How to Love a Princess (12 page)

Catherine paused. She’d
already said too much. Apparently her body wasn’t wired up to keep secrets from
Nicolas. “We have government contracts with both America and Russia.”

“How varied exactly is
this coal?”

“Don’t look at me like
that,” she said to his sudden scowl. “The energy source engineered from the
rock is clean and pure, but then the rock was not exactly meant to be digested.
I’ve got a good—or maybe I should say bad
feeling about this.”

His scowl relaxed with a
sigh. “No, you were right this first time. If we’ve found the source, then this
is the first good news I’ve had in weeks.”

“Oh, Nicolas.” Her lower
lip twisted beneath her teeth. “What if—”

“If we’ve found the
source,” he interrupted sternly, leaving no margin for doubt, “then we’re
halfway there.”

“I want to come with you
to the mines in the morning.”

He looked at her for so
long, she was convinced he was searching for a reasonable excuse. Her heart
clenched when he leaned in even closer and said softly, “Wear jeans and
trainers,
cucciola
.”

5

T
he mines
were concentrated in the Black Hills bordering Ophella to the north. Nicolas was
behind the wheel of the Land Rover while Catherine directed them along the
twisting bends through the deep woods that forked at various intervals. As they
climbed the hill, the vegetation reduced solely to Evergreen Firs that never
shed their foliage, blocking out the sunlight and any warmth it might have
supplied.

“That leads to the Hunting
Lodge,” she said when they passed yet another fork in the road. When he lifted
an eyebrow at her, she punched his arm. “Now it’s used for nothing more
sinister than guest accommodation. Do you always have to assume the worst in
me?”

“I try to,” Nicolas
replied honestly.
Not that it’s working.

He grinned into her
baffled stare to soften the blunt truth he should have kept to himself. A long
forgotten pledge flashed inside his head.
There is no secret dark enough, no
crime vile enough, no discovery black enough to keep me from you, little one.
He lost the grin as he realised that his heart was still holding onto that
pledge and preventing him from letting go. He hadn’t expected instant recovery,
but he had hadn’t even made a start.

“Left,” she called
suddenly.

Jerked from his thoughts,
Nicolas spun the wheel to take the turn and the back of the vehicle skidded
recklessly.

“Sorry,” he muttered once
he had it back under control.

“My fault,” Catherine
said. She’d been distracted by his strange admission, by the shadows playing
across his face as one emotion chased the other from his crossed brow to the
grin that disappeared as quickly as it had formed.

The brick buildings of the
mine’s administration offices came into view as they rounded the last bend to
arrive at the clearing deep inside the forest. She indicated to a reserved
parking spot and leapt from the vehicle as soon as he cut the engine. “I need
to have a word with the site administrator. Due to safety regulations, we won’t
be allowed into the tunnels without clearance.”

“Go ahead.” Nicolas lifted
the rear door of the Land Rover to retrieve the case of equipment he’d packed.

When she returned with
clip-on badges and hard hats, he was ready to go, case in one hand, torch in
the other. Catherine set her bundle down on the roof of the vehicle, stripped
both her gloves to clip one badge onto the lapel of her jacket, then turned to
him with the other.

“Allow me,” she said,
seeing his hands full. She took the step that brought her up close to his chest
and instantly regretted the offer. Fingers suddenly clumsy, she struggled with
the clip that was too small, the collar of his windbreaker that was too narrow,
his overwhelming nearness that was too much. Her eyes slowly lifted, drawn
against her will by a force she had no power over, and met the intensity of his
gaze.

His scent was somewhere
between musky and fresh pine, all male, all familiar. Longing tightened her
chest; physical longing, emotional longing, spiritual longing.

He was more than the dark
haired, stone carved male that attracted her so fiercely, he might very well
have been created in the likes of her own personal Adonis, perfect planes with
adoring flaws made to order for her own particular weaknesses. His jaw, square
and strong, almost too hard. His nose just that little longer than classical
beauty dictated. His eyes dark, deep, almond shaped, more harsh than sensual.
Without those flaws, he’d be too handsome, he wouldn’t be the single man that
set her blood on fire and tugged ruthlessly at her heartstrings.

He was more than the man
she’d fallen hopelessly in love with, the man she’d locked inside her heart and
refused to release, no matter that they’d never be together.

Nicolas was her other
half.

The brown eyes that held
her captive were softened by the awareness that crackled between them, yet not
without the hard edge of recriminations.

Dropping her gaze
abruptly, Catherine gripped the edge of his collar and redoubled her efforts.
Her fingers brushed his throat and burned. “Why do they always make these
things so fidgety?” she said to dispel the maelstrom of feelings and yearnings.

He said nothing and she
wasn’t about to look up again. Finally, she secured the badge and took a
welcome step backward. And caught the bemusement dancing in the brown depths of
his gaze.

Nicolas glanced at the
hard hats on the roof, then back to her. “Would you mind?”

He was the devil stoking
what was already a burning furnace, but for one more moment of her lingering
touch, for one more stolen kiss, he was prepared to burn in a hell made hotter
by his own hand.

Tomorrow, he’d start
un-loving and un-wanting her.

He lowered his head a
little as she reached up to fit the hat, then, before she could move away, he
stole his kiss, brushing her lips with the slightest pressure that sent an
immediate rush through his blood. When she didn’t jump away, he deepened the
kiss, dropping the torch to slip that hand around the back of her head,
threading his fingers in a knot of silky hair, moulding her mouth to his will,
branding her lips with the love pouring from his heart.

Only the sound of an
engine in the distance tore them apart and he’d swear she went as unwillingly
as he.

Cazzo.
He rubbed at his temples as she whirled
away from him to busy herself with her own hat, to hide the clash of pleasure
and confusion he’d glimpsed in those vast blue eyes, to continue the pretence
that she didn’t respond helplessly to his kisses. He bent to retrieve the
discarded torch, testing the on switch to check that it had survived the fall.

He wasn’t crazy. He wasn’t
inexperienced. And he knew when a woman melted beneath his touch and Catherine
was every inch that woman.

Why did she continue to
deny it? To deny him? Why had she given up on them easily? She wasn’t the type
of woman to lust without deeper emotions.

As she turned back to face
him, her auburn hair pressed flat beneath the hard hat to make her eyes seem
even rounder and larger, flashing blue in defiance of what had just happened.
That stubborn chin notched up defensively and the answers came to him like a
bucket of frigid water dumped over his head. Answers she’d already given him,
answers he apparently had difficulty remembering.

He wasn’t the stuff
royalty was made of and Catherine would deny herself a million times over in
favour of duty.

He wasn’t the kind of man
Ophella would accept as the husband of their future queen.

God help him for false
pride and immodesty,
but Geoffrey was?

The reasoning eluded
Nicolas, but he had no option other than to accept the ending she seemed hell
bent on. Catherine put Ophella above all else and she’d decided that he wasn’t
the man to make her a better queen.

That man was Geoffrey. Her
choice sucked, but there it was.

“Lead the way,” he told
her grimly, bringing tomorrow a little closer in light of his latest discovery.
“Duty before pleasure, right?”

Catherine’s cheeks burned
at the reference to what they’d just done. If she continued to allow herself to
be kissed senseless, she’d be leading them both down a path of hope that had to
come to a dead end. “We can’t do that again.”

“It’s just a saying,
Catherine,” he cut in. “Besides, your duty will never be done, will it?”

She opened her mouth to
protest, but he was already marching across the parking lot and away from the
buildings. Not that she had any idea of what she might have said. Scowling into
his back, she stomped after. He paused at the wooden signpost at the edge of
the gravel, then started down one of the three roads leading out.

“Nicolas,” she called out.
“That road will take you to the main entrance of shaft 3B. We can drive down
there later, but the dogs entered a subsidiary tunnel that opens onto a
footpath.” She waited as he retraced his steps, then she pushed through a dense
bush and onto a path not visible from the parking lot. The track was overgrown
and narrow, forcing them to walk in single file.

“They must have been
chasing a hare, or maybe a fox,” Catherine explained, her voice loud enough to
travel to him behind. “The subsidiary tunnel was dug eighteen years ago during
the initial exploration stage of this mine, then abandoned to another opening
about a mile to the east.”

They walked in silence for
the further fifteen minutes it took to reach the opening. Catherine stared at
the hardwood planks bordering up the entrance and groaned. “I’m sorry. I forgot
that I asked Harry to take care of this. All the other mine entrances are
guarded and I was afraid a child or another animal might find this opening.”

Nicolas propped his case
against a tree, dropped the torch on top of it and came to stand beside her.
“You seem to forget with remarkable ease.”

She glared up at him. But
he was studying the blocked entrance and not her.

“Was that another stab at
me?” she blurted angrily. He glanced at her with a frown and she threw her
hands up. “Come on, take your best shot. Let’s get this out of the way. I’m
tired of all the accusations and not so subtle innuendos, Nicolas. I did what I
had to do, all right?” Tears of frustration and anger, tears of her own loss
renewed a thousand times by the careless kisses he threw at her, threatened to
spill. She wiped at her eyes furiously. “I’m sorry that I hurt you.”

I’m sorry that you
still love me.
She
couldn’t say that, but it was what drove the stake deeper. “Hate me. Despise
me.” In that moment, she honestly wished he would. It would make all this so
much easier. “You have every right. But stop playing this game of cat and
mouse.”

A tremble started in her
shoulders, then worked its way through her entire body. “You can’t just kiss me
whenever the fancy takes you.”

Four years of emotion
shuddered through her veins. Now that it was finally coming out, she couldn’t
stop. She couldn’t bear it anymore. She couldn’t bear loving him. She couldn’t
bear the thought of not loving him. For one sweet moment in time, she’d had the
world at her feet and it had been ripped from under her with one cruel blast.

His hand landed on her
shoulder and she jumped back, pushing him away. “Stop taking digs at me,
Nicolas. Trust me, I know exactly what I did. What I destroyed. But it’s gone
now. Leave it alone. I’m not strong enough.”

“Strong enough for what,
Catherine?”

To reject you over and
over again.

To give up on us anew
every day.

“To fight this,” she said,
her voice unsteady and barely audible. His gaze was dark and piercing. She took
a deep breath and appealed to the inner core that made the man. “Please,
Nicolas, stop making me fight this.”

Their eyes held for a long
minute. It took that full minute for her to realise that she’d made a dangerous
mistake. Not even Nicolas was that
noble.

“What exactly are you
fighting,
dolce cuore
,” he asked softly.

She shook her head,
closing her eyes, afraid to answer truthfully, afraid to lie.

“What, Catherine?” His
voice hardened, edged in grit. “Answer me. What are you fighting?”

Her eyes snapped open.
“You. Me. Us.”

“Then don’t.”

“I have to.”

“Why? For Geoffrey?” He
uttered a curse that steeled his eyes and thinned his lips. But the contempt blackening
his face didn’t last long. His manner changed as he reached out to her, tipping
her chin to him, the pad of his thumb stroking her lips. “I’m sorry, Catherine.
I have no right.” He dropped his hand, taking the instant warmth with it as he
turned away from her. “Stand back.”