Read Online Wedded for His Royal Duty by Susan Meier - Free Book Online

similar to the one his tailor used. She hugged the robe to her bosom, but it was too late. He’d seen the yellow bra and panties. He’d seen the creamy white arc of her breasts. He’d seen the curve of her hip.
    He stopped dead in his tracks.
    Rose about had a coronary. “What are you doing here? And why didn’t you knock?”
    “A fiancé doesn’t knock.” He tried not to watch as Eva turned her back to him and slipped into the robe. But the vision from the back was as awe-inspiring as the front. For a short woman, she had a long, sloping back that ended in perfect round hips and a round butt.
    Eva slid into the robe, yanked the belt at her waist and turned to the sixty-something man who stood with a tape measure in hand, gaping at Alex.
    “Could you give us a minute?”
    The older man said, “Of course, but only a minute. Considering time for fittings, I’ve got about two weeks to make a gown the whole world is going to see. Everybody’s got to be on board with the timing or I swear I will fold like a house of cards.”
    Composed now, Rose took his arm. “Of course, we’ll cooperate with your timing.” She tossed Alex a pointed look. “This will not happen again.”
    “At least not without a phone call to warn us you’re coming,” Eva’s mom said haughtily. “You might be engaged, but a gentleman caller is still a gentleman caller.”
    The three trooped out of the room and Alex laughed. “Have a lot of gentleman callers, do you?”
    “My mom is struggling to find any sense of normalcy in this situation. She thinks her husband left her. And she’s in the public eye. If she wants to ban you from the room, I say we let her.”
    “We can’t. Dom reminded me this morning that the most important group we have to fool is the servants.”
    She frowned.
    “The palace staff. There’s a betting pool. Apparently no one believes I’ll actually marry you.”
    Her delicate eyebrows rose. “And who do we have to thank for that, Mr. Date-Every-Woman-in-the-Known-Universe?”
    “You’re a woman in the known universe and I never dated you.”
    She held up one finger to stop him. “No, you haven’t. And maybe that’s the problem. Just jumping into this wedding the way we have, everybody sees it as nothing but a royal responsibility.” She tapped her finger against her lips, thinking. “So maybe what we need to do is have a date. A real date. Not lunch, but something smashing.”
    “In front of the staff,” Alex reminded her, letting his gaze roam along her fluffy white robe, knowing the pretty bra and panties were beneath, and that they covered a gorgeous butt and breasts just the right size for his hands. “That means the trip to the country home is cancelled. It smacks of PR.”
    “So what can we do here? In the palace?”
    He knew one very important thing they could do. In his apartment. In his bedroom. Too bad the staff couldn’t see that. But they would see the seduction leading up to it—
    “Have dinner at my apartment.”
    She laughed. “Oh, how many times have you used that line?”
    The way she said it cut through him like a knife. His success with women was legendary. But in a good way. She didn’t have to sound so snooty about it. “I wasn’t that bad.”
    She stepped down from the platform, tightened the belt with a quick yank. “Oh, please.”
    “You know, maybe we’re looking at this all wrong. Maybe the reason the staff doesn’t think the wedding will come off is you?”
    She gasped. “Me?”
    “You have an attitude about me.”
    She gaped at him.
    “Maybe what you need to do is start being nicer to me.”
    “Okay. Fine. I’ll be nicer to you. But I need specifics so I can do some prep work. What’s your plan for tonight?”
    “If this was a normal date, I’d call the kitchen staff and tell them to set up a romantic dinner around eight. You’d arrive in something pretty and I’d be spellbindingly witty while they served dinner. We’d dismiss them after they served the