The Royal House of Niroli: Secret Heirs: Bride by Royal Appointment / A Royal Bride at the Sheikh's Command

The sounds of the party drew him closer, but he lingered in the backyard garden, reluctant to go in and have to try to explain to Elena’s friends who he was and why he was living there. She must have told them something to explain Jeremy. He didn’t want to complicate matters.

But he wanted to see her. And suddenly, there she was through the window. She looked like an angel. His heart started to pound just looking at her. She’d finally shed her dark glasses and her eyes were huge, dark and luminous. She’d freed her hair and it fell in wispy ringlets all around her shoulders. She wore a strapless sundress, which was spectacularly form-fitting, emphasizing the thrust of her breasts and her tiny waist and exposing a lot of smooth, creamy skin. He wanted her so badly, he was beginning to ache for her again—and that was ludicrous! He had to stop this.

But he couldn’t stop watching her. She moved with such grace and looked so beautiful.

And more than that, she was so brave. Her vulnerability was deep and abiding and it couldn’t be erased from the experiences of her life. And yet, she put herself out there every day, let it all hang out and laid it all on the line. Why couldn’t he do that, if only a little bit? He knew it would make him a better person. It slowly began to dawn on him that he admired her as much as he desired her. Maybe more. And all he could do was watch.

Elena’s good friend Natalia Carini was helping her clear away the mess from her party. Most of the guests had gone home, but some of her closest friends stayed behind to make sure she didn’t get stuck having to do all the clean-up herself.

They’d been laughing over a joke Natalia had made when suddenly her smile faded and she stared out through the window into the dark night.

“Elena, there’s a man skulking in your garden,” she said.

Elena’s head came up. “What sort of man?” she asked, a thread of interest apparent in her voice no matter how she tried to disguise it.

“Tall. Handsome.” Natalia laughed softly. “He just winked at me.”

“Ah.” A feeling of excitement swept through her, though she tried her best to suppress it. “That must be Jeremy’s father.”

“I see.” Natalia leaned over the counter to get a better look at him. “He seems lonely out there, don’t you think?”

Elena nodded, fighting back a smile. “I’ll go out and see if he needs anything.”

Natalia turned and pretended to scold. “I’m not sure I approve of you dallying with strange men in the garden.”

“He is strange,” Elena admitted with a laugh, “but I can handle him.”

Lisa and Ted Barone had lived in the neighboring house for years, so knew Elena about as well as anyone. It was Lisa who, witnessing this, turned and called softly to her husband. “Will wonders never cease? Elena has a man in her life.”

Elena had started for the door, Fabio trotting right beside her, but she turned back at that. “No, I don’t,” she said uneasily. “No, no! This is not a man in my life.”

Lisa struck a pose. “Really? What is it, then? A giraffe? A leopard?”

Natalia shook her head as though she was sorry, but had to side with Lisa. “Looks like a man to me.”

Elena had to laugh. Her friends were being annoying, but in a good way. “He’s a man all right. But he’s not in my life. Not in the intimate way you mean.”

“Bring him in,” Natalia urged, “and let us make the judgment call.”

And so she did. She went out into the cool night air and zeroed in on where he was standing right away.

“Adam?”

“Right here.”

He leaned down to pet Fabio, then agreed to come in and meet her friends. Still, to cover the bases, they went over a quick game plan first.

“I know you don’t want to use your real name,” she said, thinking. “It has been in the papers. So-o-o … let’s see. We’ll call you Rex.”

“Rex?” He grimaced, not at all sure about that. “Don’t they call dogs Rex?”

“And kings,” she reminded him. “But you need a last name, too. And it should be relevant so we can always claim there was a point to this. How about Hollywood?”

“Rex Hollywood?” He groaned. “I may be something of a sham, Elena, but I’m not that kind of a phony. Anyway, technically, my base production center is in Burbank, not Hollywood.”

“Rex Burbank? Perfect.” She beamed, pleased with the results of their attempt at skullduggery.

And so Rex Burbank was who he became to her friends. He met them one by one and was charming and personable to each. The only one who had a problem with him was the predicable one— Gino.

“Rex Burbank?” he said in unalloyed disgust. But he shook hands and didn’t say any more once Elena had jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow.

“So, Rex,” he said when the introductions were over, exaggerating the name to the point where it was almost comical. “How do you like our little island nation?”

Adam shrugged, accepting a drink from Natalia and smiling his thanks. “An island is an island. I’ve been to lots of them.”

A ripple of quiet outrage went through the small crowd around him, but Gino was the one who continued to question him. “You find nothing unique about Niroli?”

Adam looked about at the faces turned up to his and realized he ought to temper his cynicism a bit, for public consumption at least. “Actually I haven’t had time to do much looking around,” he assured them all. “Once I do, I’m sure I’ll start appreciating Niroli’s many special qualities.”

“Maybe you should do more sightseeing and stop bothering people in their homes instead,” Gino said, his chest thrust out confrontationally.

Things might have escalated out of control from there, if Natalia hadn’t pulled Adam away to show him a display of early Nirolian musical instruments Elena’s mother had collected and kept in a glass case at one end of the living room. There were items that looked very much like violins, others like wind instruments and a set of strangely formed drums. Each had roots in forms that were familiar, but each also had something very unique in its design and development, something contributed by Nirolian natives from centuries past.

“Elena’s mother was a music archivist,” Natalia explained. “She did a lot of work for the Nirolian National Music Society at the palace twenty years ago or so.”

Adam nodded, impressed by the professional look to the display. “I take it she is deceased.”

“Yes, she had a heart attack about ten years ago. Luckily, Elena’s grandmother was still alive at the time and so she wasn’t alone.”

“And now she’s lost her grandmother, too.”

“Yes, fairly recently. But she’s strong.” Natalia smiled impishly. “You’ve noticed that, I imagine.”

He grinned back at her. “Yes. And I know she wants to be independent.”

“Oh, yes. What she wants most right now is to find a way to take advantage of the scholarship she won to that New York music school.”

Adam remembered that Gino had hinted about some sort of opportunity overseas. “She won a scholarship?”

“Yes. It’s in a program that uses music as a type of therapy for troubled children. The only problem is getting to New York and then paying for housing while she’s there. And being able to do it on her own. All that is quite an undertaking for a woman who’s been raised in such a small, protective environment. Not to mention a woman who is blind.”

“She can do it.” He made the claim without the slightest sense of irony. The conviction that she could do just about anything she put her mind to seemed to have implanted itself deep inside him and he had no doubts.

“We all know that,” Natalia responded. “But it will be quite difficult. And possibly very painful.”

The others caught up with them and the conversation moved in other directions, but Adam couldn’t get Natalie’s last words out of his head, and he kept looking at Elena, wishing he knew how to make things easier for her in some way. “Difficult … painful.” Those shouldn’t be factors looming large in the future of a woman like this. And yet, instinctively he knew that trying to protect her from them would be a form of abuse in itself. There were going to be hazards she would have to face on her own. Luckily, she seemed a lot more ready for them than he was to let her experience them. He was going to have to force himself to back off and leave her alone.

But what was he thinking? He wasn’t going to be around long enough to be involved in any of that, was he? Even if he became King, Elena wasn’t likely to fall into his circle at the palace. Because, if the truth be known, despite all the rules they were throwing at him about how much time he had to spend here, he wasn’t planning to make Niroli his permanent home.