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She asked him the same question he had asked her. ‘And how does that make you feel?’
His answer was not so direct, though. ‘I am the sole heir to the Tulano throne. The people have been patient long enough.’
‘But how do youfeel?’
‘I prefer not to feel,’ Rafe said. ‘Feelings tend to complicate things.’
‘So you choose not to have them?’
‘Yes.’
Only that wasn’t strictly true, for walking and talking with Antonietta gave him a feeling he would like to capture and store. This morning, walking free, with the winter sun high and Antonietta by his side, his life felt exhilarating rather than complicated.
‘And the women you...’ she swallowed ‘...you date? Are you saying that you don’t have feelings for them?’
‘I am not a machine,’ Rafe said. ‘Nor am I an utter bastard.’ He looked sideways and saw that her head was down. She was frowning slightly as she tried to understand him. ‘It is said by many that I have my father’s heart...’
Antonietta flushed, because Aurora had said much the same thing. ‘And do you?’
‘No,’ Rafe said. ‘I have my mother’s heart. I don’t get close to people, Antonietta. I am cold like that.’
‘Is she cold to you?’
‘Especially to me. My parents were young when they married and I think she blames my arrival for my father’s philandering ways. She is the epitome of the Ice Queen.’
‘Perhaps so—butIdon’t find you cold, Rafe.’
‘Because you haven’t seen me when I choose to move on. Then I am as detached and indifferent as she. That is why I prefer to pay for company; that is why I choose to have a contract.’
‘Yet I haven’t signed anything.’
‘No.’ He gave a tight smile at this.
‘So what if I go to the press?’ Antonietta asked. ‘What if in a couple of years’ time I’m on some chat show, revealing all?’
‘All?’ Rafe checked. ‘You mean you would tell the world about the night I took your virginity...?’
He loved it that she blushed, and he loved it that he knew she would never reveal it, and yet he teased her all the same.
‘Would you tell them about the morning I took you in the temple ruins...?’
‘You didn’t, though,’ she said, even as he pulled her towards him. ‘And you won’t—we can be seen from the monastery.’
‘If people have binoculars,’ Rafe pointed out, but as he moved in to kiss her he could taste her tension and feel her distraction, so he halted their kiss and held her a moment.
Rafe thought of how happy she had been when they’d been away from here. How the tension had lifted from her shoulders, how she had laughed and danced and relaxed in his arms. He thought of his yacht, and the privacy that would be afforded them there.
And he decided.
‘Come with me to Capri.’
