Invitation to the Prince's Palace / The Prince's Second Chance: Invitation to the Prince's Palace / The Prince's Second Chance

‘Am I likely to meet your mother this morning?’ Mel glanced about her and tried not to let an added dose of apprehension rise.

Rikardo shook his head. ‘No. The queen is away from the palace.’

‘Well, thank goodness for that, anyway,’ she blurted, and then grimaced.

But Rikardo merely murmured, ‘Indeed,’ and they fell silent.

In that silence, Melanie tried not to let her mind boggle at the thought that she was walking through a palace beside a prince, and feeling relieved not to be about to meet a queen, but it all did feel quite surreal. Rikardo nodded to a staff member here or there. He’d said it was fine to be seen out with him by anyone they came across, so Mel would take that at face value. He’d obviously come up with some explanation for her presence.

‘The kitchens here would be amazing.’ She almost whispered the words, but she could imagine how many staff might work there. The amazing meals they would prepare. Mel felt certain the royal staff wouldn’t have cake plates thrown at their heads as her cousin had done to her that final night.

Rikardo turned to glance at her. ‘You can see the kitchens later if you wish.’

Before she left for the airport. Mel reminded herself deliberately of this.

‘I didn’t know that Braston grew truffles. I probably should have known.’ She drew a breath. ‘I’ve never cooked with them. My relatives loved throwing dinner parties but they were too—’

She bit the words back. She’d been going to say ‘too stingy’ to feed their guests truffles.

‘Truffles have been referred to as the diamonds of the kitchen. Along with tourism they have represented the main two industries for Braston for some years now.’ Rik stepped forward and a man in liveried uniform opened the vast doors of the palace and suddenly they were outside in the morning sun with the most amazing vista unfolding all around.

‘Oh!’ Melanie’s breath caught in her throat. Everywhere she looked there were snow-capped mountains on the horizon. A beautiful gilded landscape dotted with trees, hills and valleys and sprinkled with snow spread before them. ‘I didn’t see any of this last night. Your country is very beautiful. I’m sure tourists would love to see it, too.’

‘It is beautiful, if small.’ Pride found its way into Rikardo’s voice. ‘But much of Europe is, and there are countries with more to offer to travellers. I would like to see an improvement in the tourist industry. If my brother Anrai has his way that will also happen very soon.’

Melanie liked his pride. Somehow that seemed exactly as it should be. And also the warmth in his tone as he referred to a brother. That hadn’t been there when he’d spoken about the king or the queen, and, even if she’d only met the king briefly and had tried not to catch his attention too much, Georgio did seem to be a combination of forthrightly spoken and austere that could strike a girl as quite formidable.

You could handle him. If you managed yourself among your aunt and uncle and cousin for that many years and held onto your sense of self worth, you can do anything.

It hadn’t hurt that Mel had set up a back-door arrangement and sent lots of cakes and desserts and meals out to a local charity kitchen to be shared among the masses. Her relatives never had caught on to that, and Mel had had the pleasure of giving away her cooking efforts to people who truly appreciated them.

Well, that life was over with now. Over the past year or so the family had forgotten to give her the kind moments that had balanced the rest. They had focused on the negative, and Mel had started saving to leave them. Now she just had to get back to Australia and to Sydney so she could start afresh.

It would be all right. She’d get work and be able to support herself. It didn’t matter if she started out with very little. She pushed aside fears that she might not be able to find work before her meagre savings ran out.

Instead, she turned to smile at Rikardo. He looked different out of doors and in profile in these surroundings, more rugged somehow.

Face it, Mel. He looks attractive no matter what light you see him in, and each new light seems to make you feel that he’s more attractive than the last one. And that moment of shared consciousness when she first stepped into his sitting room this morning. Had she imagined that?

Of course she’d imagined it. Why would a prince be conscious of … a kitchen hand? A cook. Same difference. They were both worlds away from being an heir to a kingdom.

‘We commercially grow black truffles here.’ Rikardo spoke in a calm tone. ‘If you are not aware of it, truffles have a symbiotic relationship with the roots of the trees they grow under.’

‘In this case oak trees,’ Melanie murmured while she tried to pull her thoughts together. Was he calm? If so, his threshold for dealing with problems must be quite high. ‘That’s what they are, isn’t it?’

Her glance shifted below them to the left where grove upon grove of trees stood in carefully tended rows. ‘I’d heard that truffles could be grown commercially in that way. I think in Tasmania—’

‘That’s correct, and, yes, they are indeed oak trees.’ He’d taken her arm, and now walked with her towards a grouping of …

Outbuildings? Was that a fine enough word for buildings within the palace grounds? There were garages with cars in them. Sports cars and other cars. Half a dozen at least. They all looked highly polished and valuable. They would go very fast.

Did the sun go in for just a moment? Mel turned her glance away. A man drove past them in one of the vehicles. Rik raised an arm as the driver slowed and tooted the horn before driving on. ‘That is Anrai.’

‘I thought he resembled you in looks.’ Except Rikardo was far more handsome. And having her arm held by him made Mel way too conscious of him.

Small talk, Mel. You’re supposed to be indulging in polite, get-to-know-you-but-don’t-be-nosy-about-it small talk. ‘How many brothers do you have?’

‘Just the two, both older than me and busy trying to achieve their own plans—’ He broke off.

A worker walked towards them, leading … a pig with a studded red collar around its neck. When the animal saw Rikardo, it snorted and almost pulled the worker over in its enthusiasm to get to the prince.

Rikardo looked down at the animal and then turned to Mel. ‘This is Rufusina. She is a truffle hog and will be coming to the groves with us this morning.’

‘This is Rufusina?’ For some reason Melanie had pictured a gorgeous woman in an ankle-length fur-lined coat with long flowing brown hair. Maybe the woman had known Rikardo for ever and had secretly wanted to marry him herself.

Can we say overactive imagination? Well, this was the perfect setting for an imagination to run wild in! Mel tried to refocus her thoughts. ‘She’s a very interesting-looking truffle hog. She looks very …‘

Porcine?

‘Very intelligent,’ Mel concluded.

‘I am sure that is the first thought that comes to all minds.’ For the second time since they’d met, Rikardo’s lips twitched. Though his words laughed at Mel just a little, they laughed at Rufusina, too, for there was a twinkle in his eye as he watched the hog strain at her leash to get to him, and succeed.

Rikardo then told the hog to ‘sit’ just as you would say to a dog. The pig planted her haunches and cast an adoring if rather beady gaze up at him. She got a scratch behind each ear for her trouble. Rikardo took the lead.

They were at the groves before Mel had come to terms with her prince having a pet pig, because, whether he’d said so or not, this animal had been raised to his hand.

Mel would guarantee it. She could tell. They arrived also before Mel could recover from the beauty of Rikardo’s twinkling eyes and that hint of a smile.

And what did Mel mean by ‘her prince’ anyway? He certainly wasn’t! She might have him for a few more hours, if that, and all of which only by default anyway because she’d been silly enough to think he was a cab driver.

Later, after she’d been returned to Australia, she could write her story and send it in to one of those truth magazines and say she’d spent a few hours with a royal.

She wouldn’t, of course. She wouldn’t violate Rikardo’s privacy in that manner.

Today, in the broad light of Rikardo’s … kingdom, Mel couldn’t imagine how she’d mistaken him for anything other than what he was, whether she’d been overtired and overwrought and under the influence of an allergy medication or not.

It wasn’t until they reached the actual truffle groves that Mel started to register that Rikardo seemed to have somehow withdrawn into himself as they drew closer to his destination. She wasn’t sure how to explain the difference. He still had her arm. The pig still trotted obediently at his side on its lead. Rikardo spoke with each person they passed and his words were pleasant, if brief.

But Rikardo’s gaze had shifted to those rows of oak trees again and again, and somehow Mel felt the tension rising within him as they drew nearer.

‘Winnow.’ Rik greeted a spindly man in his fifties and shook his hand. ‘Allow me to introduce my guest, Miss Watson.’

So that was how Rik planned to get around that one. But would that be enough? Because for all the people that mistook Mel for her cousin, plenty more … didn’t.

‘Do you have the results of the soil test, Winnow? Are we infected again with the blight?’

This time Mel didn’t have to try to hear the concern in Rikardo’s tone.