Prince of Secrets

She’d been only eight when her dad died, but she’d believed her parents loved each other deeply and forever. It was her mother’s constant criticism and unfavorable comparisons later that made Chanel realize Beatrice had not approved of her husband any more than she did their daughter.

“They were not compatible.” Demyan said it like he really knew—not that he could.

“I thought they were, when I was little. I was wrong,” she admitted.

“We aren’t them. We are compatible.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I know more than you think I do. We belong together.” There was a message in his words she couldn’t quite decipher, but his dark gaze wasn’t giving any hints.

“I told you I was a sure thing.” Though she wasn’t sure that was true. Part of her was still fighting the idea of total intimacy, especially at the cost of opening herself up like this. “You don’t have to say these things.”

“I am not a man who makes a habit of saying things I do not mean.”

“You never lie.” He’d as good as said so earlier.

Something passed across his handsome features. “I have not lied to you.”

His implication was unbelievable. “You really plan to marry me. After three dates?”

“Yes.” There was so much certainty, such deep conviction in that single word.

She could not doubt him, but it didn’t make sense. Her scientific brain could not identify the components of the formula of their interaction that had led to this reaction.

In her lab she knew mixing one substance with another and adding heat, or cold, or simply agitation resulted in identifiable and documented results.

Love wasn’t like that. There was nothing predictable about the male-female interaction, especially for her.

But one thing she knew—a man could not hide his true reaction to a woman in bed. It was why she’d refused her ex back at university. He hadn’t been completely into it.

Oh, he’d wanted to get off, but she could tell that it didn’t matter it was her he was getting off with.

“Show me,” she challenged Demyan now. “Make me believe.”

His eyes narrowed, but he didn’t pretend not to understand what she wanted.

* * *

Demyan could not let Chanel’s challenge go unmet.

Whatever the cretin who had turned her off sex had done to her, at least part of her thought Demyan would do the same thing. He could see it in the wary depths of her gray eyes.

“You will see, sérdenko. I am not that guy.”

“You keep calling me little.” She didn’t sound as if she was complaining, just observing.

He noticed she did that when the emotions got too intense. She retreated behind the barrier of her analytical mind.

When this night was over there would be no barriers between them.

“You speak Ukrainian.” Her dossier had mentioned she studied the language, but not how proficient she was.

To translate the endearment, which was a diminutive form of heart, implied a far deeper knowledge of his native tongue than the investigative report had revealed.

“I studied it so I could read scientific texts by notable scientists in their native tongue.”

“And sérdenko came up in a scientific text?” he asked with disbelief.

“No.” She sighed as if admitting a dark secret. “I like languages. I’m fluent in Ukrainian, Portuguese and German.”

“So you could read scientific texts.”

“Among other things.” She blushed intriguingly.

“What things?” he asked, his mouth temptingly close to hers.

He wanted to kiss her. She wanted the kiss, too—there could be no doubt.

“Erotic romance.”

“In Ukrainian?” he asked, utterly surprised for the third time that night.

This woman would never be a boring companion.

“Yes.”

“I am amazed.”

“Why?”

“If you like reading about sex so much, how are you still a virgin?”

“I like reading murder mysteries, too, but I haven’t gone out and killed anybody.”

He laughed, unable to remember the last time he’d been so entertained by a female companion.

This marriage he had to bring about would not be a hardship. Chanel Tanner would make a very amiable wife.

With that thought in mind, he took the first step in convincing her that they belonged together.

He kissed her, taking command of her mouth more gently than he might have before her revelation.

She couldn’t know it, but her virginity was a gift to him in more ways than one.

First, that he was the only man who would ever share her body in this way was not something to take lightly. Not even in this modern age.