A Royal Mess and Her Knight To Remember Read online

  The wedding was tomorrow. Marriage. Commitment.

  Forever.

  Words she’d thought about in a vague sense, but had never really applied to any of her relationships so far. How could they when just by being herself—a rather opinionated, strong-willed woman, that is—she always scared men away?

  If truth be told, she wanted a man to love her to distraction. She wanted a man who didn’t care what she looked like in the most horrendous shade of pink that ever existed. She wanted a man who’d go out of his way to please her, even if it meant having a really stupid bachelor-bachelorette party.

  She wanted a man to want her—not her title or her bank account—but her, Annie, the woman.

  From inside came the sound of cheers, and Annie knew they must be doing the promised fashion show. She couldn’t do it, she just couldn’t.

  Driven by these shaky emotions, that she couldn’t have explained to save her life, Annie moved into the shadows and walked the length of the balcony. She’d just go back inside via the next room over and sneak up to her room.

  Simple.

  Only nothing in her life was simple. The next room, which looked like a den, was dark.

  And locked.

  The room after that, possibly a library, was also locked.

  And so was the next.

  And the next.

  Something akin to panic drove her on, in her shiny, skimpy black lingerie that rode up where it shouldn’t and threatened to uncover parts of her that should never see the light of day or, in this case, the dark of night.

  Then she imagined having to go back to the fashion show, and pressed on.

  Cool evening air caressed her skin. She tried not to picture how she looked—a solid mass of goose bumps on skin far too fair for a black vinyl thong.

  A mosquito buzzed by her. She narrowed her eyes. “Bad mistake, bug, I’ve had all I can take tonight.” She wielded the whip and hit pay dirt.

  Then tripped on her heels.

  Good thing the paparazzi hadn’t followed her to Taos. She could only imagine the headlines.

  Princess Annie Changes Her Image.

  Tomboy Princess Annie Goes Hookerville.

  News At Eleven.

  Her father would kill her. Her sisters would never let her forget it. And Amelia…the woman who’d been like a mother to her, her mentor, her friend, would slowly shake her head and yet at the same time somehow make it all better.

  Amelia always made it all better.

  Annie wished she was home.

  Especially when she found the next door locked, too.

  Keep your head, came Amelia’s voice, strong and real. Annie didn’t bother looking around, she knew Amelia wasn’t standing there. And then, good luck. The very next room, also dark, also very quiet, had an opened window, with curtains softly blowing from the light breeze.

  Keep your head.

  Just as always, from across the globe, Amelia came through.

  Lifting a stocking-clad, thigh-high-booted leg, Annie swung it over the windowsill.

  KYLE HAD HIT dreamland. He was waist-deep in a hot tub filled with big-breasted, naked women, all there to give him pleasure.

  Maybe this wasn’t dreamland, it was heaven.

  Water lapped at his chest. A blonde sank into the hot tub in front of him, with a knowing, promising, wicked smile on her face. Her mouth hovered right above where he wanted it…

  A sound startled his subconscious. Don’t wake up, he told himself. Don’t even think about it.

  He sank back into the tub with the women, all of whom pressed closer to stroke their hands over his body while the blonde—

  The window in his room slid all the way open.

  Damn.

  He came all the way awake, and was very unhappy about it. Dreams like that didn’t come along every day, and he’d been just about to get lucky, very lucky, as he hadn’t in some time.

  Swiping a hand down his jaw, he blinked and stared at the figure straddling his window, one leg in and one leg out.

  It was female.

  He knew this because of the outline of the most luscious, curvy body he’d seen in a good long while. Slowly, a bit confused now, he sat up.

  Was he still dreaming? The body silhouetted in front of him definitely could have been one of the bodies in the hot tub he’d just been dreaming about.

  But, no. Not a dream. He was a cop all the way through to his soul. At the slightest noise he always came awake. He was definitely awake now. He threw the covers aside.

  The woman, one leg in his room and one still out, went utterly still.

  “Who’s there?” he demanded.

  Another long frozen second, and the woman shifted, started to pull back out of his window.

  “Oh, no, you don’t,” he said, and surged out of bed to the window, grabbing one silky leg.

  He knew that leg. He’d know it anywhere.

  10

  HE HAD HER by the calf, and there was no doubt in Annie’s mind who he was.

  His hand was gliding up, up, up, and then his fingers were gripping her thigh.

  “Let go,” Annie choked out, trying to pull back out of the window, panicked that someone would flip on a light any minute, and highlight the outfit she still couldn’t quite believe she had on.

  But for now, at least, they were in utter darkness. “Damn it,” she snapped, her breath backing up in her throat. Of all the rooms in the entire place, she had to pick his. Just his fingers on her skin had her insides doing the happy dance. “Let go!”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Well we can’t just stand here.”

  “You’re right. Don’t move, I’ll turn on the light—”

  “No!” She lowered her voice with great effort. “Don’t even think about it.”

  She heard his soft laugh. Soft, sexy laugh that the rugged, uncompromising man didn’t let go of often enough. Her tummy fluttered. Her nipples tightened, which meant they scraped against the rough material barely covering them.

  “You ever heard of the word please?” Kyle wondered aloud.

  She drew a breath in and tried not to scream. “Don’t turn on the light. Please.”

  “Why?”

  “Because…” Oh, hell. “Because I’m not exactly dressed for company, okay? Now let go of me and back off. I can’t breathe around you.”

  “That’s very interesting, and we’ll get back to that in a second, but for now I’m interested in the not-dressed-for-company thing.” His hand skimmed up her back, her bare back, and slid under her hair. His thumb caressed the sensitive skin there. His other hand moved up her thigh, then her stomach. Also bare.

  He let out a low whistle, his hands still roaming.

  “Kyle,” she warned.

  “I’ve got to still be dreaming.” His voice was husky and a little thick now, as his hand settled high on her ribs. If he so much as twitched his thumb he was going to get breast.

  “It’s not a dream, it’s my life and it’s a nightmare,” she told him grimly. “Now, I’m going to back out of this window. And you’re going to go back to bed and pretend this never happened.”

  “Tell you what.” His naughty fingers continued to play with her skin, causing shivers. “Let’s do this all friendlylike, okay? You come all the way in here and tell me what’s going on.”

  “Or…?”

  “Or I flip on the light.”

  “How is that friendlylike?” she demanded, but as if he read her mind on jumping out the window, he tightened his hold on her.

  “Come on now,” he said, gently forcing her into the room. Before she could so much as knee him, he had her in the window and on his bed.

  By the time she leaped back up, he had the window and curtains closed, and then she was blinking like an owl in the bright light he flipped on.

  His jaw dropped. “Holy sh—”

  “I told you.” She crossed her arms over her chest, which didn’t exactly help. When she did that, the whip she still held nearly