Going Royal 02 - Some Like It Scandalous (26 page)

“Anna!” They didn’t actually hurt, startling him more than anything. He strode across the room before she could reload it and pulled it out of her hands. “What are you doing?”

She growled—actually growled—and grabbed a pillow from the sofa and struck him. It bounced off his shoulder and fluffed his hair. But the second swipe caught his cheek and he actually fell back a step.

“Are. You. Out. Of. Your. Mind?” She punctuated every word with a blow of the pillow. He grabbed for it and wrestled it out of her hands and she raced away to grab another one and threw it at him.

He ducked and chased after her, surprised as hell that after the night he’d had he could smile. “Anna—stop.”

She picked up a lamp and hurled it. It went wide and smashed against the wall and took his smile with it. He barely managed to dodge the next set of missiles. A picture frame followed, then a vase. When she grabbed a marble egg he held up both hands. “Anna, darling—” Good God, she was fierce and beautiful.

The front door opened and Armand caught sight of Kyle filling the entryway. Anna looked at him. “Out. We are having a private discussion. I promise I’m not going to kill him.”

Kyle flicked a look from Armand to Anna and back again. “I’ll be outside.”

And he closed the door.

“You’re upset,” Armand began in a placating tone, he needed to calm her down.

“Am I really? And why would that be?” She passed the marble egg back and forth between her right and left hands. “Could it be the floozies you decided to parade at the party? Or maybe it was the shedding of your security so you could be a target? Or better yet, it was the not calling me yourself to tell me you were okay and spending the rest of your evening dancing like some gigolo?” Her voice cracked at the end and she slammed the egg down on the table.

The plan had been to push her away, but he couldn’t handle her hurt or her loss. He blew out a breath. Time. If he bought them some time, they could make it work. “Sweetheart.”

“Oh no, you can go back to Miss Novak right now. I’m pretty pissed at you.” She folded her arms. “Your Hind Ass.”

He blinked slowly. “What did you just say?”

“You heard me, it’s slightly more polite than jackass, but since we were all playing parts tonight, I’ll give you—” she made a show of looking at her wrist, a wrist that still bore the sapphire and diamond bracelet he’d left her, “—five minutes to try and spin this your way.”

Gaping at her, he tried to pull together the train of thought he rode into this mess on. Her eyes sparkled, her cheeks flushed and her hair in wild disarray—as though she’d run her fingers through it a hundred times. “You’re beautiful.”

“Oh no, you do not get off that easily. Compliments will get you nowhere.” He started forward and she backed away, circling the sofa to elude him. “You owe me an explanation, mister.”

She was amazing, like the furies of old come to avenge her own honor, she railed at him. “You really are very beautiful, I’m only sorry I didn’t get to tell you sooner.”

“Charlie, focus on the problem at hand. We’re not talking fashion,” she snapped, that volatile little growl in her voice, and he couldn’t help but grin.

“I don’t recall you having this much of a temper before.” This dark, passionate side fascinated him.

“I don’t recall you ever giving me this much grief before either. What were you thinking? Risking yourself like that? Why?”

“Sweetheart, it was safe. My men knew exactly what I was doing.” He continued around the sofa. “I told them about it—we needed the focus on me and the only way to do that was to take the focus off you.” He caught her arms and pulled her close. “I’m sorry it scared you.”

She was stiff in his arms. “You were stupid and foolish and—”

He kissed her, hard and slow. She fisted her hands against his shirt, then her mouth softened and opened to him. He was a drowning man gasping for air. How the hell was he ever going to let her go?

Breaking the kiss, he rested his forehead against hers. “I am a jackass, but I’m a jackass who loves you. The next few months—they’re going to be hard, but if everything calms down then we can—” even the idea of leaving her for so short a time sank the knife in a little deeper, “—we can start to see each other again.”

Drawing back, she stared up at him. “I’m sorry, what?”

“Did you mean what you said earlier? About trust...being a leap of faith?”

“Yes and don’t change the subject. What do you mean in a few months we can start seeing each other again?” Her eyes narrowed and her fingers dug into his shirt.

“It’s—it’s not safe right now. For you. It may never be safe. It’s a lot of politics and misdirection, but they are targeting you because of me. If you go back to your life and I to mine, we can give it all time to quiet down. And then—”

“Oh. Hell. No.” She slapped his chest and he grimaced at the sting. “You are not making choices for me. Not anymore. You took away my choice when you didn’t tell me the truth and I took away yours when I walked out all those years ago. But I’m not leaving—throw me out if you want to—but I am not going. Not this time.”

A laugh worked its way up and he shook his head. “This is ridiculous.”

“I’m glad we agree.” Sharpness punctuated her tone.

“You didn’t want this life—”

“No, I didn’t know what I wanted except for one thing and that’s actually never changed.” She lifted her hands to his face, gentle as a feather, and stood up on her tiptoes. “You. I loved you then and I love you now. I wanted you—I wanted Charlie. But what I didn’t realize is that I wanted Armand too. I want all of you—not just the pieces. I want to be there when you have to stand up to bullies and I want to be there when you play a video game. I gave up ten years with you because I was stupid, I will not give up ten minutes more because someone else is stupid. I know you don’t trust me or think you can and...”

Tilting his head he watched her fight to find the words and touched his own fingers to her lips. “I know you don’t want to change the subject, but I need the answer to this. Did you mean what you said on that stage? About trust?”

“Yes. It’s a leap of faith—it’s why it’s so hard to get back when you’ve lost it. I thought I lost it when I thought I didn’t know you. I didn’t trust—I didn’t trust that maybe you showed me who you really were all those years and that a title isn’t anything more than a nuisance. I don’t know if I can ever—”

“Shh.” He dragged her closer and wrapped his arms around her. He didn’t know if he could make that leap—just that he wanted to. “You don’t have to prove anything. Anna, this is a mess and I want you safe. I want you safe more than I want my own life.”

“I don’t want to be safe if it means not being with you—that’s not safe, Armand. That’s lonely.” She said “Armand” the same way she said “Charlie,” ripe with lush affection and equal parts exasperation.

“A few months, we just need a few months.” He rubbed her back. “A few months to fix this.”

“No.”

“You’re not going to change that answer, are you?” Wry, he let her go long enough to sweep her up into his arms.

“Nope. You’re stuck with me.”

He carried her back to the bedroom and dropped with her onto the bed. He kissed her nose. “You make me crazy.”

“Well, right back at you.” She ran her fingers through his hair and he dipped his head down to kiss her throat. His lips barely brushed her skin when she gave his head a tug and he winced.

“Oh no.” She smiled. “You see—you came to the party with three other women.” She gave him a little shove. He rolled to the side and she slid off the bed, smoothing her dress, demure as a queen. “And then you stayed to dance with a whole lot more and you still haven’t agreed to not separating. So this—” she gestured to herself, “—is off-limits. I’ll see you in the morning. I love you.”

And with that she swept out of the room. He stared after her and didn’t know whether to laugh or throw something.

What was he going to do with her?

* * *

Anna barely slept. She’d readied herself for bed, half expecting him to burst in the door at any moment. But he didn’t. Rising before the alarm went off, she showered and dressed. He would try to tell her they needed to separate for a while, she would say no. He might even order her to leave—but she’d heard his declaration the night before. Yes, he was a royal jackass. But he was
her
royal ass.

He loves me.
I’m not going anywhere.

The staff came through sometime during the night or maybe in the early hours of the morning. All the debris of her ambush had been cleaned up and a breakfast set out, including scrambled eggs, toast, bacon, sausage and fried potatoes. The warmers kept the food hot and she took time to make a plate, pour a cup of coffee and settle down with her digital tablet.

Setting the scene was important. She opened her email to see a report from Kate waiting for her on the final tally from the gala. The helpful assistant who just happened to also be a bodyguard—weren’t Armand and his men clever?

Armand.
She rolled the name around her mental palate. It wasn’t as hard to think of him that way—he was still Charlie beneath. But he was also the prince. The grand duke. The head of his family. She had hours the night before to work into a good steaming mad and time to think. Once she’d got past the jealousy it wasn’t hard to put two and two together. Rick knew his best friend and he’d told her to look past the news, what they reported—well, hinted that she should—and he was right.

The prince put on a grand show and she very nearly let him suck her into that vortex.

The door opened down the hall and she sat forward, picking up a piece of bacon and nibbling it as she “perused” the email report. But the first thing she saw were the zeroes and her jaw dropped.

“Good morning—What’s wrong?” Armand’s voice tinged heavy with concern. He walked over to the table and dropped down to crouch next to her.

“Kate sent me a report of last night’s final figures...” She turned the tablet to him. “We raised fifty million dollars.” The figure wasn’t exact and Kate emphasized that the accountants would give her a true and accurate statement, but fifty million dollars would send a lot of kids to school.

A hell of a lot.

“Congratulations.” Armand kissed her forehead and rose. He walked over to pour himself a cup of coffee. “You were amazing last night, if I forgot to tell you.”

“You did, but with all that cleavage hanging off of you, I’m not surprised you’d forget about me.”

“Anna, it was a diversion.” He sighed. “I did it on purpose.”

“Oh, I know.” She smiled at him and took a bite out of her bacon. “I just haven’t forgotten how comfortable you looked.”

He carried his coffee over and hooked out the chair next to hers. Sitting down, he gave her a kind, almost soft look. She waited.

“Two months—”

“Nope.” She went back to her food and flipped the email to the next note.

He drummed his fingers against the table. “You’re not listening to me.”

“Oh, I listened to you just fine. You’re terribly worried for my safety because of a threat and you want us to take a break for a few months so the press will blow over and then
perhaps
we
might
be able to see each other...” She glanced at him.

“Exactly. It’s not an ideal situation, but you would be safer.”

“And in this grand plan after we take our break, do we get to see each other every other weekend? Or perhaps one weekend a month? Oh, I know, we schedule alternating holidays where we happen to encounter each other...” She paused at his consternated frown. “Seriously, that was your plan?”

“For a short while, yes.” And he didn’t sound terrifically happy about her reaction to it.

She decided against throwing her coffee in his face. She rather loved his face. But the eggs would do a lot to spoil his royal dignity. “No.” Flipping to the next piece of email, she picked up her toast and took a bite.

A long huffing sigh. “You’re being impossible.”

“No, I’m being Anna. You’re Armand. I’m Anna. We’re a couple. That means we’re together—not living in distant cities acting like strangers, not meeting accidentally in foreign lands... Together. The whole package. You and me.” She flipped the digital pad closed and dropped the toast on the plate. She wasn’t particularly hungry anyway.

“I could leave tonight. Head to Europe.” Frustration edged his voice, his fingers curling into a fist.

“All right, well, when you get back. I’ll be right here. Unless they change the locks...” That was definitely within his purview. “In which case, I’ll be on the fourteenth floor. Did you know we have three thousand square feet? I don’t think it will look remotely odd if I’m living there.” She rose and leaned over to kiss him softly. “Speaking of which, I have to go to work. I love you. I hope I’ll see you later.”

Tucking her digital tablet under her arm, she walked to the door. She’d forgotten her purse, but she wasn’t about to ruin her exit by going back for it. She let herself out and walked over to the elevator.

Kyle stood inside when it dinged open and he gave her a small encouraging smile. “You play a mean hardball, Miss Novak. Keep it up.”

She grinned and they rode down silently to the fourteenth floor.

* * *

“She’s impossible.” Armand paced in front of the window of the hospital room. Richard had finally been released from the surgical floor and security arranged for a private room. It would still be a few days before he could go home.

“Really? Do tell.” His best friend sat up in bed, his bruised face looked like hell—the green and yellow splotches somehow uglier than the deep purple when he’d been admitted.

“She won’t listen to reason. I told her I love her, I’ve told her I want to be with her...”

“Then listen to her.” Richard interrupted the diatribe. “And point of order, I’m pretty sure the words you told me you used were ‘maybe in a few months’ and ‘a jackass who loves you.’ Of course, I’m on painkillers and you’re upset. So maybe I’m wrong.”

Armand glared at him. “You’re extremely blasé about this. I would think after your accident...”