Aaron shot her a look, then turned to Chris. “I’ll see that it’s done immediately. And I’m sure the first thing he’ll want is to see the e-mails themselves, so we should all forward them to him.”
“I bet this will turn out to be nothing,” Louisa assured them in her typical optimistic way. “Probably just some harmless computer hacker trying to impress his friends.”
Deep down Chris hoped she was right, but in reality he sensed a disaster coming on.
Melissa stretched out on a lounge chair on the back patio, sipping her latte, the morning sun on her face. She closed her eyes and tipped her face up, breathing in the fresh ocean air, feeling as though she could nod off. She’d slept poorly last night. She had tossed and turned for hours, filled with longing and regret. And confusion. A part of her wished desperately that she’d invited Chris into her room, while another part of her was scared to death to get too close.
Hadn’t she endured enough rejection in her life?
The trick was not letting him get close. After all, how could he hurt her if she didn’t care? The problem with that was, it had only been a day and she already liked him far too much for her own good.
She’d never understood how it happened so easily for some people. Love just seemed to fall in their laps when they weren’t even looking. But despite her desperate longing for a family, the right man constantly seemed to elude her. Around about her thirtieth birthday, she’d begun to worry that she might never find Mr. Right. And now, at thirty-three, she’d nearly given up on the concept of marriage and family and resigned herself to settling for Mr. Right Now.
Maybe the trick was not to look. To just sit back and let it happen naturally. Which was tough when, as every day passed, her biological clock ticked louder.
She heard the door open behind her and turned to see Chris step out onto the patio. He wore a pair of dark slacks and a white silk dress shirt with the sleeves rolled loosely to the elbows that contrasted his deeply tanned forearms.
“I thought I might find you out here,” he said, flashing her one of those heart-stopping, deliciously sexy smiles. The man was far too attractive for his own good. Or hers. She could just imagine the gorgeous children he would have with the lucky woman who eventually nabbed him. Which was inevitable. For a crown prince, marriage and children weren’t a luxury. They were a duty. Like her half brother, Phillip. But he’d been smart enough to marry a woman he loved.
Not that she considered herself unlovable. But the sad truth was, when Chris did choose a wife, she would be considerably younger, with plenty of fertile, child-bearing years ahead of her. A commodity Melissa no longer possessed.
But she wasn’t going to let that fact ruin her vacation. Love was nice, but there was also a lot to be said for smoking-hot, no-strings-attached sex.
She returned his smile and said, “Good morning, Your Highness.”
He lowered himself into a chair across from her, his back to the sun, folding one leg casually atop the other. “Did you sleep well?”
“Very,” she lied. “And you?”
“Quite.” He gazed up at the cloudless blue sky, shading his eyes from the sun with one hand. “Beautiful morning.”
“Yes, it is,” she agreed. “The news this morning said it should be pleasantly warm this afternoon. Around seventy-nine degrees. And no humidity.”
“Some might consider that a little too hot.”
“That’s because they haven’t lived in the deep South of the United States. Seventy-nine is downright balmy.”
He grinned, and for a moment he just looked at her, a spark of amusement in his eyes.
She narrowed her eyes at him. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
“When you talk about the U.S., your Southern accent thickens.”
“Does it?”
He nodded. “I like it.”
And she liked that he liked it. He certainly hadn’t wasted any time with the flirting this morning. A full day of this and tonight she wouldn’t even think of telling him no.
“Hungry?” he asked with a smoldering grin that said he had more than breakfast on his mind.
“Famished.”
“Breakfast should be ready.” He rose from his seat and held out a hand to help her from the chaise. She took it and his warm fingers curled around her own. He had strong, long-fingered, graceful-looking hands. The thought of what they would feel like on other parts of her body made her shiver.
She hoped she didn’t have to wait too long to find out.
Despite all the natural beauty that Thomas Isle had to offer, Chris had found that most women grew bored with the tour of the family’s vast acreage and greenhouse facilities within the first hour. In fact, with the situation in the east fields he might have welcomed it. He should have known Melissa would be different.
She spent the morning in rapt interest, taking in the sights and sounds and information, asking a million questions, soaking up the answers much the way a parched sponge absorbs moisture. Either she was genuinely interested, or she was one bloody good actress. The morning didn’t lack for sexual teasing and innuendo, either.
The pale-orange sundress she wore barely reached mid-thigh and left all but a few narrow strips of her back exposed. She obviously spent a lot of time either in the sun or the tanning bed. Her skin looked bronzed and smooth and was suspiciously lacking any bathing suit lines, and her legs were a work of art. Long and slim and shapely. About as close to perfection as he’d ever seen.
She wore her long hair down, draped in shiny waves over one shoulder. The effect was exotic and sexy, as was her accent. He liked to test himself, guessing which dialect would emerge next. In serious instances, when she was asking questions about their business or meeting their employees, she sounded more east-coast U.S. When she was excited, she sounded decidedly more Southern. Only when she was teasing, or slaying with that sharp wit, did the deep drawl come through.
If he had to choose, he would say he preferred the drawl the most. And the sassy smile that partnered with it.
At one, when he suggested they head back to the castle for lunch, she seemed genuinely disappointed to be ending the tour.
“But we didn’t see the east fields yet,” she said.
“They’re not going anywhere,” he promised. “Besides, aren’t you hungry?”
“Starved, actually.”
He walked her to the car, hand pressed gently to the small of her back. They had done an awful lot of touching all morning. A caress here, a soft touch there. The accidental brush of their shoulders, or her elbow against his arm. Or maybe it wasn’t accidental at all.
And frankly, he couldn’t wait to get her alone.
“Couldn’t we see the east fields, then have lunch?” she asked.
“I could call ahead and have the cook pack us a picnic lunch,” he suggested, knowing most women ate that romantic sort of thing up.
Her eyes lit and he knew he had her.
She smiled and said, “I suppose the east fields could wait.”
Using his cell phone, he rang the kitchen, arranging for a variety of fruit, crackers and cheese, caviar and a bottle of their best champagne to be prepared. After he hung up, he helped Melissa into the car.
When they were comfortably seated, she turned to him and said, “I get the feeling, Your Highness, that you’re trying to soften me up.”
She didn’t miss a thing. He liked that about her, and at the same time it could prove to be quite an inconvenience. Although there didn’t seem much point in denying