evils of the world couldn’t reach them, as if he’d always be the one person she could count on. Until he wasn’t.
Finn jumped from the car and helped her rise from the low leather seat. The driver sped away after being told to return in two hours. They were alone.
Juliet started to walk up the path to the center of the park.
Finn tugged on her hand, swinging her around face-to-face. “Maybe we should get something out of the way.”
“What’s that?” The words were half out of her mouth when the sizzle between them and the glint of anticipation in his blue eyes answered that question.
He was going to kiss her.
Involuntarily, her tongue came out to wet suddenly dry lips and his eyes lingered on them before he met her gaze squarely.
“This.”
Juliet froze as Finn’s mouth descended.
A part of her screamed to break his hold, to run before it was too late. Her legs wouldn’t move.
Then his lips claimed hers, taking her mouth powerfully, demanding a response. It was Finn. So familiar and hot and everything she’d been missing for a very long time. She moaned and leaned into it, desperate to taste the divine, to plunge into him.
Euphoria rushed through her veins, deluging her senses with sharp, slick desire. Pushing eager fingers through his short hair, she held his head in place as the kiss exploded with incandescent energy.
Their bodies melded, aligning just right, just as always. Yes. Oh, yes, she’d missed him.
Missed how he never held back, missed his intoxicating presence and missed how his strength enabled hers.
His hand slipped beneath a spaghetti strap at her shoulder and he skimmed silky fingertips down her back. If he kept this up, her lingerie would be making an appearance after all, very shortly.
He pulled away before she’d even begun to sate herself on the thrill of his touch. Breathing heavily, he rested his forehead on hers. “That didn’t quite do what I hoped.”
It had certainly done plenty for her. “What were you hoping for?”
“That it would allow me to eat in peace instead of thinking about whether you still taste the same. Now I’m pretty sure a repeat is all I’ll be thinking about.”
She hid a smile. “If dinner goes well, a repeat might be on the menu.”
His eyelids dropped to a sexy, slumberous half-mast. “I’ll keep that in mind. Shall we eat?”
“If you insist.” He might be able to eat. The flip-flopping in her stomach didn’t bode well for her.
There were still plenty of sparks between them. Not that she’d wondered. But that kiss had at least answered one lingering question—whether they could pick up where they’d left off.
The answer was a resounding yes.
As long as they could sort through the past. The scandal. The utter sense of betrayal he’d left her with.
Suddenly, she didn’t want to think about it. There weren’t any laws that said they had to immediately hash out how abandoned she’d felt.
Finn led her to a chair and helped her sit, then took his own seat. As the chef served a delicious first course of tomatoes drizzled with balsamic vinegar, Finn mentioned the queen’s bout with appendicitis and Juliet murmured appropriate well-wishes. She then shared that her second-youngest sister was expecting a baby and nodded at Finn’s hearty congratulations.
A very pleasant conversation all the way around. Thankfully, at least some of the social graces Elise had tirelessly drilled into Juliet’s head had held.
Except she couldn’t get that kiss out of her mind, and watching him talk wasn’t helping. It had been a very long time since she’d been kissed. Since the scandal.
Finn hadn’t let any grass grow under his feet in the female companionship department, but she’d taken the ostrich approach. If she stuck her head in the sand long enough, all those feminine urges would dry up and go away.
She’d been pretty successful thus far. Yet in two seconds, he’d done a spectacular job of reminding her sheer will couldn’t stop the flood of longing for the tender affections of one very talented prince.
“Did you quit your job in Delamer?” Finn asked once the chef finished serving the main course of corvina sea bass and asparagus over quinoa.
“I did.”
The short phrase communicated none of the grief she’d experienced over resigning her position teaching English to bright young minds. She loved the children she taught and had hoped to find a way to continue teaching in America.
Then she remembered.
She hadn’t been matched with an American husband. If things worked out with Finn, she could go home, go back to her job, back to the sea. Back into his arms.
Was such a fairy tale actually possible?
With renewed interest, she swept her gaze over the man opposite her. “Are you still flying helicopters?”
“Of course. I’ll do that until the day I die. Or until they ground me. Whichever comes first.”
No shock. He’d always loved flying as much as he did the search and rescue part of his job. The source of contention wasn’t what he did but whom he did it for.
“Hmm,” she said noncommittally and forked up a bite of fish. “I wasn’t going to jump right into this, but I’m on uncertain ground here. Tell me what you hoped to gain from Elise’s match. Are you really looking for a wife?”
Finn set his wineglass down firmly and focused on her, the warmth in his expression all too easy to read. “I can’t keep being the Party Prince. The best I thought I could do was an arranged marriage, like my parents. Means to an end, and I’m okay with that. What about you?”
That focus unleashed a shiver she couldn’t quite control. “I was prepared to marry whomever Elise picked. I couldn’t stay in Delamer. Not with the way things fell apart between us. Marriage was a means to an end for me, as well.”
She’d like to stop there and just enjoy this date. But there were too many unanswered questions for that.
“What is this dinner all about? We aren’t having a first date like we would with the matches we’d envisioned for ourselves. This is something else. We have history we’re avoiding. Important history. History that has to be resolved.”
Finn’s gaze grew keen. “You want to throw down? Go for it.”
“No, I don’t.” She shook her head, though he was certainly the only man who could take whatever she dished out. “We’ve fought enough in our relationship. I want to work things out like adults. Can we?”
With a smile, Finn picked up her hand and rubbed a knuckle with his smooth thumb. “Let’s hold off on history with a capital H. Dinner is about me and you reconnecting. That’s the part of our history I prefer to remember.”
“Okay.”
She’d waited this long. What were a few more hours? The time would be well spent working through what she’d realized she’d done wrong a year ago. Instead of fighting so hard to convince Finn to talk to his father, she should have gone about this a whole different way.
If Finn was truly looking for a wife, what was stopping her from marrying him in order to bring about change from inside the palace gates? Princess Juliet would have far more power to influence the king away from mandatory military service than plain old Juliet Villere.
And then maybe she could finally be rid of the crushing guilt she felt over Bernard’s death.
* * *
Dinner forgotten, Finn nearly swallowed his tongue when Juliet pushed back her chair and waltzed to his side of the table wearing a sultry smile and sporting a very naughty glint in her eye. She extended a hand, which he took silently, and then he stood, allowing her to lead him up the path into a more heavily wooded section of the park.
“Interested in the native fauna and flora?” he asked when the silence stretched on.
“More interested in how well the flora conceals us.” She backed him up against a tree and stepped into his torso deliberately, rubbing her firm breasts against his chest.
Oh, so that’s what she had in mind. Obviously, she remembered how good it had been as well as he did. And apparently she had no problem rekindling that part of their relationship, impending matches to other people notwithstanding. Fantastic.
“That earlier kiss was good. Make this one better,” she commanded.
Instantly, he complied, yanking her into his arms and exploring her back flat-handed. Their mouths met, aligning perfectly, and heat arced between them.
Juliet.
Desire thundered through his body, soaking him with a storm of need. She was in his arms, overpowering his senses as if he’d jumped from his helicopter without a parachute.
Thank God Elise had pulled her devious stunt to put them in each other’s path again, if only for one night. Tomorrow, he and Juliet could both be matched with more suitable mates.
The kiss deepened and Juliet snuggled against him as if she’d never been away. Heat swept along his skin, craving the perfection of Juliet’s beautiful body against it. He groaned and shifted a knee between her legs, and his thigh hit the sweet spot immediately.
That was some dress. The high-heeled and insanely sexy shoes helped too.
He lifted his lips a fraction and murmured, “I’ve missed you. Can we take this someplace more private?”
Her smile curved against his cheek and she nodded.
Grasping her hand, he pulled her in the direction of the newly returned town car, settled her in the backseat and nearly dived in after her.
He’d never been able to resist her, and now he didn’t have to.
Somehow, Finn had been granted a reprieve. The king hadn’t phoned him to demand an explanation for the photographs from last night. Now he had this one chance to recapture a small slice of heaven before submitting to an arranged marriage.
He’d hoped, against all logical reason, that the woman Elise matched him with could heal his broken heart. The odds of that happening with the woman who’d smashed it in the first place were zilch. Especially since he’d never in a million years give it to her again.
So he’d grant EA International another chance. Once he had a new bride by his side, the public would forget about the Party Prince and he could become known for something worthwhile.
The People’s Prince. He liked the sound of that.
In the meantime, he could have Juliet...and all the good things about their relationship. Without getting into the painful past.
“So I take it you thought dinner went well?” he asked with a grin he couldn’t have wiped off his face for anything. “You know, since you agreed to a repeat of the kiss.”
Her hair was a little mussed from his fingers. He itched to pull out all the pins and let those silky locks tumble over him.
“I’m staying open to where the night leads. But it’s been good so far.” She studied him speculatively. “We’re not fighting. We’re connecting, like you said.”
They weren’t fighting because they’d thus far avoided the problem. And he was totally prepared to keep avoiding history with a capital H for as long as possible. “If this driver would step on it, we’d be connecting a whole lot more.”
She laughed. “We have all night. But while we’re on the subject, does connecting mean you’re open to being on my side this time around?”
Apparently she did not subscribe to the same desire for avoidance of the past. “I’ve always been on your side.”
“If that was true, you’d never have taken the stance you did.” Her expression closed in. “You’d have supported me and my family when we tried to talk to your father.”
That was the Juliet he’d last seen in Delamer. His stomach dipped. The connection part of the evening appeared to be over.
“You say that like I had no choice, like I had to agree with you or it equaled lack of support.” But that’s how he’d felt, as well. As if she couldn’t see his side. Instantly, it all came roaring back. All the hurt and anger he’d been living with for a very long year. “You didn’t support me either. And I never asked you to go against everything you believed in.”
She yanked her hand from his. The heat in her expression reminded him she got just as passionate about taking his head off when they clashed.
So much for dinner going well.
“That’s exactly what you wanted me to do.” A lone tear tracked down Juliet’s face and his gut clenched. It hurt to see someone as strong as Juliet crying. “Forget about Bernard and support you every day as you put on the uniform of the Delamer military. Every day, I’d be reminded Bernard died wearing the same uniform and I did nothing to avenge that. Every day, I’d be reminded you chose to stand with the crown instead of with me.”
The car stopped at the private entrance to his hotel. It was positioned discreetly in the secluded rear section of the property, off to the side of the underground parking garage.
Finn didn’t get out. This wasn’t finished, not even close.
“Vengeance well describes it. You humiliated me. That protest garnered the attention of the entire world. Juliet—” Finn pinched the bridge of his nose. They should have recorded this conversation and played it back, saving them the trouble of having it again. “I’m a member of the House of Couronne. You burned the flag of the country my family rules while we were dating. How can you not see what that did to me?”
Not to mention the man she’d vilified was his father. He loved his father, loved his country. She’d wanted him to choose her over honor.
“My family is forever changed because of your father’s policies. Bernard is gone and—” Her voice seized, choking off the rest. After a moment, she stared up at him through watery eyes laced with devastation. “A man who claimed to love me would have understood. He would have done anything to make that right.”
But he wasn’t just a man and never would be. He could no sooner remove the royal blood in his veins than he could fly blindfolded.
The tearing in his chest felt as if it was on repeat, as well. “A woman who claimed to love me would have realized I have an obligation to the crown, whether it’s on my head or not. I don’t get the choice to be someone other than Prince Alain Phineas of Montagne, Duke of Marechal, House of Couronne.”
He belonged to one of the last royal houses of Europe and he owed it to his ancestors to preserve the country they’d left in his care. No matter how antiquated the notion became in an increasingly modern world.
Now he was ready to get out of the car. To be somewhere she wasn’t. That was one thing that hadn’t changed—Juliet causing him to feel a touch insane as he veered between extreme highs and lows very quickly. She followed him to the curb, clearly determined to continue twisting the spike through his heart.
“I never wanted you to be someone else. I loved you.”
Past tense. It didn’t escape his notice.
“You meant everything to me, Finn. But it’s peacetime. The mandatory military service law is ridiculous. Why can’t you see that your royal obligation is to stop being so stubborn and think about people’s lives?”
“For the same reason you can’t see that the military is mine,” he said quietly.
He’d never wear the crown. Flying helicopters was the one thing he could do that Alexander, as the crown prince, couldn’t. Juliet’s refusal to get out from under her righteous indignation prevented her from taking his side.
She was the stubborn one.
Anger coated the back of his throat. Juliet was still the same crusader under the cosmetics and sexy dress. She was still determined to alter the heart of the institution to which he’d sworn loyalty.
Suddenly, it was all too easy to resist her. He didn’t have the slightest interest in rehashing all of this for the rest of the night, regardless of the more tangible rewards. He’d never bowed to anyone before and he wasn’t about to start now.
Arms crossed against her abdomen, Juliet stared dry-eyed at the unoccupied valet booth behind Finn. “I think it’s safe to say the date was not a success.”
“I’ll have the driver take you back to Elise’s house.” Finn tapped on the passenger-side window.
The squeal of tires on cement reverberated through the quiet underground lot. A van sped down the ramp and wedged tight against the rear bumper of Finn’s hired car. Four men with distinctly shaved heads, beefy physiques and dark clothing jumped out, trouble written all over them.
“Juliet, get in the car,” Finn muttered, angling his body to shield her as the men advanced on them.
He never should have given his security guys the night off.
It was the last thing he registered as the world went black.
Four
Grit scraped at Juliet’s eyeballs. She tried to lift a hand to rub them. And couldn’t.
Heavy fog weighed down her brain. Something was wrong. She couldn’t see and her hands weren’t working. Or her arms.
Rapid blinking didn’t improve her eyesight. It was so dark.
She never drank enough alcohol to be this fuzzy about her current whereabouts...and how she’d gotten there...and what had happened prior to.
“Juliet. Can you hear me?” Finn’s voice. It washed over her, tripping a hodgepodge of memories, most of them X-rated.
Finn’s voice in the dark equaled one activity and one activity only. Pleasure, the feel of his skin on hers, urgency of the highest order to fly into the heavens with him—
Wait. What was Finn doing here?
“Yeah,” she mumbled thickly. “I hear you.”
Pain split through her brain the moment her jaw moved, cutting off her speech, her thoughts, even her breath. Inhaling sharply, she rolled to shift positions—or tried to.
Her muscles refused to cooperate. “What’s...going on?”
“Tranquilizer,” Finn explained grimly and spit out a nasty curse in French. “I think they must have used the same dose on both of us.”
The sinister-looking men. An unmarked van. The date with so much promise that ended badly. And then got worse.
Juliet groaned. “What? Why did they give us tranquilizers?”
“So they could snatch us without a fight,” Finn growled. “And they should be thanking their lucky stars they did. Otherwise I would have removed their spleens with a tire iron.”
Snippets of dinner with Finn flashed through her mind. Okay, good. So she hadn’t lost her memory and she wasn’t suffering from the effects of a hangover. “We were kidnapped? Stuff like that only happens in the movies.”
“Welcome to reality.” The heavy sarcasm meant he was frustrated. And maybe a little worried. That didn’t bode well. Finn always knew what to do.
Shifting along her right side indicated his general vicinity. Not too far away. “Can you move? Are we tied up?”
It was hard for her to tell. Everything was numb. That’s why she couldn’t move. She’d been drugged. And blinded, maybe forever.
What sort of scheme had she stumbled into simply by being in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong companion?
A strong, masculine hand smoothed hair from her face, throwing her back to another time and place where that happened with frequency.
“Nah,” Finn said. “They shot us up with enough narcotics that they didn’t need to tie us up. I’m okay. The cocktail didn’t affect me nearly as long as it did you.”
Gray invaded her vision and got lighter and lighter with each passing moment. Thank goodness. “Where are we?”
“Not sure. In a house of some sort. I was afraid to leave you alone in case you needed CPR, or the welcoming committee showed up, so I didn’t do more than look out the window.”
A fuzzy Finn swam through her eyesight, along with a few background details. White walls. Bed.
Finn held her hand. She squeezed, gratified that her fingers had actually responded, and then licked dry lips. “Guards?”
“Not that I can tell. I haven’t seen anyone since I regained consciousness.” Finn nodded to a door. “As soon as you can walk, we’ll see what’s what.”
“Help me sit up,” she implored him.
Finn’s arm came around her waist and she slumped against him. Two tries later, her legs swung off the bed and thumped to the floor.
Barefoot. Had they taken her shoes? She wasn’t even completely over the sticker shock at the price of those ivory alligator sandals and now they were probably in a Dumpster somewhere. And she’d actually kind of liked them.
“Now help me stand,” she said. Their captors might return at any moment and they both needed to be prepared. Sure Finn was stronger and better trained, but she was mad enough to take out at least one.
Finn shook his head. “There’s no prize for Fastest Recovery After Being Tranquilized. Take your time.”
“I want to get out of here. The faster we figure out what that’s going to take, the better.” Throbbing behind her eyes distracted her for a moment, but she ignored it as best she could. “How far do you think they took us from your hotel?”
Elise would be worried. Maybe she’d already called the police and even now, SWAT teams were tearing apart Dallas in search of Prince Alain.
Or...Elise might be smugly certain she’d staged the match of the century and assume they’d gotten so wrapped up in each other, Juliet had forgotten to call. The matchmaker probably didn’t realize they were missing yet.
“There’s only one way to find out where we are. Come on.” Finn took one step and her knees buckled.
Without missing a beat, he swept her up in his strong arms and she almost sighed at the shamefully romantic gesture.
Except he was still the Prince of Pigheadedness. Why had she ever thought she could marry him—even under the guise of changing Delamer policy from the inside?
Finn deposited her easily on the pale blue counterpane and kept a light but firm hand on her shoulder so she couldn’t sit up. “It’s early afternoon, if the daylight outside the window is any indication. We’ve probably been captives for about eighteen hours. The entire Delamer armed forces are likely already on their way to assist the local authorities. Stay here and I’ll go figure out the lay of the land.”