She noticed Beck had stilled. When he didn’t give her a snippy little retort, Caroline looked at him. “What?”

“I was about to say, Caroline, that I spoke to the prince about it, who happens to be standing just there.”

An icy scrape went down her spine. The top of her head buzzed. She stared at Beck for a long moment before she pushed her hair from her face and made herself turn around to see. The prince was indeed standing there, his back against the wall, one dark brow arched. He gave her a half-hearted wave. She hadn’t seen him because the door was open and impeding her view, and her bloody hair had obscured the rest of her vision. She whipped back around to Beck. “Why didn’t you tell me he was here?”

“I should think it obvious, seeing as how he is just there,” he said, gesturing emphatically toward the prince. “And by the bye, what do you know about the invitations being recalled?”

“Nothing!”

Beck narrowed his gaze.

“And what, pray tell, did the illustrious Royal Highness have to say for my deplorable status of being an unmarried woman?” She knew quite a lot about those invitations, as it happened. It was she, after all, who had suggested to Lady Norfolk that she might want to postpone her soiree, given Lady Montgomery’s rather visceral reaction to the gossip surrounding the prince. Priscilla had relayed to Caroline that while having tea with Lady Montgomery, she’d mentioned the prince’s unsavory habits, and Lady Montgomery had nearly choked on her crumpet, and screeched for her secretary then and there and demanded the invitation be rescinded at once.

Also, Lady Norfolk was terribly pregnant and terribly cross. Caroline had assumed, on her friend’s behalf, that the anxiety would be too much.

“Watch your tongue, Caroline,” Beck warned her. “Naturally, he said what any man would say—that it’s well past time you married.”

“Ah—with all due respect, Beck, that is not exactly what I said,” the prince politely demurred.

“It was implied,” Beck said impatiently.

“What did you say?” Caroline asked, turning back to the prince.

“Caro, please! Do not speak to His Royal Highness as if he were some servant to be interrogated for a missing spoon!”

“It’s quite all right,” the prince said. “I merely said that in Alucia most women are married by the time they are twenty. It was an observation, that’s all.” And now he was observing her hair with a curious look.

“And you are well past twenty, Caro,” Beck needlessly pointed out.

Ooh, she would strangle Beck when they were alone. Why was it she could never meet the prince when she looked her best? Why must she always look so bedraggled? He’d been casually looking on all the while she was standing with her hair half down and stuffing cheese into her mouth.

She slowly turned back to her brother. “You’re right, Beck. I should marry. Bring on the suitors, then. Bring them now! If the prince says it—”

“Again, I did not say it,” the prince said quickly. “I simply had a conversation with a friend—I didn’t mean to offer advice.”

“But you did.”

“Caro! For God’s sake, he is a prince of Alucia! Show some respect!” Beck bellowed.

“My lord?”

Caroline and Beck turned toward the door at the same moment. Garrett had stepped inside, unnoticed by them, and interrupted what Caroline felt was the prelude to a brawl. “My lord, there is a gentleman at the door about the horse.”

“Ah!” Beck grinned and hopped to his feet. “That must be the stable master where I intend to house my horse when she arrives. Fine blocks of stables they are, too—the queen’s Horse Guard is stabled there.” He started for the door but paused to look at Caroline. “This would be an opportune time to do something with your hair,” he added, his fingers fluttering in the direction of the fallen tress that drooped over her shoulder as he hurried out.

Caroline made a face at his back and remained where she was, her arms folded. When she was certain he was gone, she pivoted around and marched to where the prince stood behind the open door.

He seemed alarmed at first and straightened as if he thought he might have to do battle. But then he quickly clasped his hands at his back, his legs braced apart, and seemed to prepare himself for whatever she had to say.

“How dare you,” Caroline said.

“How dare I...?”

“Speak to my brother about my marriage prospects!”

“Once again, I did not speak to your brother about your marriage prospects. Or even that you were not married. Your brother asked a question and I answered as I would answer any friend.”

“I am not his ward, for God’s sake. I’m a grown woman and I do as I please.”

“Evidently true on both counts,” he agreed. And then he smiled.

It infuriated her that he should smile in a way that would make her feel so buzzy. With a quick look at the door, she shifted closer. “I don’t have to do as he commands, you know.”

“I never dreamed that you did. I can’t imagine there is any man on this earth that can tell you what to do.”

She shifted even closer. She could detect the musky scent of his cologne, could see a bit of lint on his collar. “Why should any man tell me what to do? I am as much a person as him or even you, Your Highness.”

“Obviously.” He picked up the tail end of the loose tress of hair and brushed it along her collarbone before dropping it over her shoulder. It instantly slid forward again.

All the nerves in Caroline’s body began to sizzle. She despised this man, but she’d never been quite so aroused as she was in this angry moment. She dropped her gaze to his mouth and the shadow of his beard. “Why are you always here?” she demanded. “Are you having an affair with our Ann?”

His eyes widened. He barked out a laugh. “Good God, Caroline, do you speak every thought that occurs to you?”

She would ignore, for the moment, that he had used her given name, which meant, she supposed, that they were very much acquainted, thank you, just as she’d maintained all along. She would further disregard how pleasant her name sounded in his melodious accent. And she would not use this moment to discuss how many thoughts did not pass her lips, for there were quite a lot of them. “Well? Are you?”

His brows dropped into a dark frown, and he leaned forward. “Hear me plainly, woman. No. For God’s sake, no. If I were to have an affair, it would be with a woman who is lush, and curved in all the right places, and open to my suggestions for how to debauch her. Not a timid maid.”

The sizzle was quickly turning to fire. She couldn’t help but wonder what his suggestions for debauching a woman might be. Her gaze fell to his mouth again. She was feeling a little heady.

“My turn. Why aren’t you married? Surely a beautiful woman like you, with her own inheritance, and an enormous dowry, apparently, who does not have to do what any man says, would attract quite a lot of gentlemen in this town. Particularly the type who enjoy a great challenge. Or are they all bloody fools?”

Aha—again, she would not be put on her heels by a compliment casually tossed to her. “Of course I’ve attracted them,” she scoffed. “I don’t care for any of them. Why aren’t you married? Been waiting for the right Weslorian to come along?”

He chuckled, and his gaze moved to the bit of lace she’d sewn along the edge of her bodice. “The same as you, madam—I don’t want anyone to tell me what to do and I don’t want responsibilities.”

“Aha! So you do prefer maids, then.”

He slowly lifted his gaze to hers and held it tight, like he had her attention in his fist. “I prefer women, Caroline,” he murmured. “I prefer women who are confident of their place in this world...but perhaps those who hold their tongues when they ought.”

“Because you don’t agree with everything a woman says doesn’t make what she says wrong.”

He lifted his hand, and with the tip of his finger, he traced a line from the curve of her shoulder up to her chin. “Tell me, Caroline—what gives you the right to speak to me in this manner?”

She leaned forward, just an inch or so from him. “I was born with the right to speak however I want to whomever I want. You are not the prince of me.”

The prince blinked. “Of all the outrageous—”

She didn’t let him finish. She pushed at his chest with both hands, forcing him against the wall, and before he could recover, she rose up on her toes to kiss him. She kissed the prince like she’d never kissed another man in her life. Admittedly, there hadn’t been very many, and certainly she’d never kissed a gentleman like this. But there was something about this man that begged for it—he was so high and mighty, so sure of himself. She had never taken such liberties, and she’d never been so wholly thrilled with an act in her life. This was fire.

But for a high and mighty man, he seemed not to know what to do. He held his arms out wide, as if he were silently announcing he wanted no part of this. Except that his mouth said differently. Oh, but his lips and his tongue said something else entirely. He wouldn’t touch her with his hands, but he nipped at her lips, his tongue playing with hers. He pressed against her, his chest against her chest, and kissed her back as passionately as she kissed him. It was intoxicating, and it wasn’t until her hair found its way between their lips that she suddenly pushed him away and stepped back.

She was breathing raggedly and so was he. They were both panting like they’d chased each other around this room. They stared hard at each other for one endless moment. An entire book of thoughts and feelings and unspoken words flowing between them was written in that moment. Caroline felt something open in her, warm and wet and accepting.