“You’re naked?” Her brother frowned. “It’s the middle of the day. I thought it would be safe to call.”
“Excuse me, darling,” Tiffany said to Ryzard. “My brother has called to ask if the sun is over the yardarm. Could you lift the sheet and see?”
Christian sputtered, Ryzard looked to the sky for patience and his crewman buried a snort of laughter into his shirt collar. Although Ryzard had to admit it was nice to know she gave others a hard time, not just him.
“We’re about to go swimming, you idiot,” she said to her brother. “See? Bathing suit.” She ran her phone down her body as if she was scanning for radioactivity, showing him the strapless band and itsy slash of blue. Then she turned the phone to show him the equipment on the deck. “There are the breathing tanks and scuba flippers. There’s the mask that’s going to give me an anxiety attack so Ryzard will have to buddy-breathe me to the surface. Is my virtue restored? Want to tell me now why you called?”
“Dad hasn’t come across anything useful yet, but said he’d ask around.”
“Motivated, is he?” The way Tiffany’s blond lashes lifted to send a resolute look toward Ryzard made his blood kick into higher gear. “Tell him I appreciate anything he’s able to pass along.”
“As do I,” Ryzard told her as she hung up. “If you’re talking about what I think you are.”
“I asked Christian to put a bug in his ear. Dad’s not speaking to me directly right now, but I don’t know if that’s because he’s in Washington and doesn’t have time for the kind of conversation he thinks we need to have or if he’s genuinely angry. I hope you don’t mind, but I was worried Dad might—” She shrugged apologetically. “I’m his little princess. I didn’t want any grumpiness he felt toward you to come out with anyone in a position to affect your situation. If he knows I have an interest in the outcome, he’ll take care to support your petition. Or at least not damage it.”
His ears rang with the impact of what she was saying. “He has that kind of influence?” It wasn’t like him to underestimate people, but his sexual enthrallment had temporarily shortened his sight of the bigger picture.
“He’s very well connected. And I’m being overcautious,” she assured him, moving to put a hand on his arm. “Don’t worry. He wouldn’t do anything rash. Something like throwing support behind a leader who hasn’t been recognized... It’s too big a gamble going into an election. If anything he’ll be even more circumspect, couching his reaction while trying to find out everything he can. He’s not going to stir up a lynch mob or anything.”
“No shotgun wedding?” he prompted, throat dry. How far would her father go for his daughter’s groom?
“Absolutely not,” she assured him.
He should be relieved. He couldn’t betray Luiza’s memory by contemplating marriage to another woman, but in the back of his mind a voice whispered, If it was for your country...
He brushed the thought aside, trying to remind himself this was a simple fling. Two people enjoying sexual compatibility and the luxury of Caribbean waters. If he took a moment to reassess Tiffany, not just because she was lissome and golden, not simply because she had a quick, intelligent mind and a clear understanding of politics, but because she could soon be first daughter of the United States of America, that didn’t mean he was being disloyal to his one true love. Luiza had had a dream for their country, and he was obligated to consider any avenue to achieve it. That’s all he was doing.
He watched her frown at her diving mask, lips white where she pinched them together. She’d told him about her aversion to wearing things tight against her face, but he watched her draw in courage with a deep breath and wrestle the mask onto her face.
“I’m really worried I’ll freak out down there,” she said in a tone made nasal by the mask covering the upper half of her face. Her eyes behind the glass were anxious.
“You’re tough,” he told her, pride and regard moving in him. “You’ll handle it.”
“You don’t know that.” She set a hand on her bare chest. “My heart’s going a mile a minute.”
“But you’re trying anyway, despite your anxiety. That’s why I know you’ll be fine,” he assured her.
He quickly slipped into his own gear, not wanting to make her wait for the distraction of reef and shipwreck to take her mind off her fears. Holiday fun, he insisted to himself. Nothing so complex as wanting to coax her past bad memories because he felt compelled to share the wonder below the surface with her.
Why it mattered to him that she go with him was a puzzle he didn’t study too closely. He could just as easily dive with one of his crew and had in the past, but he was aware of a preference for staying aboard with her over diving without her.
That wasn’t like him. He was not a dependent person. Tiffany had been surprised the other day when he’d told her he didn’t want a wife or children. He understood the reaction. Everyone in the world wanted a lifetime companion and offspring, but after Luiza, he’d closed himself off to the idea.
He didn’t want emotional addiction to another being. It made a person vulnerable, and he couldn’t afford such weaknesses.
But the thought of marrying Tiffany kept detonating in his mind, trailing thoughts of sleeping with her every night for the rest of his life.
It was because of the advantages she offered him. It would be a practical move, not something he did out of a need to connect himself irrevocably to her. He didn’t want or need family.
He needed to stabilize his country and make good on his promise of peace.
“You look like a frog,” she said as they readied to jump.
“So kiss me, Daddy’s Little Princess. See what I turn into.”
She did, quick and flirty, then bit her smile onto her mouthpiece and fell back into the water.
He leaped after her.
CHAPTER SEVEN
“THAT WAS FANTASTIC!” Tiffany panted, still breathless from their ascent from a shipwreck covered in coral and barnacles, populated with colorful fish darting in and out of fronds. Ryzard had carried a spotlight so the wash of blue-green from the filtered sunlight had disappeared, revealing the true brilliance below.
He handed off his tank to his crewman, then heaved himself to sit on the platform at the stern of the boat, legs dangling beside her. “Up?” He offered a hand.
“Still recovering. Give me a sec,” she said breathlessly.
He relayed their gear as they both stripped, lifting her tank off her back, muscles flexing under the glistening latte of his tan. His black bathing suit was ridiculously miniscule, making American men such as her brother seem like absolute prudes with their baggy trunks. She’d heard people refer to those teensy tight suits as banana hammocks and budgie smugglers, but on the right man, they were sexy as hell.
A crooked finger came under her chin, and he lifted her face to look him in the eye. Beneath the water, his foot snaked out to catch her at the waist and guide her into the space between his knees.
“What?” she challenged, hands splaying on the steely muscles of his flexing thighs.
“Are we staying in the water a little longer?” he asked suggestively. “You can’t look at me like that and not provoke a response.”
She flicked her gaze downward and saw he’d filled out the tight black fabric to near bursting.
“Don’t ever let anyone tell you you’re not beautiful, draga. When you smile, you light up the room, and when you’re aroused, I can’t take my eyes off you.”
The water should have bubbled and fizzed around her, she grew so hot and flushed with joy.
“Will you come to Bregnovia with me?”
Oh. It was an out-of-the-blue question with huge implications, the most important being, he wanted to keep her with him.
Surging upward, she straightened her arms and let her chest plaster into his, meeting his hot kiss with open-mouthed, passionate joy.
“Yes,” she agreed.
One big hand came up to cradle the back of her head and the other dug into her waist, holding her steady while his calves pinched her thighs, bracing her in the awkward position. Their kiss went on for a long time, sumptuous and thorough.
With a tight sound of frustration, he jerked back. “No condom,” he muttered.
“What? There’s plenty of room in that suit for one.”
“Not much room at all, actually,” he growled. “You’ll take the lead into the cabin.”
Laughing unreservedly, she let him pull her the rest of the way out of the water and onto his lap. “At least we know what you turned into down there.”
He raised his brows in query.
She whispered, “Horny toad.”
He pinched her bottom as he urged her inside.