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‘What are you doing at the hotel all dolled up?’ Danny ran his eyes over her dress.
‘I’m having dinner here,’ Arielle said abruptly. She wasn’t going to reveal that she would be meeting Prince Eirik.
‘I’m surprised you can afford the Belvedere’s prices. But maybe you are up to your dad’s old tricks. A fancy car was seen driving up to your place.’ Danny shrugged. ‘The police never found the last consignment of drugs that Gerran smuggled into Cornwall before he was arrested. I reckon you know where he hid the stuff and you’ve been waiting for interest in the story to fade before you could carry on his drug-dealing business. All that collecting plastic from the beach and recycling it to make table mats is just a front to hide what you’re really doing.’
‘None of that is true.’ Arielle panicked when she spotted Gustav walking across the hotel foyer. She feared Danny might make more vile accusations and be overheard. ‘Get lost, Danny,’ she muttered before she hurried away from him.
‘Miss Tremain, please come with me.’ Gustav directed her into the service lift that was used by the staff. ‘I apologise for the secrecy, but there are journalists outside the front of the hotel. Prince Eirik’s yachting accident has unfortunately made the headlines around the world.’ The lift stopped at the top floor, and they stepped directly into the penthouse suite. ‘I’ll let the Prince know you are here,’ Gustav murmured before he disappeared through a door.
Arielle looked around the elegantly furnished sitting room. She had never been in such luxurious surroundings and felt out of her depth. The conversation with Danny had been a painful reminder of her father’s crimes and she felt tainted by her association with him. She was tempted to leave before the Prince’s other guests arrived. No one would notice if she slipped out of the hotel through the back door. But a stubborn voice inside her insisted that she had nothing to be ashamed of.
Her heels sank into the deep-pile carpet as she walked over to the huge window that gave wonderful views of the bay. In the moonlight, the sea was as calm as a pond.
‘It looks benign, doesn’t it?’ The gravelly voice from behind Arielle sent a quiver along her spine. ‘It’s hard to believe that the sea was so wild the other night and my yacht was destroyed by powerful waves.’
‘I love its unpredictability. Only a fool believes the oceans can be controlled,’ Arielle said softly. Her heart was banging against her ribs, and she could not bring herself to turn around immediately. But then she remembered that he was aprince.She spun away from the window and almost overbalanced in her high heels before making a clumsy attempt at a curtsey. ‘Your Highness.’
‘Please, no formality.’ Prince Eirik crossed the room in long strides and stopped in front of her. ‘I recognised your voice. When you appeared among the waves the other night, I thought I was hallucinating.’ His eyes were the brightest blue imaginable, and he was completely gorgeous. Arielle was unprepared for his devastating impact on her when he smiled. ‘It sounds crazy,’ he said ruefully, ‘but when I saw that you had a tail and silvery skin, I half believed you were an actual mermaid.’
She laughed. ‘I was wearing a silver wetsuit, and I swim with a monofin. I’d love to be a real mermaid, but I have legs.’
‘I noticed,’ the Prince said in a low tone that sent a spike of heat through Arielle. The brilliant gleam in his eyes made her catch her breath as he roamed his gaze over her and lingered on the swell of her breasts, before moving lower to make a leisurely appraisal of her legs.
She prayed there wasn’t a snag in her ultra-fine stockings that she’d picked up by mistake when she’d meant to buy a pair of tights. She was conscious of the bare skin at the tops of her thighs above the wide bands of lace that held the stockings up. Shockingly she felt a slick dampness between her legs as she imagined the Prince lifting her dress and sliding his hand over her naked thighs.
Something raw and feral blazed in his eyes. Arielle was mortified that he might have read her mind. ‘Forgive me, I am forgetting my manners,’ he said abruptly. He shoved his hand through his dark blond hair and walked over to a table where there was a bottle in an ice bucket and two glasses. Arielle’s gaze followed him. He looked incredibly attractive in tailored black trousers and a cream shirt made of a filmy material, through which she could faintly see his golden skin and the darker shadow of his chest hairs.
‘Would you like some champagne?’
‘That will be lovely.’ At least she supposed it would. She’d never tried champagne before. The Prince popped the cork on the bottle and filled a long flute with pale golden bubbles.
‘Unfortunately, I can’t join you,’ he said as he handed Arielle her drink before he poured himself a glass of sparkling water. ‘My doctor is concerned that the wound on my head could become infected and has insisted I take a course of antibiotics.’
He was no longer wearing the surgical dressing. Her eyes flew to the red weal on his brow where the cut had obviously been stitched. ‘I suppose you can’t take risks with your health now you are the heir to Fjernland’s throne.’
She could have kicked herself for being so blunt when his expression became shuttered. It was only just over a year since the tragic death of his older brother, she remembered.
‘Quite so,’ the Prince said drily. ‘Only a few of my closest aides knew that I was competing in the AII race. The news that my yacht had sunk in treacherous sea conditions was not well received by Their Serene Highnesses.’ He noticed Arielle’s look of surprise that he had referred to his parents by their formal titles and raised a quizzical eyebrow. ‘The Sovereign Prince and Princess are monarchs first and foremost. When I was growing up, parenting me was low down on their list of priorities.’ There was faint bitterness in his voice.
Arielle took a sip of champagne and blinked as the tiny bubbles exploded in her mouth. She’d read somewhere that you couldn’t get drunk on champagne, but she did not intend to put the theory to the test. She hoped the Prince hadn’t opened the bottle just for her. ‘I expect your other guests will drink the champagne.’
‘Other guests?’ He shook his head. ‘There are no other guests. I wanted to meet you privately and we will have dinner here in my suite. But if you prefer, we can go down to the public dining room.’
And risk being spotted by someone from the press or by Danny Bray? She quickly shook her head. ‘Here is fine.’ She hesitated. ‘Should I address you as Your Highness or Prince Eirik?’
He smiled, showing a flash of brilliant white teeth in his tanned face, and her heart collided with her ribs again. ‘Eirik will do nicely—Arielle.’ His husky accent turned her name into a song. Her skin burned where he placed his hand at the base of her spine and escorted her into the private dining room. ‘Allow me,’ he murmured as he lifted her silk shawl from her shoulders.
His fingers lightly brushed against her skin, and she felt as though he had branded her. Get a grip, Arielle told herself sternly. Maybe the champagne would help her to relax, she thought, and took a gulp of her drink.
Eirik took his place opposite Arielle at the table. She had tensed when he’d pulled out her chair and waited for her to sit down and he wondered why she was wary of him. It was not a reaction he usually evoked in women. He found her intriguing and the sexual chemistry between them was almost tangible.
She took several sips of her champagne, reinforcing his idea that she was nervous. It was difficult to believe after she had demonstrated incredible bravery when she’d swum out to his sinking yacht and guided him to safety. But the fact that he was not only royal but the heir to the throne tended to create a distance between him and other people.
When he had been the spare heir, he’d largely been left to his own devices and had enjoyed more freedom than his brother. Sometimes he’d felt guilty that Niels had borne the burden of being Fjernland’s future monarch with all the expectation and weight of history on his shoulders. It was not a role that Eirik had ever wanted, and he’d been able to avoid much of the pomp and ceremony of royal life and focus on establishing his yacht-manufacturing company.
All that had changed on the mountain. From now on his life would be dictated by protocol and ceremony and above all duty to the crown. The very existence of Fjernland as a principality rested on Eirik’s shoulders. According to the laws of succession, if the monarch died without an heir, Fjernland would lose its independent status that it had won in bloody battles many centuries ago and would once again be ruled by Denmark.
Eirik accepted that he must marry. It was not a prospect that filled him with pleasure, but that hardly mattered. He had been responsible for his brother’s death—certainly that was his mother’s opinion. He was under pressure to choose a suitably aristocratic wife and produce an heir as soon as possible, in preparation for when he became ruler of Fjernland.
