Tempted By The Royal. Michelle Celmer
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doesn’t mean I’ll do so again just because circumstances have thrown us together and it’s convenient.”
He smiled at her across the table—a smile that made all of her bones turn to jelly and made her grateful she was sitting down.
“I wasn’t thinking about the convenience factor so much as the it-was-really-great-sex factor.”
“The only reason I made an exception to my rule was because I didn’t expect to ever see you again.”
“I didn’t think I’d ever see you again, either,” he admitted. “And yet, you’ve been on my mind almost constantly over the past few weeks, and it was always my plan upon returning to Texas to find you.”
“That wasn’t our agreement,” she reminded him.
“So let’s make a new agreement.”
“What do you propose—lots of hot sex in the few weeks leading up to Scott and Fiona’s wedding, after which I go back to serving drinks and you go back to doing whatever it is a royal does?”
Something in her tone must have given her away, because his brows lifted. “You’re annoyed that I didn’t tell you I’m a prince,” he guessed.
“Do you think?”
“Why don’t I remember your affinity for sarcasm?”
“Maybe because we really didn’t know one another at all before we fell into bed together.”
“Are you saying your decision to sleep with me would have been different if you’d know I was a prince?”
“Yes,” she asserted vehemently.
“Why?”
“Because then I would have known that I meant nothing more to you than another conquest in another town.”
Even as she spoke the words, she realized how hypocritical they sounded. After all, she was the one who’d insisted that a one night stand was all she wanted.
But he didn’t point out this fact. Instead he said, “You were never a conquest. You were a beautiful woman who intrigued me as no woman has done in a very long time.”
She wanted to believe him, but she couldn’t get past the fact that he was a prince and she’d been rejected by too many average guys to believe that she could have captured the attention of someone so extraordinary.
“I’m not going to sleep with you again.”
He lifted his cup to his lips, drank. “I got the impression, when Fiona asked you about coming to Tesoro del Mar, that you wanted to refuse.”
“It’s not that I wanted to,” she denied. “It’s just not a great time for me to be leaving the country.”
“Is that the truth? Or is it that you didn’t want to be with me?”
“You weren’t a factor in my decision,” she lied.
“No?” he challenged softly and, reaching across the table, brushed his knuckles down her cheek.
The gentle caress sent tingles down her spine, and when she responded with another no, it sounded almost like a sigh.
He smiled. “Well, I’m glad you are coming. Tesoro del Mar is a beautiful country, and I will look forward to showing it to you.”
“I’m going for Fiona, not for a vacation.”
“There’s no reason you can’t do both.”
She shook her head. “I really can’t be away from my business for too long.”
“You don’t have a manager?”
“I’m the manager.”
“But you don’t work every single shift,” he guessed.
“No,” she admitted. Karen had shared the managerial duties for a few years now, usually covering the dinner shift so that Molly had a break between lunch and evening duties and could take the occasional day off. “But I’m never too far away if there’s a problem.”
“Is it that you don’t trust your manager to take care of things in your absence?” he wondered. “Or that you don’t trust yourself to be alone with me?”
“There’s nothing wrong with your ego, is there?”
He only grinned. “I don’t recall you having complaints about my ego—or any of my other parts—when we were together.”
No—there had definitely been no reason to complain and no ability to do so when she was writhing and moaning with pleasure.
“Are we finished here?” she asked, deliberately ignoring his comment. “Because I have to be downstairs for a delivery in about ten minutes.”
He pushed his chair away from the table. “Fiona will let you know the travel arrangements.”
“Thanks.” She followed him to the door.
He stepped out onto the landing, then pivoted back to face her again. “And the answer to your question is no—we’re not even close to being finished here.”
Molly was in a mood when she went down to the bar and she knew it. She was tired and she was cranky and it was all Eric’s fault. As if it wasn’t enough to find out that the man she’d picked up in her own bar was a prince, now he’d suddenly reappeared in her life, wanting to pick up right where they left off.
Of course, he didn’t know that the last time they’d gotten naked and horizontal together, they’d made a baby. She was certain that little bit of information would make him reconsider his pursuit of her, but she definitely wasn’t ready to share.
You have to tell him.
She sighed even as she cursed the nagging voice of her conscience. She knew she had to tell him. She would tell him. Just not yet. Not until she was feeling a little less flustered and emotional about everything.
Okay—that might take a little longer than the seven months remaining before her due date, so maybe that wasn’t a reasonable guideline.
After the wedding, she decided. She would be close to the end of the first trimester by then and there wouldn’t be any reason for them to remain in contact afterward if he didn’t want to.
She nodded, satisfied with that reasoning. “After the wedding.”
“What wedding?”
She hadn’t realized she’d spoken the thought out loud until Dave, the delivery man from the local liquor store responded with the question.
She scrawled her name on the bill he presented to her and shook her head. “I’m babbling to myself. Obviously I’ve got too much on my mind.”
“My brother talks to himself all the time,” Dave told her. “My mother thinks he’s a genius. My dad just thinks he’s nuts.”
“There’s probably a fine line there,” Molly said.
“Which side do you fall on?” he asked curiously.
“Nuts,” she said. “Definitely certifiably insane.”
She had to be if she was still attracted to a man who’d messed up every single aspect of her life.
“Admitting a problem is the first step toward getting help,” he said, and winked at her.
She restocked the shelf behind the bar, then carried the extra inventory to the storage room. The boxes were heavy, and though the weight wasn’t anything she couldn’t handle right now, she knew there would come a time when she would have to stop that kind of lifting. She wouldn’t do anything that would jeopardize the well-being of her child.
But,