Penelope and Prince Charming (Nvengaria #1)(24)

“I cannot imagine,” Petri said, eyes twinkling.

“Penelope’s great-grandfather must have been a rogue. To whose bedchamber does it lead?”

Petri gestured. “Do you care to look?”

He held a candle at the ready. The black square, tapering to darkness, made Damien shudder, but he mastered himself and gave Petri a nod.

Petri led him in through the opening in silence, the lone candle making the narrow space glow. The low-ceilinged passage ran straight, this wing of the house long.

A stone wall halted their progress after about fifty feet, where the architect had decided to forget about the passage and get back to the business of building the house.

Petri moved his candle to show wooden paneling that ran behind the chambers on their right. A few feet above the floor was a small hinged door, about six inches square.

In silence, Petri eased the little door open. Damien crouched down and put his eyes to it.

A table half covered the hole, but he could see plenty beyond it. Damien looked into a bedchamber, a charming, girlish one. The bed had thin posts painted white, carving picked out in soft green, hung with green damask. A chair covered in the same fabric reposed by the fire, a comfortable seat for reading the stacks of books piled next to it.

A writing table stood at the window, papers stacked neatly, the chair square in front of it as though Penelope lined it up precisely when she finished at the desk every day. The thought made Damien smile.

Penelope sat at a dressing table that was as neat as her desk on the opposite side of the room. Facing an oval mirror, she brushed out her long hair, which crackled and shone in the lamplight. Damien had touched those tresses when he’d kissed her, warm silk spreading under his fingers. Her hair was soft and smelled of the lavender in which she’d rinsed it.

She absently studied her reflection as she slowly pulled the brush through her hair, as though her mind was miles away. She wore a green and gold dressing gown, its colors a near match to the chair and bed hangings—perhaps green and gold were Penelope’s favorite colors. Her hands held the hairbrush steadily, her movements graceful.

If Petri had thought that Damien observing Penelope at her toilette would help ease his desires, the man was very much mistaken.

Petri lifted his candle and pointed to the hinges of a larger door, similar to the one in Damien’s room.

I ought to leave her alone, Damien thought. Let her get used to me and what she must do.

The trouble was, Damien had no time. If he’d had a year, he’d woo Penelope slowly, seducing her with words and gifts and small delights of kissing. Damien had become an expert at seduction during his years of exile—he’d learned to be the best player in the games of the bedchamber. He had concluded early on that the only way to stay alive was to act the part of playboy prince, carefree and amusing, thinking of nothing more than the next woman in his bed.

Outwardly. Beneath the facade, Damien kept his eye on the affairs of European politics, forging ties for the far-off day he would inherit his father’s kingdom. That day had come sooner than he’d imagined, but the ties were in place.

Damien’s father had expected him to die in obscure poverty—if the assassins did not kill him—perhaps in some poetically dingy room in Paris or Rome. Instead, Damien had managed to gain wealth and influence, a result of canny investments and years of working his fingers to the bone. He’d lived comfortably, welcomed everywhere but in his own home.

Damien had until Midsummer’s Day to return to Nvengaria with Penelope—according to Alexander’s and the prophecy’s dictates. Damien did not have time for slow seduction. He had to be swift and sure but yet not let things happen too soon.

It was enough to drive a grown prince mad.

The large panel swung silently open into the chamber at Damien’s touch. He moved the small nightstand and stepped around it into the room. Behind him, Petri obligingly closed the door.

Penelope caught sight of Damien in the mirror. The brush paused, hovering in the gold cloud of her hair. Penelope did not cry out in alarm, or turn and demand to know what he thought he was doing. She simply watched him, her green eyes waiting.

Need sliced through Damien. Prophecy or no, this woman was beautiful. In dishabille, she was breathtaking. Penelope’s hair hung to her hips in a honey-colored wave. Lighter streaks roped through it, drawing Damien’s eyes down its length.

He wanted to be naked and have that hair pouring over him. He wanted Penelope to be bare with him, the heat of her body blending with his as he made love to her in slow, even strokes. Damien’s breath hurt him, and another part of him did too.

Not yet, he admonished himself. She will be in my bed soon enough. She will yield. And then …

His mind whirled with and then.

Penelope desired him too—he sensed that. She’d made none of the signals of the highborn women who wanted his seduction, no sly looks and come-hither smiles, but he knew she wanted Damien with the same basic, primitive need that pounded through him.

They were being pushed together by some invisible force, one that wanted them bound no matter what. There was a mindlessness about the force—it did not care what else they felt, as long as they were united.

That mindless force made Damien’s feet move, taking him across the room to Penelope, his hunger for her building in every step.



* * *



Penelope watched through the mirror, hairbrush still, as Damien moved toward her with quiet footfalls. She’d have been alarmed to see anyone else suddenly emerge into her chamber from the wall, but somehow it seemed natural that Damien should come to her.