Claiming His Princess: Duty at What Cost? / A Throne for the Taking / Princess in the Iron Mask

‘What can I say? She was one of the smart ones.’

Wolfe waited for his friend to start up another good-natured lecture about settling down. Anne, it seemed, had reformed the once bad-boy Marquis to the point where Wolfe now almost preferred her company to his.

‘Well, that works out well for me.’

‘It does?’

Gilles chuckled. ‘Don’t look so relieved. I wasn’t about to try and reform the unreformable.’

‘Thank God.’

‘But I do need a favour.’

Favours Wolfe could do.

‘Sure.’

‘There’s a girl I need you to keep your eye on tonight at the reception.’

Wolfe didn’t exactly look at the sky, but he came close. ‘Friend of Anne’s, by chance?’

‘Yes, actually. But, no, I’m not trying to set you up, you suspicious clod. She’s the woman my father wanted me to marry.’

Gilles’s words sparked a distant memory of a late-night chat from years back that Wolfe had completely forgotten about. He took another pull of his drink and wished it was beer in an icy bottle instead of champagne in a tepid glass. ‘I’m listening.’

‘Years ago my father and hers came to the decision that we would forge a strong union if we married when we came of age.’

‘I think you “came of age” about ten years ago, my friend, and isn’t that a little last century?’

Gilles’s mouth twisted into an ironic smile. ‘You’ve met my father. Hers is worse. Anyway, the media have done a good job beating some life into the old story this past week, playing up the whole jilted fiancée thing, and Anne said it’s been a bit rough on her.’

Wolfe knew what it felt like to be talked about behind his back. Even if the people in the small town he’d grown up in had been doing so out of sympathy rather than slander. At least for him and his brother, at any rate. ‘What’s wrong with her?’ he asked suspiciously.

Gilles scoffed. ‘Nothing. But I don’t want you to sleep with her. Actually, I’d be downright angry if you did. She’s gorgeous, and way too good for you. I just want you to keep an eye on her. Make sure she’s having a good time.’

‘Who is she?’ he asked, premonition snaking down his spine.

‘See the woman talking to Anne now?’

Wolfe didn’t have to look to know it was the Princess from the wall and he nearly groaned. Anyone but her. But at least now it made sense why she had been so familiar with the estate. They were family friends.

Wolfe turned his back on the woman he was intent on avoiding for the rest of his life. ‘I’m sure she can take care of herself.’

Gilles gave him a quizzical look and Wolfe cursed his curt tone. He had nothing against the Princess, really. Except for the fact that she’d occupied his mind all afternoon and made him want to push her sweet skirt up around her waist and take her up against the nearest hundred-year-old oak. He definitely didn’t want to find out that Gilles had once been with her. Had they been lovers? The thought left a sour taste in his mouth.

‘I’m sure she will, too, but as she’s attending the wedding alone I thought you could keep your eye on her for me. You know—ask her to dance, make sure she has a drink.’

Today he’d been mistaken for a rescue service, a gardener and now…‘You’ve got waiters for that, and I’m not a damned babysitter.’

Gilles’s eyebrows shot up, but before he could say anything his new wife stepped around Wolfe and curled her arm through Gilles’s. ‘Babysitting who?’

Her green eyes met Wolfe’s speculatively and Wolfe saw Gilles’s eyes fall guiltily on someone behind him.

‘I hope you do not mean me, Gilles?’ Ava’s tone was as lyrical and as superior as Wolfe remembered it.

Gilles stepped forward and kissed both her cheeks. ‘Ava, you look as beautiful as ever.’

‘I can see that you do mean me,’ she berated lightly. ‘And I can assure you I do not need babysitting.’

Her eyes briefly cut to Wolfe’s with such aloof disdain it made him want to smile. He remembered her hands splayed over the ridges of his abdominal muscles as she’d clung to him on the horse. She might not like him very much, but he knew dislike wasn’t the only emotion she felt.

‘Of course you don’t, ma petite.’ Gilles humoured her. ‘Now, let me introduce you to Wolfe, a good friend of mine.’

Unable to prevent himself from ruffling her regal feathers, Wolfe tilted his head. ‘We’ve met. How’s the head?’ His eyes drifted to the wide-brimmed hat, tilted to one side to conceal the bruise on her forehead. The pale pink exactly matched a flirty two-piece suit that followed the line of her curves all the way to her perfectly shaped calves and slender ankles.

Exceptional legs, he thought, his gaze trekking slowly back up to her face.

She arched a brow that told him she hadn’t taken kindly to his once-over, or to the implied intimacy in his tone.

‘You know each other?’ Gilles regarded Ava in surprise.

‘No.’

‘Oh?’ Gilles cut his curious gaze back to Wolfe.

‘Shall I tell him, or do you want to?’ Wolfe drawled.

After briefly glaring all sorts of retribution his way, she turned a serene smile on Gilles and Anne. ‘It was nothing. I had a small problem with my car and your friend kindly provided me with a lift to the château.’

‘A small problem with your car?’ Gilles frowned.

Wolfe held her gaze as he felt the others turn to him and told himself to leave well enough alone. Ruffling her glorious feathers was not on his agenda, even if his body was demanding that he forge a new one—preferably starting with her naked on top of a set of silk sheets. ‘What Her Highness means is that she had a car accident, climbed your outer wall and got captured by my men—’

‘And stole your horse because you were being incredibly rude!’ she provided, cutting Gilles’s blustering in half.

Wolfe shifted his weight and stuck one hand into his pocket. ‘And here I was thinking you stole him because you wanted to go for a ride.’ He rubbed his hand across his abdomen, unable to stop himself from teasing her a little.

‘I did think about it,’ she murmured huskily, the quick dart of her pink tongue caressing her lower lip and sending a bolt of lust straight to his groin. ‘But since he wasn’t up to my usual standard I thought why bother?’

Wolfe laughed at her bald-faced put-down. Gilles was fortunately too worried about her accident to pick up on the subtext, but Anne’s interested glances told him that she wasn’t quite as obtuse.

‘You weren’t hurt?’ Anne queried, concern lacing her words.

‘A bump on the head,’ Ava dismissed casually. ‘Really, the whole thing was incredibly insignificant.’

Wolfe’s lips quirked. ‘You know, I wouldn’t have described it that way myself.’

‘No?’ Ava held his gaze. ‘Maybe you need to get out more.’

‘Maybe I do,’ he agreed, noting the line of pink that highlighted her lovely cheekbones. Maybe he needed to get out with her. No. He’d already decided not to go there. But, damn, he was enjoying sparring with her.

‘But what were you doing on the wall?’ Gilles interrupted with a frown.

‘Well, trying to get down, obviously,’ Ava returned pithily. ‘Which would have been a lot easier if you hadn’t removed that lovely old chestnut tree.’

Gilles gave a typically Gallic shrug. ‘I had no choice. It was a security risk.’

Wolfe laughed right up until the moment she shared a warm smile with Gilles. Again he wondered at their history. Had she been in love with his friend? Was she still? Was that why Gilles had asked him to watch out for her? Was it possible she would cause trouble if he didn’t? Questions, questions, questions. And there was really only one he wanted answered.

How responsive would she be in his bed?

His name suited him, Ava mused absently, nursing a flute of champagne as she willed the evening reception to finish.

Predatory.

Intense.

Arrogant.

And utterly transfixing when he turned those molten toffee-coloured eyes on her. Not to mention aloof and emotionally unavailable if the evening gossip was to be believed.

‘They call him Ice, and apparently he has a heart as hard to find as a pink diamond,’ one woman had said, giggling as she’d gazed longingly across the room at him.

Ava had rolled her eyes. She knew many women saw an unattainable man—especially a wealthy alpha male like Wolfe—as a personal challenge to go forth and rehabilitate, but she wasn’t one of them. She was only interested in a man who was caring and considerate and who respected a woman as more than just a trophy to be admired and trotted out when it suited him. A gentle, sophisticated man, who was looking for love and companionship more than short affairs with a variety of women.

That thought reminded her of the luncheon she’d had with Anne last month. ‘Hot’ and ‘divine’ were words that had been bandied around when she’d talked about a friend of Gilles’s called Wolfe. As had ‘confirmed bachelor’. Ava remembered zoning out at that point, telling her friend she wasn’t at all interested in commitment-phobes like her ex. Which put Gilles’s ‘hot’ friend with the beautiful eyes and corrugated abdominal muscles firmly off her Christmas list.

Even if he did looked incredible in a custom-made tuxedo.

Oh, stop, she scolded herself. Lots of men looked incredible in tuxedos; they were the equivalent of a corset for women.

Of course lots of men hadn’t made her burn just by looking at her, or made her want to touch them all over, but that was just bad luck. Or maybe it was more to do with how uncomfortable she felt tonight. Maybe she was just looking for a distraction from all the polite smiles and curious stares from many of the other guests.

Those who were friends knew that she’d never seriously been involved with Gilles, but they were intent on having a good time and she felt curiously lonely in the large crowd.

Her mind was intent on remembering the way Wolfe had held her in his arms that morning, with such breathless ease she hadn’t been able to stop herself from imagining what it would be like to kiss him. Embarrassingly, she had even held herself perfectly still as if in anticipation of that kiss!

Pah!

She was just feeling a little strained after having to put on a brave face all day. And, okay, she was also a little intrigued by Wolfe. It had been a long time since a man had caught her attention. A long time since she had wondered about his kiss. A long time since she had felt the warmth of a man’s loving embrace. Not that Wolfe’s would be loving—but it would be warm…

Ava pulled a wry face at herself. Before today she wouldn’t have said she had missed a man’s embrace at all. But right now, watching this one they called Ice nonchalantly circle the room but not quite participate in the frivolities made her ache for it.

And don’t try using that sexy little body to garner any favours, Princess.

Ava’s lips tightened.

Arrogant.

Rude.

Unsophisticated.

Uncultured.

So why had she surreptitiously touched his body at the first opportunity?

Ava shivered and raised her champagne glass to her lips.

Empty. Drat.

The doctor Wolfe had sent to see her—an unexpectedly nice gesture she still had to thank him for—had told her it would be best if she didn’t drink tonight. Her position as ‘jilted fiancée’ in a room full of her peers told her it would be best if she did.

Taking another glass of Gilles’s best from a passing waiter, she took a fortifying sip. It didn’t surprise her that Wolfe had a reputation with women. A man who could lift a fully grown woman off a horse and lower her slowly to the ground with one hand held a certain earthy appeal.

For some, she reminded herself firmly. Not for her.

‘My dance, I believe?’

For a minute Ava imagined the deep voice behind her was Wolfe, but it lacked a certain velvety-rough tenor and hadn’t sent any delicious tingles down her spine so she knew it wasn’t. Turning, she smiled at a nice English Lord who had been hounding her all night.

She didn’t feel like dancing with him, but nor did she feel like triggering more gossip by refusing every man who approached her. Smiling with a polite reserve she hoped he read as, Lovely, but be assured I’m not interested in furthering our acquaintance, she stepped into his arms. Which was when she caught sight of Wolfe, watching her yet again from across the room. Her eyes immediately ran over the woman at his side, who looked young, happy and relaxed. By contrast Ava felt old, surly and uptight. Which was partly Wolfe’s fault, she thought churlishly, because she couldn’t seem to stop thinking about him.

And the fact that he had a beautiful woman at his side while he held his eyes on her only confirmed that the talk about him playing the field was true. Unless he had been watching her all night because of Gilles’s silly request that he ‘babysit’ her. For some reason the latter thought aggravated Ava more than the former.

Five minutes later, feeling as graceful as a goose under Wolfe’s constant regard, she sent her dance partner to fetch her a glass of water so she could find out. She didn’t need an audience when she told Wolfe that his attention was not only supremely annoying but totally unnecessary.

Orientating herself in the vast room, she located him lazily propping up a wall in a dimly lit section of the ballroom, feeling ridiculously elated when she found the bubbly blonde was no longer running her fingernails up and down his powerful forearm.

He didn’t say anything when she stopped in front of him, just looked down at her through a screen of thick dark lashes that made his mood impossible to gauge. Not that it mattered. She was here about her feelings, not his.

‘You are eyeing me off because Gilles asked you, too, no?’ She knew she’d mixed up her words—her English was always clumsy when she was agitated.

‘I think the term you’re looking for is watching over you.’

Amusement laced his tone and her spine stiffened in annoyance.

‘I don’t need watching.’

‘I thought all women liked to be watched. Isn’t that why you wrap yourselves up in those slinky dresses?’ His drink swayed as he made an up-and-down motion with his hand.

Ava glanced down at her strapless jade-green gown, which was fitted to the waist and then fell to the floor in silky waves. ‘My dress is elegant, not slinky.’

‘Why don’t we agree on elegantly slinky, for argument’s sake?’

He was smooth, this handsome Australian, very smooth. ‘I do not need babysitting,’ Ava said, reminding herself that she had not approached him to flirt with him.

‘I never said you did. In fact I told Gilles you could take care of yourself.’

‘Presumably because I made off with your horse?’

‘You didn’t make off with my horse.’ The pitch of his voice dropped subtly. ‘But you did play a pretty dangerous game on him.’

Ava’s heart kicked up a notch at his silky taunt. ‘I’m quite sure I don’t know what you mean.’

Wolfe smiled. ‘I’m quite sure you do.’

He took a lazy sip of his beer and her eyes were drawn to the strong column of his throat when he swallowed. She looked up to find that his eyes had closed to half-mast as she watched him and her breasts grew heavy.

Determined to ignore the sensation, she continued. ‘So, if you are not doing Gilles’s bidding, why do you watch me?’

‘Why do you think?’

His eyes toured over her body and she had a pretty good indication of why. Something hot and quivery vibrated up and down her spine. The memory of the feel of his hands on her torso returned. They were so large they had almost swallowed her whole.

Perturbed by the physical response he so effortlessly created in her, Ava shook her head. Compared to her he appeared so cool and relaxed, and yet she was sure if she touched him he’d feel as tightly coiled as a spring.

‘I think you are a man who gets what he wants a little too often, Ice!’ she challenged, deciding that he was messing with her head. The way he looked at her. The way his eyes lingered on her mouth. She knew he felt the chemistry between them and she wondered why she wanted to push him to show her. Even more she wondered what it would take to make this self-contained man lose control.

‘Is that so?’

‘Yes.’ Ava tried to match his careless tone even though her heart was thumping inside her chest. ‘The word in the powder room is that you steal hearts wherever you go.’

‘Have you been talking about me, Princess?’

Ava felt her temper spike at his evasiveness. ‘That’s not an answer.’

His eyebrow rose at her sharp tone. ‘You didn’t ask a question.’

Wanting to stamp her foot in frustration, she decided the smart thing to do was to bid him goodnight. She’d already decided to ignore the way he made her feel, and yet here she was almost begging him to make her change her mind.

Dragging her eyes from his sensual half smile, she took a step back and curled a stray wisp of hair behind her ear. ‘Fine. If you’ll—’

His hand shot out and snagged her upper arm. His hold was gentle, yet uncompromising, and she couldn’t prevent a gasp of surprise at the unexpectedness of it. ‘Don’t play games with me, Rapunzel. I guarantee you’ll lose.’

Ava barely contained her temper. If anyone was playing games here it was him, not her. And if a small voice in her head was asking her if trying to get the better of him on the lawn earlier had not been a game—well, she didn’t much care right now.

‘You have that wrong.’ She lifted her chin. ‘I am not the one playing games here.’ Because deep down she knew it would be beyond stupid to invite this man into her life in any capacity.

He stared at her, finally letting the sensual heat she had felt in him all night shine through in his eyes. She couldn’t look away, like a deer caught in headlights as he inexorably drew closer—only realising it was she who had swayed towards him when a glass of mineral water was thrust in front of her face.

‘There you are,’ Lord Parker puffed, pushing his chest out in Wolfe’s direction.

Half expecting Wolfe to challenge him, Ava was absurdly disappointed when all he did was slide a thumb across the rampaging pulse-point in her wrist before releasing her. As if as an afterthought he bent towards her, his mouth close to her ear, his intoxicating scent making her breathless.

‘Careful what you wish for, Princess. You just might get it.’ He straightened and inclined his head in her direction. ‘If you’ll excuse me?’ He mimicked the cool words she’d been about to serve him moments earlier before striding across the marble floor and into another room.

Ava let out a long pent-up breath. She should be glad he was gone. He was arrogant, obnoxious, and too cool for school—and yet he made her burn hotter than any man ever had before. It was a powerful aphrodisiac. All-consuming and tempting. And despite the fact that he had just warned her off some obtuse part of her still wanted to know what it would feel like to have those capable hands on her heated skin—her naked, heated skin.

‘Ladies and gentlemen…’

The MC interrupted Ava’s conflicting thoughts.

‘The bride is about to throw her bouquet before the couple departs for the evening.’

A triumphant squeal rent the air as the bouquet was caught by one of Anne’s American friends, followed by a stream of synchronised clapping as the bride and groom made their way upstairs. They would be spending the night at the château before leaving for their honeymoon after luncheon the following day.

Ava joined in the well-wishing but her chest felt tight. Anne and Gilles were so happy. So in love. An old fear that she would never get to experience that depth of emotion with someone special cut across the happiness she felt for them both.

Realising she must be more out of balance than she’d first thought, she decided to call it a night. Glancing around the room, she noted that Wolfe was nowhere to be seen and felt another stab of irritation at herself. She was torn between wanting him to want her and wanting him not to. It was as if she was somehow in thrall to him. As if her brain no longer functioned, or it functioned but was stuck in one groove, like the needle on an old-fashioned record player. The word sex was going round and round in her head like an endlessly exciting mantra.

Ava stared at her water glass and wondered if someone had drugged it. The last thing she wanted was sex with a man completely unsuitable for her hopes and dreams. Wasn’t it?

Annoyed, she pivoted on her heel—and gasped when she nearly ran smack into the man who had occupied her mind pretty much the entire day and night.

‘You’re leaving before our dance,’ he murmured silkily.

The balls of her feet hurt and she didn’t want to dance. ‘I did not think you played games.’ She could barely hear her own voice above the sound of her thundering heartbeat. Had he been toying with her to heighten her awareness of him? If so, it had worked. She had never been more aware of a man in her life.

She saw his nostrils flare at her confrontational tone and something primal unfurled low in her pelvis, because she knew that he did play games. And even though it went against all her principles part of her wanted to play—with him—tonight.

‘Maybe I want to feel you in my arms one more time.’

Heat rushed through her body as his husky words burned her up inside. How did any woman stop herself from drowning under such blazingly sexual intensity?

‘Do you?’

As if sensing her near capitulation, he gave her a lupine smile. ‘Yes.’ He set her drink aside and swept her into his arms.

Ava’s stomach flipped. She’d like to think that she’d let him walk her backwards onto the dance floor—although that would imply she still had some influence over her actions and she wasn’t sure that she did.

‘What about what I want?’ The question was meant to establish some sense of control on her part, but she suspected that he knew what he did to her and had seen right through it.

He brought the hand holding hers towards her face and rotated it so that his knuckles gently drifted across her cheekbone. ‘This is what you want, Princess.’

A cascade of sensations made her shiver and she told herself to tread carefully. Told herself that there was only one kind of man who parried around a woman all night and then approached her at the end. The kind her mother would have told her to steer well clear of. What it said about her wanting him regardless she didn’t want to think about.

He was so sure. So confident. She should shoot him down in flames. Using his own pistol to do it.

Instead she braced herself against his magnetic sensuality and told herself she would walk away at the end of the song.

‘One dance.’

CHAPTER THREE

DANCE? WOLFE DIDN’T want to dance with her. He wanted to possess her. And for a self-confessed non-game-player he had played a game of parry and retreat with her to rival all others.

Not intentionally.

His intention had been to avoid her. But once she’d entered the ballroom in a green dress that flowed around her body like a caressing hand he’d been lost.

Well, maybe not lost. More like mesmerised. And it had annoyed the hell out of him that he’d noticed that every other male in the room felt the same way. The married ones couldn’t do anything about it, but the single ones had been lining up as if she was a participant in some secret speed-dating service.

He, on the other hand, had spent most of the night fighting the urge to muscle his way through the throng of wedding guests and throw her over his shoulder like the barbarian she had accused him of being. Hell, his body had been so attuned to hers he’d practically known every time she’d blinked.