‘Really?’
‘I don’t let any old riff-raff in.’
Now Catalina was laughing too; a low, sweet musical sound he’d never heard from her lips before. It filled every part of him as much as her scent always did.
* * *
Alone in the bath, Catalina closed her eyes. She wanted to cry. She wanted to howl. She could do neither.
Her father had her exactly where he wanted her. He knew it and so did she.
Dominic’s poison had seeped fully into him.
There had once been some compassion in the man who had raised her. Not much by any means but enough for her to pretend he did love her as a daughter and not just a princess to show off to the world and bring pride to the House of Fernandez. It seemed Catalina’s failed betrothal to Helios had killed the last of it and created an opening for Dominic’s hatred towards her to pour through in replacement.
As she shampooed her hair, trying to relish the freedom of doing this act alone, all too aware that within a year Marion or one of her other palace companions would be at her side, because a princess couldn’t possibly wash her own hair, it came to her what she must do.
The freedom she had been so close to having for ever had been snatched from her grasp but that didn’t mean her baby’s freedom had to be snatched away too.
* * *
They took Nathaniel’s jet to Marseille. From there it was a short drive to one of the city’s most famous hotels. Hotel Giroud. The first project he had undertaken and the catalyst for the fortune he had acquired throughout the subsequent decades.
‘I thought you sold this when it was completed?’ she said as they entered the plush foyer.
‘I bought it back five years ago. It had been allowed to fall into disrepair so I revamped it.’
‘It’s beautiful.’ It was also very decadent. The place screamed money.
The reception staff all leapt to attention when they saw the boss. Waving them away with a grin and words of encouragement at their hard work, he led her to a back office. Adjacent to it was an elevator.
She raised her eyebrows and her silent question was answered with a gleam of teeth. Nathaniel keyed in a code and the elevator opened.
They stepped inside and, moments later, the elevator came to a halt. When they stepped out it took a couple of moments for her eyes to adjust to the dimness. Then she blinked. And blinked again.
‘What is this?’
They were standing in a vast, cavernous space with beautiful oak flooring. In the centre of it was a huge round bar, the polished wood gleaming, the brass rail around its rim shining even more so. Dozens and dozens of richly dressed men and women stood around the bar drinking. Dozens more filled the card and roulette tables strategically placed around the room and even more sat at normal tables, socialising and networking.
Music played in the background, a pulsing beat she felt through the soles of her feet.
‘This, mon papillon, is Club Giroud.’
She twisted round to look at him. ‘I didn’t know it was part of the hotel.’
‘Only those who are members know the clubs’ locations, and only those members and the staff who work in them know how to access them. This one has its own elevator from the underground car park.’
Catalina had heard much about these secret members-only clubs Nathaniel owned but, of course, she had never been in one. A club owned by a notorious womaniser had not been considered a suitable establishment for a virgin princess to venture to.
He laughed. ‘What were you expecting? Strippers and topless waitresses?’
‘Something like that,’ she murmured.
‘We do provide entertainment at the weekend which is of the adult variety, but nothing that wouldn’t be fit for the eyes of a princess.’ He leant down to speak into her ear. ‘There’s a back room I hire out to members. A few of those private parties have been known to become rather wild.’
There was something about the atmosphere of the place, the music and the feel of Nathaniel pressed so close to her that made her quite breathless.
‘Come,’ he said, taking her hand. ‘Let me give you the tour and introduce you to everyone.’
For the next hour they socialised. Catalina knew a few of the members, who all betrayed their shock at seeing her there. After a while it amused her.
‘It’s like they can’t believe they’re seeing me out of my natural habitat,’ she whispered to Nathaniel.
‘There’s always been an air of mystique about you,’ he murmured back. His hands brushed against her side. ‘Would you like to see my office?’
‘I’d like to see more than that.’ Where the words came from, she didn’t know. As the days together passed, the greater her longing for him had become. She craved him.
In a few days’ time she would hand her passport, her ticket to freedom, to her father.
There had been so many times she’d opened her mouth to tell Nathaniel what her father had demanded of her but she’d always bitten back the words. She didn’t know how he would react. They might be having hot, passionate sex at every opportunity but that didn’t mean he cared about her on any other level.
She didn’t think she could bear to look in his eyes when he learned that she would never be able to leave Monte Cleure, and to find that he simply didn’t care. Not for her.
But he cared about their baby, of that she was certain.
Once she’d given her passport over to her father, she would confess and tell him her plan. Nathaniel and their baby would be okay. She couldn’t save herself but she could save them.
Now, his eyes gleaming, Nathaniel led her to a door marked ‘Private’ and locked it behind them.
It was just an ordinary office, much like the one in his apartment, dominated by a large desk and not much else.
He didn’t need much else, not when he spent so little time in any one place.
And right then they didn’t need anything but each other.
He brushed his lips against her neck and wound a hand round to grasp a buttock. ‘We don’t have much time. Not unless you want people to wonder what we’re up to.’
A pulse throbbed low in her pelvis, so familiar a reaction it was as if her body was training itself to seek pleasure from his very first touch.
His mouth found the lobe of her ear.
She moaned softly then turned her face to find his lips. ‘If we only have limited time,’ she breathed, ‘I suggest we make the most of it.’
‘You do?’ he murmured, his hand squeezing her sensitised breast lightly before dipping lower to her thigh and bunching the material of her dress between his fingers.
‘Oh, yes. I do. In fact, as a princess of Monte Cleure, I demand it.’
His other hand unzipped his trousers and freed his large erection. It brushed against her thigh, sending another pulsation racketing through her. ‘What do you demand, Your Highness?’
She raised her bottom to allow him to tug her black lacy underwear down. ‘I demand you.’
With little effort on her part, her underwear slid down her legs and fell to the floor.
‘Then you shall have me.’ Then, without ceremony, he plunged inside her, groaning loudly as he filled her in one motion.
Holding her tightly with his hands on her hips, Nathaniel moved inside her with short, hard thrusts that were carnal