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قديم 04-12-07, 09:29 AM   المشاركة رقم: 6
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معدل التقييم: Blue Eyes عضو بحاجه الى تحسين وضعه
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كاتب الموضوع : Blue Eyes المنتدى : الارشيف
افتراضي

 

thank u all for u comment,i will complet it.

 
 

 

عرض البوم صور Blue Eyes  
قديم 04-12-07, 09:31 AM   المشاركة رقم: 7
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ليلاس متالق


البيانات
التسجيل: Feb 2007
العضوية: 23148
المشاركات: 265
الجنس أنثى
معدل التقييم: Blue Eyes عضو بحاجه الى تحسين وضعه
نقاط التقييم: 26

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البلدPalestine
 
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Blue Eyes غير متواجد حالياً
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كاتب الموضوع : Blue Eyes المنتدى : الارشيف
Newsuae2

 

Chapter One


“You need to smarten up, Alisa!” Arranging the tray, Alisa did her best not to get upset by Maria the cook’s pertinent observations. “Prince Benito likes his staff to look immaculate—you won’t keep this job if you don’t make more of an effort.”

“I will,” Alisa attempted an assured nod. “It was just such a rush to get here. I only just found out I’d been offered the job. I had to race home to sort out care for Marietta—”

“Don’t use your child as an excuse, Alisa,” Maria scolded, “A woman in your unfortunate position is lucky to have been offered the position of Prince Benito’s housekeeper here in the villa. There are plenty of other palace maids who would only be too happy to take your place! You should present with your hair neatly tied back and maybe a little makeup—you’re not scrubbing the fireplaces now! You have to look the part. “

“I will, Maria…” Picking up the tray, Alisa headed down the long corridor, her new, shapeless white uniform swishing as she did so, the bulky, rubber-soled white shoes she had been issued not making a sound on the highly polished marble floors. Alisa added smarten up to her endless list of urgent things she had to do.

Had to do.

She needed this job. Even if the hours were impossible, even if keeping up with Prince Benito’s exhausting, glittering schedule meant she would hardly see Marietta while he was here in Niroli, surely it would be worth it.

Alisa saw her hand was shaking slightly as she put it up to knock on the bedroom door.

As a palace maid, Alisa was used to glimpsing royals and their lavish existence, but it was always from a distance—laundering their sheets, washing their plates, scrubbing their floors. Unnoticed and utterly dispensable.

Until now!

Prince Benito had made his spectacular entrance to Niroli just three nights ago. A guest of his cousin, the very adored, if rather reprobate, Prince Luca Fierezza of Niroli, Benito had sailed his hundred-and-seventy-five-foot yacht from the neighboring island Contarini, and in the short time he’d been on the island he’d more than made his presence known, as was usually the case during his frequent visits. Whispers had been echoing down the palace corridors about wild nights of gambling and partying, and the first casualty of his reckless ways had been the villa’s loyal and hardworking housekeeper Bianca, sacked for supposedly rolling her eyes at the excessive requests of his latest girlfriend, Victoria. The second casualty had been Victoria herself—dumped by the prince, it was gleefully rumored, for rolling her eyes at one of his more excessive requests.

Hopefully the third victim wouldn’t be Alisa.

Two gentle knocks on the door, a pause for modesty’s sake, and Alisa entered, holding her breath as tightly as she held the tray and taking a moment for her eyes to adjust to the darkness.

“Your coffee, Your Highness.”

Apparently he didn’t like needless chatter. A brief greeting had been her instructions—his coffee to be poured while he awoke and placed on the table beside him, then the curtains opened and his bath drawn.

Then she could breathe normally again.

Only, it wasn’t his royal status that daunted Alisa as she made her way over. It wasn’t that she desperately needed this job to work out. No, it was actually something rather more basic that had the twenty-one-year-old trembling with nerves as she hesitantly stood over him. It was that she’d never been in a man’s bedroom before—at least not while the owner was present.

Had never stood watching as a man slept.

Benito was lying prone on the vast bed, pillows tossed on the floor, his hand over the side as if he were on a lilo and trailing the water below. Even in semidarkness he was beautiful, more beautiful than the pictures she had seen. Broad shoulders, jet hair, the sculpted and chiseled perfection of his cheekbones and straight Roman nose and full, slightly parted lips. His beautifully arched eyebrows frowned slightly at the intrusion as Alisa quietly set about pouring his morning coffee—an apparent must before he even considered surfacing.


* * *

Where the hell was he?

He stretched out his long legs and encountered nothing; he was unused to an empty space in his bed. Still hungover, he opened one eye, but instead of orienting himself, Benito fought wakefulness, enjoying the sweet, soapy, feminine fragrance filling his nostrils, the soft voice lulling him from sleep, watching long, slender fingers shaking slightly as they poured his morning coffee.

“What time is it?”

“Eleven a.m.” Her voice was coming from the other side of the room now. Benito turned toward the sound and sat up, observing as she pulled open the heavy drapes. Dark curls, loosely tied back, trailed down the back of her dress, the shapeless, voluminous cut of the material serving to accentuate her slender arms and legs and, not so idly, Benito wondered what she’d look like from the front.

“Would you like me to run your bath now?”

When she turned around, the sun behind made her face almost unreadable, but as she walked toward him, slowly she came into delicious focus. A riot of curls framed her pretty face, dark eyes shyly averted, her full rosebud mouth moved awkwardly as she addressed him and, he noted, the yards of material that swamped her frame couldn’t quite stifle the splendid curve of her breasts.

Wishing he was still on his stomach, Benito pulled his knees up as she leaned over and handed him his coffee. He saw that those dark eyes weren’t actually black but the deepest green, and that soapy fragrance was momentarily overriding the strong scent of coffee and having the most disturbing effect on him.

“Would you like a bath?” she asked again. Taking the cup from her hand, Benito promptly decided that he needed to get out more—three nights of sleeping alone and he was attracted to the maid.

“Please.” His nod should have dismissed her—had it been Bianca, his old housekeeper, it would have—but clearly unsure of her role, she stood there uncertainly, her straight white teeth nibbling nervously on her bottom lip as she plucked up the nerve to address him again.

“Is there anything else I can do for you?”

A very wry smile dusted his lips as a terribly inappropriate thought occurred—she was seriously gorgeous! Benito was tempted almost to pull back the sheets and tell her exactly what she could do for him, and for the first time in probably a quarter of a century, he actually blushed at the depravity of his thoughts.

“Sort out the bathroom.” He flicked his hand now to dismiss her. “There is a lot of clutter, women’s stuff. I want it all cleared out. I am tired of looking at her trash. Bin it, please.”

“Of course.”

Running his bath, adding oils and placing his towels, Alisa caught a sight of herself in the vast bathroom mirror, cringing at her untamed curls and flushed complexion, wondering how she could smarten up without a single tool of the trade. Everything she earned was more than accounted for, what with rent, Marietta’s medicine, books for night school, oh, and on a good week, food!

What if she didn’t “bin it”?

Taking the lid off a lipstick, Alisa, lost in thought like a child rummaging through her mother’s makeup, wound it up and held it beside her mouth, oh so tempted to try it on.

“What are you doing?”

Guilt made her jump. Alisa didn’t know how long he’d been standing there watching her, just a towel slung around his hips. He walked behind her and stared at her reflection, staring at every flicker of her reaction as she burned with mortification, not just at being caught, but at what must surely follow.

Her time as his housemaid was no doubt over before it had even started

 
 

 

عرض البوم صور Blue Eyes  
قديم 04-12-07, 09:34 AM   المشاركة رقم: 8
المعلومات
الكاتب:
اللقب:
ليلاس متالق


البيانات
التسجيل: Feb 2007
العضوية: 23148
المشاركات: 265
الجنس أنثى
معدل التقييم: Blue Eyes عضو بحاجه الى تحسين وضعه
نقاط التقييم: 26

االدولة
البلدPalestine
 
مدونتي

 

الإتصالات
الحالة:
Blue Eyes غير متواجد حالياً
وسائل الإتصال:

كاتب الموضوع : Blue Eyes المنتدى : الارشيف
افتراضي

 

Chapter Two


“I’m sorry!” Alisa’s guilty eyes met his. “I wasn’t going to…” She knew how bad it looked, knew that she’d been caught just thinking about stealing. “I would never…“ Her voice trailed off helplessly as he stood silently, watching her flounder. “It seemed such a shame to waste it when I’ve been told I have to smarten up—”

“Who said you needed to smarten up?”

“Maria the cook—all of them. They say that if I am to work for you I must make more of an effort.” Tears were filling her eyes, and she lowered them in shame and misery. “I don’t have any makeup, I don’t have anything…”

“Try it then” Dark blue eyes met hers in the mirror, just a glimmer of a smile on his cruel mouth. “Who knows? Maybe if you do smarten up, I will keep you.”

Bastard.

She wanted to turn and run, but since that would find her facing his naked chest, Alisa had little choice but to comply. She’d never put on lipstick; the cool waxy pad felt strange against her lips as her unskilled fingers tried to press it on.

“Like this.” He turned her rigid body around, took the golden pen from her clasped hand and painted the color slowly on using tiny featherlight strokes on her lips. She closed her eyes in shame, sure he was laughing at her, playing with her, like a cat taunting a bird before the kill.

What the hell was he doing?

Christ, he didn’t care if she took the makeup. After all, he had no need for it! Benito knew he should have directed her out and firmly closed the bathroom door, but she was so adorable…. Those startled, fearful eyes enthralled him, the rapid rise and fall of that glorious bosom had hardened him again, and now here she was, the soft skin of her cheek in his palm, damp lashes fanning her cheeks as she closed her eyes against tears. And that mouth! That full, sultry mouth all dark pink and shiny, and here he was, naked, except for a precariously placed towel, with this beauty in his hands.

When she opened her eyes and stared fearfully into his, never had he so badly wanted to undo his own handiwork, so tempted to kiss it all off.

“There.” He turned her around to face the mirror, observed silently as she viewed the transformation. He felt kneed in the groin with longing as she pouted slightly, then ran her lucky tongue along unfamiliar lips. “What do you think?”

“It is what you think that matters.” He watched her swallow, watched as a salty tear spilled from the corner of her eye.

“I’m sorry. I can assure you nothing like that will happen again.”

“Good.” His voice was suddenly gruff. “What is your name?”

“Alisa.”

“Well, Alisa, you do not need lipstick to—” He didn’t finish what he was saying, his whole line of thinking completely inappropriate. “That will be all.”

He stood stock-still as she gave a hurried nod, then turned her flaming face from him and hurried from the bathroom. In her haste, she forgot to close the door. Only, he didn’t call her back; far easier instead to do it himself, to drag out a long-held breath and lean his weight against the jamb for a moment.

She was truly beautiful.

Lowering himself into the soapy water, Benito tried to block out her features from his mind, but even with his eyes closed, her face was all he could see, those full lips a mere few inches away from his as he’d caressed her cheek.

“Cristo!”

Unwashed, unsatisfied and spun out on lust, Benito hauled himself out of the bath, dried and dressed himself in rapid time, then punched some numbers into the phone.

“Pronto, Luca…” he greeted his cousin warmly.

“What are you doing calling so early?” Luca laughed. “It is not even lunchtime.”

“Shame to waste the day in bed.” Benito shrugged.

“Do you want to take out the boat?” Luca suggested. “I can have it arranged—”

“No,” Benito quickly interrupted. “I think I might go and look at the casino, see how my investment is doing.” Luca Fierezza was the major owner of the Niroli Casino, but as a silent partner, Benito had a keen interest in the place.

“Of course,” Luca agreed. “I will have the accountant set up the books for you to see. Do you want to meet there in, say, half an hour?”

“That is not what I am interested in—I should have made myself clearer. It is a shame to waste a day alone in bed.”

“So the rumors are true—things are definitely over with you and Victoria!” Luca let out a low growl of laugher. “You know there will be many women only too pleased to help you get over this tough patch.”

“Good,” Benito responded, replacing the phone, glad that Luca understood him. Luca was more like a brother than a cousin. Or more like a brother should be, Benito thought as he stuffed his wallet with cash and credit cards. His own brother, the much-older King Alessandro of Contarini, was more a disapproving father figure than the friend and confidant Luca was. Not that Alessandro approved of the friendship—their wild youth had more than kept the two palaces’ spin doctors dancing on their toes.

But what was new? Benito thought, heading to the bathroom to douse himself in his own signature fragrance, catching sight of the discarded lipstick. His very birth had been turned into PR exercise—he was the “sticking plaster” baby of Contarini, conceived many years after his siblings in an attempt by his parents to salvage their marriage. His father and Alessandro had been too busy running the struggling country to bother with a bored and curious child. Only his sister Francesca had really given a damn, inviting him to stay on the richer Island of Niroli over the years, giving him a teasing glimpse of how a prince should really live.

And live he did!

He picked up the internal phone to summon his transport, and stalked out the bedroom, only pausing momentarily when he saw the lavish brunch Alisa and some other servants were setting up on balcony overlooking the beach. “I’m eating out today. I shan’t be back till late—if at all…”

He could see that her eyes were swollen from crying, and knew that, no doubt, she was awaiting the axe to fall. Something twisted inside him. “I have left some mending for you in a basket on my bed. See that you properly take care of it.”

“Certainly, Your Royal Highness.”

“Benito,” he corrected curtly. “When I am at home, I like to be called Benito.”

“Since when?” Alberto the butler huffed the second the front door slammed closed. Then, picking up a pastry from the table, he took a bite.

“You should go home and see how your wife is doing,” Maria suggested. “Spend some time with Anna while…” Her voice trailed off helplessly, time the one thing Alberto’s wife had little of left. “The rest of us can take it easy for the rest of the day! Not you.” Maria frowned at Alisa as various staff appeared from the shadows, all delighted to feast on the cold meats and pastries that Benito had left untouched. “You heard His Royal Highness—you’ve got his room to attend to, and then you’ve got some mending to be getting on with.”

Picking up the endless damp towels Benito had thoughtlessly tossed aside, Alisa set to work making the crumpled bed. But as she plumped the pillows, her hands lingered, lifted the heavy cool fabric to her face and inhaled his scent, replaying details in her mind, not the fear and humiliation this time, but the feel of him.

The feel of such a stunning man, holding her, his breath on her cheeks, his naked skin that had forced her eyes closed, that trill, low, low in her stomach as he had stood so close. Shameful, wanton, unfamiliar thoughts stirred in her troubled mind as she pictured him lying in that bed.

Don’t be daft, Alisa scolded. She had no right to even entertain such thoughts. He was a royal prince. He could have—did have—any woman he wanted.

With a sigh she picked up the basket, frowning at its heavy weight, and headed back to her own spartan room, but as she lifted a shirt her eyes widened in shocked wonder at the *******s beneath—every perfume, every cream, every piece of makeup her greedy eyes had devoured was there…was now hers.

“See that you properly take care of it.”

Benito’s husky words rang in her ears as Alisa set about her tasks, as she dragged herself through the day and anticipated tonight.

Anticipated his face when he came home, wondering, wanting to see just a glimmer of masculine approval in those decadent eyes when he saw the change in her.


 
 

 

عرض البوم صور Blue Eyes  
قديم 04-12-07, 09:37 AM   المشاركة رقم: 9
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اللقب:
ليلاس متالق


البيانات
التسجيل: Feb 2007
العضوية: 23148
المشاركات: 265
الجنس أنثى
معدل التقييم: Blue Eyes عضو بحاجه الى تحسين وضعه
نقاط التقييم: 26

االدولة
البلدPalestine
 
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الحالة:
Blue Eyes غير متواجد حالياً
وسائل الإتصال:

كاتب الموضوع : Blue Eyes المنتدى : الارشيف
افتراضي

 

Chapter Three


The single light in her room was impossible to study by—the words in her book blurred and, her head drooping with exhaustion for the hundredth time, Alisa was tempted to close it.

Then what?

She had to stay awake. Had to greet the prince if he appeared and hope to God he didn’t notice Alberto wasn’t here.

Since their first encounter Alisa had hardly seen the prince. Her newly rouged lips and kohl-rimmed eyes barely merited a glance during one of his rare appearances.

She’d sit in the hallway, Alisa decided. The light was so much better there, and if she did fall asleep, if he did choose to come home, then she’d be awoken by the sound of the car….

“Your Highness!” Blinking, smiling a little too brightly in the hopes he wouldn’t hear the fog of her voice, Alisa jumped to attention as Benito pushed the front door open.

“Where’s Alberto?” He frowned, clearly less than impressed at having to let himself in. “And I already told you—I prefer Benito.”

“Can I get you anything…Benito,” Alisa stumbled. “A light supper?”

“You can answer my question. Where is Alberto?”

“At home.” Cringing, she was desperate to look at the floor rather than him, but for Alberto’s sake she tried to hold Benito’s haughty glare. “I know it is irregular, but his wife was taken very ill this afternoon. He will be back first thing in the morning.”

“If his wife is suddenly sick, then of course he should take some time off.” Benito waved, striding toward the lounge as Alisa nervously followed.

“She has been sick for a while—today she got worse…” Her words were tumbling out, the book she should have hidden, in her hand as she pleaded for the sake of her colleague. “She only has a week or two to live. I hope you can understand—”

“You think I am that much of an ogre?” He swung around. “You think because I am royal I have no feelings?”

“Of course not.”

“Alberto can return to work when he is ready. If it causes problems with the palace I will even tell them that. Until he returns, I do not need a butler!”

“No” The forbidden word to royalty came out of her mouth before she could stop it. Her heart jumped to her throat as his eyes formed two dark slits, the air thick with tension as she fought to retract her comment, yet willed herself to continue. “That would not help Alberto. I know you mean well, Your Highness, I mean, Benito, but you fail to understand—”

“I. Fail. To. Understand?” Each word was like a pistol shot, her words clearly enraging him further. “I come home to no butler, my housekeeper half-asleep with her head in a novel—” he grabbed at her book and waved it in the air “—and instead of firing you both I come up with a solution.”

“I was studying…” Alisa begged, her hand grabbing for her precious book, but he held it too high. “Please, I need my book.”

“For what?”

“I told you—I am studying.”

“Tourism.” He frowned at the title. “You have big dreams! Is that why you do not fit in?” As he handed the book back to her he registered her grimace. “I have seen the way the other staff talk to you, that you choose to go to your room rather than—” He gave a small shrug. “You think you are too good for them?”

“No, but that is how they think I feel.” Alisa admitted. “They say I should be happy with my lot, honored to work at the palace.”

“You think it is beneath you?”

“Of course not.” She began brushing the floor with her foot. “I am grateful for the work, but yes…one day I hope for better. Please, Benito,” Alisa screwed her eyes closed, could scarcely believe the mess she had made of things. She couldn’t bear the thought of facing Alberto in the morning…and it was that thought alone that gave the nerve to continue. “Your offer for Alberto is incredibly generous—”

“I will not be patronized by a maid.” Benito sneered. “Have the guts to finish what you started. Tell me what it is that I do not understand.”

“A-Alberto needs the work,” she stammered, her eyes glassy with tears as she told him the truth. “If he has time off, he will not be paid and now, more than ever, he needs the money.”

“Surely he should want to be with his wife.”

“Want and need are two different things.” Somehow her words hit, only not the mark she’d intended. The vast airy room was suddenly stifling and warm… And even when she remembered her place, even when she added a respectful “Sir” to the end of her sentence, it did nothing to release the sudden tension.

“Surely they mean the same.” His voice was low, the anger gone from it, but it was just as dangerous. The lateness of the hour, the fact it was just the two of them in the villa trickled into her consciousness as surely as it did into his. “Come on. You are the clever one who is studying. Tell me—what is the difference?”

“I don’t know.” Alisa moistened her dry lips, her mind whirring as she attempted to answer him. “Want is…desire, craving…”

“And need?”

“Need is…” She could feel her cheeks flaming under his scrutiny. She attempted to hold his unwavering gaze, but was sideswiped by untoward thoughts as she struggled to keep control,

“Go on.”

“Need is about obligation, about doing what is necessary.”

There was an interminable silence, her heart hammering so loudly surely he must hear it. Her fate—Alberto’s fate—was held solely in his manicured hands.

“You can cover his shortfall? If Alberto is not here, you can make up his duties without my having to inform the palace.”

“Of course,” Alisa breathed, wondering if she dared to tell him now about Marietta, that she had to dash home each evening to kiss her and give Marietta her medications, but Alberto needed this so much that Alisa chose not to.

“When I am out, when the other staff are gone—” her breath was hot in her lungs as she awaited his demands “—you can use the study, the computer.” The tiny gasp that escaped from her lips was unavoidable. The precious money, the time she would save typing up her work rather than laboriously handwriting her assignments or using the library computer, was way beyond anything she could have expected. And yet there was a strange thud of disappointment, too, in that tiny slice of time her mind had danced dangerously.

“Thank you.” How paltry that sounded. “Really, thank you.”

“You should go to bed now.” Benito’s words dismissed her, but his eyes still held hers.

“Do you want supper?”

“I am fine.”

She knew she should turn and go, thank him again on the way out, but instead she stood there, mere inches separating them. Benito was the one who spoke first.

“I cannot decide if makeup suits you.”

Alisa gave a little laugh. “I cannot decide, either. It seems a lot of trouble to go to and my pillow…” she halted herself, but Benito pushed on.

“Tell me.”

“I forgot to take off my lipstick one night…” She didn’t elaborate, knew somehow they were both crossing a line, especially when she held his gaze, especially when, after the longest pause, Benito voiced his wicked thought.

“Lucky pillow.”

 
 

 

عرض البوم صور Blue Eyes  
قديم 04-12-07, 09:39 AM   المشاركة رقم: 10
المعلومات
الكاتب:
اللقب:
ليلاس متالق


البيانات
التسجيل: Feb 2007
العضوية: 23148
المشاركات: 265
الجنس أنثى
معدل التقييم: Blue Eyes عضو بحاجه الى تحسين وضعه
نقاط التقييم: 26

االدولة
البلدPalestine
 
مدونتي

 

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الحالة:
Blue Eyes غير متواجد حالياً
وسائل الإتصال:

كاتب الموضوع : Blue Eyes المنتدى : الارشيف
افتراضي

 

Chapter Four


“Hush, Marietta,” Alisa soothed, holding the angry, coughing bundle tightly to her body. “You have to take your medicine. She ought to see the doctor,” Alisa added to her neighbor and trusted friend Bella, who hovered nearby.

“You have given her an extra dose of medicine,” Bella pointed out. “That is what the doctor will tell you to do, and charge you for the pleasure. She is just missing you.”

“I miss you, too,” Alisa breathed, hugging her sister more closely as her eyelids grew heavy. “Tomorrow, after Sunday school, we will have the whole afternoon together.”

“You sound tired.” Bella’s voice was sympathetic. “Are you very busy?”

“Not really—there isn’t much work to do. Benito lets me use the computer when he is out so I have been catching up with my studies.”

“Benito?” Bella frowned.

“That is what he likes to be called.”

“Why is this man doing you any favors?”

“Because he’s…nice.” Alisa gulped, glad for once of Bella’s fading eyesight so she couldn’t see dull blush on her cheeks, the blush that was ever present whenever she so much as thought about Benito.

She’d fled to her bedroom after his provocative words, had tried and failed to ignore the sizzling tension between them, struggled to remind herself she was a mere maid, that he was a prince, that nothing could ever come of it, but the opportunity to talk about him was just too tempting to pass up. “Really nice sometimes. You know, Bella, despite all the scandal attached to his name, he’s actually a very kind man.”

“A man who’s used to getting what he wants!” Bella said, unusually sharp. “Watch yourself, Alisa.”

“As if he’d even look twice at me!” Alisa attempted a casual laugh, but Bella wasn’t about to be swayed.

“You’re young, you’re beautiful,” Bella said, “and you have a heart of gold, a heart he would use, then cast aside without a second thought. Don’t go getting fancy ideas in your head, Alisa…if he is being nice, you can be assured it is just a means to an end for him.”

“Perhaps,” Alisa conceded.

“No perhaps about it!” Bella insisted. “I know you well, Alisa. You always were a dreamer, and you are doing it now. One night in his arms would not be enough for you. You deserve more than the dregs Prince Benito Fortesque would give you.”

“You should see how he lives, Bella—I’ve never seen such waste. Why should he get everything and Marietta has nothing?”

“She has you,” Bella said wisely. “Once you finish your schooling you will be able to give her the things you want to, the things your parents would have wanted you both to have.”

At the mention of her parents, Alisa felt her throat thicken. Even after five years she missed them terribly.

“They would be so proud of you,” Bella said softly. “It would have been so much easier to let the authorities take Marietta—instead you have taken her on as your own. Suffered the unfair shame of raising an illegitimate child here on Niroli. I know it hasn’t been easy.”

“I couldn’t have done it without you.” Alisa hugged the elderly woman. “I will pay you back. As soon as I can afford it, I will fly you to the mainland and you will get your eye operation.”

“Dreaming again!” The old lady gave a weary shrug.

“Nice dreams, though,” Alisa countered. “I have to go. It is only me on tonight, and if he comes back and no one is there…”

“It’s Saturday night,” Bella laughed. “Why would Benito be home?”

Why indeed?


* * *

Walking into the darkened lounge, Alisa almost shot out of her skin as she saw him sitting in the chair, a dark, foreboding expression on his face that had her heart quickening.

“I had to make my own supper!” He stared at her accusingly. “I came back a dark house and no staff. You said you would cover for Alberto. I was about to ring the palace!”

She should have apologized, should have begged his forgiveness if she had a hope of keeping her job, but Marietta’s sobs were still ringing in her ears; Bella’s plight, her warning, still buzzing in her head. And the shame of wanting him too much… Instead of scaring her, his reaction enraged her—gave her, if not the strength, then the stupidity to say her piece.

“Poor Benito,” she purred, but it was laced with venom. “Poor Benito had to open his own door, had to turn on the lights by himself and then, my goodness, fix his own supper! My heart bleeds for you.”

“That is no way to talk to me.” He stood up caught her wrist and spun her around. “I am your boss.”

“Not now.” Alisa spat. “So don’t humiliate me by insisting on an apology when you will dismiss me a second later. I am not sorry that I went home for half an hour to kiss my—my daughter good-night.”

“You have a child?”

“I have a life, Your Royal Highness. A life you’re about to ruin, so get it over with.”

He should—Benito knew that was exactly what he should do. Her insolence, that she hadn’t been here to tend to him, were good enough reasons—not that he needed them. But the anger that broiled him now wasn’t because of that. She had a child. He couldn’t fathom why it mattered, only knew that it did. She had a husband waiting at home, missing that long-limbed body each night, just as Benito would miss her.

Hell, he’d hit the casino, had gone to the clubs and the bars, spent the past three days trying to lose himself in all the glamour Niroli could offer, only he hadn’t been able to. He could think about only her, Alisa, the little spitfire in his arms now.

“You need this job?” His eyes held hers.

“Of course.”

“What if I let you go home to kiss your child every night?” He saw the hope that flared in her eyes disappear almost instantly as doubt impinged when he spelled out his terms. “And then you come back to kiss me?”

It should have been the most abhorrent of offers—from anyone, anyone else it would have been—but staring deep into his eyes, feeling the pad of his fingers on her leaping pulse, awareness coursing through her body, it was anything but abhorrent.

Too stunned to respond, too shocked to question, she stood there as his lips found hers, moved gently on her resisting flesh as her mind begged for reason.

He was skilled. If he’d moved too fast she’d have backed away, would have slapped his cheek with her tense hands, but instead her head arched slightly backward as his lips trailed down her neck, his tongue making its debut only then. He kissed her skin slowly, moving back up to the little piece of flesh at the base of her ear. She shivered beneath him.

“Or,” he offered more generously, “I kiss you.”

It wasn’t a teasing taste this time—his thorough mouth was hot on hers, his tongue delicious. Her whole body flared, a tiny shift was all that was required till it pressed against his. His hands were off her wrist now, knotting into her thick curls as he devoured her, his manhood hard and urgent against her. It was bliss to lose herself for the first time in the longest time, to not think, to just feel…

“I want you,” he gasped the words between kisses. “From that morning when first I saw you…I have wanted you. I will not get rid of you if you…”

His words propelled her from ecstasy to hell, the crude terms of his offer glaringly laid out. Breathless and angry, she pushed him away.

“I will not be your puttana!” She spat the words as she ran out the door. “I scrub you floors, Your Highness, so I can stay off the streets, not the other way around.”

Trembling with rage she slammed her bedroom door, pulled off her uniform and jumped into bed, pulling the sheets around her body, reeling with shock at her bold words and all that would surely ensue. For Marietta’s sake maybe she should have just tended to his obvious needs.

Her obvious needs.

Her nipples felt like thistles against the starched, scratchy sheets, the space between her legs hot and heavy with insatiable desire.

Alisa closed her eyes as full horror hit. The words he’d uttered in passion might just as well have been her own; he’d dammed the intimacy because he’d spoken her impossible truth.

From that morning when first I saw you…I have wanted you.

She wanted him, too.

But she wanted more than just one night with him.

She wanted the impossible

 
 

 

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