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CHAPTER EIGHT
BEATRICETOOKSOMEtime freshening up. She reapplied some lipstick, smudged some more soft grey shadow on her eyelids and that was it—the recent exposure to the winter Alpine sun had given her skin a deep glow that made her look deceptively healthy, even though she felt tired and washed out.
Her freshly washed hair resisted her efforts to pull it back from her forehead and into a sleek ponytail on the nape of her neck, but she persevered and got a result that made her nod faint approval at her reflection.
A quick spritz of perfume before she shrugged on a long-line oversized blazer in a swirly print. She thought she might pass muster. Her lips curved into a small, reflective smile as she remembered the first time she’d stepped off one of the royal fleet of jets onto home tarmac. Except it hadn’t felt like home as she knew it.
When Dante had said private she had assumed that this covered both the flight and the arrival—she’d been wrong! Stepping into the sun, she had found herself faced with a military guard of honour, several dignitaries and half the royal family, complete with hats and heels. She’d stepped out wearing jeans and a tee shirt emblazoned with a cartoon of a smiling monkey, and trainers that had seen better days. Her hair, waist-length, loose and wild.
Given the way she made her living, she was used to being the focus of attention, but that was playing a part. That day she hadn’t had any fake sexy persona to hide behind—she had worn less in public but she had never felt more exposed.
She had been furious with Dante for not warning her, and he had added insult to injury by suggesting that she was overreacting.
She hadn’t asked about today, but she was pretty sure that, given the circumstances, this would be low-key and not a hat-and-heels-and-handshakes occasion. But even if it had been, she no longer had anything to prove.
It was quite liberating to have already flunked the exams, and actually the intervening months had made her grow in confidence. Something that hadn’t really hit home until now.
With a toss of her head that set her ponytail bobbing, she pushed up the sleeves on the oversized tailored blazer and went to join Dante. She tilted a smile up at him.
‘So, let’s do this.’
Dante had been scrolling through his phone as he’d waited. At the sound of her voice he slid it back into his pocket and turned his head. She sounded like a sports coach giving a confidence-boosting pep talk, but she looked like a goddess. He felt the heat flash down his front and settle painfully in his groin. Beatrice could make a sack look sexy; along with a perfect supple body, she had an innate sense of style.
He remembered the first time she’d arrived; the image would stay with him forever—Beatrice dressed in jeans that showed off her incredible bottom and endless legs, carrying off the military escort reception with a queenly confidence that had filled him with pride. She’d been mad as hell, he recalled, a reminiscent smile turning the corners of his mobile mouth upwards.
Beatrice felt the heat inside her rise as his dark gaze settled on her. She stood her ground and fought not to react.
‘You look good.’
She tipped her head in acknowledgement; it hid the rush of blood that warmed her cheeks.
Their arrival was indeed low-key and, like the Italian lessons, it seemed she had learnt more than she’d thought. She nodded through the handshakes and smiles in a way she would once have thought unimaginable… Maybe it was because she had not had to impress anyone.
There was something quietly liberating about it. Was this the way Dante, who never tried to impress people, felt? She slid a glance at him as she stepped through the open door of the limousine. He was conversing with someone who had a serious expression and wore a holstered gun. She gave a little shiver. That was something she could never feel nostalgia for, along with bulletproof glass.
She had settled in her seat when the door opened, and Dante joined her. ‘Sorry about that, just a message from Carl.’
She nodded but didn’t ask. She was aware in the periphery of her vision that Dante was watching her.
‘How is he?’ she forced herself to ask.
She understood being close to a sibling, but she had never understood why Dante had never, ever displayed any resentment towards his older brother.
She had always been careful not to show how she felt but his next words suggested she hadn’t been entirely successful.
‘Our marriage problems were not down to Carl.’
‘I don’t think that,’ she tossed back with a small unconvincing laugh. ‘I never did.’
Strong marriages survived the storms, some were even made stronger, but theirs had sunk without trace at the first squall.
Why do you think it will be any different now?
She pushed away the doubts. ‘What is the hold-up?’ she gritted, bouncing out of her seat as she virtually pressed her nose to the window.
His eyes went from her foot tapping on the floor to the visible tension in her slim neck.
‘This is going to work, you know.’
