Guarding His Royal Bride. C.J. Miller
calculating. He killed without mercy. He rammed his agenda through by any means necessary. Iliana hadn’t believed those accusations. She had seen him in another light, and she had felt special because she’d believed herself privy to some secret side of Demetrius.
But that warmth and affection was completely overshadowed by what he had done. He had lied to her. He had manipulated her. He didn’t get the benefit of the doubt anymore.
She would make his life hard. She would make him rue the day he had decided to use her for political maneuvering.
Iliana stood and stretched, letting her shirt ride up a bit. She turned to give Demetrius a look at her profile. She wasn’t vain, but she worked out and she knew she looked good. Demetrius was attracted to her. No way had he faked that. In her peripheral vision, she saw that she had his attention. So she bent over at the waist, touching her toes and wiggling her hips.
If Demetrius wanted to play the “married” card, she would play it, too. Let him see what he could have and what he was missing. She’d deny any advances, and she wouldn’t stand for one moment of him cheating. But she knew he wouldn’t. Demetrius DeSante was a lot of things, but he wasn’t a cheater.
He did, however, move like a panther.
He was at her side in moments. “What are you doing?”
She smelled his cologne, or maybe it was the soap he used, light and spicy. It turned her on, but she tamped down her lust. That ridiculous emotion had ruled her the night before, and she was shutting it off from here on out. “Stretching. My schedule is off. I didn’t work out this morning, and my muscles feel tight.” She pretended to be unaware that he was hard beneath his pants. She tossed the question back at him. “What are you doing?”
He growled in the back of his throat. “Stop it.”
“Stop exercising? Why?”
“You know what you’re doing. Every man in this cabin is staring at you, and I won’t have it.”
She rolled her eyes. “You can’t command people to stop using their eyes.”
“I will remove the eyes of the next person who looks at my wife with lust.” His voice was loud and clear. Everyone looked away from them.
“You are being ridiculous.”
He walked to the entrance to the small bedroom aboard the plane. “A word. Alone, please.”
Iliana followed him into the bedroom. He closed the door behind him. She sensed he was grappling for control. Control of his anger or his lust? She waited.
“Are you trying to antagonize me?”
She smirked at him. “Yes.”
His eyes blazed. “At least you admit it.”
“I want you to apologize,” she said.
He loosened the tie around his neck and undid the first button of his shirt. Disheveled looked good on him. “If I say the words, will you stop being upset?”
“You have to say the words and mean them,” she said. “Then I’ll see how I feel.” She would still be angry, but she wanted him to twist a little for what he had done.
He looked her up and down. She felt as if he had touched her. “Iliana, I’ve never been more attracted to another woman than I am to you. What I know about the king of Valencia as it relates to you has nothing to do with that attraction.”
“But you married me because of it.”
He drew in a deep breath. “I would have married you one day. I moved up the timeline because of the king’s health problems.”
Surprising words, and she didn’t know if she could believe them. His admission wouldn’t slake her anger. “You could have been honest with me.”
“I told you about the king when the time was right.”
Right for his plans and for him. The encounter with the assassin the day before flashed to mind. “Do you think the man who tried to kill me was after me because of my connection to the king of Valencia?” She had thought the murder attempt had to do with Serena, or maybe even Demetrius.
“I suspect someone else knows who you are and they want you dead because of it.”
Iliana wished she hadn’t left Acacia. She could have stayed in the castle and dealt with Serena and Casimir’s lovey-dovey behavior for a few days. Anything was better than this. “Going to Valencia seems like a patently bad idea, then, if someone wants to kill me.”
“No one will kill my wife.”
Low self-esteem wasn’t his problem. “You’re not invincible, Demetrius.” She’d heard Casimir and Demetrius telling war stories, and she’d heard rumors of her husband’s prowess in battle. Despite implications to the contrary, he was human.
“I would sooner die than let someone harm you.”
He had spoken similar words before, and it accentuated how different their worlds were. She had never been in a physical confrontation. Acacia had never been to war. Demetrius had battle scars to prove that he had. “Let’s aim for no one dying.”
“We will stay together in Valencia. You will not sneak away. For your safety and the safety of anyone who may make the poor decision to harm you.”
Iliana blinked at him. “I know how to be safe.”
“Were you being safe in Elion last year?”
Of course he would bring that up. She had been nearly mugged, but Demetrius had rescued her. “I made a mistake. I’ve learned from it.”
“Do you want to have sex?” he asked.
She shook her head, trying to clear her thoughts. Had she misheard him? “Excuse me?”
“You’re sending me mixed signals.”
He looked devastatingly handsome. Black shirt and gray pants, pressed and stylish, his dark hair brushed back from his face. Sliding her fingers into it, letting the silky strands fall between her fingers, would feel good. This wasn’t the first time she had been angry with Demetrius, and the strange part was that she was perpetually attracted to him. She must have a thing for picking the wrong men, as she was clearly a lost cause where Demetrius was concerned. “I’m giving you one signal right now. I’m angry.”
“Some couples counter fights with sex.”
Tempting, but sleeping with Demetrius wouldn’t get it out of her system. She’d want him more. “Couples have sex after the fight is resolved. This is nowhere near resolved.”
“Tell me what I need to do to resolve the fight so I can go back to making love to my wife when she needs me to.”
Those words felt like a caress across her breasts and down her body. “I don’t need sex.” She’d had great sex with him in the early-morning hours. It should tide her over for at least a week. Given her recent dry spell, she could go six months without another man laying a hand on her.
“It would relax you, and you seem very tense right now.”
“We aren’t alone on the plane.”
“My staff won’t interrupt us in here.”
She felt her resolve cracking, but she shored up her defenses. “No sex. You’re still withholding information. I’m withholding sex. You have yet to tell me why you married me.”
“I married you because I wanted to. You can’t pretend that you don’t enjoy it when I touch you. Sex has nothing to do with this fight. Let’s keep the two separate.”
Reasoning that would only make sense to a man. She wouldn’t let him win. “No.”
“Then, let’s call a truce for at least the rest of the flight.”
“No.” If