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Only when she caught her breath did Joaquin begin to move.
And everything was wildfire once more.
Only this time, both of them burned.
His pace was impossible. And glorious.
And far, far better than the dreams that had kept her alive all this time.
All she could do was hold on as best as she was able, wrapping herself tight around him as he took them both on the wildest, most glorious ride of her life.
Her nails dug into his back. Her hips rose to meet his as if of their own accord. Her head was thrown back, she was sobbing out her joy, her need, her dark delight.
And in that moment, Amalia wouldn’t have cared if the entire population of Ile d’Montagne was lined up at the foot of the bed, watching them.
Because this was beautiful. And she was entirely his.
It had been that way since the moment she’d laid eyes on him and neither time nor distance nor her role in a far-off kingdom had changed that one bit.
This time, when she shattered once more, she heard his cry as he came with her.
And she thought, as she spiraled off into nothing in his arms, that at least there was this.
Amalia might not be who she’d always believed she was, but there was still this. There was still Joaquin.
And somehow, some way, everything would be all right.
CHAPTER FOUR
JOAQUINHADMISCALCULATED.
Grievously.
They spent the day in his bed—and all over the rest of the home he had abandoned when she had left him that summer. When the feast of her body could not sustain them any further, he had fixed them simple meals from the small kitchen he kept here, custom built for those times he did not wish to go to the trouble of walking all the way back to the main part of the hotel.
He had not thought that part through, either. He had spent a lot of time in this place while he was overseeing the renovation of the island. He had been new to wealth then and had wanted to keep an iron control over every aspect of the project. But he had not been that man in years. These days he preferred to control the many teams that did his bidding, not necessarily the projects he had them handle for him.
That was different. When it came to Amalia, however, he was as wholly invested as he had ever been.
He kept telling himself to snap out of it. But always, that same rush of desire would rise in him anew and they would end up back in his bed, learning each other all over again.
Now it was late. Outside the glass walls of the dungeon he had transformed into quiet elegance because it pleased him to know he could do such things, he stood by the window and watch the moon rise over the dance of the waves.
Behind him, the only living creature he had ever loved slept, her dark hair fanned out across the pillow and her cheeks flushed with the force of her dreams. All of him, he imagined. If they were anything like the ones he had of her more often than he liked to admit.
He did not have to look over his shoulder to confirm it. He knew the image would be burned into him forever.
Just like every other image, every other moment.
Joaquin had always intended to taste her again. He was not a man who believed in once-in-a-lifetime events—not he, who could so often dictate the course of both time and events. And lives, come to that.
He had not believed it was possible that he would never encounter her again, and the need to hasten that moment had burned in him. For years. He had liked the fire of it, because he’d been so certain it was hatred.
That it was what she deserved from him after her betrayal. He had taken a kind of pleasure in letting it grow, knowing that sooner or later, their paths would cross again. When they did, he would be ready.
This had seemed too good to be true.
First, that for all the haughtiness she had showed him at the end of that summer—all her talk of her station and what she owed her subjects—she was no princess, after all. He was a mongrel from the streets of Bilbao and yet he had as much right to the Ile d’Montagne throne as she did.
