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‘“Re Dezante!”’Beatrice blinked. ‘Dancing King?’
‘I’m delighted my brother died, apparently. I am dancing on his grave at the chance to be King.’
She took up the file on her desk, bracing herself for whatever delights awaited. It had never bothered her till now. She’d looked at intimate shots of other clients rather as if she was searching for her horoscope at the back of a magazine, but she knew her lips pursed when the pictures were of him.
There had never been anything sleazy—Julius, even at his most depraved, had always ensured the drapes and luxury suite doors remained closed while he had his wicked way. It was just the odd image that particularly irked—that had Beatrice lying awake at night, frowning into the dark, pondering new mysteries.
Who would kiss someone’s feet on a beach? All that sand. Yuck. Why would anyone want to kiss a foot?
Beatrice gave herself a mental shake and reminded herself to keep her face relaxed. She considered adding antacid to her coffee cup, to save her from the burn that hit her sometimes.
‘Should I prepare to be shocked?’
‘You seem completely unshockable, Beatrice.’
She tried to be, but not this morning...
Re dezante, indeed. Orprincipe dezante—because he wasn’t yet King, but this prince could certainly dance.
Gosh, she had never so much as considered that he might.
In the photo he wore black trousers and a black shirt and black boots, and the woman he held was being dipped so low that she was almost lying on the deck of his yacht. Her hair was splayed out on the deck in a puddle of brunette curls and waves.
Beatrice had been anticipating something dreadful, appalling, yet the sight of him fully dressed and justliving, while she’d spent her birthday weeping, seemed to ram home the fact that it really was time for change.
She blew her nose, to give herself time to school her reaction. She was so jealous of her, the beauty in his arms, and not even for the fact that it was Julius holding her...
It was her abandon. Her trust in the hands that held her.
‘You didn’t drop her, did you?’ Beatrice’s voice was croaky as she attempted a joke. ‘Are there going to be air ambulances and medics...?’
‘What?’
He sounded bemused by her question, and Beatrice reminded herself that quips were not her forte, so she got back to the remaining photos.
No, he hadn’t dropped her. There were others dancing too, but the camera had been trained on him, and Beatrice’s attention moved to the next shot. The woman was back on her feet, their bodies were locked together, her thigh lifted onto his, and she saw how his hand held her hip. She flicked to another picture, and another, and another...
She wanted to shift in her seat, because she felt discomfort in a place there should not be any. She wanted to rearrange her bra because it felt a size too small all of a sudden.
How could a picture of a fully dressed man do this to her?
Beatrice didn’t know.
Yet it did.
Hedid.
At night, she slept with her hands above her embroidered quilt, as the nuns had insisted. She lay like a lady, desperately wanting to be a woman, fighting the feelings he evoked night after night.
Now, though, those feelings had not only crept into her evenings and mornings. They were following her into work—rather like the white peacock who startled her some mornings and provided an unwelcome escort, trailing his feathers behind him...
Make it stop, Beatrice thought.
The Prince’s scent was not that of the stables, but citrussy and fresh, and she felt as if there must be a neon sign over her head with an arrow pointing to the effect he was having on her. She dared not look up, so she stared at the images instead.
‘Did they get any photos after...?’
She felt a little shaken, which was exactly what she had been hirednotto be.
