“I do?” he grunted, then realized JP was giving him an easy out. Just like he’d been doing since that garden kiss. Damn it.
Not that he could satisfy his hunger anyway. He was doomed to starve. A healthy, grown man shouldn’t be forced to starve, not in this day and age.
“Oh, yeah. I do.”
He did have a hundred things that needed done and feasting on Jane’s delectable body wasn’t on the menu.
Chapter Eleven
Later that night, a supposedly ready for bed Jill paced across the elaborately woven rug that covered the polished marble floor of her suite.
Lost in thought, she picked up a porcelain vase, ran her finger across the ornate hand-painted surface, and set it back on the intricately carved wooden table.
She couldn’t take much more. Knowing Rob was so close and yet so removed from her. Yet also knowing staying far away was the smartest, safest thing she could do.
A little over two weeks remained.
Two weeks and she’d have to choose one of the dwindling dirty dozen. Striding back across the room with nervous energy, she rubbed her arms when she stepped off the rug and her bare feet touched the cold marble floor.
Two weeks, then her romantic week in paradise.
Once her pretend honeymoon was finished she’d never see Rob again.
And that was just if one of the bachelors chose her over the money. It was highly likely that she only had two weeks left with Rob.
An invisible vice squeezed her heart.
A month from now when she was far away from this castle set in a fairy land of rolling green hills and men clamoring for her attention, what would be her most cherished memory when she looked back on her Jane Millionaire adventures? Her biggest regret?
Without a doubt, Rob Lancaster would star in both.
His kiss in the garden ranked as her most treasured moment. Not kissing him again her biggest regret. Her gaze landed on the solid wood door connecting their rooms.
Rob was less than twenty feet away, but more than a locked door separated them.
What would he do if she knocked on that door and kissed him? Told him she wanted to know what it felt like to make love to him? Would he turn her away? Or would he give in to the passion she’d seen in his eyes?
Darn it. If Jessie were here, she’d put on a naughty nightie and seduce him senseless. Jessie had never had any qualms about going after a man she wanted.
So why didn’t she?
She was supposed to be Jessie, after all. But her supplied wardrobe didn’t carry any outrageously sexy lingerie, and even if it did, she doubted she’d wear it. Because even though Rob wanted her, he would more than likely send her to her room a very disappointed woman.
But what if he didn’t? What if she floated to her room a very satisfied woman? She’d never know if she didn’t knock.
Of all the things she’d ever been called, a coward wasn’t one of them.
She walked to an antique dresser, ran a pearl-backed brush through her highlighted hair until it shined, and stared in the mirror at her make-up free face. What would Rob see when he opened the door?
A pretend princess who was really a policewoman jock? A Hollywood starlit looking for her road to fame?
Heck, at this moment, she was none of those things. She was a woman so caught up in one man’s spell that she knew if she didn’t act on her feelings, she’d wonder ‘what if’ for the rest of her life?
Before all the reasons why she shouldn’t go to his room popped into her head, she dropped her brush onto the silver tray. The loud clang reverberated straight through her. Taking a deep breath, she crossed the room, heedless of identity crises and contracts and fraud and every other reason why she should crawl into her own bed and forget about Rob.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
Nothing.