One

      Above the sound of the breeze blowing through the cedar trees that dotted the island hillside, Nic Alessandro heard the scuff of a footstep on flagstone and knew he wasn’t alone on the terrace.

      “So this is where you’ve been hiding.” Brooke Davis’s voice was like his favorite vodka: smoky and smooth, with a sexy, implied bite. And she went to his head just as swiftly.

      Already suffering from a well-deserved hangover, Nic was further jolted by her unexpected arrival on this out-of-the-way Greek island. But he couldn’t let himself be glad to see her. The future he’d once planned to have with her was impossible. His older brother, Gabriel, had married a woman incapable of having children, meaning he would have no son to inherit the throne of Sherdana, the European nation their family had ruled for hundreds of years. Now, as next in line to the throne, it was up to Nic to find a wife that the laws of his country would accept as the future mother of the royal line. As an American, Brooke didn’t fit the bill.

      “Is this the rustic cabin on the side of a mountain you told me about?” she asked. “The one you said I’d hate because it had no running water and no indoor toilets?”

      Nic detected the strain she tried to hide beneath her teasing tone. What was she doing here? Had her brother Glen sent her to talk Nic into returning to California? He couldn’t believe she’d come on her own after the way he’d broken things off.

      “Here I was picturing you suffering in some hovel in the middle of nowhere. Instead, I find you living in a luxurious villa above the most gorgeous harbor I’ve ever seen.”

      Her voice came from the side of the terrace that led down to the beach, so she must have arrived by boat. Walking up the hundred and fifty steps hadn’t winded her a bit. She loved to work out. It was what kept her lithe body in perfect shape.

      What had he been thinking when he’d finally surrendered to the powerful attraction he’d hidden from her for the past five years? He shouldn’t have been so quick to assume that his royal duty to Sherdana ended the minute Gabriel had gotten engaged to Lady Olivia Darcy.

      “You’re probably wondering how I found you.”

      Nic opened his eyes and watched Brooke saunter across the terrace. She wore a white, high-waisted cotton blouse and faded denim shorts with a ragged hem. The gray scarf wound around her neck was one of her favorites.

      Everything she passed she touched: the back of the lounge chair, the concrete wall that bordered the terrace, the terra-cotta pots and the herbs and flowers they held. As her fingertips drifted along the fuchsia petals of a bougainvillea, Nic envied the flower she caressed.

      At this hour