The Royal Groom (Wrong Way Weddings Book 4) Read online

  His first kiss—and a public one at that—had the impact of a dynamite charge. How would it feel to be kissed by him for real?

  She imagined mushroom clouds and erupting volcanoes, then the limo slowed and entered one of the high-security oceanside estates. They were waved through a gate by a green-shirted private security guard.

  “How will the reporters and photographers get through security?” she asked.

  “They won’t.” He laughed softly, enjoying a private joke. “But they can park about a mile away and hike a rugged obstacle course along the beach. If they don’t fall in the ocean or break their cameras on the concrete barrier that blocks off this section of beach, they’ll be able to use their telephoto lenses. You may want to wear the top of your bathing suit.”

  “You bet I’ll wear it!”

  “I forgot—Americans can still be prudish about such things. If we were doing this on a European beach, you would certainly be topless.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Don’t be sure until you’ve experienced the sun caressing your bare back and the sea breeze rippling over your breasts.”

  He grinned, and she felt like squirming. He was talking about sun and wind, but she was imagining hands and lips.

  “Our host is away, so we can go right to the beach,” Max said when the limo stopped some distance from a huge gleaming white house set in a grove of trees. “We can walk from here.”

  The bodyguards hadn’t followed them onto the estate, and their driver showed no sign of leaving the vicinity of the limo. Max carried the cooler and big towel and led the way.

  Leigh had lived most of her life near the ocean, but this beach took her breath away. It had the pearl-white sand, swaying palms, and azure water of a travel poster, with the seclusion of an uncharted island. Shells and bits of driftwood were scattered at random, gifts from the sea that were usually gathered by tourists on the public beaches.

  “This is lovely. It’s hard to believe we’re not completely alone,” she said.

  “Believe me, the cameras will find us.”

  He stopped a few dozen feet from the darker wave-washed sand near the water and set the cooler down, then let the wind unfurl the towel before he spread it.

  “Is this satisfactory?” he asked, starting to pull his shirt over his head.

  “Yes, very.”

  One spot on the sand was much like another, but the chest he revealed would be unique on any beach. She tried not to stare, but pecs like his were mesmerizing, sun-bronzed with a sprinkling of fine dark hair and chocolate-brown nipples she could practically taste.

  He turned his back to unzip, letting his shorts fall to his ankles, and gracefully stepped out of them. She’d seen quite a bit of him in his fuzzy blanket, but his idea of a swimsuit was a scrap of sea-foam-green jersey that exposed more than it covered.

  The royal buttocks didn’t disappoint. They were firm and rounded and perfect for stroking. She swallowed hard and turned her back.

  “Let me help you.” He put his hands on her shoulders, but she was clutching the front of the beach coat. “You are wearing a bathing suit, aren’t you?”

  “Oh, yes. I followed Albert’s instructions.”

  He was waiting. She could disrobe or engage in a tug-of-war. She felt about as sophisticated as the waitresses at Rocky’s Roadhouse on the old highway west of Miami, and they wore pigtails and off-the-shoulder peasant blouses.

  She let go of the fistful of silky material and felt warmth on her bare shoulders as he peeled away the beach coat.

  It wasn’t the sun; it was his breath, hot and tickling as he gently nuzzled the back of her neck.

  “Albert made me buy it,” she said, looking down and realizing just how little there was of her silver bikini. “I’ll see he’s suitably rewarded.”

  He rested his hands on her waist, and she didn’t know whether to be sensible or sensual, to pull away or move closer. He made the choice harder when he slid his hands down the bare sides of her hips in an outrageously intimate caress.

  “My mother doesn’t know I’m here. If this makes page one in a tabloid...”

  “You’re absolutely right.” He pulled away but not before playfully hugging her.

  “Oh.”

  “Come on.” He took her hand and pulled her toward the water, pausing so she could slip out of her flip-flops before they ran into the ocean.

  The sea was relatively calm, making it easy to forget about hurricanes and giant waves. He released her hand and plunged into the swell, staying under so long she began to worry. She could see the headline: Prince Lost at Sea. But she didn’t give a darn about his fame; she just wanted to see that sexy smile again.

  “Max! Max!”

  She started swimming in the same direction, but the ocean had swallowed him up. Looking back, she could see the shoreline was farther away than she liked. She was a good pool swimmer, but she had a healthy respect for the ocean. There was no sign of him.

  A sudden tug on her ankle pulled her under. She struggled, but it took only an instant to realize she wasn’t in danger—of drowning. When she bobbed to the surface, her face was only inches from his.

  “You scared me!” She twisted away from his hands when he tried to rest them on her shoulders.

  “I’m sorry. I thought you’d know it was me,” he said contritely.

  “I did—but I thought you were drowning. You hadn’t come up...”

  “Would you be sorry if I did drown?” He closed in on her, locking his hands behind her neck. “Would you miss me?”

  Miss him? She didn’t have an answer, not one she was able to give him.

  She was in over her head and sinking fast, but it had nothing to do with swimming. Max put his arms around her, and they plunged to the bottom. His lips found hers. And stayed there as they rose to the surface together.

  “One not for the cameras,” he murmured, holding her close and treading water for both of them as his mouth found hers again.

  She shut her eyes and trusted him. All the feeling in her body was concentrated in the area he was caressing with parted lips. His tongue touched hers, then plunged deep, making stars explode behind her closed lids.

  “Whoa!”

  “I take that as a compliment,” he said, holding her against him.

  “We should go back to shore.”

  She was terrified. And not of any ocean predators. What if she fell for Max? He was a prince, and she was the girl who’d vowed never to be dependent on a man. Her picture-perfect childhood had turned into a nightmare when her mother suddenly had to cope alone. Leigh was never going to get caught in the trap of arranging her whole life for a man. Not that Max would ever see her as a potential princess.

  She didn’t want the playboy prince complicating her life. Swimming back to the beach, she hoped it wasn’t too late to avoid an emotional entanglement.

  He followed her to their towel and produced another smaller one, watching silently while she dried her face and arms.

  “If I did frighten you, I’m sorry. It wasn’t my intention,” he said.

  “We have a business arrangement. You’re not supposed to have intentions,” she said more sharply than she’d intended.

  “I think you’ve been reading too many tabloids. You believe I do nothing but seduce women.”

  “I’m sure you do other things, too.” She furiously toweled her hair, keeping her face averted.

  “Too? As in also? Meaning you think seduction is my main occupation?”

  “Oh, don’t be so dramatic, Max. I’m not passing judgment on your love life.”

  “Thank you for that,” he said dryly. “Especially since you know absolutely nothing about it. But you are a reporter, aren’t you? Playing fast and loose with the facts is a job requirement.”

  “That’s a mean thing to say. Maybe you have too many people fawning over you to—”

  “Fawning?” He lowered his voice, sounding dangerously provoked. “People respect me because I resp
ect them.”

  “Do you respect me?”

  He stared at her for a long moment. Then, to her relief, a faint smile replaced his frown. “I believe I do.”

  Did he deserve his playboy reputation? Max didn’t think a healthy interest in the opposite sex was a character flaw. But it still bothered him that Leigh might believe the lurid headlines that sensationalized even his casual friendships with women.

  “Maybe I overreacted,” she said with a charming little grin.

  “Or maybe you’re afraid you’ll grow to like my kisses.” He used a teasing tone, but he really wanted to know how she felt.

  “I do like them.”

  He smiled at her frank admission and liked her even more because of it. A little pretense added spice to a relationship, but lately he’d been put off by coy, manipulative women. That was why he’d persuaded Leigh to run interference for him on this trip.

  “Don’t turn around, but I think I saw a glint of something,” she warned.

  “Our friends with the cameras?”

  “Yes, now I’m sure.”

  “Then it’s time.” He retrieved a plastic bottle from the cooler. “Shall I do the honors, or do you want to?”

  “Rub lotion on your back?” She sounded dubious.

  “Rub it wherever you choose.”

  “Okay, I’ll do it. Sit.”

  She knelt behind him, and he could hear the plop as she squeezed the bottle.

  “I got too much. It’s cold from the cooler. You might not like this.”

  “Nobody else will know that,” he assured her.

  “Well, here goes.”

  He’d never had a less romantic back rub. She slapped it on with the same technique a baker used to knead bread, and her hand hadn’t warmed it enough to feel good.

  “I have enough in my hand to grease a hippo,” she complained. “It’s squirting between my fingers.”

  He reached back and captured her slippery hand, guiding it over his throat and through the mat of hair on his chest, then pressed it against his cheek.

  “Have I solved your problem?”

  She murmured assent and tried to pull her hand away. He wasn’t ready to give it back.

  “Lotion applied,” she said hoarsely.

  “You don’t seem to have much practice at this sort of thing.” His lips caressed the inner side of her wrist, definitely not part of his plan, but deeply pleasurable.

  “My hand, please.”

  “Of course.” He released it, trailing his fingertips down the length of her arm as she pulled away. “Now lie on your stomach, and I’ll show you how it’s done.”

  “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Do you want our observers to think I’m a chauvinist, enjoying your ministrations without giving you protection from the rays of the sun?”

  “Next you’ll say it’s part of our deal,” she complained, not as reluctant as she pretended.

  The towel was warm, and the sand shifted comfortably under her. Max positioned himself to block her from the telephoto lenses; so much for performing for the press. She should call him on it, but the sea breezes made her lethargic. She burrowed into her resting place and sighed under his touch.

  “You really are good at this,” she said as he slowly and thoroughly went from her shoulders to her waist.

  “Shall I go on?” he asked.

  “Please do.”

  She’d hate herself later. Right now, his hands felt wonderful. She practically squirmed with pleasure as he worked his way down to her toes.

  “You won’t burn now.”

  He was wrong. He’d ignited her senses, and she was getting hotter by the moment.

  “Now what we came for,” he said, rising to his feet.

  Such nice feet, too, lean and tanned and only inches from her face. Knots of muscle swelled the backs of his calves without looking lumpy. Didn’t the man have any defects?

  “Lunch,” he announced.

  “Maybe after a little nap.”

  “If I lie down beside you, Miss Bailey,” he said in a low caressing voice, “you won’t want your mother to see the photographs.”

  “I hate cameras,” she said under her breath, sitting up and casting aside her mood of drowsy contentment.

  “Open your mouth,” he ordered.

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m a prince, and I’ve commanded you to do so,” he teased, holding up a cluster of plump purple grapes.

  “In that case...” She closed her eyes and let him lay one on her tongue, biting into the juicy fruit with zest. “Wonderful.”

  “Now feed me,” he prompted.

  “This is just for the photographers, right?”

  “Just for them.”

  “Okay.”

  He handed her a flat plastic container of canapes—bits of smoked salmon and cheese on dainty little crackers. She picked one at random and put it between his lips, surprised when they closed around her fingers and suckled the tips.

  “You’re a big boy—you can feed yourself,” she admonished, but she was already reaching for another tidbit.

  She didn’t have a chance to give it to him. He lowered his head and kissed her, letting his tongue part her lips. She knew happily-ever-after endings were for other women, but what could it hurt to pretend just for a few minutes that this was real? That a real prince was devouring her mouth because he really wanted to kiss her?

  Max closed his eyes and tried to wish away the hidden newshounds. He wanted to be on a secluded beach with Leigh, wanted her all to himself without considering the consequences.

  He savored her lips with his, probing deeper into the warmth and sweetness of her mouth.

  “Is that enough?” she asked just when he’d decided he never wanted to stop.

  He looked into her face and saw nothing but warmth and responsiveness. Women were never more beautiful than when their mouths were swollen and their eyes dewy with passion, and she was so lovely his throat ached. He allowed himself another moment to savor the magic of being with her, then reluctantly stepped away. It was time to leave.

  5

  “One of my bags is missing,” Leigh said, studying the luggage cart just wheeled into the room.

  “That’s all there was, ma’am.”

  The bellhop had bodybuilder’s shoulders and surfer-boy good looks. He was probably only doing this job until fame and fortune beckoned, but he wasn’t doing it very well at the moment.

  “I saw it on the cart in the lobby. All five bags were on it.” She secretly believed anyone who hauled around that many deserved to lose one now and then, but the missing garment bag held evening gowns, including the one she intended to wear for the engagement announcement tonight.

  “I’ll check for you. It may be on another cart,” he offered with drilled-in courtesy, but not before she saw a frown of annoyance.

  “It’s like these two,” she said, pointing at the two black pieces Albert had provided to carry her temporary wardrobe. “My name is on the tag—Leigh Bailey.”

  “Yes, ma’am. I’ll check at the desk.”

  “Please do it right away.”

  She tipped him five times what he deserved, knowing it was only the minimum at the Jefferson Arms, one of Chicago’s older but luxurious downtown hotels. Max would probably feel right at home here. Her room had furnishings that belonged in a palace—heavy velvet draperies, plush emerald carpeting, and a spectacular view of Lake Michigan.

  Briefly, she thought of her Detroit cousins, Cole and Zack Bailey, who’d each recently fallen in love and gotten married. She was close in proximity but decided not to call them. She had enough on her plate.

  It was already late afternoon, and she’d be in a real fix if the bag didn’t turn up immediately. Max was escorting her to a benefit for his grandfather’s favorite charity, and this was The Night. Once he used the M-word, as in marry, every paper in the country would want pictures of the woman who was going to be the prince’s bride. She had to have that bag.

/>   While she waited, she decided she’d better check in with her editor before he went home for the weekend. In Miami it was already after five, so she put through the call. “Waverly, it’s Bailey.”

  “’Bout time you checked in. Where are you?”

  “Chicago.”

  “I’m going to have a hell of a time with accounting when you turn in your expenses.”

  “Actually, this isn’t costing the magazine anything.” She felt awkward making the admission.

  “We’re paying your salary, so it’s still costing. What about this thing you have with the prince?”

  “I told you it’s only a business arrangement. He asked me to pose as his fiancée to discourage the throng of admirers—princess wannabes. Before he leaves, I get an exclusive. He’ll answer anything I ask.”

  “Sounds okay.” That was hearty approval, Waverly-style. “How are you going to handle the breakup?”

  “He’s going to let me dump him.”

  Ed Waverly laughed so loudly she held the phone away from her ear. It wasn’t that funny.

  “I like the angle—inside story by the woman who scorned Prince Max.”

  “No, I’m going to do a piece I can be proud of—what it really means to be royalty in the twenty-first century.”

  “Write a thesis on it if you like, but give me a story that will sell magazines. Remember who signs your paycheck.”

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, she wanted to say, but her editor’s tolerance for sass was low.

  “I know my job,” she reminded him mildly.

  “Keep in touch.”

  The phone went dead in her ear.

  “You have a nice weekend, too,” she grumbled, but it was the missing bag that was really bugging her. She was used to her boss’ lack of phone manners.

  She closed her eyes and tried to concentrate on the chain of events. The first-class seats on the plane had been so comfortable she’d slept most of the way from New York, where Max had spent the day conferring with a banking consortium. She’d enjoyed an afternoon at the Guggenheim Museum, then gone to dinner at a French restaurant with Hans, who’d been relieved of his prince-watching duties to escort her.