The Royal House of Niroli: Innocent Mistresses: Expecting His Royal Baby / The Prince's Forbidden Virgin

‘Well, that’s where you’re wrong, Nico,’ she assured him. ‘Where my personal life is concerned I don’t seem to have much of a hold on it at all. And, for your information, it was the taxi driver who recommended your mother’s hotel. He telephoned ahead as we were driving from the airport to book me in.’

‘A quirk of fate?’

‘If you like,’ she said, ‘but I certainly didn’t engineer it.’

‘And you want me to believe this, along with all your other lies?’

‘I’ve never lied to you, Nico.’

The air between them was charged with tension. Nico was so close she could see the amber flecks in his searing blue gaze, so close they shared the same breath, the same air. But as always he reacted in a way that surprised her. Dipping his head, he brushed her cheek with his lips, stopping just short of her mouth, and to her eternal shame she closed her eyes and swayed towards him.

‘It’s that easy, isn’t it?’ he said gently. ‘You’re that easy.’

When she didn’t reply he put a finger beneath her chin and tilted her face up so she was forced to look at him. ‘You wormed your way in here, and now you think you’re going to have a good, long stay at the palace. Well, let me put you straight, Carrie Evans. You get twenty-four hours to live your dream, and then you’re out of here.’

She closed her eyes against the contempt in his gaze. Nothing she could say would make him believe her, but she couldn’t walk away. ‘Whatever you think of me we have to talk, and I’m not leaving Niroli until we do.’

‘Are you threatening me, Carrie?’

‘I’m stating facts—’

‘So, hell hath no fury?’

‘You think this is about revenge?’

‘What else?’

‘You think I followed you to Niroli because I can’t forget what happened between us?’That was part of the truth, Carrie realised, but she couldn’t throw away her life on a hopeless cause, not with a baby to protect. ‘You don’t know me, Nico. You don’t know me, at all.’

‘Well, perhaps it’s time I found out more,’ he said coldly. ‘Shall we start with how much it would cost me to get rid of you?’

Carrie flinched. ‘Half an hour of your time is all I’m asking.’

‘When?’

‘Tomorrow night after dinner …’ She didn’t want to rush into anything, she had tried spontaneous and knew she wasn’t good at it.

‘I thought I made it clear that your deadline for leaving the palace is tomorrow …’ Nico stopped and his face darkened with anger as he read the situation. ‘Oh, I see,’ he said. ‘My mother has extended an invitation to her new protégée for dinner tomorrow night.’

‘I’m sure you can spare me half an hour—’

‘You’re sure of a lot of things, aren’t you, Carrie?’

‘Until tomorrow, Nico …’

She turned on her heel, burning with shame from what he thought of her, but Nico brought her back. She held herself stiffly in his arms, eyes closed as she fought the urge to respond to him. But he knew she wanted to and with a sound of contempt he let her go and walked away.

CHAPTER SEVEN

‘YOU poor child …’ The words had burned themselves into Carrie’s mind. She woke the next morning in her bedroom at the palace in a state of panic. Clutching the sheet to her chest, she gazed around, wondering where she was and who had spoken to her. Her mind was still sleep-drenched and wouldn’t function properly. It took a few moments to accept she was alone and the presence talking to her was a voice in a dream.

Slipping out of bed, she padded barefoot across the room to open the heavy curtains on another soft Nirolian dawn. The view of the silver lake tinged with pink was so beautiful she stood for a moment with her eyes closed inhaling the scent of blossom. It could have been such a happy time if things had been different. If Nico had only cared for her, just a little.

It promised to be another hot day. The sun was already burning off the low-lying mist, and she could see the rowing boats bobbing lazily by the boathouse. It was easy to imagine Nico sitting across from her in one of the tiny vessels, his muscles flexing as he rowed her out on the lake … But as that was unlikely to happen she might as well have a shower, Carrie thought in her usual down-to-earth way; a long, cold shower.

She was becoming good at stretching the truth, Carrie thought, rubbing her hair dry as she walked out of the bathroom, and it wasn’t something she was proud of. To make matters worse Princess Laura appeared to accept everything she said without question. They had struck up a friendship based on a mutual love of the natural world and painting, but it was becoming harder all the time to hide her feelings for Princess Laura’s son. There were no miracles waiting to happen, her dreams were futile, and her baby needed something more tangible than a daydream to secure its future.

Princess Laura had arranged for Carrie’s breakfast to be sent up to her room. Seeing she was already dressed, the young maid insisted on laying everything out for her on the vine-hung balcony outside the small sitting room.

‘Only if it’s no trouble for you,’ Carrie said.

‘No trouble at all,’ the maid assured her with a shy smile.

The princess, with her customary sensitivity, had found Carrie a cosy suite of rooms close to her own. Carrie’s balcony overlooked a pretty walled garden with welcoming proportions more like those of the home of a friend, rather than the vast palace grounds.

‘I prefer this wing,’ the princess had told her, and then Carrie had discovered to her astonishment that they had adjoining apartments. ‘Only special people stay here.’ Princess Laura had said.

Carrie was living a lie she had no stomach for. She wanted nothing more than for the truth to be out in the open, but couldn’t say anything while Nico stood like a roadblock in her way.

A discreet tap on the door of the apartment brought Carrie’s pacing to a halt. But when she opened the door there was no one there. Then she spotted the envelope on the floor. Carrie’s eyes widened as she read the handwritten note. It was from Princess Laura, offering her accommodation at the palace for the duration of her stay in Niroli, which the princess hoped would be for longer than a few days. ‘We have far too many empty rooms here, Carrie, and I did enjoy your company. Please say you’ll stay …’

As Carrie clutched the sheet of paper to her chest she knew that if she could have chosen anyone in the world to be the grandmother of her baby it would be Princess Laura, but Nico would never allow it. Princess Laura was everything a grandmother should be, but the princess was like a golden chalice hanging just outside her baby’s reach.

This was one of the reasons he had left Niroli as a young man of seventeen, Nico reflected dryly as his mother advanced. Having finished his final lap, he checked his time: fifteen hundred metres freestyle in a few seconds over fifteen minutes. Not quite Olympic standard, but close. Planting his hands on the side of the swimming pool, he sprang out, water glistening over his tanned, athletic body.

Snatching up a towel, he buried his face to hide his smile. His mother was in full dragon mode. Behind a deceptively homely face Princess Laura hid a steely determination. He knew that was probably what had saved her when his father had been killed. Tossing his towel into a laundry basket, Nico was thankful for his mother’s strength of character. She had been broken when she had received the news of his father’s death, but had thrown herself into her charity work with renewed vigour, and that had been her salvation.

Straightening up, he wrapped a clean towel around his waist. Raking his hair into some semblance of order, he drew himself up to his full height … all the better to read the invisible banner his mother was waving above her head. It had a single name on it: Carrie Evans.

Carrie was going to stay how long? Grinding his jaw as his mother stalked back the way she had come, Nico vented his silent rage at the sky. He would not tolerate Carrie inveigling her way into the palace and winning over his mother into the bargain. The only reason he’d kept quiet was because he wasn’t ready to reveal Carrie’s state of health, or the lies she kept telling him. Fortunately, his mother didn’t appear to know about the so-called pregnancy, but to be told by her to back off and stop treating Carrie like an underling was insupportable. And to be assured that she was under his mother’s protection.

Right now he could cheerfully throw Carrie Evans over his shoulder and take her to the airport himself and put her on the first flight out of Niroli … But that wouldn’t solve a thing, because, knowing Carrie as he did, she’d get the first flight back again. For now, he would tolerate her presence. He would wait his moment, and then he would expose her for the liar she was.

‘You must have new clothes, my dear …’

Carrie had learned that Princess Laura didn’t do questions, and that statements were more her line. She couldn’t help smiling as she walked back towards the quaint arched doorway that marked the entrance to her apartment. When she had tried to tell Princess Laura that she didn’t need any clothes the princess had silenced her with nothing more than an arched brow. There was a formal dinner that night, she had said, to which Carrie was invited. Carrie hadn’t needed to be told that a market-stall dress wouldn’t do for that.

And now the princess had worked her magic again … Clapping her hands, she had invited dressmakers hovering just outside the open door to join them. And from that moment silks and satins, chiffons and jewelled net had been draped around Carrie, while pins and scissors had flashed in the light. A fabulous ball gown had been created where she stood.

It had been like a dream.

Maybe if it had been a dream she might have thrown herself with more enthusiasm into the pleasure everyone else was getting from her transformation, Carrie thought, but she knew that she would never belong to this life, and that Nico would never accept her. Hearing a tap on the door, she turned. ‘Come in …’

It was the young maid again, who curtsied, making Carrie blush. ‘There’s no need for that,’ Carrie assured her, and now the maid was blushing, too.

‘These are your clothes, signorina.’

As Carrie reached forward to take a few garments from the girl she had to step back as footmen marched past her wheeling a collection of boxes and bags. ‘There must be some mistake,’ Carrie said with concern as she followed the footmen into her sitting room. ‘I didn’t order these.’