The Princess (Montgomery/Taggert 10)

She wasn’t fully awake. Her eyes were half open, her hair falling over her shoulders. She gave him a soft smile. “Good morning.”

The next minute he pushed her out of the hammock and onto the ground. Wide-awake now, she rubbed her bruised posterior.

“You’re the dumbest broad I ever met,” he muttered angrily. “Didn’t you ever go to school and learn the facts of life?”

“If you are referring to a public school, I have never attended. I had tutors and governesses.” She stretched. “I slept very well, did you?”

“No!” he snapped. “I slept rotten. In fact, I didn’t sleep much at all. Thank God this is our last day together. After this ‘vacation’ I am going back to the war to rest. I told you to go fix your hair. Pull it back the way you had it, just as tight as you can get it. And put your underwear back on.” With that he stomped away down the path.

Aria stared after him for a moment then began to smile. She wasn’t sure what was wrong with him but it was making her feel absolutely heavenly. She walked to the water and looked at her reflection in a clear little pool.

Many men had asked for her hand in marriage but quite often they had done so without having met her. They wanted to marry a queen, regardless of what she looked like. Count Julian, sixteen years her senior, had asked her grandfather’s permission to marry her when Aria was eight.

Aria felt her hair. It was dirty right now but when it was clean…She glanced down the path, didn’t see the man, so she looked inside his crate of provisions. There was no shampoo but she did find a fat bar of soap and a skimpy towel.

Hurriedly, she undressed and stepped into the stream. She was lathering her hair when he returned. He stopped and stared, eyes wide, mouth dropped open.

She grabbed the tiny towel and tried to hide her nude body behind a tree branch. “Go away. Get out of here.”

With a look of dumb obedience, he turned and left the camp.

Aria smiled and then she grinned. She began humming. That odious man and the awful things he had said to her: “skinny ass,” “you could walk stark naked in front of me and you wouldn’t interest me.” How utterly lovely his stares had made her feel. Of course he wasn’t really anyone, but sometimes that type of man…She wasn’t supposed to know about it but a cousin of hers had borne a child without being married and it was said that the father was the footman who wound her bedroom clock each night. Aria had heard her mother say that of course the footman had hypnotized the poor girl. Smiling even more broadly, Aria wondered.

She took her time dressing—and didn’t put her underwear back on—and began to comb her hair. She was still combing when he returned.

“I got lobster for breakfast and there’s crackers in the crate.”

He stopped talking and she was aware that he was watching her. She smiled slightly as she played with her long, dark hair in the early morning breeze.

Suddenly, he grabbed her shoulders and hauled her up to face him. “Lady, you are playing with fire. You may think I’m some servant of yours you can tease and still be safe with but you’re wrong.”

With his fingers digging into her shoulders, he pulled her to him and kissed her in a fierce, hungry way. When he had finished, he pushed her away.

“You’re a twenty-four-year-old child, an innocent little girl, and I’m willing to leave you that way for your Duke Julian, but baby, don’t push me. I’m not your servant and I’m not safe. Now get over there and haul up that net and give me those shrimp.”

It took Aria a moment to react. She put her hand to her mouth. Julian had kissed her once but only gently and only after asking her permission. It was not a raw, hot thing like this man’s kiss.

“I hate you,” she whispered.

“Good! I don’t feel any love for you either. Now scat!”

Breakfast was a quiet, sullen thing with neither of them talking.

After they had eaten, he lit a cigarette. Aria opened her mouth to tell him he didn’t have her permission to smoke but closed it again.

She didn’t feel inclined to speak to him and now she was somewhat afraid of him. How very much she wished she could get off this island and away from him.

After his cigarette, he stood, gruffly told her to stay in the camp, then disappeared down the pathway.

Aria sat for a long while, hugging her knees to her and thinking of her grandfather. How she wished she could go home where people and places were familiar.

After a few hours, when the man didn’t return, she made her way down the path to the beach. He was lying under the single palm tree, his eyes closed, his shirt open, his rifle leaning against the tree.

“Planning to go fishing again?” he asked, not opening his eyes.

She did not reply as just then they heard a motorboat.

J.T. was on his feet in seconds. “Get down,” he commanded. “And stay there. Don’t come out until I say it’s okay.” He grabbed his rifle and started running along the beach.