Prince Albert: A Billionaire Stepbrother Romance Read online

  “That’s not how you play,” I say, my eyes lingering on her expression, her lips parted just slightly. The thin strap of her dress is hanging halfway off her shoulder, and I want to pull it the rest of the way down, but I don’t. She’s drunk. No matter how fucking hot she is, that makes her off-limits. Even so, I can’t help teasing her a little bit. “Never have I ever been so wet in the back of a limo, driving around Vegas with a total stranger.”

  She looks at me for a long time, and her lips fall open farther. She raises her eyebrows like she’s appalled, but flicks her tongue over her lower lip, and I know without a doubt that if I were to reach between her legs, I’d find she’s just as wet as I think she is. But I don’t. “That’s not how you play, either,” she says. “And, besides, it’s not true.”

  “Liar.”

  “The entire thing is completely a blur,” she says. But her voice wavers.

  “Liar.” I whisper the word, close to her ear, watching as goose bumps dot her skin on her arms in response to warmth of my breath. “You remember everything.”

  I pull away from her, just far enough to see a flush rise to her cheeks, pink coloring along her cheekbones that makes me wonder how she looks after orgasm, whether that flush deepens and she gets a dewy glow like she has right now.

  I can’t help but feel smugly satisfied at the way I bring that flush to her cheeks.

  Then she steels her jaw and looks at me. “Barely,” she says.

  Barely. That means definitely.

  “I could help you remember,” I say.

  “Thanks for the offer,” she says. “But I’m busy. And besides, you’re a prince, after all. Don’t you have better things to do? I’m sure there’s a damsel in distress somewhere who needs rescuing.”

  “You’re wandering these halls like you’re the one who needs rescuing.”

  She chokes back a laugh, but there’s no joy in it. “Unless you have the ability to produce my passport, you can’t help me.”

  “Your passport? Are you leaving?” I can’t help but be annoyed at the possibility of her leaving when she’s gotten here. Can I help it if I’m intrigued by the thought of spending the summer getting under this girl’s skin?

  Belle shrugs. “Maybe,” she says. “I don’t know. But I can’t find it. And at the very least, I want to make sure I have it.”

  “You have someplace better to be for the summer?”

  “Something that’s better than being paraded around like some kind of trophy in media interviews and whatever else I’m supposed to do as the child of the new Queen of Protrovia?” she asks.

  “How about getting to know your new family?” I ask. “Getting to know my father? Or Protrovia. It’s not such a bad place. You might find there’s a lot to like about our country.”

  Her face softens. “I’m not trying to be ungrateful,” she says. “It’s just that everything has happened so fast. And you already knew about the engagement. I was the only one in that room that had the news sprung on her.”

  “Well, it was a surprise to me when I got back from Afghanistan,” I say. “I haven’t been back here that long, you know. The Vegas trip was to blow off steam with my friends, American-style.”

  “You were in Afghanistan?” she asks.

  “In the military,” I say. “The Royal Protrovian Army.”

  She studies my face for a moment. “I didn’t know they sent people like you to Afghanistan,” she says.

  “People like me?” I ask, laughing.

  “That is not the way I meant it,” she says, and her face colors, the flush on her cheeks deepening to an entirely different shade of red.

  “Oh?” I ask. “So you meant it in a non-condescending, non-pejorative way, then.”

  “I meant royal,” she says. “You know that’s what I meant. You just like giving me grief.”

  That’s not all I’d like to give her. The words are on the tip of my tongue, but I don’t speak them. Not getting laid for over two weeks since I was in Vegas has me so horny I can hardly focus. That’s the problem. That’s why I’m standing here with a rock-hard cock, in front of this girl who looks at me, her face upturned, eyes telegraphing her irritation with me.

  “I’ll admit that giving you grief, as you so elegantly put it, does hold a certain appeal,” I say, being deliberately patronizing.

  “Sorry that I’m not as elegant as you are,” she says, rolling her eyes.

  “There’s an American embassy in Protrovia,” I say. “You can get a new passport, if you need to.”

  “Attempting to get rid of me now?” she asks. “You’re not going to try to convince me to stay?”

  “You’re a grown woman,” I say. “If you don’t want to stick around for the fireworks this summer, I’m sure you have better things to do with your time.”

  “The fireworks?” she asks, as I turn to leave. “You mean, all the drama with the wedding?”

  I wasn’t referring to the wedding.

  “Sure,” I say. “That, too.”

  I watch as that same flush rises to her cheeks again.

  I turn, leaving her standing in the hallway, whistling as I walk away.

  If Belle stays for the summer, fireworks are definitely on the agenda.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Belle

  I’m hiding out in my room. Room is an incredible understatement. I'm staying in one of the family residences in the palace – a huge suite the size of an apartment, with a ridiculous walk-in closet, filled with designer clothes and shoes that are all my size. It's everything you'd expect from a palace – opulent beyond belief, antique furniture and wine-colored fabrics and gold-gilded accessories.

  I slept like the dead last night, longer than I’ve slept in years. And I’ve spent all day holed up in my room, doing my best to pretend none of this is actually happening.

  I’ve avoided everything on the agenda today.

  There is literally an agenda – an actual program, like you’d get at a wedding or a graduation. It’s printed on delicate cream-colored paper and embossed with the royal crest in the background.

  I wonder if they do this every day, whether if they pass out an itinerary, a schedule of events to be adhered to, expectations to be met.

  It’s completely and utterly ridiculous.

  This entire thing is ludicrous.

  I’m not a princess, not even close. Sure, I’m a Kensington – my family's name is recognizable in certain circles – but I'm nowhere near being royalty.

  My father was the child of Polish immigrants who changed their family name from Kedzierski to Kensington when they arrived in America. Oliver Kensington started working when he was eight, a shoeshine business on a New York sidewalk before going to school in the mornings. He made his first million dollars before he was twenty. By then, it was real estate, not shoe shining.

  My mother was his high school sweetheart. When I was a kid, I remember them having late night candlelit dinners every Friday night in our living room. Sometimes it would be after an event – charity or business something-or-other -- and sometimes there was no event at all. I'd sneak out of my room and hide around the corner, watching them as they held hands and my mother giggled like a schoolgirl, talking to him.

  "You get one great love in life, kiddo," he told me once. "If you're lucky. So you have to make it count. Remember that."

  Everything changed after my father died. My mother threw herself into charities, social functions, her status. She dived into advancing the Kensington name. I thought it was her way of remembering him, but at some point all of that stuff became an end in and of itself.

  Of course, becoming a queen is the ultimate position of status.

  I can’t imagine growing up in a place like this. It’s a million times more rigid and fraught with expectations than my life ever was. I’d almost feel badly for Albie -- if he didn’t seem to enjoy all of it so much.

  I spent all morning surfing the internet and getting the scoop on Albie. There’s a lot of scoop to be had o