It was said as if he found her a complete nuisance. Her temper flared. “I didn’t plan on collapsing at your feet, Your Highness. I’m sure I can recuperate just as well at my hostel if you’ll let me dress and be on my way.”
She dimly remembered the doctor helping her to change, after having had clothing brought to her room, presumably from some royal storehouse. Turning her head, she could see several garments folded neatly over a stand under a window. One of the other teachers at the school where she worked would have called the situation “landing on her feet.” Looking at the prince’s forbidding expression, Allie wasn’t so sure. “I’ll make sure you get your clothes back safely,” she added.
The prince shook his head. “The clothes are unimportant. Dr. Pascale wants you to remain here.”
That made one of them, she thought tensely. She sat up, forgetting for a moment that the doctor’s bounty had included a decidedly skimpy nightdress that revealed as much of her as it covered. With difficulty she resisted the temptation to drag the covers back over herself. There were other, more important issues here. “Surely I have some say in this?” she demanded.
It was the wrong tone to use, she saw, when anger flared in the prince’s black eyes, but all he said was, “If you were from Carramer, you would know better.”
“Because you’re the prince and I’m nobody?” she asked. He might be the ruler of his country, but he wasn’t her ruler, and it was time she pointed it out.
If her comment amounted to high treason, he took it remarkably calmly. “Your status is irrelevant. I was referring to Dr. Pascale’s prescription of rest and quiet for you.”
The thought that Lorne wouldn’t allow her to stay for any other reason added fuel to her annoyance. It was clear that, doctor’s orders or no, the prince would like nothing better than to send her packing. She probably reminded him too painfully of the Australian wife he had lost. But Lorne wouldn’t want to risk having her collapse again if he let her leave before the doctor okayed it. And in truth, she did feel shakier than she had any intention of admitting.
The prince saw it, anyway. “Rest now,” he instructed. “Your accommodation has been informed that you are remaining here, and your luggage will be brought later this morning.”
“You’ve thought of everything,” she said mutinously.
He chose to ignore her tone. “Precisely. To allay any unseemly rumors, they have also been informed that you are joining my staff as a temporary companion to the crown prince.”
This was interesting news, given that Lorne obviously didn’t want her anywhere near his little son. “And am I?”
“Of course not. Nori seems to enjoy your company, but he is already well looked after.”
He was also a lonely little boy, but she had a feeling Lorne wouldn’t welcome that observation. “Then I’m afraid I can’t stay,” she said, pushing back the bedclothes.
It was a mistake, she realized as soon as she swung her legs over the side of the bed. The nightdress barely reached her thighs. Lorne had seen much more when he rescued her from the surf wearing only a bikini, but she hadn’t felt as exposed then as she did now.
She was acutely conscious that this was a bedroom and Lorne was first and foremost a man, a man among men, she recalled him being described in her guide book. She had thought the phrase extravagant and was alarmed at how readily it sprang to her mind now. He made her feel a sense of herself as a woman that she hadn’t felt in all the years that she had served as her mother’s housekeeper and younger sister’s caregiver.
She refused to let him see how much he discomfited her and stood her ground beside the bed, wishing that the room would stop moving around her and spoiling the effect.
“Get back into bed. You’re in no condition to go anywhere,” he commanded, but his voice had gentled and he moved to her side, steadying her. “Let me help you.”
She could have managed to stay upright if only he hadn’t touched her, but as soon as he took her arm her knees turned to jelly and she sagged against him. “I won’t stay here under false pretenses,” she insisted, trying to ignore the tattoo her heart had set up. It was a symptom of her weakened state, nothing more, she insisted to herself.
His deeply vibrant voice was very close to her ear. “Obviously you have yet to learn that one does not say no to royalty.”
Lorne might be used to his subjects shaking in their shoes when he looked at them, but she came from stock that had made an art form of equality. Respect was another matter, but it had to be earned, and riding roughshod over her preferences was no way to earn it. “And you have yet to learn that we Australians are an independent lot who prefer being asked to being told,” she said as coolly as she could manage.
His expression turned grim. “During my marriage, I was made well aware of your Australian disdain for authority, but you are in Carramer now. You will stay because the doctor advises it.” He didn’t add “and I command it” but he might as well have. She heard it in his steely undertone.
“Or you’ll do what? Throw me over a cliff like the guidebook says your ancestors did?” Her chin came up and she almost closed her eyes as the gesture brought her face alarmingly close to his. She settled for lowering her lashes slightly so she looked at him through a feathery screen. It softened the strong contours of his face but not by much.
The glint in his gaze clearly said “don’t tempt me” but the only outward sign of his anger was in the rigidity of his arm around her and the sudden tightening of his jaw as he said, “Please get back into bed.”
Surprise almost knocked the wind out of her. “There, see? Saying please didn’t hurt a bit, did it?”
As soon as the whispered words were out, she cursed herself. What was it about the prince that made her open her mouth and say stupid things? Lorne was a man who plainly wasn’t used to deferring to anyone. What would it have cost her to be gracious? Instead she had to issue what amounted to a challenge.
She should have known better, she grasped, as she glimpsed the light of battle in his eyes. Then his head came down and his lips claimed hers. Like many grown women, inside Allie was a little girl who had dreamed of one day being kissed by a prince, but nothing in her childhood fantasies had prepared her for the reality. Instinct told her that Lorne was only showing her who was boss, but the molten way he made her feel overruled logic, leaving a sensation so all-consuming that she didn’t want it to end.
When he put her away from him, she was glad of the bed at her back as her knees buckled. She curled her fingers around the edge of the mattress for support. “I wasn’t aware that your customs included the one about droit du seigneur,” she said shakily.
“Supposing it was not just a medieval myth. The right of the ruler to have any woman of his choosing before any other man hasn’t been claimed for centuries,” he said equably. The coldness in his expression reminded her that he hadn’t kissed her out of desire, but because she had challenged his authority.
“But you think it did exist?” She suppressed a shiver at the possibility.
His mouth curved into a perceptive smile, making her wish she had fought him when he kissed her. Why hadn’t she? “It would be…edifying,” he confirmed after a long pause, “but it has nothing to do with why I kissed you.”
She tossed her head, wishing she had more energy to put into the defiant gesture. His kiss had added to her feeling of weakness in ways she was probably better off not thinking about. “I know perfectly well that you did it to show that I may have won the round but you will win the match because of who and what you are.”
He inclined his head in agreement. “Then we both know where we stand.”
He was only confirming what she had suspected, but part of her rejected the thought that it was his only reason for kissing her. In the midst of her own maelstrom of feelings