Christmas Nights (5 page)

Extreme danger and extreme desire went hand in hand, producing between them an extreme pleasure that was an almost unbearable delight. A delight that was merely a foretaste of what the night that lay before them would hold for her. How could Eloise have wanted someone else when she’d had a husband who could give her this kind of pleasure?

Eloise! Abruptly Ionanthe pulled back from Max before he could stop her, telling him in a voice designed to conceal the shaky vulnerability she was really feeling, ‘My sister may have welcomed being treated like a sex object, but I don’t.’

Her angry contempt coming hard on the heels of her earlier eagerness rasped against Max’s already dangerously charged emotions. How the hell had he managed to lose control of himself so easily and so quickly?

‘You could have fooled me,’ he responded grimly. ‘In fact I’d have gone as far as to say you were positively…’

‘What? Asking for it? Is that what you were going to say?’ Ionanthe rounded on him angrily. ‘How typical of a man like you—but then I suppose I shouldn’t have
expected anything else. Cosmo was a sexist bully, and you are obviously cut from the same cloth.’

Her accusation cooled Max’s own anger to sharp-edged ice.

‘What I was going to say was that you seemed to be positively enjoying it. But if we’re talking about shared family flaws, then perhaps
I
should have remembered that your sister also had a taste for playing the tease, blowing hot when she wanted something and then blowing cold when it suited her.’

I am not Eloise
, Ionanthe wanted to say. But she remembered how often her grandfather had distanced himself from her and withheld his love from her with the words, ‘You are not Eloise.’ Instead she picked up her heavy skirts and turned her back on Max as she headed down the empty corridor.

S
HE
was free now of the presence of the stiffly correct lady’s maid she had needed to help her out of the heavy formality of her wedding gown, alone in the bedroom she would be sharing with her new husband.

Over the handful of days that had elapsed between Max presenting her with his ultimatum and their marriage Ionanthe had told both Max and the Count that she did not want to be surrounded by ladies-in-waiting or a large staff, and it had eventually been agreed that two ladies-in-waiting would attend her on only the most formal occasions, and that she would have only one personal maid who would attend her only when she needed her.

It was a relief to be wearing her own clothes again—even if the maid had eyed them with disdain.

The suite of rooms she was to share with Max had surprised her. She had assumed that he would be occupying the Royal State Apartments, which she remembered from her childhood, but Max had created his own far more modern living quarters in the older part of the building—the castle itself—rather than opting to live in
the seventeenth-century addition of the palace. The ‘new’ royal apartments comprised a drawing room, a dining room with a small kitchen off it, the bedroom she was now in, two bathrooms and two dressing rooms, which were entered via doors on either side of the large bed that she was trying desperately hard to ignore.

The drawing room had large glass doors that opened out onto a private terrace, complete with an infinity swimming pool, and the view from the apartments’ windows was one of wild rugged splendour over the cliffs and out to sea.

Unlike the rest of the palace, with its grand and formal decor and furniture, these rooms had a much more modern and relaxed air to them. In fact they were rooms in which she would have felt very much at home in other circumstances.

She had deliberately chosen to change into a pair of jeans and a simple tee shirt, as though wearing them was somehow like wearing a badge of independence, making a statement about what she was and what she was not. And because she wanted to distance herself in every way from what had happened earlier, so that he knew it had been a momentary aberration—her response to him alien to everything she believed she stood for and something never to be repeated.

She did not desire him. She simply desired the son he would give her. When she lay beneath him, enduring the possession of his body, it would be because of her belief that the people on this island deserved to be freed from their servitude. Not because she wanted to be there, and certainly not because she gloried in being
there. There would be no repetition of that earlier kiss. She would show him no weakness or vulnerability.

Abruptly she realised that she was pacing the floor. Why? She already knew that he would claim payment of her family’s debt to him. If he thought to draw out her torment by making her wait, because he thought she would be anxious until it was over and done with, then she would show him that he was wrong.

She opened the glass doors and stepped out onto the terrace. The air on this side of the island smelled and felt different, somehow—sharper, stronger, more exhilarating. The sea both protected the castle and reminded those who had built it that it was a dangerous restless living force that could never be ignored. Like love itself.

Love? What had
that
to do with anything?

Everything, she told herself sombrely. Because she would love the son this marriage would bring her, and in turn would ensure that he loved his people.

Late autumn had long ago faded into winter and now the tops of the mountains that lay inland were capped with snow as icy and remote as the heart of this marriage she had made.

Where was he? When was he going to come to her and demand his pound of flesh? Ionanthe paced the terrace as she looked towards the bedroom she would have to share with Max.

At least it was not the same bedchamber he had shared with her sister. Yania, the young woman who had been appointed to attend her, had told her that when she had mentioned that Max had moved out of the Royal State Apartments immediately after Eloise’s death.

Because he couldn’t bear to sleep there alone without her?

What did it matter to her
what
he felt?

She turned round to stare out to sea.

‘I’m sorry. I got involved in some necessary paperwork which took longer than I had anticipated.’

Was it the fact that she hadn’t heard him come towards her or the fact that she hadn’t expected his apology that was causing her heart to thump so unsteadily against her chest wall?

‘Have you eaten? Are you hungry?’

‘No, and no,’ Ionanthe answered him shortly, adding, ‘Look, we both know what we’re here for, so why don’t we just get it over with?’

Max frowned. Her dismissive, almost critical manner was so different from the come-on she had given him earlier that it struck him that it must be just another ploy—and that irritated him. He’d expected anger, resentment, bitternes—those were the things he had been prepared for her to display, the things he’d promised himself he’d try to find a way to soothe for both their sakes. Fiery, ardent passion followed by icy disdain were not. She was challenging his pride, needling him into a retaliation he couldn’t subdue.

‘“Get it over with”?’ he repeated grimly. ‘Are you sure that’s what you really want?’

He was referring to that… that incident on the stairs, Ionanthe knew, trying to humiliate and mock her because of her response to him then. The memory of that response was a taste as sour as the bitter aloes her nursemaid had painted on her nails as a child to stop her from
biting them. Ionanthe looked down at those nails now, immaculately neat, with well-shaped cuticles, buffed to a soft natural sheen.

Max saw Ionanthe look down at her own hand. Her nails were free of the polish with which Eloise had always painted hers, and he had a sudden urge to reach for her hand, with its slim wrist and elegant fingers, and hold it within his own in an age-old gesture of comfort. Comfort? For her or for himself? Why not for both of them? After all, they were entering the unknown and uncertain world their marriage would be together, weren’t they?

What was wrong with him? He already knew that there could be no real intimacy between them. Far better that they kept their emotional distance from one another. After all, she had made it plain enough to him that she didn’t look for anything from their physical union other than getting it ‘over with.’

He had moved closer to her, Ionanthe recognised. She hadn’t seen him move, but her body knew that he had. Her senses had registered it and were still registering it; her nerve-endings were going into overload as they relayed back the effect his closeness was having on them.

‘Yes. That is what I want,’ Ionanthe confirmed, her pride pushing her to add recklessly, ‘What else is there for me to want?’

‘Pleasure, perhaps?’ Max suggested.

Pleasure. Her muscles locked against the images his mocking words had evoked, but it was too late. Those same feelings she had experienced on the steps were running riot inside her like a gang of skilled pickpockets,
overturning the barriers put up to deter them and plundering the vulnerable cache they had discovered.

‘I don’t look for pleasure in a relationship such as ours.’ Her words were as much a denial of what she could feel within her own body as they were of what she was sure was his taunting mockery of her.

‘But if you were to find it there…’ Max persisted.

‘That’s impossible. There could never be any pleasure for me in having sex with a man I can’t respect. I wouldn’t want there to be. It would shame me to want such a man,’ she declared furiously, desperate to stop him from thinking she had actually wanted him when they had shared that kiss.

Max felt the swift running tide of his own pride, its power and speed sucking away reason and impartiality. She was challenging him as a man—challenging his ability to arouse her and pleasure her. Telling him that she would rather lie ice-cold in his arms than permit her body to be warmed by any shared need or desire.

Ionanthe saw the glint of anger in Max’s eyes. A quiver of something that was more than mere apprehension feathered across her nerves. Perhaps she had gone too far? she admitted. Said more than was wise? Now, in the chill of her growing anxiety, it was easy to admit what she had not been prepared to see in the heat of her prideful anger. Her husband was a powerful, sexual man—a man who knew how to touch a woman’s body to draw the most sensual response from it. In her determination to stop him from thinking that she wanted him, and so spare her pride, had she unwittingly triggered his own pride?

‘I am sure we are both agreed that we have in our different ways made a commitment that it is our duty to honour,’ Ionanthe told Max hastily, trying to repair the damage she feared she might have caused. ‘That being the case, I am sure we are also agreed that there is no need for either of us to look for anything more than the… the satisfaction that comes from doing that duty.’

‘Your views on sex are obviously very different from those of your late sister,’ Max responded wryly.

‘My views on many things differ from those of Eloise,’ Ionanthe hit back. ‘I did not want to marry you,’ she added when he made no response. ‘You were the one who forced me into this marriage.’

‘You are right,’ Max announced. ‘We might as well “get it over with”.’

Was it because he was thinking about Eloise, comparing her sexuality to her late sister’s and finding her wanting that he had made that abrupt statement? Ionanthe wondered.

The light had faded whilst they had been arguing, the sun sinking down into the sea and turning it a dull molten gold.

In their absence an ice bucket containing a bottle of champagne and two crystal champagne flutes had been placed on one of the modern black-marble-topped tables just inside the glass doors.

Ionanthe watched as Max opened the bottle with a single economically fluid movement, expertly filling the two glasses and then holding one out to her.

She rarely drank, but she suspected that to refuse
now would open her up to another unfavourable comparison with her late sister.

‘What shall we toast?’ Max asked as she took the glass from him.

What did you toast on your wedding night with Eloise?
Ionanthe was tempted to ask, but of course she didn’t. Instead she looked at him and said quietly, ‘I would toast freedom. But of course it is not a toast we can share.’

Max could feel the anger burning up under his skin.

‘You toast freedom, then, and I shall toast pleasure,’ he told her mockingly, slanting a glance at her that made her whole body burn.

She was trembling so much she could barely hold the glass, never mind drink from it.

When she replaced it on the table, Max said coolly, ‘You’re right—we’re wasting time when we should be performing our duty.’ He shot back his cuff and looked at his watch—a plain, serviceable watch, not at all the kind of ostentatious rich man’s toy she would have expected him to be wearing.

‘Shall we agree to meet in the bedroom in, say, fifteen minutes’ time? Dressed, or rather undressed for action?’

Ionanthe could feel her heart bumping along the bottom of her ribcage. She wasn’t going to let him see the despair she was beginning to feel, though. Instead she lifted her chin and agreed, ‘Very well.’

Max drained his glass, and was just turning away from her when after a brief knock the drawing room door was hurriedly opened. The Chancellor came in, looking very concerned, Count Petronius hard on his heels,

‘I told you there was no need for us to disturb His
Highness, Ethan. I can deal with this matter,’ said the Count.

‘What matter?’ Max demanded.

The Chancellor needed no further invitation. Ignoring the Count’s obvious irritation he addressed Max. ‘Highness, there has been a disturbance in the city—fighting in the streets among some of the men of your new bride’s people, claiming that it is wrong that she has been forced to make a blood payment on behalf of her sister—’

‘They have been arrested and are now, as we speak, being held in the square by the Royal Guard,’ the Count broke in. ‘There is no need for you to concern yourself on the matter, Highness. They will be treated with appropriate severity.’

‘No!’ Ionanthe defended her people automatically. These were men who had been loyal to her late parents and to their land. Now they stood firm to support Ionanthe. ‘They will have meant no real harm.’

‘They threatened the person of their ruler,’ the Count insisted. ‘And they must be punished accordingly.’

Max looked from the Count’s implacable expression to Ionanthe’s flushed face. So,
something
could apparently arouse his bride to passion, even if it wasn’t him.

‘I shall speak to these men myself,’ he told the Count.

‘And I shall come with you,’ Ionanthe told them both firmly.

Max looked at her. Her announcement and her determination were very different from the reaction he had expected, knowing from experience what the reaction of both her sister and her grandfather would have been. He
would have pursued the subject, to satisfy what he admitted was his growing curiosity about the differences he was observing between his late wife and the sister who had taken her place, but this was not the time for that.

‘Sire, I would urge you not to risk either your own safety or that of Her Highness,’ the Count was warning. ‘Far better to allow the authorities to deal with the situation.’

Max listened to him, and then pointed out coolly, ‘I disagree with you, Count. In fact I believe that it is time that all the people of Fortenegro recognised that
I
am this island’s final authority, and that
my
word is law.’

With a brisk nod of his head, and without waiting to see what the Count’s reaction was to his none-too-subtle challenge to the older man’s determination to hold on to the power he had made on his own, Max strode towards the main doors to the castle.

‘Open the doors,’ he told the waiting guards firmly.

Was he going to order that those who were loyal to her family be punished? Ionanthe worried as she half ran to catch up with him.