“Mama, you’re not going to let Prince Christian make us live at the palace, are you?” Marc’s plea carried less defiance than he’d shown downstairs.
“Not if you don’t want to.” She lifted the covers, indicated he should get into bed, and then fussed with the sheets and comforter while she sought for some way to convince her son it was all going to be okay. “But I think you might like the palace. You have grandparents, and an uncle and aunt and two cousins who will love spending time with you.”
“I only want you and Nana.”
What was really going on with Marc? He was usually excited to experience new things. He’d rushed into his first day of school without once glancing back at his mother. An extrovert like his father, he made friends easily.
“You know that Nana and I aren’t going anywhere, right?”
Marc sat up and hugged his mother, his arms showing a desperate sort of strength. “Don’t make me live with him.”
“You don’t like the prince?”
“He’s okay.” Marc sat back down and toyed with his dragon. “Do you like him?”
“Yes, of course.” Noelle sensed there were more questions to come and wondered where her son’s thoughts were taking him.
“Are you going to marry him?”
With all the time she and Geoff had spent together, Marc had not once asked her that question. Why did he think things were different between her and Christian? Had he overheard them talking, or was it just a logical progression because Christian was his father and in Marc’s mind, parents were married?
“I don’t know.”
“Do you want to?”
Noelle chose her words carefully. “Not if you don’t want me to.”
Marc took a long time to think about his answer. At last he gave her a solemn nod. “I’ll sleep on it.” It’s what his grandmother often said to him when he asked for something out of the ordinary.
Hiding a smile, Noelle leaned down and kissed her son on his brow. “I’ll await your answer in the morning.”
After reminding her son that she was right next door, Noelle departed Marc’s room. She left the door cracked so the light from the hallway could flow across the soft carpet. They were in a strange place and occasionally he didn’t sleep straight through until morning. She didn’t want him to wake up to total darkness and get upset.
In her own room, she changed into her favorite ice-blue nightgown and picked up her sketchbook. Finding time to be creative these days was harder and harder as the practical needs of her growing business occupied her more every month. She had employees to supervise and financial data to keep track of. Fabric came in wrong or late. Equipment broke. Clients changed their minds. A hundred details demanded her attention every day.
With a weary sigh, she sat on the window seat that overlooked the inner courtyard and flipped to a blank sheet. For a long moment she stared at the empty page, her mind playing over the conversation she’d just had with her son.
Did she want to marry Christian? If she spoke with her heart, then the answer was a resounding yes. But she’d grown jaded in the past five years and more often chose to follow her head. It kept her from making mistakes and being hurt.
So if she was thinking and not feeling where Christian was concerned, why had she admitted to wanting to make love with him tonight? Heat flooded her core. She shifted on the comfortable cushion, but there was no escaping the pressure between her thighs. Her nightgown’s cool silk caressed her flushed skin. Breath quickening, Noelle closed her eyes and let her thoughts drift from one erotic image to another.
A while later, Noelle glanced at the clock, surprised to see an hour had passed. She always lost track of time when Christian occupied her thoughts.
Noelle set aside her sketchbook. She pinned up her hair before slipping into the robe that matched her nightgown. She knew the way to Christian’s room. He’d made certain of that when showing her which rooms she and Marc would use during the weekend. Feeling like the heroine in a gothic novel, Noelle moved swiftly along the forbidding stone corridors of the keep. Her light footsteps made little sound on the carpet, but to her sensitive ears, she could have been an entire marching band. By the time she reached Christian’s door, her thudding heart and rapid breathing betrayed both nerves and excitement. She took a second to compose herself before knocking.
Wearing pajama bottoms and a scowl, Christian threw open the door as if he intended to shout at whoever had interrupted him. In an instant his annoyance vanished. “Noelle?”
“I’m sorry how Marc took the news that you’re his father.”
Christian’s gaze flicked over her precarious updo, silk robe and bare feet. “You came here dressed like that to talk about Marc?”
“No.” She put her hand on his bare chest, savoring the warmth and power of him for a split second before pushing forward. “I just thought it sounded like a more civilized opening than I want you naked and inside of me before either of us knows what hit us.”
Taking two steps backward, he gave way before her determined advance. Then his long fingers snagged in the belt that held her robe closed and he tugged her hard against him. She reveled in his passion, anticipation searing along her nerve endings. But as his lips neared hers, she turned her head aside. His breath stroked along her cheek.
“First we need a few ground rules,” she murmured, fighting to keep her voice even as his fingers slipped her belt free and parted the robe.
“Ground rules?”
His hot breath against her ear made her shiver.
“This is about sex and nothing more. It doesn’t mean I’ve changed my mind about doing what’s best for my son, and it’s not a promise that anything will happen between us in the future.”
“You’re pretty bossy for a half-naked woman.”
Her robe fell to the ground, and Noelle gulped as his palms grazed over her silk-clad hips and up her spine. “Just sex,” she repeated, her voice a hoarse rasp.
“So this is okay?” He cupped her breast, fingers playing over her rapidly hardening nipple while he watched her expression from beneath thick black lashes.
“Yes.”
“And this?” His free hand dislodged the pins in her hair. He sank his fingers into the thick mass that fell around her shoulders and tugged to drag her head back and expose her throat.
Noelle forgot to breathe as he placed his mouth over the pulse in her neck and sucked. Her heartbeat shifted into an erratic rhythm. “Sure.”
“So this isn’t off-limits?” Moving with slow tormenting precision, his hand left her breast and glided down over her belly to cup her, the heel of his hand applying the perfect pressure to weaken her knees.
“Yes.” She barely got the single syllable out before he began pulling his hand away. Frantic, she grasped his wrist and held him in place.
