Surprisingly, though, Nicholas turned away and went to the low table where supper had been laid out. Aurora watched as he inspected a bottle of champagne and poured some of the fizzing spirits into a dish.

His back was to her, and she found herself admiring the powerful, sinewed lines of his nude body. He was like the sensual prince in Desiree's journal – indeed, this entire room resembled the silk and sandalwood seraglio described in the journal, Aurora thought, her glance moving around the exotic bedchamber. Especially this low divan with its luxurious cushions and filmy curtains. She could almost imagine herself in the Frenchwoman's place, waiting for her lover. Nicholas was her magnificent master, and she his captive, meant only for his heathen pleasures.

"The decor here," Aurora remarked curiously, striving for calm, "is very much like the palace harem in the journal."

"That isn't entirely coincidence," Nicholas replied. "I asked that we be given these rooms once I learned of their Eastern motif. You seem so taken with the journal."

He returned to her then and sat beside her on the divan, presenting the dish for her inspection. It held several small sponges soaked in champagne.

"Do you remember what the journal said about preventing conception?"

"Yes." She was strangely disquieted by their purpose – preventing a man's seed from taking root – even though she couldn't possibly risk letting Nicholas get her with child.

"May I?" he asked.

"Yes."

The clamor of her heart echoed in the quiet of the room as Nicholas drew down the sheet to bare her body to his warm gaze. When he slid a wet sponge between her thighs, Aurora caught her breath at the chill sensation.

With a murmur of apology, he gently parted her legs and pressed the sponge into her pulsing cleft, then farther still, until it was sheathed deep within her body. Aurora shivered, but then his mouth followed his fingers, warming her cool flesh.

Aurora gasped at the fierce jolt of desire Nicholas created, and arched against him. It was ice and fire… But it wasn't enough.

"Nicholas," she pleaded, her urgency suddenly returning. "Come inside me." Eagerly she stretched out her arms to him in welcome, wanting him with all the willingness of her ripe woman's body. She wanted his hot skin against her, his heat, his power. She wanted him filling her.

He understood her craving, for without hesitation, he stretched out to cover her body with his. Pleasure darkened his eyes as he eased her legs open, his lean, hair-dusted thighs brushing abrasively against hers.

"Yes," he whispered hoarsely. "I want to be part of you all night, Aurora. I want to fall asleep deep inside you and wake up with the taste of you…"

He kissed her again, urgently, and entered her in one long, slow thrust. Breathless, Aurora closed her eyes as hardness and softness melded into one ravishing sensation.

Nicholas began to move then, his rhythm quickening luxuriously. His thighs pressing hers wider, he claimed her in hot, slick strokes, penetrating deeper and deeper each time.

Her senses on fire, Aurora wrapped her legs around his hips and arched up in welcome. He wasn't gentle, but she didn't want gentle. The incredible, exquisite, painful hunger was building, until her arousal was as intense as his own. They were man and woman, filled with primal need. She could not get close enough.

He plunged into her, driving her to a place of wanton delight, filled with bright, hot pleasure. She wanted to weep with the beauty of it.

Their coupling grew rough, wilder, till the fiery, clawing need became unbearable. They strained together, insatiable, in a mating of raw, animal passion. He demanded her surrender, demanded abandon, and she gave him both. She writhed beneath him. Her fingernails raked his back as he took her, her soft cries goading him to greater wildness.

Her frenzy at last ripped the last shred of restraint from Nicholas. His rasping breath choked words against her mouth as he drove into her. He shook with the pounding need to pleasure her, to possess her, to brand her with his passion…

The inferno broke over them in a tumult that made them both cry out. Aurora sobbed as her body erupted in a white-hot climax, while Nicholas groaned, a harsh, raw sound. Crushing her savagely close, he shattered in a searing explosion of emotion that had her name at the end of it.

In the heated aftermath, he collapsed against her. For a long moment, he lay there, trembling from the force of his thundering heart, the only movement his fingers clenching and unclenching in her hair.

Their bonding had been fierce and primal, like nothing he had ever felt before. He wanted to throw back his head and howl in triumph…

He had won this time. He had conquered Aurora's rigid control for the moment, making her surrender to overwhelming passion. But now came the far harder task: binding her to him in love.

And he had only two short weeks in which to succeed.

That night was the first of many such passionate moments together.

Despite her many qualms, Aurora found her time with Nicholas pure enchantment, a magical interlude in her life like nothing she had ever experienced. As he'd asked, they had no past, no future, no nationality. They were simply man and woman, lovers in a paradise of desire.

The opulent secluded mansion offered sinful enticements Aurora could never even have imagined, but it was Nicholas who made their time together pure bliss.

He showed her pleasure beyond her dreams, leading her into a realm of the flesh and of the senses. They spent long hours exploring the boundaries of erotic ecstasy. He taught her to please him and to openly express what pleased her. At his impetus, she cast away all inhibition or awkwardness, shedding the stifling codes of proper society with wild abandon, willingly surrendering to his tantalizing touch and the fire in his seductive eyes.

Nicholas made her feel utterly wanted and desired. And yet he challenged her spirit and her mind as well as her body. His intelligence and wit were a constant delight, while the rapier-sharp edge of his sensual charm made mincemeat of her usual reserve.

He made her laugh, and he made her yearn. She had never felt so cherished. She had never felt so free. Here she could be as wild and wanton as she wished.

It disturbed her, however, to discern his purpose. Nicholas was not only mirroring certain carnal elements of the journal; he was wooing her as the Turkish prince had wooed Desiree.

Aurora herself gave him an opening to discuss their courtship one afternoon when he surprised her reading the journal. Coming up behind her unaware as she sat in the garden, Nicholas bent to press a delicate kiss on her nape.

Aurora gave a start at the erotic sensation and glanced up.

"What holds you so fascinated that you didn't even notice me?"

"This."

She flushed as he took the jeweled volume from her and studied the page. "My lover and I are as one," he murmured, quoting a sensual passage. "All reserve between us, all secrets, gone." Nicholas eyed her thoughtfully. "That is precisely what I want for us, Aurora."

"My reserve is diminishing," she replied in her own defense. "You have seen to that."

"True, but you still have a long way to go." He returned the journal to her, but continued to regard her. "You are very much like Desiree was in the beginning – afraid of her own desire."

More alike than she cared to admit, Aurora thought unwillingly. Desiree had been a sheltered young innocent awakened to stunning passion by a man who became her obsession…"She had good reason to be afraid, Nicholas. As a concubine, she was completely powerless, totally at the mercy of a savage ruler."

"He proved not to be so savage. And eventually she came to wield a great deal of power over him." Moving around the bench, Nicholas sat beside her. "That's something else you have in common. You have no notion of your own power." He smiled tenderly. "I think you could rule me with very little effort."

When she made no response, Nicholas bent toward her. His mouth caught her earlobe, and she shivered again, violently.

"And another similarity," he breathed in her ear. "Desiree thought she wanted liberty, but she discovered something she valued more. Passion. She chose that over freedom."

Uneasily Aurora edged away from his tormenting attention. "You forget that her tale ended unhappily. That her passion resulted in misery."

"Our story won't end like that, Aurora." His lips found her neck again, moving softly on her skin, each caress spinning pleasure about them like some silken, invisible web. "You can have all the incredible passion Desiree found without the heartache…"

"Nicholas, please…" She shook her head. "You said we wouldn't think about our future."

"So I did." His eyelids drooped sensually as he gazed at her. "Then kiss me, sweetheart, and make me forget…"

Gratefully, Aurora moved into his arms and raised her mouth to his, giving herself over to his sensual passion.


To her relief Nicholas did not mention the journal again, allowing her to slip back into their fantasy.

They took long lingering walks together, wandering the grounds, absorbed in each other. The gardens were a delight, boasting elegant, erotic statuary and even a giant maze sculpted from topiary yews, while the surrounding woods were intriguing. The dense, green-gladed beechwood offered an enchanted world all its own, full of quiet paths and running streams with mossy banks, dappled with blinks of golden sunlight and cool shadow.