‘In this instance I was thinking of your safety. Don’t you find the crowds daunting?’
‘I think it’s lovely that they’ve made the effort to come and see me get married,’ Holly confessed. Spying two small girls holding a bunch of flowers that they obviously picked themselves, she pushed her elaborate bouquet towards an astonished Casper and hurried across. ‘Are those for me? They’re so pretty. Are they from your garden?’ She talked to the girls, then to their mother, shook what felt like a million hands, and slowly and gradually made her way along the avenue towards the palace. But it took a long time because everyone had something to say to her and she had plenty to say in return.
Several people pushed teddies into her arms for the baby, and eventually she needed help to carry everything.
After an hour of chatting to a stunned and delighted crowd, Holly finally allowed herself to be urged back into the carriage.
‘Clearly I misjudged you.’ Casper settled himself beside her, indicating with his head that the procession should move on.
Holly’s heart soared. ‘Y-you did?’
‘Yes. I thought you’d find the whole day impossibly daunting. But you’re a natural.’ He gave a wry smile. ‘I’ve never seen anyone so skilled at talking about nothing with such enthusiasm and for such a long time.’
Holly digested this statement, decided that it was a compliment of sorts, and tried not to be disappointed that he’d been referring to the way she’d handled herself in public, rather than his opinion of her pregnancy.
Reminding herself that she had to be patient, she smiled. ‘How can it be daunting when everyone is so nice?’ Holly waved again and spied another group of children in the crowd. She opened her mouth to ask if they could stop, but Casper met her questioning glance with a slow shake of his head.
‘No. Absolutely not. Delighted though I am that you’ve managed to please the crowd, we have about two-hundred foreign dignitaries and heads of state currently waiting for us at the palace and we’re already late. I’d rather not cause a diplomatic incident if we can avoid it.’ But his tone was in direct contrast to the warmth in his eyes. ‘You’ve done well, tesoro.’
His praise made her glow inside and out, and she felt so ridiculously happy that she couldn’t stop smiling. All right, so they’d had a shaky start to their relationship, but one of the advantages of that was that it could only improve.
Feeling optimistic about the future, Holly smiled all the way through the formal banquet, all the way through the dancing and all the way up to the moment when she was finally escorted to the prince’s private quarters in a wing of the palace suspended above the sea.
It was only as the door closed behind them, leaving the guests and the guards on the outside, that reality hit her.
They were alone.
And this was their wedding night.
Gripped by a sudden attack of nerves, Holly gave a faltering smile, instinctively breaking the throbbing, tense silence that had descended on them. ‘So this is where you actually live. It’s beautiful—so much light and space, and—’
‘Stop talking.’ Casper reached for her clenched hands, gently prised them apart and then slid them round his waist and backed her against the door with an unmistakeable sense of purpose.
Trapped between solid oak and six foot two of raw male virility, Holly found she could barely breathe, let alone talk. Dry mouthed, knees shaking, she was aware only of the simmering undercurrents of sexuality that emanated from his powerful frame as he took her face in strong, determined hands, his mouth on a direct collision course with hers.
Holly closed her eyes in willing surrender, senses singing, nerves on fire. When the kiss didn’t come, she whimpered a faint protest. ‘Casper?’
His mouth hovered a breath from hers. ‘Open your eyes.’
Her eyes opened obediently and she stared up at him, her heart skipping several beats as she scanned the aristocratic lines of his masculine features. ‘Please—kiss me.’
‘I intend to do a great deal more than that, angelo mio…’
Held captive by his lazy, confident gaze her heart started to pound, and searing heat pooled low in her pelvis. She probably should have played it cool, but Holly was too aroused to remember the meaning of cool.
Her body was in the grip of a strong, explosive excitement that simply intensified as his mouth finally glided onto hers with effortless skill.
His tongue probed the interior of her mouth with erotic expertise, and Holly just melted, moaning low in her throat as his strong hands brought her writhing hips into contact with his potent masculine arousal.
‘Not here.’ His voice thickened, he pulled away from her and scooped her easily into his arms. ‘This time, tesoro, we’ll make it to the bed. And we’re taking our time over it.’ He strode through several rooms and then up a winding staircase that led to a bedroom in a turret.
Trembling, mortified by how much she wanted him, Holly clutched at his shoulders as he set her down on the floor, barely conscious of the beautiful circular room, the high arched windows or the vaulted ceiling. Her body was on fire with anticipation, and her entire focus was on the man now undressing her with deft, experienced fingers.
As tens of thousands of pounds worth of designer silk slithered unrestrained to the floor, her old insecurities resurfaced, and Holly was grateful for the relative protection of moonlight and und
erwear. But Casper showed merciless disregard for her inhibitions, peeling off her panties in a slick, decisive movement and tumbling her trembling, naked body onto the enormous four-poster bed.
‘Don’t move. I like looking at you.’ Having positioned her to his satisfaction, Casper sprang to his feet and removed his own clothing with impatient fingers, his eyes scanning her squirming body and flushed cheeks as he undressed with unself-conscious grace and fluidity. ‘You are so beautiful.’