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  “Sacked...wait, no!” She found herself on her feet at once, reaching out as if to snatch her job back from the jaws of destruction. “Allen, I’m sorry. I..I haven’t been quite myself lately, but I promise tomorrow—”

  “What you do tomorrow is no business of mine,” Allen interrupted. “And my business is no longer any business of yours. I’m sorry I have to do this, but you’ve left me no choice. You’re fired, Siobhan.”

  “But…no, you can’t…”

  “I can’t?” Allen whirled on her, his eyes flashing. “I will tell you what I can’t do, Siobhan. I can’t kiss enough royal ass to make up for your flighty behavior. I could overlook your subpar performance, but I will not overlook your blatant disregard for professional propriety.”

  He stopped to catch his breath and shoved his hat back on his head. He started toward the door, then stopped when he heard her sniffling.

  “Listen. I like you. You’re a good kid. But you need to understand something. You cannot bring your personal problems into your job. You’ve done that with me and I fear it’s done damage to my business. I hope this will serve as an important lesson for you, painful as it may be. I wish you the best.”

  “Um…Allen…” Siobhan’s throat threatened to close over the words. “My…my salary for this month…”

  “You’ll not be paid for the last two events.” Allen growled. “I’ll issue a check for the rest of your time—from before you turned reckless and irresponsible.” Allen spun on his heel and stormed away.

  Siobhan was frozen where she stood until she heard Allen slam the front door.

  Then she crumpled and tears rained down her face. Even while she fought to get a grip on herself, all the pent-up emotions of recent days were taking their toll and overflowing.

  Jaxon emerged from the hall where he had stood listening and entered the room. Unused to seeing her cry, he wrapped his arms around her. After a moment, he asked, “What happened? What did you do to get fired?”

  After that, the whole story came tumbling out.

  Before her reddened eyes, Jaxon’s expression grew more and more censorious. Although he said nothing and uttered no criticism, his surprise at her behavior spoke volumes and pierced her pride. He was, however, a good deal more vocal when it came to Angus.

  “A girl like you doesn’t belong in a limo.” Jaxon saw her wince and hastened to add, “A bloke with that kind of money could only be messing around with you because he’s bored with his own kind.”

  Jaxon had a shrewd streak about people that Siobhan respected but when he added, “I hope you didn’t forget to use protection,” Siobhan settled dismayed eyes on him.

  She hadn’t given a single thought to protection. And due to her lack of a love life, she wasn’t taking any contraceptive precautions either.

  She now wished she’d thought about it. She told herself the risks of pregnancy were low, it had been just one night, and her cycle was not very regular.

  “If I end up with a baby, my whole life and all my prospects go right down the tubes. I’ll never stop struggling to survive.”

  “Well,” Jaxon let out a huge breath. “You did this to yourself…”

  “Don’t say any more,” Siobhan urged. “All you’re doing is reminding me that getting involved with Angus was like giving way to a sudden attack of madness.”

  “Let’s hope for the best,” Jaxon advised stonily, his face tightening while he considered that possibility. But then he pointed out in a tone of practicality, “No point beating yourself up about it. That won’t change anything.”

  She began feeling incredibly tired at about the same time as she started feeling nauseous. Anxiety took over her, because she feared the worst and the shadows below her eyes deepened while she lay awake at night fretting. She was planning to go out and buy a pregnancy test when Jaxon persuaded her to go to the doctor instead to get a more reliable diagnosis.

  Lekten

  2:00 p.m

  Paranoia permeated the very air of the Lektenstaten capital. Tabloids and news stations alike had only stoked the fire, each presenting a different theory. As Angus moved through his endless meetings and conference calls, he noticed the sideways looks and tight lips of his people as they evaluated their friends, colleagues, and acquaintances through the lens of formless suspicion.

  Through the tinted glass in the back of his limousine, Angus watched with dismay as a restaurant owner tossed a Romani out on his ear, gesturing apoplectically and jabbing a furious finger at the tabloid he held in his hand.

  This is unsustainable. He picked up the same tabloid from the stack beside him. He had expanded his news sources since the attack, if only to understand what the general public thought it knew.

  Wild Gypsies Attack Parliament! the tabloid exclaimed. With a heavy sigh, he flipped to page forty to read the story. Conspiracy theories, conclusion jumping, and blatant racism. Disgusted, Angus tossed the magazine away, wondering how anyone with half a brain could believe that drivel.

  “I suppose basic critical thinking isn’t necessary for life,” he muttered, as he picked up the next magazine. “Though perhaps it should be.”

  Dowager Princess Driven Mad! the tabloid informed him.

  Mildly amused, Angus flipped to the page.

  Dowager Princess Catriona Cristina Braxton-Lenox has finally lost her mind. But who could blame her? As the royal family tree dwindles under the King’s reluctance to marry and produce an heir, the Dowager Princess has become criminally desperate. Sources tell us it was she herself who commissioned the bomb which attacked Parliament only a few short days ago, as an act of revenge against her rebellious son.

  Angus stopped reading and burst out laughing.

  “These clowns will reach for anything. Ah...but that was not all they said, was it,” he realized with a frown. “It seems my mother’s displeasure has reached the ears of the masses at last.”

  He flipped through a few more magazines, but did not absorb anything he read. His country was falling to pieces before his very eyes; worse, he could not seem to figure out how to stem the rising tide of chaos.

  “What you need is a night of mindless relaxation,” he told himself. “A bit of primal stress relief, perhaps?”

  Siobhan’s image rose obediently in his mind, her naked breasts brushing tantalizingly against his imagination.

  He pulled out his mobile and texted his aide-de-camp: Find me a break in my schedule. I need to go to London asap.

  Then he dialed Siobhan’s house but the call went unanswered. Her recorded voice served as a tease. “Siobhan. I wish you were there. Even more, I wish I was there. Well, hopefully soon. This is torment to have one night in heaven and never knowing when I’ll experience it again. I need to taste you again. Everything else is dull by comparison. Call me.”

  London

  3:00 p.m.

  The doctor was very thorough and he assured her there was no doubt she was pregnant. Although Siobhan had believed she was prepared for that possibility, she was devastated—and strangely, at the same time elated—when her biggest fear was confirmed.

  Her heart thundered until she could feel it jumping into her throat and she swallowed hard, looking around at a world suddenly frozen like a fly in amber: the doctor’s smile; the nurse’s congratulations; even the rain falling outside—all was suddenly still, and the only audible thing in all the world were the sounds of her own breathing and the echo of that word: Pregnant.

  She managed to close her mouth, but she was numb from head to toe. It was as if the doctor was talking from a mile away and she was having a surreal out-of-body experience.

  A baby—a real living, breathing, crying baby—would be looking to her for total support in less than nine months’ time. And she had no money, no job, no future.

  She walked out of the clinic in a daze.

  Jaxon phoned her from his workshop to ask the result as she was walking back home and she gave him the news in a deadened voice, staring at her reflection in the shop
windows she passed while she tried and failed to imagine her slender body swollen with pregnancy.

  With Angus’s baby. The guy who promised they’d see each other again soon, but they never did. The guy who was having an affair with a beautiful, wealthy blonde.

  As screwups went, this one was epic.

  When Jaxon came home from work, he joined her in the kitchen. “How do you feel?”

  “Like I want to kick myself for being so stupid,” she told him truthfully.

  “Have you told him yet?”

  “I…no. I texted him but although he had seen it, he didn’t call—not that I expect that will make much difference to my plans—”

  “You already have plans?” Jaxon queried.

  “Just getting on with life as best I can,” Siobhan muttered dully.

  Because at the moment, she had no idea what she was going to do, but she was keeping the baby.

  9

  Lektenstaten Parliament

  Tuesday, March 1, 2016

  10:00 a.m.

  Five words had embedded themselves in Angus’s mind since he had seen Siobhan’s text this morning: I need to see you.

  While listening to a long speech from Dom Mircea Roma, the leader of the Romani People United party in Parliament, Angus drifted into an erotic daydream.

  As the self-justifying speech for being chosen for prime minister went on and endlessly on, Angus added elaborate layer upon layer to the fantasy. He pictured Siobhan spread-eagled, naked in the golden glow of the Lektenstaten sunshine, her lush white breasts crowned by straining pink peaks that glistened damply with the champagne he was licking from her curves.

  He was remembering the tantalizing glide of her hair across his stomach and the velvet soft glory of her mouth over his chest and imagining how it would be to have her give him a blowjob, when he was pulled instantaneously from the seductive images that had captured an imagination he had not known he possessed, by the traditional three thumps of the majordomo’s stick on the floor, followed by his title being called loudly by the majordomo’s tenor voice, announcing the time for his speech.

  “His Majesty, the King of Lektenstaten.”

  Even though his body was hot and heavy with discomfort and sexual need was a tormenting pulse beating through his big powerful frame, he snapped straight back into his aloof sovereign mode and stood up, delivering his speech with precision. He held his handsome dark head high, stating his reasons for not having yet chosen the prime minister: it was the first time ever that the Romani People United had a majority in the parliament—by one chair—and he, as the king did not want to appoint a member of the RPU as Prime Minister with such a slim—and unprecedented—majority. Instead, Angus proposed that he relinquish his prerogative in this election and have the people vote for whom they wanted as PM.

  Applauses showered the end of his discourse, and he proceeded to the greeting salon, where he received the politicians and a lunch was served.

  By three o’clock, he was entering the family bank and presiding over another meeting.

  By five, closely followed by his phalanx of assistants, Angus strode down the corridor like a madman possessed. He was incensed by the erotic recollections that had recently dared to cloud his concentration at inappropriate moments during his work day.

  Has sex ever been that good for me before? That wild? That hot?

  If it had been, he couldn’t recall it. Possibly he had waited too long to ease the natural needs of his body and now all the pent-up hunger of a year’s celibacy was tormenting him for release.

  He’d had a lot of women in his life before he married, and now that settled phase was well and truly over.

  Life was short. Sex was just sex and he was young and healthy. He worked hard, why shouldn’t he play hard as well?

  He pulled his cell phone from his suit pocket and consulted his schedule for the next day. He had a lunch at noon and then a full afternoon, but nothing in the morning. A slow smile spread on his face as he texted his pilot and security team informing them he was heading to London in thirty minutes and informed his aide-de-camp he would be away for a few days.

  There’s nothing wrong with the pursuit of pleasure.

  Jaxon Talbot’s house

  8:00 p.m.

  Siobhan was in the kitchen making tea when a double knock sounded at her door. With a perfunctory brush of her hands at the lavender wool caftan she wore, she went to answer it.

  A shock of recognition jolted her when she saw the tall, dark, well-dressed man on the doorstep. She was stunned into silence, her tongue clinging to the roof of her dry mouth.

  Her tummy flipped, butterflies fluttered, and dangerous warmth surged between her thighs. For a terrifying moment, she had no control of her body and the surge of memories she had worked so hard to suppress engulfed her in a relentless tide. But now here he was in the flesh, and rapidly she remembered his weight on her, the raw burn of his sexual possession, and the wild, hot excitement of it.

  “May I come in?” Angus studied her intently.

  She turned pale, her shock at his appearance almost palpable.

  Emerald eyes bright as jewels glanced evasively off his; her wealth of black curls tumbling down past slight shoulders now rigid with tension.

  “What…ah…now? What do you want?”

  Angus quirked a brow. “To see you. What else?”

  She stepped back, allowing him inside.

  Angus thrust the front door shut behind him, and with a hungry groan of impatience, he hauled her up to him and crushed her soft, pouting lips with ravenous urgency beneath his.

  Siobhan put her hands on his chest to push herself away.

  “This is not a good idea,” she tried to say, her head shaking even though the rest of her body betrayed her by trembling under his skilled hands, while her own hands refused to lift from the wall of his chest.

  Angus backed her up against the wall and pinned her there, his hands closing over hers to imprison her. Ensnared by scorching golden eyes, Siobhan could barely get a breath into her straining lungs. Her awareness of the raw masculinity of his lean powerful body soared sky-high. Her nipples pinched tight beneath her clothes, erotic heat tingling low in her pelvis.

  “I’ve missed you like crazy, Angel,” Angus husked thickly, his hot appreciative gaze pinned to her. “You make me want a woman in a way I never knew was possible. All the time.”

  His lips captured hers, punishing and demanding, with a kiss in which it was impossible not to feel the turmoil that held him hostage. He tasted of wine and need and passion—all these things she had tasted before.

  But now she tasted something new, an aching hunger that moved his kiss beyond mere passion to something dark, dangerous, and all-consuming.

  “You didn’t call.” She told herself in a couple of minutes she would spell out the news she was pregnant, and he would vanish from her life.

  “I did—a few times—but you didn’t answer and my time was consumed with governmental affairs and—”

  “Stop, Angus. We need to talk.”

  He pressed his mouth to the skin below her ear and grazed his teeth to make her gasp and quiver, hungry as he fought his way under her dress. He cupped her over her leggings, “Talking in the bedroom is an overrated pursuit, Angel.”

  Her spine arched, a cry of helpless pleasure escaping her when his fingers brushed her hot, moist cleft. She was desperate for his caresses, her breath sobbing in her throat while she twisted and turned beneath the sensuous stroke of his fingers. “Ah, Angus.”

  As he banded both his arms about her slight body to hold her to him she wrapped her arms around his neck, her breath rasping in her throat and her heart pounding inside her chest. She had forgotten how incredible he tasted and the sheer extent of the primal rush of excitement he could induce just by plunging his tongue into her mouth. He did it again and again, racking her with desire and enforcing his sensual dominance.

  There was no thought of denial in Siobhan’s head. His deep
drugging kisses and the lancing invasion of his tongue destroyed her defenses and brought her treacherous body stinging back to life.

  She wanted more.

  Just one more time. She bargained helplessly with herself while his skillful hands divested her off all her clothes in seconds, and didn’t voice any of her concerns when carried her to her small bedroom and put her on the bed.

  Pulling of his sweater, he crawled on the narrow bed with her, and shaped her tender breasts, and sent a piercing arrow of longing zinging from her overly sensitive nipples to her core. “You are so soft.”

  She went willingly then, melting into him because she had no real choice, her senses overloaded with the taste and scent of him, the mouth sucking and nipping at her breast, the brush of his jeans against her legs, the feel of his hot flesh melting her bones.

  He leaned down to nuzzle her nipples, his breath making them throb, but he didn’t suck, only teased until she was squirming under him. He finally set upon her breasts with his hot mouth.

  “Oh, my God,” she whispered, as he dragged his tongue over her stiffened nipple.

  He hissed something in his language.

  “What did you say?” Her hunger for him was like a leaping flame tormenting her from inside. The power of her own wanton response shattered her.

  “I said I’m going to kiss these all night.” He ran the backs of his fingers over both of her nipples, his gaze flickering over her face, gauging her response.

  Her body twisted and jerked like a puppet in the hold of a tyrannical master. Yet, nothing mattered but the satisfaction she was reaching for and the delirious excitement of the pace his mouth set.

  How exactly have I been living without this? When he stood to shrug out of his jeans and underwear, she found herself arching forward.

  He laughed at her wantonness and stood by the bed to let her roam her hands over him.