The Prince's Second Chance Read online

  “His wife?”

  She nodded. “She fired me. When she found out… Well, she said that this was supposed to be a family restaurant and that it wouldn’t do to have an unwed, pregnant teenager waiting on tables.

  “Alonzo was furious with her. He didn’t approve of my condition any more than she did, but he understood that I needed some way to support myself and my child. So he gave me a new job—washing dishes.” Gabriella shrugged. “The money wasn’t as good as working in the dining room, but at least it was something.”

  “I’m sorry,” Cameron said. “I brought you here tonight because I’d hoped it would help you remember the good times. I didn’t realize how much history you had here.”

  “Most of it was good times,” she said, then her lips curved a little at the edges. “Aside from the occasional night when I had to wait on tables filled with obnoxious college boys.”

  “You can’t be talking about my friends.”

  “You guys used to take turns paying the bill,” she recalled. “And I always knew when it was your friend Andre’s turn, because I would find my tip—in nickels and dimes—in the bottom of the beer pitcher.”

  Cameron winced. “Okay. He was obnoxious. But another one of those guys used to hang around after closing sometimes, staying late to help you clean up—and just to be with you.”

  She frowned, as if she wasn’t sure she remembered what he was talking about, but the teasing sparkle in her eye assured him that she did.

  He pushed his chair away from the table and went over to the ancient jukebox against the wall. He dropped some coins into the slot, punched in the numbers from memory. He watched Gabriella as the first unmistakable notes of “Why Can’t This Be Love?” filled the air. The half-smile on her lips faded, and every muscle in her body went still.

  She’d been a die-hard Van Halen fan and when she’d locked the doors after the last customers had gone, she’d crank up the music and dance around while she wiped down the tables and stacked the chairs. The very first time he’d kissed her, it was this song that had been playing. Thinking about that now, he couldn’t help but wonder how it was that he struggled to remember the names of half the women he’d slept with in the past dozen years, but he’d never forgotten a single detail of the time he’d spent with Gabriella.

  “Dance with me.”

  She hesitated.

  “Come on,” he cajoled. “You don’t want to disappoint Sierra.”

  “How does this have anything to do with Sierra?”

  “She suggested that I take you out dancing. I know the ambiance here isn’t the same as a club, there’s no flashing lights or pulsing bass or—”

  “No,” she agreed. “This is better.” Then she finally put her hand in his.

  He drew her gently to her feet. She came willingly, if not quite eagerly. She was still wary, he understood that, so he would content himself with little steps. Right now, all that mattered was that she was in his arms.

  It wasn’t exactly a slow song, but they’d always danced to it like this, close together. They fell into that same familiar rhythm now, and with each whisper of contact, even the most subtle brush of flesh against flesh, the sparks between them flared hotter.

  Less than two and a half minutes into the song, he gave up any pretense of following the music and settled his hands on those seductively swaying hips, pulling her hard against him. Gabriella’s eyes widened, but her lips curved, and she lifted her arms to his shoulders.

  There was no hesitation when he kissed her this time, and nothing tentative in her response.

  Her lips were soft and yielding, deliciously and intoxicatingly familiar. Of course he remembered her taste—he’d kissed her on his yacht only a few days earlier. But he’d remembered her taste even then; he’d been haunted by her scent and her warmth and her passion for years.

  There had been a lot of women in and out of his life over the years. Probably too many women. But none of them had ever lingered in his mind or taken hold of his heart the way Gabriella had done.

  It was more than the rush of blood through his veins, it was the rush of joy he felt when she smiled at him. It was the way his pulse leapt when she so much as glanced in his direction, the way his heart pounded when she touched a hand to his sleeve. It was the unexpected and undeniable bone-deep contentment and rightness that he’d only ever felt when she was in his arms.

  Seventeen years ago, he’d told her that he’d loved her. But even when he’d said those words to her, even when his heart had felt as if it would burst with happiness when she said them back, he hadn’t fully understood what they meant. He hadn’t fully appreciated the true depth of his feelings while he was with her—and he certainly hadn’t anticipated the intensity of the emptiness he would feel when she was gone.

  But she was here with him now, warm and willing, and he had no intention of ever letting her go again.

  He combed his fingers through her hair. Pins scattered as the soft mass spilled down onto her shoulders. He’d always loved her hair, the way it looked spread out over his pillow, and the way she looked at him, sleepy-eyed and contented. The image was sharp and vivid in his mind, and he wanted her like that again. Now.

  He tore his lips from hers to trail kisses down her throat. He lingered at the racing pulse point at her jaw, and she sighed with pleasure. He moved lower, tracing the deep V at the front of her dress, dipping his tongue into the warm hollow between her breasts. She shuddered but didn’t pull away. He found the tie at her waist, released it. There was another tie inside, but he made quick work of that, too, and suddenly his hands were inside the dress, on her bare, quivering flesh.

  A quick glimpse of the red lace bikini panties and matching bra had him groaning aloud. She was so lush and perfect and…his. He backed her up against the jukebox and curled his hands around her buttocks, lifting her off of the ground. She braced her back against the machine and wrapped her legs around him, pressing herself more intimately against him, and he groaned again as all the blood rushed from his head.

  He unfastened the front clasp of her bra, letting her breasts spill free. He filled his hands with them, brushed his thumbs over the tightly-beaded nipples, and she gasped. He captured her mouth again, his tongue sliding between her lips, tangling with hers. Her hands were in his hair now, and the way she was kissing him back and pressing against him left him in absolutely no doubt that she wanted the same thing he did.

  There was no one else around. Alonzo had gone, the door was locked, and the blinds were drawn on all the windows. There was no danger of anyone seeing inside, no fear of anyone interrupting them, and he needed her desperately.

  But he’d been careless with her before. So focused on his own wants that he’d barely considered hers. He’d been so hot for her that he’d taken her virginity in the backseat of his car. He had more finesse now, and a hell of a lot more self-control. Usually.

  Somehow being with Gabriella undermined all of his best intentions. She made him forget that he wanted to do the right thing this time and simply made him want. But he wasn’t going to take her standing up against an old jukebox. Or laid out on top of a checkered tablecloth. He reprimanded himself for the alternate suggestion that immediately sprang to mind. And so, with unbelievable reluctance, he lifted his head from her breast and refastened the clip at the front of her bra.

  “Gabriella—”

  She pulled away from him, her fingers trembling as she pulled at the ties of her dress. “Don’t say it.”

  “Say what?”

  “Anything.” She tugged at the bodice, settling the material back into place, and shook her head. “I can’t believe how pathetic I am.”

  He heard the tears in her voice, as baffling as her words.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Your mother was right—I am a slut. Maybe I’ve never slept around, but I’ve never been able to control my responses to you, either.”

  He stared at her, stunned not by what his mother had said b
ut that she could possibly believe it. “Mi Dios, Gabriella. Allowing yourself to feel passion doesn’t mean you’re a…” He trailed off, unable to even say the word. “It doesn’t mean you’re indiscriminate, it only means you’re human.”

  “I almost let you seduce me in the middle of a restaurant.” She had tears on her cheeks now and her eyes were filled with misery. “Is that why you brought me here?” she asked him now. “Did you figure I’d put out as easily now as I did seventeen years ago?”

  “I didn’t plan for this to happen,” he told her.

  She made a sound of disbelief as she finished tugging her skirt into place.

  “But I’m not sorry. Because what just happened proves that the chemistry between us is as volatile now as it was seventeen years ago.”

  “It’s not chemistry, it’s hormones,” she said derisively, but he sensed that she was more angry with herself than with him.

  “Why are you so determined to fight this?” he asked gently.

  “Because I don’t do things like this.” She swiped impatiently at another tear that slid down her cheek.

  He tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “Things like what?”

  “Let myself be overcome by lust,” she snapped at him.

  She was trying to make the intimacy they’d just shared into less than it was, but he wasn’t going to let her. “It’s not about ‘letting’ when the attraction between two people is as strong as it is between us.” He touched a hand to her face. “I’ve never felt this way with anyone else—before or after you.”

  “Are we done here?” she asked him.

  He sighed. “And you’re never going to give me another chance, are you?”

  “Another chance for what?”

  “To make a relationship between us work.”

  “We never had a relationship, we had sex.”

  “I loved you.”

  “Yeah, you made that clear when you dumped me after the weekend we spent together.”

  “I was young and stupid—”

  “It doesn’t matter,” she said wearily. “Not the when or the why, because the truth is, the break-up was inevitable. Aside from the fact that we were both too young to have a clue about what we were doing, you’re a blue-blood royal and I’m a working-class single mother.”

  “The mother of my child.”

  “Which might be my ticket to five minutes of fame but isn’t going to lead to some kind of happily-ever-after.”

  “Not if you refuse to even consider the possibility.”

  She folded her arms over her chest, the action telling him more definitively than any words that she wouldn’t be swayed, but she only said, “I need to be home before midnight.”

  “I’ll have Lucien bring the car around.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Gabriella was on the back porch, watching the stars, when Sierra got home. While the midnight curfew was a matter of frequent debate between them, her daughter didn’t seem to be holding a grudge tonight. Instead of ignoring her mother and going straight to her room, as she had a habit of doing when she was annoyed, she sat down on the step beside her.

  “How was your date?” she asked.

  “It was…” Gabriella wasn’t quite sure how to respond. Both “wonderful” and “awful” were appropriate answers to the question, but either one would inevitably lead to more questions that she wasn’t prepared to answer. So she only said, “Fine.”

  “Fine?” Sierra’s brow furrowed. “Mom—if he can’t do better than “fine,” then you’re wasting your time.”

  “Okay, it was better than fine,” she allowed, not daring to let herself think about how much better specific parts of the evening had been. Specifically when her parts had been in close contact with his parts—

  No, not going to think about those parts, she reminded herself sternly.

  “Are you in love with him?”

  Sierra’s question startled her out of her reverie. She managed a laugh. “Love? Sierra, I’ve only been seeing him for a few weeks.”

  “But you’ve known him a long time, right?”

  She nodded, because it was easier than explaining that she wasn’t sure if she’d ever really known him at all.

  “Did you date him?” Sierra prompted. “You know, when you knew him before?”

  “Yes,” Gabriella admitted, because while she’d never volunteered much information about her past, she’d never lied to Sierra, either. “For a little while.”

  “What went wrong?”

  And how to answer that question without opening the floodgates? she wondered.

  But maybe it was time to stop worrying about protecting Sierra and finally tell her the truth—to tell her that Prince Cameron Leandres of Tesoro del Mar was her father.

  “We wanted different things from one another,” she began, trailing off as she heard the sound of footsteps on the gravel driveway.

  She glanced at her watch, noted that it was half past midnight. Sierra, obviously having heard the footsteps, too, was frowning. And they both jolted when a figure came around the side of the house.

  Katarina stopped with her foot on the bottom step, her eyes wide. “What are you two doing out here at this time of night?” she demanded imperiously.

  “I’d say the real question is what are you doing coming home at this time of night?” Gabriella countered. “Your car was in the driveway—I assumed you were home and in bed.”

  Katarina tilted her chin. “Well, you assumed wrong. As it turns out, I had a date tonight, too.”

  “With whom?” Gabriella demanded.

  “With Dominic Donatella. Because I decided that I wasn’t going to let him seduce the secrets of my buttercream icing out of me but I didn’t mind if he seduced me.”

  “Go, Grandma,” Sierra said approvingly.

  Gabriella just shook her head. “Go to bed, Sierra.”

  Her daughter exhaled a long-suffering sigh, but she pushed herself to her feet, dropping a kiss first on her mother’s cheek, then her grandmother’s.

  “Details over breakfast?” she whispered to Katarina.

  “Not likely,” her grandmother replied, but with an indulgent smile.

  “I think I’m going to go to bed, too,” Gabriella said, following her daughter toward the house.

  “Have a cup of tea with me first,” her mother urged. “I’m too wired to sleep right now.”

  Gabriella held up a hand. “Please, spare me the details.”

  Katarina picked up the kettle from the stove, filled it from the tap. “Obviously your date wasn’t as…satisfying…as mine,” she teased.

  “No, I only almost had sex,” Gabriella grumbled.

  “That would explain your lousy mood,” Katarina acknowledged.

  “I should never have agreed to this dating charade. At first, it seemed like a legitimate way to explain why Cameron was hanging around while giving him some time to get to know Sierra. I didn’t really think there would be any dating involved.”

  “And now you’re worried that the lines between reality and fantasy are getting blurred,” her mother guessed, all teasing forgotten.

  Gabriella sighed, nodded.

  “How do you feel about him?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know anything anymore.”

  “He’s an attractive man,” Katarina acknowledged. “A prince. And you were in love with him once before.”

  “A long time ago.”

  “Are you saying that you don’t still have feelings for him?”

  “I don’t know. I mean, when I’m with him, he stirs up all kinds of feelings that I’d thought were dead and buried. I’m attracted to him,” she admitted, although it made her blush to say the words aloud to her mother. Ridiculous, she knew, considering that her fifty-seven-year-old mother apparently didn’t have any qualms about sharing the details of her sex life.

  “But?” Katarina prompted.

  Gabriella sighed. “But I don’t know if I’m making those feelings into more than they
are because I’m afraid of losing Sierra.”

  Her mother poured boiling water into the pot. “You’re going to have to connect the dots for me.”

  “At first I was just going through the motions—letting Cameron hang around because I was sure that he would lose interest in playing daddy. But I’ve realized that he is serious about wanting to acknowledge Sierra as his daughter, and it’s only a matter of time before he does so publicly. And when that happens, everything will change—for all of us, but mostly for Sierra. She will be a princess with royal duties and responsibilities, and I won’t be able to help her with any of that. But if I’m with Cameron, well, it would ensure that I was able to stay close to her.”

  “Do you really think you could be that calculating?”

  “Haven’t I already proven that I will do anything for my daughter—even going so far as to keep her existence a secret from her own father for sixteen years?”

  “Because the princess royal gave you no choice. Sierra needed surgery, and she would only pay the hospital bills if you promised not to tell the prince about his child.”

  Gabriella nodded. “That’s how I justified it to myself,” she agreed. “But maybe it wasn’t that simple. Maybe not telling Cameron about Sierra was a way of punishing him for dumping me.”

  “No one could blame you for being hurt or angry.”

  “But that doesn’t justify using him for my own purposes now.”

  Katarina reached across the table to cover her daughter’s hand with her own. “Are you really afraid that you’re using him—or more afraid that you’re not?”

  “I can’t fall for him again.” Gabriella shook her head. “I won’t.”

  “You say that with such conviction, as if you believe it.”

  “Because I do. Because it’s true.”

  “Then you haven’t learned anything at all in the past seventeen years,” Katarina told her. “Because the mind does not and cannot control the heart.”

  Elena was growing weary of these late-night meetings, not so much the hour as the lack of results. In fact, she’d been more than a little tempted to cancel this one when she’d received Reynard’s text message. “I think I’ve got something.”