Awakening Beauty (7 page)

And clearly she’d spent too much time in it if he was asking about her. Aurora rinsed off one last time and reluctantly turned off the water. She pulled back the curtain to find steam so thick she could scarcely locate the towel. She hurriedly dried her body with the soft towel, so much more absorbent than the flannel cloth she was used to using. A person could become accustomed to modern luxuries like running water very quickly.

After dressing in the top and shorts, Aurora regarded herself in the mirror. Her arms and legs were so…bare. She couldn’t imagine going into the other room and exposing herself to Joel like this. At the same time, excitement flickered through her at the idea. She liked the way his eyes darkened and his lids lowered when he studied her body as he’d done several times since they’d met. Knowing he was attracted to her made her feel very powerful in an odd way.

Aurora drew a deep breath, turned the knob on the door and walked into the coolness of the bedroom with its very large bed. Joel lay stretched on the bed, leaning against a pair of pillows and watching moving pictures on the box that sat on the chest of drawers. Voices and music came from the box. Aurora gasped in astonishment, forgot all about her appearance and padded barefoot over to the bed. She couldn’t take her eyes from the colorful images as she plunked down onto the mattress beside Joel.

“What magic is this?” she murmured.

“Not magic. Technology,” he explained. “Images sent through space and received by the television set. This is how we get our news and other information, but it’s mostly used for entertainment. Have you seen plays before?”

“Traveling performers come to court sometimes. They sing ballads, juggle, tell stories and sometimes act out scenes.” Aurora pushed her damp hair back from her face and focused on the fast-moving pictures. It was enough to make her queasy how quickly they shifted.

“This is something like that. It’s a way of telling stories. People act them out.”

“Astonishing.” She began to actually hear what the man and woman in the box were saying to each other. They wore clothing similar to what she was used to, and the man was telling the woman he loved her, that it had always been her even when they fought.

Aurora leaned forward with her cheek resting on her hand and her elbow propped on her knee and listened to the story.

Chapter Six

As entranced as Aurora was by the TV, Joel was equally mesmerized by her. She was fucking adorable wearing her little tank top and boxers with her elegant limbs on display. Her red hair lay in dark, damp hanks over her back. He’d drawn the drapes so the room was quite dim for late afternoon and Aurora’s pale face reflected the flickering light of the television set. Her beautiful, hazel eyes were wide and her expression as transfixed as if she was having a religious revelation. Joel felt a little stab of guilt for spoiling her purity with the drug of television. It could be terribly addictive to a woman whose life had been empty of technology.

But she was content and relaxed and clearly enjoying the period drama about star-crossed lovers, so he leaned back into the pillows and simply watched her.

It was good to see her distracted from her own grief, even if just for a little while. He’d never doubted the grief was real, whatever her impossible fantasy. Uneasily, he remembered the castle vegetation that had seemed to spring across their path far too continuously for chance.

Joel shivered. He was being infected by Aurora’s madness. But what the hell was going on with her? She’d suffered no obvious injury. There was no clear reason to account for her memory loss or her very peculiar fantasy. It wasn’t even a fantasy that brought her any joy. Perhaps she’d always been crazy.

Fresh unease twisted through him. She didn’t appear mad. In fact, she was disturbingly sweet and vulnerable and sexy…and he couldn’t deny he’d felt as threatened as she did up at the castle this morning, however silly that seemed now he was back in civilization.

A burst of music from the television heralded the roll of credits. Aurora’s head snapped round to him in indignation.

“What’s happening, now? Where have the people gone?” she demanded.

“The program’s finished,” Joel explained.

“It can’t be! That woman has just discovered her long lost son is still alive, and the man with the ridiculous name wants to kill himself because the beautiful, blond girl is marrying someone else! What will happen to them?”

“You’ll find out next week,” Joel said hastily, sliding off the bed to escape the furious accusation in her eyes. “When the next episode is on.”

She frowned. “Truly?”

“Truly. Now, shall we order some food? What would you like to eat?” Grabbing the room service menu from the table, he dropped it into her lap.

Discussing the food was fine; waiting for it to be delivered while flicking around the television channels was fine too. Only when it had arrived and they spread it between them on the bed like a picnic did the shadow fall back over her face.

Joel couldn’t help reaching out and touching her pale, scratched cheek. “It’ll be all right,” he said gently.

But instead of cheering her, his kindness made her eyes fill. “Will it?” she whispered. “How?”

“I don’t know,” Joel admitted, dunking a piece of bread in the tasty stew. “But we’ll work something out.” Since she continued to gaze at him with expectation, he was forced to admit that the time for soothing platitudes had passed. He gave her a lopsided smile. “We have to decide what to do next. And for the first time in years, I haven’t a clue what that should be.”

To his relief, she smiled back, just a little wanly. “I’m not your responsibility, Joel. I know you want to get back to your own life.”

“Actually, I don’t yet. Eat up.”

Obediently, she took a wary forkful, then, looking slightly surprised by its goodness, she reached for another. “Why not?” she asked.

“I’m on holiday, taking time off.”

“Oh, yes. You said you have some things to think about. Like what?”

“Like what’s the right thing to do next.” He broke off, his bread poised in mid-air as he was struck by the parallel between his problem and Aurora’s. He was uncharacteristically indecisive about both.

“About what?” Aurora pursued. “Your business?”

“Oh, no. I always know what to do about that. It’s thriving, expanding all over the world. I barely need to do anything with it now. I’ve achieved every success I can. I can almost sit back and just watch it grow.”

She gave him a surprisingly shrewd glance over her glass of mineral water. “But you don’t want to do that. You’d be bored.”

“I’m told there’s more to life than business.”

She nodded. “Home and children.” She repeated it like a well-learned lesson. According to her fantasy, that was to have been her fate. As a princess she would’ve been educated for only that purpose. A royal home, of course, but it wasn’t so very different from what many women fantasized about. Not Vee, of course, who’d made it clear she was interested only in a mutually beneficial business arrangement.

“Partly,” he said uncomfortably. “And there is politics.”

She frowned. “Politics?”

“Government. I have a—friend who runs a promotion company. They publicize and promote lots of different things to the public, but Vee, my friend, specializes in political promotions. She’s suggested I stand for election to the Government Assembly, with a view to the presidency in a few years.”

“President,” she repeated. “That is like a king, yes?”

“Sort of. Only the president isn’t born to the office, he’s elected to it by the people.”

“And your friend Vee tells the people who to elect?”

He couldn’t suppress a surprised laugh. “I suppose she does! They don’t have to listen to her, of course, but she has a way of being very persuasive. The word is, I’m unlikely to lose with her backing me.”

Aurora’s gaze was wide and clear, and yet he had the impression that there was a lot going on behind her open façade. “So where does the home and family come in?”

He shrugged. “Traditionally, married politicians do better than unmarried ones. People seem to place greater trust in a family man than in a carefree bachelor.”

She cocked her head on one side. “You don’t seem very carefree to me. But who’s the lucky lady who would lend you this respectability?”

He should have taken offense at the self-righteous distaste in her voice, but in truth her view coincided so closely with his that he only sighed. “That’s another part of the problem. Vee rather covets the role herself.”

Aurora looked down at her plate, pushing her fork idly into the stew. “She loves you?”

“No. Well, maybe. I don’t know. The truth is, we’re pretty well suited. We’re both hard-working, committed people whose grand passions seem to be confined to work.”

Her gaze lifted and she scanned his face. “You don’t love her either. It’s a marriage of convenience. Mine too,” she added wistfully. “Although I would have loved him, I know I would have.”

“You can’t know any such thing,” Joel said, unreasonably irritated by this statement.

“You mean you don’t think you will learn to love this Vee woman?”

Joel dragged his hand through his hair. He wasn’t used to conversations like these, but the unworldly, unexpectedly sexy little princess on his bed was just too damned easy to talk to.

“I don’t know. The political thing is a challenge. It’s something new, but I’ve no idea if I’d be any good at it. And if I’m honest, part of me does like the idea of a proper home with a wife and family. Only…oh hell, I don’t know.” He rose from the bed and cleared off the plates and flatware, setting the tray on the dresser.

“Only the other part of you doesn’t?” She sounded oddly hopeful.

“The other part of me is scared,” he confessed. It was the first time he’d admitted that to himself too. “Scared of commitment, of letting down someone else if and when I fail. And besides…” Joel dropped back onto the bed, pushing the pillow against the headboard and leaning into it. “It’s funny. If I close my eyes, I can see myself making speeches, fighting verbal battles in the Assembly and working hard to get things done behind the scenes. I can see myself making things better, making a difference. But when it comes to the marriage bit, I close my eyes and nothing comes. I can conjure up a picture of Vee, but she isn’t beside me. I can see us talking and working as friends, but I can’t see the family part.”

He broke off.

Aurora said, “And that’s what you are trying to decide on this holiday, whether to go into politics and whether to marry this Vee?”

“In a nutshell.”

“Well, I would try the politics and hold off on the wedding. If she won’t help you without marriage, she’s not a nice enough woman for you.” She smoothed the rumpled coverlet briskly as if certain she’d solved his problem.

Joel blinked. He felt like laughing, only it wasn’t funny. Aurora wasn’t funny either. She was serious, intending to help him as he’d helped her. He could dismiss her words as naïve and laughably innocent. And yet they struck a chord of simple honesty that was in danger of getting lost in all the spin and dealing of politics. He felt a twinge of loss. He’d almost decided to go through with Vee’s proposal, but now, because of the words of this child who couldn’t even look after herself, he’d almost decided not to.

Who was he kidding? She wasn’t a child. She was a fully grown woman of strong if unawakened passions. That had been obvious last night, and he recognized it afresh now. Her eyes grew warm as they gazed into his face, and her long eyelashes swept down to cover her surge of desire.

Joel’s body heated in instant response. Oh yes, she was woman enough to feel the attraction that simmered and sparked between them as they lay side by side on the bed. He could see the rapid rise and fall of her pert little breasts in their skimpy top, had to fight the urge to lean across the bed and touch the pebbled nipples clearly visible through the fabric, roll them between his fingers, push up her top and kiss her breasts. A night in his arms would waken her, all right. He’d make sure of that, show her the importance, the confusion, sex could add to one’s life decisions.

No, he wouldn’t. That would be far too unkind. It wasn’t even true. He wanted her because she was lovely and because she—
moved
him, not because he wanted to prove anything. And he couldn’t be so callous as to take her when she was so confused and grief-stricken. He was well aware her interest in his life was much like the television for her right now—escape from her own devastating problems.

With a stern internal warning to his hardening cock, he said aloud, “Well, we both have a lot to think about. I suggest we should sleep on it.”

She flushed, adding delectable rosy color to her face and neck and even her shoulders. His cock ignored his warnings.

“Where will you sleep?” she asked, lifting her head, once again the princess addressing her servant, which had the effect of instantly squashing his half-formed, half-hearted plan to try to get another room for himself.

“Here,” he said dryly. “There’s plenty of space for both of us.”

She eyed the bed dubiously. “I’m used to sleeping alone in a bed this size.”

“Aurora, for the last several hundred years, apparently, you’ve slept on a wooden floor. Get over it. Trust me, we won’t even touch hands.”

Convinced she’d never be able to sleep with anyone else, let alone Joel, lying in the same bed, Aurora curled up on the edge, as far away from him as she could get. She thought she wanted time to herself, to grieve. But as she stared into the darkness, she began to wonder if she was too numb, or too confused by the world’s new strangeness. Or perhaps the sheer number of years her parents had been dead already had somehow dulled the edges.

When she closed her eyes, she remembered them perfectly, every detail of their loving, anxious faces, every expression of anger or care or concentration, every tone of voice used to address her, friends, servants, ministers… She could see them in the castle, sitting on their thrones, walking in the gardens, laughing with her in some childhood game, or riding out toward the gates.