Chapter 2

"You cheated!"

Nicki Clark's gasp was so affronted, so outraged, that Stefan couldn't help but gloat a moment longer than was strictly necessary to prove his point. She was the most infuriating woman he'd ever encountered—and he'd encountered quite a few in his generations of serving the royal family. Never, though, was there anyone as confident in ways that she manifestly shouldn't be confident. Not in her beauty, her brains, or even her ingenuity, either—Nicki Clark thought she was a lion in the body of a mouse.

And she was constantly trying to prove she was right.

"Get off me," she sputtered, and he moved willingly enough to the side, but he wasn't quick about freeing her from the thick ropes. To her credit, she didn't struggle. Instead, she went wholly quiet, her breathing evening out though he could tell her pulse was racing.

Racing…a little too fast, he thought. The same as it had in the corridor by the palace wall.

Concern instantly flushed the momentary surge of triumph out of his system. "Are you hurt?" he asked, reaching for her, but Nicki flinched away from his hand, in that peculiar manner she had. He'd seen many women who'd borne the brunt of a man's violence—this wasn't that. She wasn't ducking away from his attack, but from his offer of aid. It had taken him days to realize that distinction, while she and her friends had been guests of the royal family. If anything, it made her more intriguing to him.

Now she glared down at the web of netting with which he'd ensnared her. "I always see it thrown at people's feet, tripping them up," she said, reaching out one long-fingered hand and expertly picking up the edge of the net that would most quickly free her. The woman's mind worked like that, he'd learned too. She didn't flail. She didn't flop. When she was out of her depth she slowed down her mind and body, and her next choice was almost always the right one.

"I wasn't trying to hurt you, but to stop you." Stefan leaned back to watch her pick her own way out of the netting. This morning Nicki wore barely enough clothing for decency, but she did it in such a way that it wasn't intended as a means to attract men. In truth, she could outrun most of the men of O?ros if she caught them off guard—including him, though he was getting better at not being caught off guard. Her legs were powerful for all their short stature, corded with muscle beneath smooth, tanned skin. Her core was tight—not thick with muscle as he would have expected, but steady and firm. Her arms were lean and toned, burnished bronze by the sun despite the suntan lotion she liberally applied. She was too young to be weathered, but he'd caught himself imagining what another twenty—thirty years out in the elements would do to her face, her skin, her shiny, red-gold hair. She would be stunning in her older years, fierce and free.

He couldn't imagine Nicki old, however. He could never get past the woman's bright laughter and flashing eyes…nor the way she danced on his every last nerve, deliberately flaunting any rule she encountered.

"Yeah, well, you weren't trying to help me either," Nicki scoffed, flinging off the last of the net from her upper body. Her legs remained trapped by the trailing edge of the net caught beneath him, but she sank back on the small dune, apparently content to remain in the sun. A tightness in his gut he hadn't realized he'd been holding eased.

As he was about to ask again if she was hurt, Nicki made a face. "You know, if you want to kiss me so badly, you don't have to throw a net on me. You could just ask."

Stefan didn't react to her taunt. Nicki Clark spoke with the offhand assurance of a woman who knew that men didn't find her sensually alluring so much as startlingly attractive, her bold, fervent grasp on life so shocking and vibrant that it took most people by surprise. She used the reaction she caused as a shield, he suspected. But a shield from what?

And the woman was pretty, by any standards. With her burnished red hair, currently tangled in a sand-caked ponytail, her green eyes, and fresh, open face, she could—and had—turned heads both in the city and inside the palace. He'd watched others react to her, men and women alike naturally gravitating to her sunny demeanor and smiling at her brashness. Even the older, more established officials had unbent around her, in the way one did with someone who would be leaving soon. Nicki Clark didn't fit, but you found yourself wishing she could.

She eyed him. "See? You're thinking about it. Probably should get it over with." She settled back into the sand, her eyes drifting shut as if she didn't have a care in the world. "Again."

Her own skin flushed with the last word, and he found himself easing closer, despite the hard control with which he willed his body not to respond. He had kissed Nicki once, in the palace pool. She'd been determined to beat him in a lap endurance test, and he'd broken first, knowing he was expected in the throne room of the palace. She'd surged out of the water with such delighted enthusiasm that he hadn't thought, simply grabbed her and kissed her hard.

She, as usual, had given as good as she'd gotten, leaning into the kiss with a passion that shouldn't have surprised him, but somehow had.

Then she'd laughed it off as she laughed everything off, and he'd been left feeling…slightly uncertain.

And he never felt uncertain.

It was that memory of uncertainty that urged him forward now. As his shadow fell over Nicki's face, her smug expression faltered—not a lot, but enough for him to know he'd gotten her attention.

"You want me to kiss you?" he murmured.

Her breath hitched—and a surge of adrenaline shot through his body, priming him for action. Nicki Clark was like a lit fuse. He didn't know when she would spark out of control, but he wanted to be the one who started the fireworks.

That was dangerous, and stupid.

And so was he, when she was around.

"I have to say, I enjoyed feeling your body up against mine when you kissed me by the pool," he continued, watching the stain of a blush creep up her face. "You surprised me then."

He could tell the moment she lost her nerve. Her eyes flashed open and she gave him a big smile, as if the entire conversation were a joke she was wrapping up.

"I'm a surprising girl," she said, angling her head away from him to peer down at her legs. "I'm pretty sure I'm also going to be a crippled girl if you don't get these nets off me though. I'm about to lose circulation."

He moved enough to free her legs, but as she scooted backward out of the cocoon of netting, he caught her hand. The movement apparently startled her so much that she let him turn her wrist to his mouth. Holding her hand firmly in his grip, he bent forward and pressed his lips against her inner wrist. Her pulse was jumping again, and there was no mistaking the quick intake of breath as Nicki inhaled, her entire body going still.

"You taste like sunshine," he murmured against her skin, and he didn't mistake the shudder that rippled through her. "I haven't tasted sunshine in some time, I'm afraid."

"I—"

He lifted his head. Nicki's eyes had widened, her mouth soft and inviting, her skin flushed.

"I want to taste more of it, if you don't mind."

Not waiting for her to counter, he leaned forward and brushed her lips with his.