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Her heart thumping too hard and too fast for anything more than the underlying beat of the romantic song they danced to to register, Elsbeth could hardly draw breath. The first time she’d danced with Amadeo she’d been too excited at the thought of escaping Monte Cleure to think of anything other than not screwing it up by making a bad impression on him. This time she’d had a month since their first dance and had done little but dream of him. To be in his arms, her breasts pressed lightly into his hard stomach, her senses filling with his scent, was enough to send her into overdrive.
Amadeo danced with his new wife until the dance floor was so crowded their bodies were crushed together. She didn’t utter a single word, simply kept the fixed smile on her face that had been ever-present since she’d arrived at the cathedral. Did she even have thoughts in that pretty head or was it only air?
‘Shall we get a drink?’ he suggested, dipping his head to speak into her ear over the growing noise. He caught a light, delicate scent that perfectly suited his insipid bride. It turned his stomach.
‘If you like,’ she replied brightly.
Mentally gritting his teeth, he led her—she didn’t make the first move to leave the dance floor, just as she hadn’t made the first move on anything at all that day, always waiting for him to take the lead—back to their table. She’d finished her glass of wine during the wedding breakfast by the end of the fourth course, but had made no effort to call any of the waiting staff over to refill it for her. He was certain the glass would have remained empty if he hadn’t asked if she would like some more. She’d responded with a bright smile and a ‘Yes, please.’
What had he married? A walking, talking, wind-up doll like his sister used to play with when she was a child?
When they reached their table and fresh drinks had been brought to them, his brother, Marcelo, caught his eye and nodded to the dance floor. Following his gaze, Amadeo saw the tall figure of their new brother-in-law, Gabriel. A gap in the crowd gave him a glimpse of their tiny sister wrapped tightly in Gabriel’s arms.
A small breath of relief escaped his lungs. Gabriel had negotiated the wedding contract between Amadeo and Elsbeth. He’d also had a one-night stand with Alessia that had resulted in a baby-sized consequence. Amadeo and their parents had emotionally blackmailed Alessia into marrying him. It had ended in disaster a week ago when Alessia had kicked Gabriel out of the castle and told him to never come back. Normally, Amadeo would have taken it on himself to bring them back together for the good of the monarchy but his sister had been so distraught over the collapse of her short marriage that, for once, he’d held off from interfering. The way they held each other told him his instinct to hold back had been right as they’d obviously found their way back together without his assistance.
Taking a large gulp of his champagne, he watched Marcelo take a cheeky grab of Clara’s bottom, and saw Clara’s response, a mock slap of the hand followed by a passionate kiss on the lips. Theirs was a marriage Amadeo had emotionally blackmailed them into making too. As with Alessia and Gabriel, love had found them. And happiness. What Marcelo and Clara shared was a happiness he sometimes envied.
Sometimes too, his envy tasted bitter.
Marcelo had been allowed to escape the confines of royal life for a decade, joining the Ceres army and thriving amidst all the adventures that life had brought. It would have been out of the question for Amadeo to do the same. He was the heir. Every step he took and every word he spoke and every action he made was done with the dignity of his role at the forefront of his mind. It was beyond the realms of credulity that he would have swooped in to rescue a kidnapped woman from a palace window via a helicopter, as Marcelo had done. Both his siblings thought him rigid and stuck up. If he was, it was because he had to be. The path of his life had been laid out from his conception and he’d always known that to deviate from it could bring danger to his whole family. His siblings had not been so conscientious with their own recent behaviour. The pair of them had, in their differing ways, allowed their emotions to rule their heads and the repercussions had come close to threatening their family’s existence. It had been left to him to clear up the mess of their making.
Marcelo’s rumble of laughter at something his wife said echoed in Amadeo’s ears as his gaze locked onto his sister stealing a kiss with her husband on the dance floor.
Draining his glass, he looked again at his blank-faced bride and his chest tightened. He would never be susceptible to the kind of adolescent emotions that had seen his siblings lose their heads but he’d hoped for more than this. More than a blank face from the despicable House of Fernandez.
Once the party had finished and her prince had thanked their guests, Elsbeth walked through the maze of wide corridors to their quarters. She’d been hugely looking forward to seeing the private space she and her husband would make their home. Tucked in an L on the ground floor of the castle, the size and proportions didn’t disappoint. She followed Amadeo through a large reception room and into an even larger living area with high ceilings and an abundance of bay windows. Richly decorated in dusky pinks and gold, it surprised her how feminine their quarters were. The faint scent of paint told her it had been recently decorated.
‘What do you think?’ Amadeo asked her.
Knowing better than to tell the truth, she replied, ‘It’s beautiful.’ She wouldn’t dream of telling him she preferred bold colours and less kitschy furnishings, even if she didn’t have the feeling it had been redecorated with her in mind.
He inclined his head and opened another door into a corridor. Instinct told her where this led and her heartbeat accelerated.
‘The master bedroom,’ he said blandly, opening the door at the far end.
What greeted her made Elsbeth, the cousin of a king, someone who’d lived her entire life in one of Europe’s finest palaces, gasp.
Vast and high-ceilinged, most of the oakwood flooring was covered in a prettily patterned rug of pale blue threaded with gold. The four-poster bed was a work of art, the drapes pale blue damask, the headboard pale blue velvet topped with an elaborate gold moulded frieze of cherubs at play, at its foot a pale blue velvet chaise longue. The panelled walls were cream, the huge chandelier, along with all the other lighting, gold and crystal. This was a room fit for a queen, never mind a princess. Catching another trace of paint, she thought Amadeo must have stifled his own preferences to create a room with her in mind and, though he was wide of the mark with her taste, her heart swelled with gratitude that he’d gone to so much effort to make their home something he thought she would like and be comfortable in. It was a gesture that proved him a better man than the men in her family.
He indicated the two unobtrusive maids who’d followed them and said to Elsbeth, ‘I shall take a shower in one of the guest bathrooms while you prepare for bed. I will join you when you are ready.’
She arranged her features into a smile, making sure to hide the relief that he wasn’t going to remove the wedding dress himself. Another sign he was a gentleman! She knew perfectly well that Dominic had used her virginity as one of his selling points in the marriage negotiations. Men, Elsbeth had been assured, prized virginity in their brides.
Once the dress had been removed and carefully wrapped in tissue paper and boxed away, she sat at her antique dressing table having her hair brushed by a maid. There was something incredibly romantic about preparing herself for bed for the first time as a bride, she decided. The nightdress her mother had chosen for her, if not to Elsbeth’s taste, was romantic too. White silk with thin straps, it was modestly cut, square beneath her collarbones and falling to mid-calf. Remembering the sage-green negligee she’d been drawn to, dismissed by her mother as being too ‘slutty’, she reminded herself of what her mother had said about this one being the perfect nightdress for a virgin giving herself to her husband. The virginal nightdress was very becoming and felt wonderful against her skin so she shouldn’t complain, even if only to herself.
With her body and teeth clean, her face scrubbed of make-up and moisturised, her hair gleaming, the pretty virginal nightdress on and the bedsheets turned down, she was ready.
Swallowing the lump of fear that had suddenly formed in her throat, she smiled at the maids. ‘You can leave me now. Please tell...’ She swallowed again. ‘Please tell the prince that he can join me.’
‘Would you like the curtains of the bed to be drawn?’ one of the maids asked.
Imagining with another clutch of fear how it would feel to be cocooned on the bed and only able to hear Amadeo’s approach, she shook her head.
Alone, she took a deep breath and got under the bedsheets. After trying a number of positions, she ended up propping herself against the headboard, folded her hands loosely on her lap and, her heart thumping louder than ever, waited for her groom.
The wait seemed to take for ever. The longer it went on, the louder her mother’s stern advice rang in her ears.Wait for him to make the first move. Be compliant. Do whatever he tells you to do. Do not complain if it hurts.
Give him a baby.
