Mistress to the Prince Read Online Free Page B

through. 
     
    He wasn’t heading back to the palace where her car was still parked so Tara assumed he was ignoring her rejection of the bar idea.  “Jeffrey, could you drop me of f at my house?  I’m really beat, ” she asked since they were now closer to her home than her car. Tara decided it would be easier take a cab to work the following morning instead of trying to convince the man to take her back to the palace.  She just wanted the night to end. 
     
    “ J ust a quick drink?” he asked, the whining more pronounced now that he heard the serious tone of her voice.
     
    A headache that had been niggling for the past two hours suddenly struck full blown.  “No, thank you,” she said firmly, rubbing her forehead in frustration and pain.   “ If you turn left up here, I’m just around the corner.” 
     
    He didn’t respond for a moment and Tara was worried that he would ignore her request to take her home.  But in the end, he acquiesced.  “Fine,” he snapped and turned left. 
     
    After five more minutes, h e pulled up to her house and shut off the engine.  He was about to get out when she stopped him.  “It’s okay.  You don’t need to walk me to my door,” she said hurriedly and pulled the door open so she could quickly jump out.  She bent back down to say goodbye to him in an effort to reinforce her stance that she didn’t need to be walked, and offered a brief smile. “Thank you for taking me to the opera, Jeffrey,” she said before slamming the door closed on whatever he was about to say .
     
    She wasn’t to escape then though.  “What about a kiss?” he called out over the roof of the vehicle as he stood on the opposite side of his car.
     
    Besides waking up the neighbors with his loud voice, Tara couldn’t believe the man’s gall.  “I’m sorry.  I’m old fashioned.  I never kiss on the first date,” she called back, not bothering to even look at him as she rejected his request .   She figured it was enough that she didn’t shiver in revulsion at the idea of kissing the man.
     
    She quickly unlocked the door to her small cottage style house and let herself inside.  Once she was safely in the house, she locked the door and leaned against the wood, relieved to be alone and away from that self-centered, obnoxious man. 
     
    Tara peeked out the family room window and watched to make sure he was driving away.  She breathed a sigh of relief when she saw his tail lights disappear down the street. 

Chapter 3
     
    “What a night,” she said and moved off to her bedroom.  It wasn’t far.  Her entire house consisted of just three main rooms; the family room, kitchen and bedroom plus a small bathroom.  But it was hers and she loved it.  It was summer now and she had a beautiful backyard filled with flowers and a brick pathway as well as a patio surrounded by plants that she spent many hours on the weekend s weeding and perfecting.  She also spent a great deal of time fantasizing out there, wondering what it would be like to melt in the arms of Max , to be kissed by a man as amazingly dynamic, strong and masculine as he was.  She knew that the fantasy could never live up to the reality.  She’d built so many scenarios around the man it was ridiculous. 
     
    She was twenty six years old and had been working for the man for two years.  She knew she had it bad for him and that’s one reason why she had agreed to this blind date.  Tara used to date a lot before starting her job with the palace.  But after meeting Max, no other man seemed to measure up.  He was too…everything.  Too masculine, too charming, too sexy…just too everything she wanted in a man.  But couldn’t have. 
     
    Tara understood the pecking order in the world.  Max was a prince.  He was royalty.  More importantly, he was the Crown Prince of Cordova and would eventually inherit the throne and rule the kingdom.  Tara was a commoner.  Royalty married royalty or at least someone