Her pretended ignorance didn’t fool him. The shadows darkening her eyes gave her discomfort away. He removed his sunglasses and looked into her eyes. “The man who disappointed you.”
She fussed with her cutlery. “Pfft. What makes you so sure there is one?” When he held her gaze without replying she bristled. “Is this twenty questions? Because if it is, you’ll have to give an answer for every one you get.”
Risky, but doable if he chose his words carefully. He nodded acceptance of her terms. “Did you love him?” he repeated.
“I thought I did.”
“You don’t know?”
She shifted in her seat, reminding him of her nak*dness beneath the T-shirt thin layer of cotton. “Why don’t you tell me what you have planned for our next outing?”
“Because you are a far more interesting topic.” His voice came out in a lower pitch than normal as if he were dredging it up from the bottom of the sea. “Why do you question your feelings?”
She sighed. Resignation settled over her features. “My mother was forty-six when I was born and my father fifty. They were too old to keep up with a rambunctious child. I wanted to do things differently when I had children, so I made a plan to get married and start my family before I turned thirty. I met Mike right after college. He seemed like the perfect candidate and we got engaged. But it didn’t work out.”
“One failed relationship soured you?”
Another squirm of her nak*d bottom made him wish he could take the place of her chair. “My parents divorced. It wasn’t pretty. Have you ever been in a long-term relationship?”
“Yes.”
Her arched brows rose. “And?”
“My turn. Why did your relationship end?”
She frowned. “Lots of reasons. First, I spent too much time trying to be the woman I thought he and society expected me to be instead of the one I wanted to be. Second, he found someone else.”
“He is a fool.”
A smile twitched her lips. “Don’t expect me to argue with that brilliantly insightful conclusion.”
The waitress placed their meals on the table and departed.
“Have you ever been married?” Madeline asked before biting into her bruschetta.
“Yes.”
Her body stilled and her emerald gaze locked with his. She chewed quickly and then swallowed. “What happened?”
“She died.” The words came out without inflection. He’d learned long ago to keep the pain locked away behind a wall of numbness.
Sympathy darkened her eyes. “I’m sorry. How?”
“Ectopic pregnancy.”
She reached across the table and covered his hand. Her touch warmed him and surprisingly, soothed him. “That must have been hard, losing your wife and child at the same time. Did you even know she was pregnant?”
How could this virtual stranger understand what those closest to him had not?
“Yes, it was hard, and no, we didn’t know about the baby.” It had infuriated him at the time that many had been more concerned with the loss of a potential heir to the throne than the loss of his wife, his friend, his gentle Giselle. Only recently had his anger subsided enough for him to agree to another marriage. If his sisters had produced sons instead of daughters, he probably never would have.
They finished the meal in silence. He waited until Madeline pushed her plate aside before asking, “You do not wish for another affaire de coeur or the American dream of a house with a white picket fence and two-point-something children?”
She straightened and put her hands in her lap. “No. I’m over my urge to procreate. It’s time to focus on me. My wants. My needs. My career. I don’t need a man to complete me. And I don’t need marriage to find passion.”
Passion. Arousal pulsed through him. “You can be happy with brief liaisons? Without love?”
“Absolutely. In fact, I prefer it that way. If I want to take a promotion, a trip or stay out late with my friends, then I don’t have to worry about anyone’s ego getting bent. So, Damon…” Her fingertips touched his on the table. “What you said on the beach about your control…? Losing it with me would not be a problem.”
He inhaled sharply. Her meaning couldn’t be clearer. She wanted a lover. And he would be more than happy to oblige. The question was should he reveal his identity beforehand, or since she wanted nothing more than a brief affair, did he have to reveal anything at all? Did he have to ruin this camaraderie? For he knew with absolute certainty that the knowledge would change their relationship.
He stood and dropped a handful of bills on the table.
Her hand caught his and the need to yank her into his arms surged through him. “You paid for the taxi. Shouldn’t I get this?”
“No.” He pulled back her chair. She rose and turned, but Dominic didn’t back away. Her br**sts brushed his chest. His palm curved over her waist. “I know of a back entrance to the hotel.”
Her quick gasp filled his ears and temptation expanded her pupils. “What about your other appointment?”
His gaze dropped from her emerald eyes to her mouth. “Nothing is more important at the moment than tasting you.”
Her tongue swiped quickly over her bottom lip and he barely contained a groan. “We could go to your place.”
Again the lie complicated matters. He shook his head. “I share with another man.”
She grimaced. “And I’m sharing a suite with the bride-to-be and two other bridesmaids. I have my own bedroom, but I wouldn’t feel right taking a man to my room.”
And he had to avoid her celebrity-watching friend. He clenched his teeth to dam a frustrated growl and laced his fingers through hers. He led her outside the restaurant, passing by Ian on a nearby bench. Dominic scanned the area, for there was one thing that couldn’t wait. A narrow flower-lined alleyway beckoned. Dominic ducked in, pulled Madeline behind a potted olive tree and into his arms.
“Wha—”
His mouth stole the word from her soft lips. Desire, instantaneous and incendiary, raced through his bloodstream at the first taste of her mouth. He sought her tongue, stroked, entwined and suckled. Madeline’s arms encircled his waist, pressing her lithe body flush against his.
Her flowers and lemon scent filled his nostrils and her warmth seeped deep inside him. He tangled the fingers of one hand in her silky curls, caressed the curve of her h*ps with the other and pressed the driving need in his groin against her stomach.
A horn sounded in the street, reminding him of where they were and the omnipresent possibility of paparazzi. Except for a few insane months, he’d spent a lifetime carefully avoiding the press, and yet Madeline made him forget. Reluctantly, he lifted his head.
Madeline opened dazed eyes and blinked her long, dark lashes. Her lips gleamed damp and inviting as she gazed up at him. “That was worth waiting for.”
For the first time in ages Dominic felt like a man instead of a dynasty on legs or an animal expected to breed on command. “I will arrange privacy for our next outing.”
Chapter 3
Pain burned Madeline’s throat Thursday morning, but she’d be damned if she’d let Candace know it. She gritted her teeth into a bright smile.Watching the couturière fuss and flutter around her petite blond friend reminded Madeline of the wedding dress her mother and aunts had sewn for her. The trio had dedicated a year to creating a gorgeous gown and veil with intricate seed pearl beading and hand-tatted lace. Neither would ever be worn.
It should have been a clue that Madeline’s engagement was doomed when her dream dress included a full cathedral train, and yet Mike had claimed he wanted an informal backyard wedding, or better yet, a Vegas quickie—if she’d pay for the trip. Her fiancé had been loaded, and yet he’d been a total miser.
She shook off the memories and widened her smile. “You look gorgeous, Candace. That dress couldn’t be more perfect if it had been custom-made for you.”
“You think?” Her friend smoothed her hands over the silk douppioni skirt beneath a hand-beaded bodice and twisted this way and that to see her reflection in the three-way mirror. “I’m not showing?”
Another twinge of regret pinched Madeline’s heart. If she’d stuck with her plan, she probably would have had several babies by now. But since Mike couldn’t keep his pants zipped most likely they would have been divorced and playing tug-of-war with innocent children. Not a pretty picture. She ought to know. Her parents’ divorce when Madeline was ten had been rough.
Breaking up with Mike had been for the best, and luckily his paranoia over the two percent failure rate of the Pill had led him to use condoms as a backup every single time. Otherwise, there was no telling what the two-timing louse would have brought home from his extramural adventures.
Candace’s expectant expression dragged Madeline back to the present. “Candace, no one will know you’re pregnant unless you tell them. The empire waist covers everything—not that there’s anything to hide yet. You’re only eight weeks along.”
Candace had confided her pregnancy to Madeline and sworn her to secrecy before they’d left North Carolina. She’d wanted Madeline’s medical assurance in addition to her obstetrician’s that traveling in her first trimester wouldn’t endanger the baby.
“Okay, this is the dress. Je voudrais acheter cette robe,” Candace told the seamstress.
The seamstress rattled off a quick stream of French while she unfastened the long line of silk-covered buttons down Candace’s spine, and Candace replied in the same language. Madeline didn’t have a clue what either of them said. She should have borrowed those French lesson CDs her suitemate Stacy had used.
The heavy fabric swished over her friend’s head. With the dress draped over her arms, the seamstress departed. Candace quickly pulled on her street clothes, crossed the dressing room to Madeline’s side and took her hands. “You had a lucky escape. You know that, right?”
Madeline winced. She should have known her friend would see through her fake merriment. They’d been through a lot together in the past twelve years: college, their engagements to Mike and Vincent and the deaths of Madeline’s father and Candace’s brother. “I know, and trust me, I am not missing that two-timing dud.”
“But the wedding preparations are hard for you.” It was a statement, not a question. “I’m sorry. But I couldn’t do this without you, Madeline.”
“I love seeing you this happy.”
“Your turn will come.” Candace squeezed her fingers and released her.
Not as long as I have a functioning brain cell. God forbid I ever go through that again. “This month is all about you.”
“When will the rest of us get to meet your gorgeous guide?”
“I’m not sure. I’ll have to ask. I won’t see him again until Saturday.” Two days. It seemed like an aeon.
After kissing her into a stupor yesterday Damon had put her in a cab with the promise of passion to come. If that kiss was a sample of what she could expect, then it would be passion unlike any she’d ever experienced. She couldn’t remember Mike’s embrace ever making her forget where she was.