A Queen for the Taking?

But she wouldn’t think anymore about that. It was as if there were a door in Liana’s mind, and it clanged shut by sheer force of will. She wouldn’t think about Chiara.

She turned away from the fire, crossing to the window to gaze out at the bare gardens still caught in the chill of late winter. Strange to think this view would become familiar when she was wed. This palace, this life, would all become part of her normal existence.

As would the king. Sandro.

She suppressed a shiver. What would marriage to King Alessandro look like? She had a feeling it wouldn’t look or feel like she’d assumed. Convenient. Safe.

She’d never even had a proper boyfriend, never been kissed except for a few quick, sloppy attempts on a couple dates she’d gone on over the years, pressured by her parents to meet a boy, fall in love, even though she hadn’t been interested in either.

But Alessandro would want more than a kiss, and with him she felt it would be neither sloppy nor quick.

She let out a soft huff of laughter, shaking her head at herself. How on earth would she know how Alessandro would kiss?

But you’ll find out soon enough.

She swallowed hard, the thought alone enough to make her palms go icy again. She didn’t want to think about that, not yet.

She gazed around the bedroom, the afternoon stretching emptily in front of her. She couldn’t bear to simply sit and wait in her room; she preferred being busy and active. She’d take a walk through the palace gardens, she decided. The fresh air would be welcome.

She dressed casually but carefully in wool trousers of pale grey and a twin set in mauve cashmere, the kind of bland, conservative clothes she’d chosen for ever.

She styled her hair, leaving it down, and did her discreet make-up and jewellery—pearls, as she always wore. It took her nearly an hour before she was ready, and then as soon as she left her room one of the staff standing to attention in the endless corridor hurried towards her.

‘My lady?’

‘I’d like to go outside, please. To have a stroll around the gardens if I may.’

‘Very good, my lady.’

She followed the man in his blue-and-gold-tasselled uniform down the corridor and then down several others and finally to a pair of French windows that led to a wide terrace with shallow steps leading to the gardens.

‘Would you like an escort—?’ he began, but Liana shook her head.

‘No, thank you. I’ll just walk around by myself.’

She breathed in the fresh, pine-scented mountain air as she took the first twisting path through the carefully clipped box hedges. Even though the palace was in the centre of Maldinia’s capital city of Averne, it was very quiet in the gardens, the only sound the rustle of the wind through the still-bare branches of the trees and shrubs.

Liana dug her hands into the pockets of her coat, the chilly wind stinging her cheeks, glad for an afternoon’s respite from the tension of meeting with the king. As she walked she examined the flowerbeds, trying to identify certain species although it was difficult with everything barely in blossom.

The sun was starting to sink behind the snow-capped peaks on the horizon when Liana finally turned back to the palace. She needed to get ready for her dinner with the king, and already she felt her brief enjoyment of the gardens replaced by a wary concern over the coming evening.

She could not afford to make a single misstep, and yet as she walked back towards the French windows glinting in the late afternoon sun she realised how little information King Alessandro had given her. Was this dinner a formal occasion with members of state, or something smaller and more casual? Would the queen be dining with them, or other members of the royal family? Liana knew that Alessandro’s brother, Leo, and his wife, Alyse, lived in Averne, as did his sister, the princess Alexa.

Her steps slowed as she came up to the terrace; she found herself approaching the evening with both dread and a tiny, treacherous flicker of anticipation. Sandro’s raw, restless energy might disturb her, but it also fascinated her. It was, she knew, a dangerous fascination, and one she needed to get under control if she was going to go ahead with this marriage.

Which she was.

Anything else, at this point, was impossible, involved too much disappointment for too many people.

She forced her worries back along with that fascination as she opened the French windows. As she came inside she stopped short, her breath coming out in a rush, for Alessandro had just emerged from a gilt-panelled door, a frown settled between his dark, straight brows. He glanced up, stilling when he saw her, just as Liana was still.

‘Good evening. You’ve been out for a walk in the gardens?’

She nodded, her mind seeming to have snagged on the sight of him, his rumpled hair, his silvery eyes, his impossibly hard jaw. ‘Yes, Your Highness.’

‘You’re cold.’ To her complete shock Alessandro touched her cheek with his fingertips. The touch was so very slight and yet so much more than she’d expected or ever known. Instinctively she jerked back, and she watched as his mouth, which had been curving into a faint smile, thinned into a hard line.

‘I’ll see you at dinner,’ he said flatly. He turned away and strode down the hall.

Drawing a deep breath, she threw back her shoulders, forced herself to turn towards her own suite of rooms and walk with a firm step even as inside she wondered just what would happen tonight—and how she would handle it.

CHAPTER TWO

ALESSANDRO GAZED DISPASSIONATELY at his reflection as he twitched his black tie into place. This afternoon’s meeting with Lady Liana had gone about as well as he could have expected, and yet it still left him dissatisfied. Restless, as everything about his royal life did.

This palace held too many painful memories, too many hard lessons. Don’t trust. Don’t love. Don’t believe that anyone loves you back.

Every one drilled into him over years of neglect, indifference, and anger.

Sighing, he thrust the thought aside. He might hate returning to the palace, but he’d done it of his own free will. Returned to face his father and take up his kingship because he’d known it was the right thing to do. It was his duty.

And because you, ever naive, thought your father might actually forgive you. Finally love you.

What a blind fool he was.

He wouldn’t, Sandro thought as he fastened his cufflinks, be blind about his wife. He knew exactly what he was getting into, just what he was getting from the lovely Lady Liana.

Yet for a moment, when he’d seen Liana coming through the French windows, her hair streaming over her shoulders like pale satin, the fading sunlight touching it with gold, he’d felt his heart lighten rather ridiculously.

She’d looked so different from the coldly composed woman he’d encountered in the formal receiving room. She’d looked alive and vibrant and beautiful, her lavender eyes sparkling, her cheeks pink from the wind.

He’d felt a leap of hope then that she might not be the cold, ambitious queen-in-waiting she’d seemed just hours ago, but then he’d seen that icy self-possession enter her eyes, she’d jerked back when he had, unthinkingly, touched her, and disappointment had settled in him once more, a leaden weight.

It was too late to wish for something else for his marriage, Sandro knew. For his life. When he’d received the phone call from his father—after fifteen years of stony silence on both sides—he’d given up his right to strive or even wish for anything different. He’d been living for himself, freely, selfishly, for too long already. He’d always known, even if he’d acted as if he hadn’t, that it couldn’t last. Shouldn’t.

And so he’d returned and taken up his kingship and all it required...such as a wife. An ambitious, appropriate, perfect wife.

His expression hardening, he turned from his reflection and went in search of the woman who fitted all those soulless requirements.

He found her already waiting in the private dining room he’d requested be prepared for their meal. She stood by the window, straight and proud, dressed in an evening gown of champagne-coloured silk.

Her face went blank as she caught sight of him, and after a second’s pause she nodded regally as he closed the door behind him.

Sandro let his gaze sweep over her; the dress was by no means immodest and yet it still clung to her slight curves. It had a vaguely Grecian style, with pearl-and-diamond clips at each shoulder and a matching pearl-and-diamond pendant nestled in the V between her breasts.

The dress clung to those small yet shapely breasts, nipping in at her waist before swirling out around her legs and ending in a silken puddle at her feet. She looked both innocent and made of ivory, everything about her so cold and perfect, making Sandro want to add a streak of colour to her cheeks or her lips—would her cheeks turn pink as they’d been before if he touched her again?

What if he kissed her?