Chapter Eight #2
She promenaded down the wide corridor because, in high heels, she couldn’t walk any faster, and passed on into the spacious drawing room they used, surprised that their Venezuelan guests were not already ensconced there.
A bare minute later, Orazio joined her. Sheathed in the fashionable ripped jeans he often wore around her now when he was off duty, his tall, powerful body was delineated in faded denim and a khaki tee.
And that fast, she couldn’t take her eyes off him because she found Raz staggeringly sexy in ordinary casual clothes.
‘Where’s your family gone?’
‘To dine with the Marone clan on their yacht in the harbour. They’re old friends of my mother’s and she couldn’t leave fast enough once she received their invitation,’ he told her with sardonic amusement.
‘I didn’t warn her that Giancarlo’s papa has changed wives since she was last here.
She’ll be outraged when she finds that out. ’
‘That was mean,’ Zia reproved.
‘No less than Luisa deserves with her nonsense.’
‘You call your mother by her Christian name?’
‘According to her, being addressed as “mamma” is aging. I’ve been calling her Luisa since I was ten,’ he confided, seeing her surprise at that information and raising a broad shoulder in an uneasy, embarrassed shrug before squaring his jaw. ‘I owe you more of an explanation.
‘My mother wasn’t the most loving, caring parent,’ he admitted uncomfortably. ‘For all his faults, my father was better in that department and my grandfather is also a much warmer and more caring personality.’
‘Are you being fair to your mother?’ Zia prompted thoughtfully. ‘Or are you just annoyed right now that she arrived and said what she did?’
Orazio compressed his wide sculpted mouth before breathing in deep and wincing.
‘I’m afraid that Luisa is a selfish, cold and consistently bored socialite, who should never have had a child and who probably wouldn’t have bothered having one if it hadn’t been necessary for the monarchy. Why do you think I’m an only child?’
‘Oh…’ Zia lowered her troubled gaze, scolding herself for having assumed that his childhood had been a much smoother and easier ride than hers.
Now that it occurred to her, she marvelled that she hadn’t immediately noticed that Luisa had made no attempt even to embrace the son that she hadn’t seen in many months and, furthermore, had no problem dining with friends rather than family on her first night back in Mandovia.
‘So, let’s forget about our visitors for now and concentrate on us. You look…’ Raz dropped his dark deep drawl low as Harvey stepped in the door carrying an ice bucket and disappeared again almost as quickly ‘…delectable.’
Green eyes collided with dark blue and her head swam and her nipples tightened and that familiar ache of longing between her thighs kicked up a storm.
She snatched in a shortened breath as Orazio reached for her and lifted her up into his arms, striding over to an opulent velvet couch to drop down on it with Zia arranged across his thighs.
‘I hate it when I can’t touch you all day. It’s an unbelievable torment,’ he confided huskily, long fingers reaching up to comb softly through her silky hair and tug her head up to enable him to claim her ripe parted lips with his own.
For a couple of long minutes the champagne glasses on the table at his elbow were ignored as he tasted her with hungry fervour.
Finally, Zia tore her swollen mouth free and lifted a small hand to push back his shoulder in rebuke. ‘No…no…no… I know where this heads—only to the bedroom. And then dinner is late and we put the staff out and it’s inconsiderate—’
‘Inconsiderate? Not the word I’d use to describe this particular special evening,’ Orazio countered with calm amusement.
His attention was on her hand as he lifted it in his.
Beneath her stunned gaze, he slowly slotted a ring onto her engagement finger: an enormous flashing diamond in a setting that reminded her of an opening flower.
It was a breathtaking piece of jewellery and light was flooding in from the window beside them, dancing rainbows across the many diamond facets.
Dumbstruck, Zia continued to stare at her hand. ‘Er…what? I mean, what is this?’
‘You’re not that slow on the uptake,’ Orazio chided. ‘Obviously it’s a proposal of marriage. Do I need to get down on one knee to make it seem more real?’
In shock, Zia blinked rapidly, leapt off him as if she had been burned and backed away a few steps on wobbly legs.
‘What are you playing at? Is this some kind of a joke?’ she exclaimed.
‘Please tell me you’re not surrendering to all the stupid gossip about us and asking me to marry you to please people. ’
Raz directed a wickedly appreciative grin at her. ‘Where did you get the idea that I’m that easily pushed around by outside forces? I’m as stubborn as a pig and very resistant to doing anything I don’t want to do…even as King. It’s a role, it’s not my whole life.’
Zia sucked in a ragged breath to refresh her straining lungs. ‘OK,’ she said tautly.
She had always believed that there was a little more give in him than he was prepared to concede and she was unsure just how far he would go to grant the population of Mandovia, to whom he was ferociously loyal, what they wanted.
‘So, why didn’t you just ask me to marry you, then?
Why sort of sneak a ring on my finger as if I’ve already said yes? ’
Raz sprawled back on the couch with the grace of a prowling tiger and settled brilliant black-lashed green eyes on her pale, tight face.
All of a sudden, he acknowledged, nothing was happening as he had dimly assumed it would and he was in a tense scene without a script.
Evidently, she had not been expecting a marriage proposal from him. That was a huge shock to him.
‘I thought you were waiting for me to ask, expecting this to happen,’ he remarked ruefully.
Zia shook her head, silky luxurious strands of black hair tumbling round her flushed cheeks. ‘No, I wasn’t. I assumed we were both simply getting this relationship out of our systems—’
‘Like I’d have gone public about us if I’d believed that!’ Orazio derided with an edge of annoyance, lifting her glass and extending it to her. ‘Bubbly. I warned Harvey—’
‘Even your butler knows you were about to propose and I didn’t?’ she condemned.
‘If there’s a next time I’ll be sure to hire one of those planes that skywrites for the proposal!’ Raz fielded in a raw undertone. ‘Look, seemingly I’ve got this all wrong, but could you give me an answer?’
‘I think you’re putting the cart before the horse,’ Zia told him in stark, tight syllables. ‘I mean, how do you feel about me? For me, that’s the most important question here. When did you start thinking of me as a possible wife?’
‘The first week I met you… I just knew the same moment that you assured me that you didn’t want to marry me either…
That’s when I realised that I wasn’t as keen to stay single as I had once been.
I’ve become very fond of you, piccola mia, and I believe we make an excellent team.
You’re perfect for me and the future reunited Mandovia. ’
Fond of her? Zia was fond of her dog, Sausage, but she loved Orazio.
Struggling to keep her breathing level, the backs of her eyes suddenly prickling with an unwelcome surge of disillusioned tears, she nodded in silence.
Fond, perfect for Mandovia, an excellent team.
A very, very practical approach to choosing a future wife and queen.
How could she fault him for that? Briefly, she thought of how passionate their nights were and felt that it was a shame that not an ounce of that simmering passion appeared to have been matched by any deeper, more lasting emotion.
And that was wounding, but then not everybody got the whole fairy tale and the happy-ever-after, she told herself starkly. And certainly to date, she never had.
She was getting the proposal but not the love.
Shouldn’t she try being grateful for what they did have?
The passion, his kindness, the comfortable lifestyle he was offering her, the status, the goodwill of both their nations?
That was plenty, she scolded herself inwardly, and a whole heck of a lot more than she had ever had before.
‘I’ll take all that into consideration,’ she told him in a slightly wobbly undertone as she accepted the glass of champagne and deliberately directed her attention to her spectacular engagement ring.
‘Let me sleep on this, Raz. I wasn’t expecting you to propose so I need the time to think this over. ’
Orazio sat up in a sudden movement that spooked her, all relaxation now openly abandoned. ‘What’s holding you back?’
Zia winced, wondering how frank she could be without causing lasting offence. ‘I appreciate that you think I could be a good partner as a queen and, obviously, we’re a popular pairing, so I understand that aspect too. But when it comes to a husband, I’m looking for a bit more—’
‘How much more?’ he demanded, leaning forward, apprehension filling his glittering green eyes, tightening his facial muscles.