Page 13 of His Royal Bride Replacement
A sudden giggle escaped Rosy. ‘I’m sorry. I was just trying to imagine what would have happened if you’d brought Graziana here…but, of course, you weren’t bringing her here, you were taking her to Barbados. I think I was a little jealous of that, but I wouldn’t have enjoyed the media fascination or the idea that I was on show all the time.’
‘I’ll make up for my oversights in the future,’ he promised drowsily. ‘Go to sleep—you’ve got breakfast to make in the morning… Ihope.’
‘Hmm,’ she mumbled and slid into slumber between one moment and the next.
* * *
Rosy wakened sprawled across a living, breathing furnace. She gazed down at Alessio and slumbrous green eyes assailed hers. ‘You’re a real snuggler,’ he told her. ‘Every time I moved away, you found me again and hooked a leg or an arm around me.’
Rosy leapt off him as though she had been burned. ‘I’m so sorry!’ she framed before scrambling out of the bed and disappearing into the bathroom, where she was relieved to see the sunlight drenching the woods behind the cabin.
But even inside the shower she was reliving the feel of Alessio’s hot, urgent body under hers, the bold press of his arousal, and her face flamed. She wasn’t so naïve that she didn’t know that it was normal for a man to wake up that way but there was nothing normal about the way that intimacy had made her feel. All on edge and jumpy, parts of her heated up in dangerous response. Hair washed and patted dry, she returned to the empty bedroom to ferret out something suitable to wear. She yanked a blue swimsuit out and donned it, wrinkling her nose at her reflection before tugging out shorts, a loose top and a pair of canvas shoes.
Alessio was already downstairs and opening a cool box in the kitchen. Lightly clad in swim shorts and a tee, he was a vision of lean, powerful masculinity as he bent down, cotton fabric outlining sleek, flexing back muscles and a strip of bronzed flesh and she sucked in a sharp breath.
‘Where did that come from?’ she asked stiffly.
‘At least one maintenance system hasn’t broken down since I was last here. When we’re in residence, fresh baked goods, fruit, eggs, cream et cetera are delivered every day from the farm where my bodyguards are staying.’
‘Convenient,’ Rosy commented as she set about making a lavish breakfast while considering snacks and drinks for the beach, a much easier task with the amount of food that had been delivered.
They were having coffee when a knock sounded on the back door and one of Alessio’s security team stepped in, escorting a teenaged girl who introduced herself with timid hesitance as Bianca Marino, whose family were caretakers for the cabin. Alessio frowned, black brows drawing together, and it was Rosy who stepped in to offer the teenager a cool drink and offer her a seat.
When she admitted under Rosy’s encouragement that she was only sixteen, Rosy gave Alessio a speaking, expectant glance, remarking on how well prepared the kitchen and the main bedroom had been.
As the trembling, anxious girl relaxed a little, Rosy drew out her story. Bianca’s mother had died almost fifteen years earlier, a woman Alessio fondly recalled as Sofia, who had made cakes for him as a child. Sofia had been responsible for cleaning the cabin, her husband for the maintenance. Bianca’s father, however, had suffered a serious back injury the year after he was widowed and her brother, who had initially taken on his father’s job, had left home to find a better-paying position.
‘I will see your father before we leave,’ Alessio pronounced calmly.
‘Nobody ever came here. It didn’t seem to matter what state it was in when it was never used. We didn’t mean any harm,’ the girl muttered in awkward completion.
Alessio saw her out again, his firm mouth taut.
‘Let’s go to the beach,’ Rosy urged brightly, keen to take his mind off what they had just learned.
‘You think I’m being too judgemental?’
‘No, I think first you need to discover how Bianca’s father was injured, because he was maintaining this house at the time and he may not have notified the palace because he was afraid of losing his job. I also think there should be an annual check on every property you own. If the supervision has been this lackadaisical, when was the level of pay for the job last updated? Three of the family were working here at one stage.’
‘Fair point,’ Alessio conceded, the squared set of his broad shoulders easing, while he attempted to prevent his gaze from wandering in the direction of his bride’s truly spectacular long shapely legs. He was still aching from waking up with her lithe body draped over him earlier. Nothing wrong with that, he told himself. Only, unfortunately, there was no outlet for his very healthy libido, he reflected wryly.
Rosy slung cold drinks and some snacks into a rucksack and Alessio swung open the back door with alacrity.
‘You know the way?’ she prompted.
‘There should be a path, probably overgrown by now, and a bridge over the stream and then it’s all downhill from there,’ he promised, taking the rucksack from her shoulder to put it on his own.
They headed into the darkness of the woods, towering trees providing a canopy far above them and shading them from the worst of the summer heat but, still, perspiration broke out on Rosy’s skin. ‘It’s hot.’
‘Yes…let me check this first,’ Alessio urged, stepping onto a roughly built concrete bridge spanning a rushing stream and gripping the wooden guard rail, which fell away from his grasp into the water below.
He strode back, clasping her hand. ‘Let me go first. It’s dangerous.’
‘I’m not one of your little ditsy women, Alessio. I’m a good swimmer and that stream doesn’t look deep,’ Rosy argued with spirit.
‘But if you fell, you could hurt yourself and it’s my responsibility to keep you safe.’
Rosy heaved a sigh and grasped his hand, colliding with glimmering crystalline green eyes that sapped her resistance as easily as a vacuum extractor. He guided her over to the opposite bank and moved her on. They were travelling downhill then and the walking, even though it meant threading a passage through light undergrowth on somewhat slippery ground, was less taxing. They were reaching the edge of the woodland when she saw a blue shimmering glimmer below them. ‘The sea,’ she murmured.
