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He loved his country so much that he’d marry a woman he didn’t love because the people expected it.
Holly glanced at the sun-baked pavements and then at the perfect blue sky. ‘It’s beautiful here,’ she agreed. ‘When I looked out of the window this morning, the first thing I saw was the sea. It felt like being on holiday.’
‘You looked very pale during the service.’ His eyes lingered on her face. ‘You were on your feet for a long time. I was worried that you might keel over.’
‘And presumably a prostrate bride wouldn’t have done anything for your public image,’ she said lightly. ‘I was fine.’
‘I’m reliably informed that the early weeks of pregnancy are often the most exhausting.’
He’d talked to someone about her pregnancy? Her heart lurched, and it suddenly occurred to her just how little she knew about his life here. Had he been talking to a woman? She was aware that his name had been linked with a number of European beauties. Was he…?
‘No,’ he drawled. ‘I wasn’t.’
Her eyes widened. ‘I didn’t say anything—’
‘But you were thinking it,’ he said dryly. ‘And the answer is no, my conversation wasn’t with a lover. It was with a doctor.’
‘Oh.’ She blushed scarlet, mortified that her thoughts had been so transparent, but filled with unimaginable relief that he hadn’t asked another woman. ‘When did you speak to a doctor?’
‘While you were at Foxcourt Manor, I interviewed a handful of the top European obstetricians. It’s important that you feel comfortable with your doctor. After all, you’re not good with detached and cold, are you?’ He gave a faint smile as he alluded to their previous conversation, and Holly was so touched that for a moment she forgot the presence of the cheering, waving crowd.
‘You did that for me?’
‘I don’t want you upset.’
‘That was incredibly thoughtful.’ She wanted to ask whether he’d really done it for her or the baby, but decided that it didn’t matter. The fact that he’d noticed that much about her personality was encouraging.
‘You’re stunning,’ he murmured, his gaze lingering on her glossy mouth and dropping to the demure neckline of her dress. ‘The perfect bride. And you’ve coped with the crowd really well. I’m proud of you.’
‘Really?’ Deciding not to mention the fact that she found him far more intimidating than any crowd, Holly relaxed for the first time in what felt like an eternity. She felt drugged by happiness and weak with relief at the change in him.
He was unusually attentive and much more approachable.
Perhaps, she mused silently, he’d finally deduced that the baby must be his.
What other explanation was there for his sudden change of attitude?
‘And now you need to fulfil your first duty as royal princess.’ He smiled down at her. ‘Smile and wave at the crowd. They’re expecting it.’
Finding it hard to believe that anyone would care whether she waved at them or not, Holly tentatively raised her hand, and the immediate roar of approval from the crowd made her blink in amazement. ‘But I’m just someone ordinary,’ she muttered, and the prince’s eyes gleamed with wry amusement.
‘That’s why they love you. You’re living proof that fairytale endings can happen to ordinary people.’
The last of her insecurities faded and Holly gave a bubble of laughter, her mood lifting still further as she saw the smiles of genuine delight on the faces of the people pressing against the barriers.
Flanked by mounted guards, the carriage moved slowly down the tree-lined avenue, and ahead of her she was surprised to see Emilio’s bulky frame.
‘But you sent Emilio home.’ Puzzled, she glanced at the prince. ‘He came to say goodbye to me yesterday, and told me that you’d been brilliant.’
‘He insisted on returning this morning.’ Casper gave a faint smile. ‘On such a huge public occasion he refused to entrust your security to anyone else.’
‘Oh, that’s so kind.’ Incredibly touched, Holly gave Emilio a wave. ‘There do seem to be millions of people. What’s this street like on a normal day?’
Casper settled back against the seat. ‘The road leads directly to the palace. It’s a favourite tourist route. Turn to the right at the bottom, and you reach the sea.’
Holly was still smiling at the crowd when she saw a toddler stumble and fall to the ground, his little body trapped against the metal barriers by the sheer pressure of the crowd. ‘Oh no! Stop the coach!’ Before Casper could respond, Holly opened the door of the carriage, hitched her white silk dress up round her middle and jumped down into the road.
Oblivious to the havoc she was creating in the security operation, she hurried across to the bawling toddler and the panicking mum. ‘Is he all right? Oh my goodness—can everyone move back a bit, please?’ Raising her voice and gesturing at the crowd, she breathed a sigh of relief as everyone shifted slightly and she saw the mother safely lift the sobbing child. ‘Phew. It’s a bit crowded, isn’t it? Is he all right? There—don’t cry, sweetheart. Have you got a smile for me?’ She reached out to the child who immediately stopped crying and stared at her in wonder.
‘It’s your tiara, Your Royal Highness, it’s all sparkly, and he loves everything sparkly.’ The woman flushed scarlet. ‘We all wanted to get a good view of you, madam.’
Holly noticed a trickle of blood on the child’s forehead. ‘He’s cut his head on the barrier. Does someone have a plaster?’
‘Holly.’
Hearing her name, she looked over her shoulder and saw Casper striding towards her, a strange expression on his face. ‘Holly, you’re giving the security team heart-failure.’
‘I’m sorry about that, but do you have a handkerchief or something?’ She glanced anxiously back at the toddler who now had his thumb in his mouth.
Casper hesitated and then produced a handkerchief from the pocket of his uniform.
Holly took it and leaned over the barrier to press it gently against the toddler’s forehead. ‘There. It doesn’t look too bad when you look at it closely.’ One of the security team produced a plaster and vaulted the barrier to deal with the child, and Holly suddenly realised that the crowd was cheering for Casper.
The prince delivered a charismatic smile and slipped his arm round his bride. ‘Next time, don’t leave the coach. It isn’t safe.’
‘It isn’t safe for that toddler, either. People are crushing too close to the barriers. What was I supposed to do?’ She knew it was foolish to read too much into his comment, but she couldn’t help it. Would he warn her not to leave the coach if he didn’t care about her?
The cheering intensified, and then there was a yell from the crowd that turned into a chant.
‘Kiss her, Prince Casper! Kiss, kiss, kiss…!’
Holly blushed scarlet but Casper, clearly as experienced at seducing a crowd as he was women, pulled her gently into his arms and lowered his mouth to hers with his usual cool confidence. Stunned by the unexpected gentleness of that kiss, Holly melted against him, stars exploding in her head and her heart.
Would he kiss her like that if he didn’t care?
Surely it was another sign that he finally believed that she must be telling the truth? That he’d been wrong about her.
The crowd gave a collective sigh of approval, and when Casper finally lifted his head there was another enormous roar of approval.
‘Now you’ve charmed the crowd, we need to go back to the coach.’ Amusement in his eyes, he tucked her hand into his arm. ‘And you need to stop jumping out of carriages and behave with some decorum. Not only are you now a princess, but you’re a pregnant princess.’
‘I know, but—’ She glanced towards the crowd. ‘Some of these people have been standing outside all night, even the children—do we have to go in the carriage? Couldn’t we just walk? We could chat to people along the way.’
Casper’s dark brows locked in a disapproving frown. ‘It would be a major security risk.’
‘I know you don’t care about that. When you’re in public you always walk. I read that you have a constant argument with your bodyguards and the security services.’ She bit her lip, suddenly wishing she hadn’t reminded him of her Internet moment, but he simply smiled and took her hand firmly in his.
‘In this instance I was thinking of your safety. Don’t you find the crowds daunting?’
‘I think it’s lovely that they’ve made the effort to come and see me get married,’ Holly confessed. Spying two small girls holding a bunch of flowers that they obviously picked themselves, she pushed her elaborate bouquet towards an astonished Casper and hurried across. ‘Are those for me? They’re so pretty. Are they from your garden?’ She talked to the girls, then to their mother, shook what felt like a million hands, and slowly and gradually made her way along the avenue towards the palace. But it took a long time because everyone had something to say to her and she had plenty to say in return.
Several people pushed teddies into her arms for the baby, and eventually she needed help to carry everything.
After an hour of chatting to a stunned and delighted crowd, Holly finally allowed herself to be urged back into the carriage.
‘Clearly I misjudged you.’ Casper settled himself beside her, indicating with his head that the procession should move on.
Holly’s heart soared. ‘Y-you did?’
‘Yes. I thought you’d find the whole day impossibly daunting. But you’re a natural.’ He gave a wry smile. ‘I’ve never seen anyone so skilled at talking about nothing with such enthusiasm and for such a long time.’
Holly digested this statement, decided that it was a compliment of sorts, and tried not to be disappointed that he’d been referring to the way she’d handled herself in public, rather than his opinion of her pregnancy.
Reminding herself that she had to be patient, she smiled. ‘How can it be daunting when everyone is so nice?’ Holly waved again and spied another group of children in the crowd. She opened her mouth to ask if they could stop, but Casper met her questioning glance with a slow shake of his head.
‘No. Absolutely not. Delighted though I am that you’ve managed to please the crowd, we have about two-hundred foreign dignitaries and heads of state currently waiting for us at the palace and we’re already late. I’d rather not cause a diplomatic incident if we can avoid it.’ But his tone was in direct contrast to the warmth in his eyes. ‘You’ve done well, tesoro.’
His praise made her glow inside and out, and she felt so ridiculously happy that she couldn’t stop smiling. All right, so they’d had a shaky start to their relationship, but one of the advantages of that was that it could only improve.
Feeling optimistic about the future, Holly smiled all the way through the formal banquet, all the way through the dancing and all the way up to the moment when she was finally escorted to the prince’s private quarters in a wing of the palace suspended above the sea.
It was only as the door closed behind them, leaving the guests and the guards on the outside, that reality hit her.
They were alone.
And this was their wedding night.
Gripped by a sudden attack of nerves, Holly gave a faltering smile, instinctively breaking the throbbing, tense silence that had descended on them. ‘So this is where you actually live. It’s beautiful—so much light and space, and—’
‘Stop talking.’ Casper reached for her clenched hands, gently prised them apart and then slid them round his waist and backed her against the door with an unmistakeable sense of purpose.
Trapped between solid oak and six foot two of raw male virility, Holly found she could barely breathe, let alone talk. Dry mouthed, knees shaking, she was aware only of the simmering undercurrents of sexuality that emanated from his powerful frame as he took her face in strong, determined hands, his mouth on a direct collision course with hers.
Holly closed her eyes in willing surrender, senses singing, nerves on fire. When the kiss didn’t come, she whimpered a faint protest. ‘Casper?’
His mouth hovered a breath from hers. ‘Open your eyes.’
Her eyes opened obediently and she stared up at him, her heart skipping several beats as she scanned the aristocratic lines of his masculine features. ‘Please—kiss me.’
‘I intend to do a great deal more than that, angelo mio…’
Held captive by his lazy, confident gaze her heart started to pound, and searing heat pooled low in her pelvis. She probably should have played it cool, but Holly was too aroused to remember the meaning of cool.
Her body was in the grip of a strong, explosive excitement that simply intensified as his mouth finally glided onto hers with effortless skill.
His tongue probed the interior of her mouth with erotic expertise, and Holly just melted, moaning low in her throat as his strong hands brought her writhing hips into contact with his potent masculine arousal.
‘Not here.’ His voice thickened, he pulled away from her and scooped her easily into his arms. ‘This time, tesoro, we’ll make it to the bed. And we’re taking our time over it.’ He strode through several rooms and then up a winding staircase that led to a bedroom in a turret.
Trembling, mortified by how much she wanted him, Holly clutched at his shoulders as he set her down on the floor, barely conscious of the beautiful circular room, the high arched windows or the vaulted ceiling. Her body was on fire with anticipation, and her entire focus was on the man now undressing her with deft, experienced fingers.
As tens of thousands of pounds worth of designer silk slithered unrestrained to the floor, her old insecurities resurfaced, and Holly was grateful for the relative protection of moonlight and underwear. But Casper showed merciless disregard for her inhibitions, peeling off her panties in a slick, decisive movement and tumbling her trembling, naked body onto the enormous four-poster bed.
‘Don’t move. I like looking at you.’ Having positioned her to his satisfaction, Casper sprang to his feet and removed his own clothing with impatient fingers, his eyes scanning her squirming body and flushed cheeks as he undressed with unself-conscious grace and fluidity. ‘You are so beautiful.’
As his carelessly discarded clothes hit the floor, Holly quickly discovered that there was more than enough light for her to make out bronzed skin and bold male arousal. Dizzy from that brief glimpse of raw masculinity, she drew in a sharp breath as he came down on top of her.
Shocked by the sudden contact with his lean, powerful frame, Holly’s pulse rate shot into overdrive and she slid her hands over his shoulders, her back arching as his clever mouth fastened over her nipple, and he plundered her sensitive flesh with sure, skilled flicks of his tongue.
Lightning bursts of sensation exploded through her body, and as his seeking fingers traced a path to that place where the ache had become almost intolerable Holly shifted restlessly against the silk sheets, the wanton movement giving him the access he needed.
With slow, sensitive strokes, he explored the most intimate part of her until Holly was sobbing his name, begging him for more, in the grip of such a terrifying craving that she knew if he stopped now she’d die.
Casper shifted her hips and his own position, giving her just time to register the silken throb of his arousal before he plunged deep into her moist, aching interior, and her world exploded.
Rocketing from earth to ecstasy, Holly shot straight into a shattering climax, only dimly registering Casper’s disbelieving curse and the sudden faltering of his rhythm as his own control was threatened by her body’s violent response. Sobbing his name, Holly dug her fingers into the slick flesh of his shoulders, so out of her mind with excitement that she was incapable of doing anything except hold on as each driving thrust drove her back towards paradise.
Her body splintered into pieces again, and this time she felt him reach his own release, and she hugged him tightly, overwhelmed by what had to be the most incredible experience of her life.
‘You’re a miracle in bed,’ Casper said huskily, rolling onto his back and taking her with him.
Stunned by the whole experience, and prepared to snuggle against his chest, Holly gave a whimper of shock as he closed his hands over her hips and lifted her so that she straddled him.
‘Casper, we can’t!’
But they did.
Again and again, until Holly couldn’t think or move.
Finally she lay there, sated and exhausted, one arm draped over his powerful chest, her cheek against the warmth of his bronzed shoulder.
She could hear the sounds of the sea through one of the open windows and she closed her eyes, feeling a rush of happiness.
She no longer had any doubts that she’d done the right thing.
They’d been married for less than a day and already his attitude to her was softening. Yes, he found it hard to talk about his emotions, but he didn’t have trouble showing them, did he?
He’d been tender, passionate, demanding, skilled, thoughtful.
Just thinking about it made her body burn again, and she slid her fingers through the dark hairs that hazed his chest, fascinated by the contrast between his body and hers.
‘I had no idea it was possible to feel like that.’ She spoke softly and gently, and pressed an affectionate kiss against his warm flesh, hugging him tightly. ‘You’re fantastic—’ She broke off as he withdrew from her and sprang from the bed.
Without uttering a single word in response to her unguarded declaration, he strode through a door and slammed it behind him.
Holly flinched at the finality of that sound, and her head filled with a totally unreasonable panic.
He’d left. He’d just walked out without saying anything. Desperate to stop him leaving, she kicked back the tangle of silken covers and sprinted towards the door.
And then she heard the sounds of a shower running and realised that the door led to a bathroom.
A tidal wave of relief surged over her and she stopped. Her limbs suddenly drained of strength, she plopped back onto the bed.
He hadn’t walked out.
He wasn’t her father.
This was different.
Or was it?
Feeling unsettled, confused and desperately hurt, she lay on her back, staring up at the canopy of the four-poster bed.
Rejection wasn’t new to her, was it?
So why did it hurt so badly?
Eventually the noise of the shower stopped and moments later Casper strolled back into the bedroom. He’d pulled on a black robe and his hair was still damp from the shower.
Without looking at her, he walked into what she presumed was a dressing room and emerged wearing a pair of trousers, a fresh shirt in his hand.
‘Aren’t you coming back to bed? Did I say something?’ Feeling intensely vulnerable, Holly sat up in the bed and twisted the ends of her hair with nervous fingers. ‘One minute we were lying there having a cuddle and the next you sprang out of bed and stalked off. I feel as though you’re upset, but I don’t know why.’
‘Go to sleep.’ He shrugged his shoulders into the shirt and fastened the buttons with strong, sure fingers. Those same fingers that had driven her wild.
‘How can I possibly sleep? Talk to me!’ Suddenly it felt wrong to be naked, and she reached for the silk nightdress that someone had laid next to her pillow and pulled it over her head. ‘What’s wrong? Is it the whole wedding thing?’ She wanted to ask whether he was thinking about the fiancée he should have married, Antonia, but she didn’t want to risk making the situation worse.
‘Go back to bed, Holly.’
‘How can I possibly do that? Don’t shut me out, Casper.’ Her voice cracked and she slid out of bed and walked over to him. ‘I’m your wife.’
‘Precisely.’ He looked at her then, and his eyes were cold as ice. ‘I have already fulfilled my side of the deal by marrying you.’
Holly froze with shock. ‘Deal?’
‘You wanted a father for your baby. I needed an heir.’
Her legs buckled and she sank down onto the edge of the bed. ‘You make it sound as though I picked you at random.’
‘Not at random. I think you targeted me very carefully.’
‘You still believe this isn’t your baby. Oh God. I really thought you’d changed your mind about that—you seemed different today—and when we—’ She glanced at the rumpled sheets on the bed, her eyes glistening with tears. ‘You made love to me and it felt—’
‘We had sex, Holly.’ His voice was devoid of emotion. ‘Love didn’t come into it, and it never will, make no mistake about that. Don’t do that female thing of turning a physical act into something emotional.’
Her hopes exploded like a balloon landing on nails.
‘It wasn’t just the sex,’ she whispered. ‘You’ve been different today. Caring. Ever since the moment I arrived at the cathedral.’ Her voice cracked. ‘You’ve been smiling at me, you had your arm around me. You kissed me.’
‘We’re supposed to look as though we’re in love.’ Apparently unaffected by her mounting distress, he strode over to an antique table next to the window. ‘Do you want a drink?’
‘No. I don’t want a drink!’ Her heart was suddenly bumping hard and she felt physically sick. ‘Are you saying that everything that happened today was for the benefit of the crowd?’
He poured himself a whisky but didn’t touch it. Instead he stared out of the window, his knuckles white on the glass, his handsome face revealing nothing of his thoughts. No emotion. ‘They wanted the fairy tale. We gave it to them. That’s what we royals have to do. We give the people what they want. In this case, a love match, a wedding and an heir.’
She blinked rapidly, determined to hold back the tears. ‘So why did you marry me?’
He lifted the glass to his lips. ‘Why not?’
‘Because you could have married someone you loved.’
He lowered the glass without drinking. ‘I don’t want love.’
Because he’d had it once and now it was gone?
Holly’s throat closed. ‘That’s a terrible thing to say and a terrible way to feel,’ she whispered. ‘I know you lost and I know you must have suffered, but—’
‘You don’t know anything.’
‘Then tell me!’ She was crying openly now, tears flooding her cheeks. ‘I’m devastated that the whole of today was a sham. I know it’s difficult for you to talk about Antonia, and frankly it isn’t that easy to hear it, either. But I know we’re not going to have any sort of marriage unless we’re honest with each other.’
Please don’t let him walk out on me. Please don’t let that happen.
‘Honest?’ He slammed the glass down onto the table and turned to look at her. ‘You lie about your baby, you lie all the way to the altar wearing your symbolic white dress, and then you suggest we’re honest? It’s a little late for that, don’t you think?’
‘It’s your baby,’ Holly said hoarsely. Her insides were twisted in pain as she felt her new life crumbling around her. ‘And I don’t know how you can believe otherwise.’
‘Don’t you? Then let me tell you.’ He strolled towards her, his eyes glittering dark and deadly. ‘It can’t be my baby, Holly, because I can’t have children. I don’t know whose baby you’re carrying, my sweet wife, but I know for sure it isn’t mine. I’m infertile.’
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