ROMANCING THE CROWN: LORENZO & ANNA

The Man who Would Be King

LINDA TURNER

The Princess and the Mercenary

MARILYN PAPPANO

www.millsandboon.co.uk

The Man Who Would Be King

LINDA TURNER

ROMANCING THE CROWN

With the help of their powerful allies, the royal family of Montebello is determined to find their missing heir. But the search for the beloved prince is not without danger – or passion!

Duke Lorenzo Sebastiani: With the crown prince still missing, the world awaits word that Lorenzo will one day ascend the throne in his stead. But now that new clues to Prince Lucas’s whereabouts have been found, what will Lorenzo’s future hold?

Eliza Windmere: Because she holds the key to the mystery of the missing prince, this royal-watching reporter is about to get up close and personal with the bachelor duke himself. But will the royal search bring her happiness – or heartache?

King Marcus Sebastiani: His Highness of Montebello never gave up hope that his firstborn son still lived. And now that the search is on, the king hopes to secure the crown prince’s legacy.

A note from Linda Turner,

popular author of over forty books:

Dear Reader,

Working on the ROMANCING THE CROWN series has been a labour of love. There’s just something about royalty that’s incredibly romantic. When you combine a lost prince, evil forces at work behind the scenes, a duke and a redheaded reporter who’s full of sass and vinegar and has just what it takes to knock the duke out of his shoes, you’ve got the kind of modern-day fairy tale I love. Writing this story was a joy, and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

All the best,

Linda Turner

Chapter 1

“Eliza? Willy called three times while you were out. He wants you to call him back. He said it was important.” All decked out in designer labels and looking every bit the socialite she was, Deborah Jones couldn’t wait to relay the message to Eliza the second she returned from lunch.

Witch, Eliza fumed, hating her smirk. If snooty little Debbie had been anyone else but the daughter of the owner of the Denver Sentinel, the newspaper Eliza sweated blood, sweat and tears for, she’d have told her to eat woolly worms and die. But that would have been playing right into her hands, and Eliza wasn’t that stupid. She’d spent nine years working her way up from copygirl to reporter to columnist, and she was protecting what was hers. From the moment Deborah had walked into the office a month ago as a new reporter for the society page, she’d made it clear to Eliza that she was not only after her job, but just looking for a reason to run crying to her daddy so she could get Eliza fired. Eliza didn’t intend to give her that reason.

But, damn, it wasn’t easy. Eliza wasn’t one of those meek, mild-mannered women who let people walk all over her. She stood up for herself, and was proud of it. So biting her tongue and forcing a smile took some effort. “Thanks,” she said as she took the pink message slip Deborah held out to her. “I’ll call him later.”

“Better you than me,” the younger girl retorted, her smirk more pronounced than ever. “That man still thinks Elvis is alive. Why do you waste your time on him? He’s a fruitloop.”

Eliza couldn’t argue with that. There was no doubt about it—Willy Cranshaw was a few cards shy of a deck. He was a hermit who lived in the mountains north of Boulder, and he was constantly calling the police with one outlandish tale after another. He had no credibility whatsoever with the authorities, and for the life of her, Eliza didn’t know why she continued to accept his calls. Over the years, he had given her a few good tips, but those times were rare and not always worth the effort of dealing with Willy. He was, to say the least, high maintenance. Still, she felt sorry for him. He seemed so lonely, and she knew what that was like. She and Robert had broken up two months ago, and she’d never been lonelier in her life.

“He just needs someone to talk to sometimes,” she replied, and wasn’t surprised when Deborah sniffed in disdain. Her daddy’s money and position guaranteed her a place in the world and someone to talk to, even if it was only a therapist. She’d never understand what life was like for a man like Willy.

“If that’s how you want to spend your time working, go ahead,” the younger girl said with a toss of her head. “I’d rather talk to someone who can give me a real story.”

When she turned and walked away with a superior smile and her pert, plastic surgery-perfect nose in the air, Eliza was half-tempted to throw her Rolodex watch at her. Her phone rang then, however, thankfully distracting her. Giving Deborah’s retreating back one last glare, she snatched up the phone. “Eliza Windmere.”

“Eliza! Thank God! I’ve been trying to reach you all morning. Didn’t you get my messages?”

“Hi, Willy,” she said with a wry grimace. Speak of the devil. “I just got your message. Deborah said you had something important for me.”

“I don’t like that girl,” he retorted, immediately distracted. “She treats me like I’m some kind of moron.”

Eliza had to laugh at that. “Yeah, I know the feeling. She does the same to me. But that’s not why you called, Willy,” she reminded him, bringing the conversation back to the matter at hand. “What’s going on? You didn’t call three times because you don’t like Deborah.”

Just that easily, he was back on track. “It’s the prince!” he said excitedly. “He’s alive!”

Eliza didn’t have to ask him which prince he meant. There was only one that was missing, and that was Prince Lucas Sebastiani, the firstborn of King Marcus and Queen Gwendolyn of Montebello and heir to the throne of the small island country in the eastern Mediterranean.

Athletic and handsome, he had a wild streak in him that had, no doubt, given his father more than a few gray hairs over the years, but Prince Lucas had always been great fodder for the nationally syndicated column Eliza wrote that chronicled the lives and loves of the royals. And she’d loved him for that. He had a great personality and was well loved throughout the world. When his plane crashed in the Colorado Rockies last winter and he was declared missing, Eliza had grieved just like everyone else…and followed up on every lead. But there had been no new information for well over six months, and she, like everyone else, had no choice but to believe he was dead.

“It’s been a year, Willy,” she said gently. “There’s no way he could be alive after all this time.”

“But he has to be,” he insisted. “I have proof.”

“Really? And what might that be?”

“Just something I found in the woods,” he said craftily. “If you want the rest of the story, you have to come here and talk to me.”

Eliza told herself he was blackmailing her and she’d be a fool to fall for it. She’d dealt with Willy too many times in the past to believe every wild story he told. This was the same man who’d claimed he’d seen Elvis, the Pope and an alien or two in the remote mountains where he lived. Before she jumped in her car and went racing up to Boulder, she had to make sure he wasn’t pulling a fast one on her.

Deliberately sitting back in her chair, she said, “Let me get this straight. You found something in the woods that proves the prince is alive, and you called me instead of the police. That looks more than a little suspicious, Willy, and you know it.”

He didn’t deny it. “I couldn’t call the cops,” he said simply. “They said if I called them again, they’d put me in jail for harassment.”

Eliza didn’t doubt that. She knew from personal experience that he was like a dog with a bone when he came up with one of his stories. He’d been known to call her as many as eight or nine times in a day. In spite of that, though, he really was a harmless old coot. He just wanted some attention, some acknowledgment that he mattered, just like everyone else.

Knowing that, she should have just pacified him and hung up, but she couldn’t, not if there was even the remotest chance that he was telling the truth. “You’d better not be lying to me about this, Willy,” she warned. “If I drive all the way to Boulder and this turns out to be just another Elvis sighting, I swear I’ll never take one of your calls again.”

“I wouldn’t do that to you. I know how you feel about the royals. I wouldn’t make this up.”

Deborah would have told her she was a fool to even consider believing him, but there was something in the old man’s tone that she couldn’t ignore. If he was telling the truth and the prince really was alive, this would be the biggest story of her career.

“I’ll be there as soon as I can,” she promised. “Okay?”

Across the phone line, he sighed in relief. “I’ll be waiting for you.”

Even though Eliza had been to Willy’s cabin several times before, she was amazed every time she managed to find the place. Located high up in a deserted canyon that was far off the beaten path, the cabin was all but lost in the thick stand of snow-covered trees that surrounded it on all sides. Anyone who hadn’t known where it was could have driven right past it without even seeing it.

Pulling up before it in her red Jeep, she knew better than to knock at the front door. She didn’t know what had happened to him in Vietnam—he shut down at the very mention of war—but he’d been living in seclusion for the past thirty years. He only allowed a select few people into his life, and even then, it was on his terms. He never talked to anyone who knocked on his front door.

She could feel his eyes on her, and wasn’t surprised that he was watching for her. He might have withdrawn from the world, but that didn’t mean he didn’t know everything that was going on around him. If anyone invaded his space, he knew it.

Striding through the snow around the side of the house to the back door, she knocked twice, waited a beat, then knocked again. She knew from past experience that even though he was expecting her and was well aware of the fact that she had arrived, he wouldn’t answer the door if she didn’t knock correctly…because she might be an imposter sent by the government to arrest him.

And this was the man she trusted to give her the story of a lifetime.

Amused at the thought, she watched the door slowly open and wasn’t surprised when he glanced past her to the forest of trees behind her to make sure no one had followed her. “It’s all clear,” she assured him. “There’s no one here but you, me and the squirrels.”

Not taking her word for it, he checked behind her and was apparently satisfied. Opening the door further, he motioned her inside. “I thought you’d never get here. Look at this.” And before she could thank him for inviting her in out of the cold, he shoved something soft into her hands.

Surprised, she frowned down at what appeared to be a dirty rag. Then her eyes focused on the embroidered patch that was sewn onto it. A lily with crossed swords. The Sebastiani family crest. It was grimy and weathered, but she still would have recognized it anywhere.

Her heart slamming against her ribs, she glanced up sharply at Willy. “Where did you get this?”

“In the woods about five miles from the crash site. It’s the prince’s, isn’t it?”

Without a word, Eliza spread out the cloth and saw it was a scarf. A light blue cashmere scarf that she had seen around the prince’s neck in a picture of him taken just days before his plane crashed last year. According to published reports, his mother, Queen Gwendolyn, had had it specially made for him and there wasn’t another one like it in the world.

It was then that it hit her. Willy hadn’t lied. There was no way a scarf belonging to the prince would have ended up five miles from the crash site unless it had been around his neck. Dear God, he really was alive!

Light-headed with excitement, she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Prince Lucas was alive. And thanks to Willy, she had the story, she thought, stunned. Who would have thought it?

Given the chance, she would have given him a bear hug, but she had a feeling that probably would have sent him into apoplexy. So she smiled at him instead and said, “It certainly appears to be. Let’s sit down, Willy, and you can start from the beginning. When did you find this? Did you find anything else that belonged to the prince? Who else have you told?”

“Stop the presses! Prince Lucas is alive.”

Striding into Simon Maxwell’s office, Eliza wasn’t surprised when her boss responded to her announcement with a snort of disbelief. Gruff and cynical, with a personality that was as caustic as sandpaper, Simon didn’t believe anything until the facts were laid out before him in black and white. “Yeah, right. And I’m the queen of England. I thought you were working on a real story, Red. You don’t get paid to write fairy tales.”

At any other time, Eliza would have snapped at the hated nickname he invariably used to tease her, but not today. Not when she was walking on air and feeling so darn good about herself and her job. Thanks to Willy, her position at the paper had never been so secure. She had a story to kill for and Ms. Nepotism was nowhere in sight. Life didn’t get any better than that.

Beaming with triumph, she reached into her oversize purse, pulled out the scarf, and dropped it on his desk. “The way I see it, LaGree, there’s nothing better than a happy ending. Take a gander at that if you don’t believe me.”

Simon hated his nickname as much as she did hers, but he hardly noticed. His eyes on the scarf and its golden crest, which he was as familiar with as she was. Motioning to the lone chair in front of his very messy desk, he growled, “Sit down. It looks like you’ve got something to tell me.”

That was all the encouragement she needed. Plopping down into the chair, she immediately launched into the story, leaving nothing out. Unfortunately, she didn’t have the happy ending—yet. “I know he’s alive, Simon. He’s got to be! This is proof he walked away from the crash site.”

“Not necessarily,” he argued, playing devil’s advocate. “An animal could have dragged it away.”

“And built a campfire?” she tossed back. “Willy said he found the scarf near the remains of a campfire five miles from the crash.”

Put that way, Simon couldn’t argue with her. “Who else knows about this?”

Not surprised that he’d asked the same question she had, she grinned broadly. “Just you and me and Willy. The king and queen don’t even know yet. Willy was afraid to tell the authorities.”

She didn’t have to tell him why. Willy’s reputation with the cops was well known by every reporter in Denver. A slow smile sliding across his chipmunk cheeks, Simon leaned forward just to be sure he’d heard her correctly. “Are you telling me that the king and queen don’t know there’s new evidence that their son is alive?”

Her blue eyes sparkling, she nodded. “You got it in one, LaGree.”

“Then you’ve got to go to Montebello and tell them!”

Whatever Eliza was expecting, it wasn’t that. “What?! But don’t you think we should tell the police?”

“And let them leak the story to every Tom, Dick and Harry who writes a gossip rag? Hell, no! Go home and pack your bags. I’ll make the airline reservations and get you some spending money. You’ve got to move fast. I want a play-by-play of everything that happens. Everything!” he stressed. “The king and queen are going to wig out when they find out the Prince is alive—”

Throwing instructions at her like darts, he never noticed that Deborah Jones had stepped into the open doorway until she demanded, “What prince? Who are you talking about? My God, is this about Prince Lucas? Are you saying you’ve found him?!”

Caught off guard, they both looked up and swore. From the look on Deborah’s face, it was obvious that she’d heard more than either one of them wanted her to.

Shooting her a hard look, Simon growled, “You’re barging in on a private conversation, Missy. Your daddy may own this place, but that doesn’t give you the right to just waltz in here without so much as a by-your-leave.”

He might as well have saved his breath. Ignoring his lecture on etiquette, she retorted, “If you have proof that Prince Lucas is alive, then I should be the one who goes to Montebello. I’ve traveled all over the world with my father. I have connections that will not only get me in the front door of the palace, but an audience with the king and queen. She doesn’t.”

Furious with the younger girl for trying to steal her thunder, Eliza felt her heart sink. She couldn’t summon a single word in her own defense. Deborah was right—she’d never been to Europe and didn’t have a clue how she would get in to see the king and queen. All she had were her wits and the Prince’s scarf. That might or might not get her anywhere, and what was important here was that Prince Lucas’s grieving parents be told that there was a very good possibility that he was alive. If Deborah could do that and get the story, Eliza couldn’t blame Simon if he sent her. He was caught between a rock and a hard place. Not only did he have to do everything he could to put out a good paper, he had to keep the owner happy. That meant keeping Deborah happy.

But this was her story, dammit! Hers! And she didn’t want to give it up…especially to a little blond-headed twit who used her father’s money and influence to get whatever she wanted. Glancing at Simon, she braced for disappointment. “It’s your call. Who gets to go?”

He didn’t even blink. “You do. It’s your story.”

For a moment, Eliza couldn’t believe she’d heard him correctly. But then Deborah started to sputter in protest, and she knew she’d won. Thrilled, she jumped to her feet and impulsively launched herself at Simon. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” she sang, giving him a bear hug. “You won’t regret this. Wait’ll you see the finished story. It’s going to be great!”

Patting her shoulder, he tried and failed to hide a crooked grin. “Don’t get sappy on me,” he said gruffly. “Go on and get out of here. You’ve got a plane to catch.”

“But I want to go!” Deborah cried. “This isn’t fair!”

“I’ve got a more important assignment for you,” Simon said as Eliza hurried out the door. “I need someone to go to Hollywood and interview Brad Pitt. You’re just the girl for the job.”

The throne room at the royal palace of Montebello was seldom used for official business anymore. Years ago, the coronation ceremonies for King Marcus and Queen Gwendolyn had been held there, but most palace guests who visited the room were usually interested in viewing the mosaics on the walls that depicted the country’s history. Not today. King Marcus had called his family together, as well as Kyle and Tyler Ramsey, two American allies assigned to protect his interests, and the ruling family of Montebello’s neighboring country, Tamir. Both royal families had long-awaited King Marcus’s decision, especially now that the two long-feuding countries had been united by the marriage of King Marcus’s eldest daughter, Princess Julia, to Sheik Ahmed Kamal’s son, Rashid, the crown prince of Tamir. Recently, Julia and Rashid had given King Marcus and Sheik Ahmed their first grandchild and as a result, the ruling family of Tamir was concerned about who would take over the Montebellan throne and how this might affect future relations between the two countries.

Now as the guests mingled about and talked among themselves in hushed voices, their eyes lifted time and time again to the clock on the wall. And with good reason. King Marcus was late to his own meeting. Speculation rippled around the room like heat lightning on a summer day. Where was the king? Had he decided not to make a decision today, after all? What was going on?

“Maybe you should go see if something is wrong,” Prince Rashid told his wife, Julia. “This can’t be an easy decision for your father. He doesn’t want to admit Lucas is dead.”

Julia could well understand that. Her brother had always been so full of life. She couldn’t imagine him dead at thirty-six. But it had been a year since his plane had crashed, and even though his body had never been found, what choice did she and the rest of the family have but to accept the fact that he must have died during the winter storms that blanketed the Colorado Rockies after the crash? If he had survived both the crash and the storms, surely he would have found a way to return to them by now.

It was the not knowing that was killing her parents. She’d watched them struggle with hope and despair and, finally, resignation, and her heart ached for them. Now that she and Rashid had their own baby boy, Omar, she didn’t even want to think about what it would be like to lose him. How did a parent handle the death of a child?

“Father just needs some time,” she said huskily, blinking back tears. “He’ll be here in a moment.”

Standing nearby, Rashid’s father, Sheik Ahmed, and Rashid’s brother, Hassan, surveyed the crowd with the sheik’s advisor, Butrus Dabir. There had been a time in the not too distant past when the Kamals wouldn’t have been caught dead anywhere near the Sebastianis or Montebello. A broken betrothal between the two families in the late 1800s had caused a century-long feud that might have gone on indefinitely if Princess Julia and Prince Rashid had not fallen in love. With their wedding and the birth of their baby, everything had, thankfully, changed, but no one had forgotten the past.

“I was hoping the king would name Princess Julia and Rashid as heirs to the throne, but the word on the street is that he’s leaning toward Duke Lorenzo Sebastiani,” Butrus said quietly.

“That’s understandable,” Sheik Ahmed replied. “The Sebastianis have ruled Montebello since the 1880s. King Marcus will protect that heritage by guaranteeing that the monarchy remains in Sebastiani hands. Julia is now a Kamal …as is her son,” he added proudly. It went without saying that Omar was the apple of his eye. “I have no issue with his choice of Lorenzo, if that is, in fact, Marcus’s choice.”

“Lorenzo is King Marcus’s nephew and top aide,” Hassan added. “He’s a military hero and well respected by Montebellans. He’s the natural choice to succeed the king since he has no other sons now that Prince Lucas is dead. And Lorenzo is a good man, one who will follow in Marcus’s footsteps and maintain our newly formed ties with Montebello.”

“True,” Butrus said. “But as the king’s heir, Lorenzo will eventually have to forfeit his position as head of Royal Intelligence. That won’t be easy for him to do.”

Across the room, Lorenzo’s thoughts ran along the same lines. He loved his uncle, and for the sake of the country, he would do what was asked of him. But privately, deep in his heart, he hoped Marcus would not choose him. He had little desire to be king.

His illegitimate half brother, Desmond, however, had a very different take on the whole situation. Waiting for Marcus to put in an appearance, Desmond almost rubbed his hands together in anticipation. “This is the day you will be named king,” Desmond told Lorenzo proudly. “No one deserves it more.”

Lorenzo had to laugh at that. “Aren’t you rushing things a bit? The king has kept his own counsel about this. We don’t know who he’s going to pick.”

“Of course we do,” his brother replied confidently. “You’re perfect for the job, and the king knows it. Trust me. Today’s going to turn out to be the most important day of your life.”

Lorenzo wasn’t surprised that he had Desmond’s total support. He always had. From the time Desmond had come into his life when Lorenzo was thirteen, he’d been there for him in a way Lorenzo’s older brother Max never had. Oh, Lorenzo knew Max loved him, too, but Max had joined the Montebellan army at eighteen, then eventually moved to the United States. Since then, he only came home occasionally for visits. Desmond, on the other hand, was the one Lorenzo could count on in spite of the fact that they’d had different mothers and had not been raised together from birth.

“I don’t know about that,” Lorenzo replied wryly, “but if the king does choose me, I hope you’ll be one of my advisors. I’m not much of a diplomat. I’m going to need all the help I can get.”

“Of course I’ll help you,” Desmond replied smoothly, delighted with his brother’s words. He kept his glee, however, carefully hidden behind an easy smile. “Haven’t I helped King Marcus all these months since poor Lucas was lost? I’ll do the same for you. More, in fact. You’re my brother. I can’t imagine being anywhere else but at your side.”

He spoke with a sincerity that was well practiced, and he wasn’t surprised when Lorenzo swallowed it whole. His brother was nobody’s fool, but Desmond had come into his life when Lorenzo was young and vulnerable and feeling lost, and it hadn’t taken much effort on Desmond’s part to win his trust. At the time, Desmond had to use his brother to get close to the king. That, it turned out, had been a stroke of genius on his part. Because now it was his brother who would be king. As his trusted advisor and closest family member, Desmond intended to take full advantage of his new position. After all, Desmond was the son of a duke, just like Lorenzo—a bastard son, but a son nonetheless. It was about time he came into his royal due.

What a shame that Prince Lucas had foolishly crashed his plane into the side of a mountain, Desmond thought snidely. Maybe one day, he’d summon up the strength to shed a tear for him…after he celebrated his own good fortune.

First, however, the king had to name Lorenzo his successor, something he should have done ten minutes ago. Troubled by the delay, Desmond frowned at the closed door where the king was expected to make his entrance. “I don’t understand the king’s tardiness. Maybe you should see if there’s some kind of problem,” he suggested. “Something isn’t right.”

Knowing how his uncle grieved for his son, Lorenzo wasn’t surprised that Marcus wasn’t his usual punctual self. With the announcement of a new heir to the throne, he was publicly admitting that he was accepting the fact that his son was dead. That would be difficult for any parent.

Wondering how he would find the strength to deal with such a situation himself, Lorenzo said quietly, “He probably just needs a little more time to come to terms with everything. I’ll go check on him.”

Whatever Eliza was expecting when she caught a cab at the Montebellan airport and went directly to the royal palace, it wasn’t the mob of reporters that crammed the front gates, trying to gain admittance. Surprised, she asked the cab driver, “What’s going on? Nothing’s happened to the king, has it?”

“Oh, no, miss,” he assured her as he took the fare and tip she held out to him. “He’s fine. Or at least he’s as fine as any father can be when he announces his son is dead.”

“What?!”

“It’s true,” he said sadly. “It’s been a year since Prince Lucas’s plane crashed and he went missing. No one wants to believe he’s dead, but there hasn’t been much hope for a long time now. I guess that’s why the king decided to name a successor. Like it or not, the living have to keep on living.”

Horrified, she hurriedly collected her Notebook computer and pushed open her door. “Oh, my God! I have to stop him. He can’t do this!”

Puzzled by her reaction, the cabby laughed. “Sure he can, lady. He can do anything he likes. He’s the king!”

Struggling with her things as she rushed toward the crowd at the gate, Eliza didn’t hear him. This couldn’t be happening! She should have tried to contact the palace the second Willy showed her the scarf. But she’d known she wouldn’t be allowed to speak to the king and queen, and the news she had wasn’t the kind that should be relayed over the phone. Besides, would anyone believe her without seeing the evidence?

She should have called anyway, she thought as she fought her way through the mass of reporters. She could have convinced someone to listen to her, and the king would have been spared the agony of picking someone to succeed his only son. Now, she had to convince the guard at the gate that she needed an immediate audience with the king and what she had to say to him was more important than the hundreds of other reporters who wanted the same thing.

“Hey, watch it!”

“What do you think you’re doing, lady? Get at the back of the line. We were here first.”

“Too bad,” she snapped. “I’m in a hurry and you guys are in my way. Move it, will you? I’ve got to talk to the king.”

The minute the words were out of her mouth, she knew it was the wrong thing to say, but it was too late. All around her, her fellow reporters mimicked, “Move it, I’ve got to talk to the king.”

“You can wait, just like the rest of us, mademoiselle,” a skinny Frenchman told her, looking down his nose at her. “And you can forget about talking to the king. His press secretary will tell us whatever he wants us to know.”

Eliza knew he was right, but his attitude irked her, and she didn’t even bother to respond. Quickly stepping around him, she told the guard at the gate, “It’s very important that I see the king. I have some information he needs…”

Surrounded by competing reporters, she didn’t dare tell him what that information was, but he wasn’t interested, anyway. “Nice try,” he drawled, “but I’ve got my orders. No reporters allowed inside the palace. You’ll have to wait, just like everyone else.”

Frustrated, she swore softly. So much for trying to go through channels. She liked to play by the rules, but sometimes it just didn’t pay. Now it was time to follow her gut and do what she should have done when she’d first seen the crowd of reporters fighting to get inside—find another way in.

“Fine,” she retorted, pretending to pout as she let herself be pushed to the back of the crowd. “You can’t blame a girl for trying.”

The front door of the palace opened then, distracting the crowd at the gate, and that was just the opportunity Eliza was looking for to slip away. As the press secretary informed the crowd that the king’s announcement would be released momentarily, she quietly hurried along the palace wall hoping to find some place to scramble over now that the guard was distracted. As luck would have it, she saw a delivery truck enter the service gate at the far end and before it could close automatically behind the vehicle, she slipped inside.

After getting over her initial shock at suddenly finding herself within mere yards of the royal palace, she quickly made her way around the corner of the stone and marble building, looking for a way in. But every door she came to was locked!

“I can’t believe this!” she muttered, continuing around the building. An entire staff of people took care of the daily operation of the palace. Surely someone had mistakenly left a door open somewhere!

Frustrated, she was about to give up hope when she rushed around another corner and suddenly found herself at the rear of the palace, facing the sea. And there, right in front of her, were the royal gardens…and a veranda with a set of French doors that looked like they’d been placed there just for her.

“Yes!” she whispered triumphantly. Now, if they were just unlocked.

Her heart thundering wildly, she dashed up onto the veranda and turned the doorknob, half expecting an alarm to blare at any second. But the door opened effortlessly, silently, and just that easily, she found herself standing inside what appeared to be the ballroom of the royal palace of Montebello.

Take notes! a voice in her head ordered sharply. But there was no time. The room was deserted, and she took advantage of that to quickly stow her computer and overnight bag behind the drapes at the window. Hopefully, they would still be there when she got back. If she got back, she silently amended. She’d just broken into a king’s palace. In some countries, they threw you into the dungeon for that if you got caught.

“So don’t get caught,” she told herself. “Act like you have a right to be here and no one will even spare you a second glance.”

It was a simple plan, one that had worked well for her in the past. Over the years, her job—and curiosity—had led her into any number of places where she had no business being, and she’d discovered that she could go practically anywhere if she acted like she knew what she was doing. So she smoothed her hair, slung her purse over her shoulder, and strode out of the ballroom like she owned the place.

Just as she’d hoped, it worked. Stepping into a wide, impressive corridor lined with a collection of paintings the likes of which she’d only seen in a museum, she passed several members of the staff, and they didn’t even blink at the sight of her. Relieved, she would have laughed, but she didn’t dare. The less attention she drew to herself, the better.

Unfortunately, she didn’t have a clue where she was going. She knew nothing about the layout of the palace or where the king planned to meet with the guests he’d invited to witness the naming of his new successor. Logic told her that the announcement would be made in one of the palace’s public rooms, but that was strictly a guess on her part. For all she knew, they could be meeting in the family quarters, which could be anywhere.

Frowning, she reached an intersection of hallways and hesitated, not sure which way to turn. And just that easily, she made her first mistake. Suddenly, a door on her left opened, and before she could summon the look of confidence that had gotten her that far, she was caught.

“Who the devil are you?”

Swearing softly under her breath, she silently told herself to bluff her way out of this. But then she turned to face her captor and whatever she was going to say next flew right out of her head as she gasped in recognition. His Grace, Duke Lorenzo Sebastiani, the man everyone had been speculating for months might one day be named king!

They’d never met, of course, but she would have known him anywhere. Over the years, she’d lost track of the number of stories she’d written about him—first as a military hero who was rewarded with the title of duke by the king, then as head of the Montebello Royal Intelligence—and she’d enjoyed writing every one of them. There was just something about the man that had always struck her fancy. He was tough and smart and loyal, and his pictures hadn’t begun to do him justice. Lean and well-muscled, his sandy-brown hair streaked with golden highlights, and his green eyes dark with a mixture of emotions she couldn’t begin to understand, it was easy to see why he, like the rest of the Sebastiani men, was one of the heartthrobs of Europe.

“Your Grace! Thank God! I need you to get a message to the king—”

“You’re an American,” he cut in, frowning in puzzlement. “How did you get in? There are no tours today.”

“No, sir, I’m sure there aren’t. I’m not a tourist. My name is Eliza Windmere. I’m with the Denver Sentinel—”

That was as far as she got. “A reporter,” he said with a grimace of distaste. “I should have known. The palace is crawling with them. C’mon. You’re out of here.” And before she could begin to guess his intentions, he grabbed her arm and started tugging her toward the nearest exit.

“Wait! You don’t understand. I have information about Prince Lucas.”

His jaw set, he didn’t so much as spare her a glance. “Yeah, right. Let me see if I can guess. You found him waiting tables in L.A., and for the right price, you’ll tell King Marcus where he is. Save your breath, sweetheart. I’ve heard it all before. The king gets a hundred letters a week from people just like you. I don’t know how you all live with yourself. Don’t you have any conscience?”

“Of course I do,” she retorted, stung. But heat burned her cheeks and deep inside, she had to wonder if he was right. The king and queen had lost a son, and though she had come to give them news they longed to hear, she also wanted an exclusive when they learned he was alive. So how was she any different from the con men trying to cash in on the Sebastianis’ grief?

Uncomfortable with the question, she reminded herself that she wasn’t trying to extort money from the king or keep his son’s whereabouts from him. Of course she wanted the story, but she had that already. At this point, she was just doing the right thing and bringing the king news of his son. “Look, I know how this must look, but I’m serious. I have vital information—”

“And I’m the tooth fairy,” he retorted. “Put that in your paper and smoke it. It’s probably one of those scandal rags, anyway.”

That was the wrong thing to say. Stopping abruptly, she jerked free of his grasp and drew herself up to her full five foot seven inches and gave him a narrow-eyed look that should have reduced him to the size of an ant. “For your information, I wouldn’t be caught dead writing that kind of trash, so I’d appreciate it if you’d keep a civil tongue in your mouth.”

She’d caught him off guard, and for a moment, he had the grace to look embarrassed. But then he obviously realized that he’d just been brought to task by a reporter, of all things. “That was good,” he told her dryly. “For a moment there, I actually forgot that you broke in here.”

“I didn’t break in. The door was unlocked—”

“So you thought you’d just walk right in,” he finished for her. “I wonder how you’d feel if I did the same at your house.”

“Dammit, I just need to talk to the king!”

“Not a chance,” he growled, and grabbed her arm again.

Indignant, she tried to jerk free, but this time, the duke had a firmer grip, and there was no escaping him. Still, she had to try. Struggling, uncaring that she’d probably have bruises on her arms tomorrow, she cried, “You’re the most irritating man. I don’t know why I ever thought you were charming.”

Before she could say another word, they were interrupted by a servant, who hurried forward with a worried frown. “Is there a problem, Your Grace?”

“As a matter of fact, there is,” he said flatly. “Show this lady to the door, will you, Rudolpho? She’s a reporter. And make sure she doesn’t get back in.”

“Of course,” the older man replied, and took Eliza’s arm in a grip that was surprisingly firm.

“No! Wait! At least talk to the king for me,” she called after the duke, but it was too late. Without sparing her a glance, he turned and walked away.

Chapter 2

“Please don’t give me any trouble, Miss,” the servant said quietly. “I don’t want to call a guard.”

Trapped, Eliza considered her options. Old enough to be her grandfather, Rudolpho seemed a gentle soul, but she knew better than to mistake him for a soft touch. The duke wouldn’t have turned her over to him if he hadn’t felt he could trust the old man to throw her out. And that could only mean one thing. She had to talk fast.

“I know you’re only doing your job, Mr. Rudolpho—”

“Sabina,” he interjected with a half smile as she fell into step beside him. “The name is Rudolpho Sabina. I’m the king’s personal servant.”

“And not easily snowed, I’ll bet,” she replied solemnly.

His lips twitched, but he only said, “No, Miss, I’m not.”

That made it more difficult. Falling back on the truth and praying it didn’t let her down, she said earnestly, “Then I hope you’ll believe me when I tell you I didn’t fly all the way from America just to get a scoop on the king’s announcement.I didn’t even know he planned to name a new heir today. If I had, I would have tried to call to convince him he doesn’t need to do this. You have to believe me, Mr. Sabina. That’s why I’m here. I have news of the prince.”

For a minute, she thought he was going to listen to her. He hesitated, but just when she began to hope that he would help her, he continued his pace steadily toward the nearest exit. “You seem like an intelligent woman,” he said quietly. “I’m sure you must realize that over the course of the past year, the king has been hounded by dozens of fortune hunters who claimed they’d found the prince. None of them could produce him. Can you?”

Just that easily, he had her neatly cornered. “No,” she sighed in defeat. “No, not yet. But I’m sure I’ll be able to with time.”

“The world is full of people who might be able to do that, Ms. Windmere. That’s not a good enough reason to see the king.”

His decision made, they reached an exit then, but before he could show her out, they were joined by a woman who hurried toward them with a frown, scolding Rudolpho all the while. “Rudy, thank God! I’ve been looking for you everywhere. Where have you been? The king is about to greet his guests—”

“Oh, please, you must stop him!” Eliza said quickly, interrupting. “There is no need for him to announce a new heir. Prince Lucas is still alive! I have proof!”

“She’s a reporter, Josie,” Rudy said when his wife gasped. “She broke in—”

“Because the guard at the gate wouldn’t let me in. I was desperate.”

Josie Sabina, to her credit, didn’t dismiss her out of hand. “Well, I suppose I might do the same thing if I was desperate,”she said with a slight smile. Studying her speculatively, she suddenly held out her hand and introduced herself. “I’m Rudy’s wife, Josie. And you’re…?”

“Eliza Windmere.” Sensing a kindred spirit, she took her hand with a sigh of relief. “It’s very important that I talk to the king, Mrs. Sabina. His son wasn’t killed in the plane crash. I live in Colorado. I wouldn’t have flown halfway around the world for a hoax. I’m not that kind of person. I really do have proof.”

When Josie glanced at her husband for guidance, Eliza felt her heart sink. This was her last chance. If Josie didn’t help her, she was going to be tossed out on her ear, and she could forget getting a message to the king. Duke Lorenzo would spread the word that she was a crazy American reporter and nothing she said would be taken seriously.

“Duke Lorenzo said to show her out,” Rudy told his wife. “I’m just following orders.”

That was her clue to do the same, but just when Eliza felt sure Josie was going to tell her she couldn’t help her, the older woman hesitated. “If there’s the slightest chance the prince is alive, you know I have to tell the queen, Rudy,” she told her husband finally. “She would want to know.”

“But what if this is nothing but a scam?” he argued. “The king won’t be happy that you upset the queen for nothing.”

“That’s a risk I’ll have to take,” she said simply. “If the prince was my son and there was the slightest chance he was alive, I would want to know.”

Put that way, Rudy knew when he was beaten. “All right,” he sighed. “We’ll wait here for you.”

Thrilled, Eliza wanted to hug them both. Finally, someone was listening to her! Now, if only the queen would! Sending up a silent prayer as Josie rushed off to talk to her, she waited with Rudy and tried not to be concerned when one minute turned into two, then three, then ten. It wasn’t easy. She didn’t like letting other people speak for her, and her too-active imagination was jumping to all sorts of conclusions, none of them good. What was taking so long?

Impatient, worry eating at her stomach, she would have gone looking for Josie and the queen if Rudy hadn’t been watching her like a hawk. And he obviously knew that. Standing nearby, he had the patient look of a man who had no intention of letting her out of his sight, even if that meant watching her for the rest of the day.

Trapped and hating it, she was looking around for a way to distract him so she could slip away when she spied Josie quickly approaching from the far end of the hall. Her heart in her throat, she stepped toward her. “Well? Will she see me?”

“You have ten minutes,” she replied solemnly, only to laugh when Eliza pulled her into a hug. Patting her, she smiled. “Come. You don’t have any time to waste.”

With Josie now as her escort, they made their way through a maze of corridors before they finally reached a small solarium at the back of the house. Stopping outside the elegantly panelled double doors, Josie gave her a quick lesson in royal etiquette.

“You wait for the queen to speak first, and you curtsy when you are introduced. And don’t worry. The queen isn’t a stickler for such things, but it is the polite thing to do, and she will appreciate it.” Amusement glinting in her dark eyes, she added, “Smooth your hair, dear. That’s it. Ready?”

No! Eliza almost cried. She was about to meet the queen of Montebello. Of course, she wasn’t ready! Too late, she realized she should have taken time to freshen her makeup and clothes at the airport before rushing to the palace, but there was no time for that now. The queen was waiting and the clock was ticking.

Drawing in a calming breath, she nodded. “Let’s do it.”

Without a word, Josie knocked lightly on the door and pulled it open. A heartbeat later, she found herself ushered into a beautiful room with pale green walls, mosaic floors and the most gorgeous plants and flowers Eliza had ever seen. And there waiting for her was not only Queen Gwendolyn, but King Marcus, as well.

Her heart pounding crazily in her breast, Eliza told herself there was no reason to be nervous. They weren’t ogres. In fact, according to all accounts, they were amazingly friendly and down to earth, considering they lived in a palace. And even though Eliza had never met them, she’d written about them and their children and extended family so much over the years that she almost felt like she knew them.

But even as she went over all the reasons why she should be perfectly at ease in the presence of royalty, she curtsied awkwardly before Josie had a chance to announce her. “Oh, I’m sorry,” she said, blushing as red as her hair. “I was supposed to wait until I was introduced—and you spoke first.”

Queen Gwendolyn smiled with understanding, and it was easy to see why she was still considered one of the most beautiful women in Europe. In her early sixties, her porcelain skin was clear and virtually unlined, her eyes sparkled, and her figure was as trim and slender as a girl’s in a blue silk suit that exactly matched the color of her eyes.

Extending her hand, Queen Gwendolyn said, “For the most part, we don’t stand on ceremony in our home, Ms. Windmere. Please…may I call you Eliza?”

“Oh, yes, of course, Your Highness.”

Liking her immediately, Eliza shook her hand and could have easily sat down and chatted with her like they were old friends. The king, however, stood protectively at his wife’s side and looked every inch the royal. The past year had not been easy for him. Regal and aristocratic, his once dark hair was now nearly completely white and there were lines at the corners of his dark eyes that had not been there last year before his son’s plane crashed in Colorado.

Quietly greeting her, he got right to the point. “Josie tells us you have news of our son.”

“Yes, sir, I do. I believe he is alive.”

“According to Josie, you have proof,” Queen Gwendolyn said, her eyes dark with entreaty. “You don’t look like a cruel woman, Eliza. If this was all just a trick on your part so you could gain an audience with us, please admit it now, and there’ll be no hard feelings.”

When she took her husband’s hand and they stood side by side, their pain was visible. Eliza could have cried for them both. She’d never been married, never had children, so she couldn’t begin to imagine the extent of their hurt. Royalty or not, they were parents and they obviously loved their son, and if she could help them in any way, she would.

“I know this past year had to be extremely difficult for you, and I know that you’ve had people coming out of the woodwork claiming they had found the prince,” she said huskily. “I’ll be honest with you. I haven’t found him, either, and right now, I don’t have a clue where he is. But I truly believe he’s alive. Because of this.” Reaching into her purse, she pulled out the scarf Willy had found and held it out to the queen. “I believe this belongs to Prince Lucas, doesn’t it?”

Her gaze locked on the dirty, tattered scarf, Queen Gwendolyn gasped softly. Tears flooded her eyes, and when she reached out for the scarf with trembling fingers, it was almost as if she was afraid to touch it. “Oh, Marcus, look!”

The king didn’t say a word. His expression as hard as granite, he shot Eliza a look that would have had a lesser woman shaking in her shoes. “We gave this to our son for Christmas last year. Where did you get it?”

“From a man named Willy Cranshaw,” she replied. “He found it in the woods in Colorado…near an abandoned campsite about five miles from the crash site.”

“You think Lucas dropped it there?” the queen asked, brushing away the tears that spilled from her eyes. “That he somehow survived the crash? All this time when we thought he was dead, you think he’s been wandering around the mountains? Is that what you’re saying?”

Eliza would have bet everything she owned that that was exactly what happened, but she couldn’t prove it. And until she could, she wouldn’t give the queen false hope. “I don’t know, Your Highness. I just know that the scarf didn’t walk away from the crash site on its own.”

She was trying to be cautious, but she might as well have saved her breath. The king and queen exchanged a long look, and suddenly they were in each other’s arms, laughing and crying and dancing with joy.

“He must be alive, Gwen!” the king laughed joyfully. “Can you believe it? After all this time, he’s really alive!”

Ecstatic, he whirled her around, then kissed her soundly, not caring who saw. “I have to tell Lorenzo,” he exclaimed, “so he can reopen the investigation. And the girls! They’re going to be thrilled. Rudy?” he yelled, all dignity gone as he glanced around for his personal servant. “I need you, man. Where are you?”

“Here, Your Highness,” the older man said quietly as he stepped into the room.

Surprising the older man, the king embraced him like a brother. “Lucas is alive, Rudy!”

To his credit, Rudy admitted that he’d already heard the news. “Ms. Windmere said that he was, Your Highness, but I thought she was another fortune hunter. Forgive me, Miss,” he told her solemnly. “But I couldn’t take any chances.”

“It’s okay,” she replied with an easy smile. “I know you were only doing your job.”

Pleased by both his old friend’s honesty and Eliza’s response, the king patted him on the shoulder. “Go get Lorenzo for me. He needs to know about this so we can reopen the investigation.”

At the mention of the duke’s name, Eliza stiffened. No! she wanted to cry. Don’T Bring Him In On This! But even as she bit back the words, she knew she was going to have to deal with the duke whether she liked it or not. He was, after all, the head of Royal Intelligence and had been in charge of the search for the prince from the moment his plane had gone down. Of course the king would want him to know about the scarf.

“Please sit down, Eliza and tell us everything,” the queen said, motioning her over to the pretty cream-colored couch and wing chairs that flanked the marble fireplace, which was the focal point of the room. “I know you said Mr. Cranshaw found Lucas’s scarf near a campsite in the mountains, but can you give us all the details you know?”

“Did he find anything else?” the king asked as he joined his wife on the couch and Eliza sank into one of the comfortable chairs. “Was there any way to tell if Lucas was hurt? Where has he been all this time? Why hasn’t he called? Doesn’t he know we’re worried about him?”

Hesitating, Eliza didn’t quite know how to answer that. As far as she was concerned, the very fact that Prince Lucas hadn’t notified his family that he was alive said a lot about his mental state, but that was strictly her opinion. She wasn’t a doctor and wasn’t about to comment on the prince’s mental or physical condition to his worried parents. So she avoided the issue and turned the conversation back to what she did know.

“Willy found the scarf at an abandoned campsite in a remote area up in the mountains. He couldn’t tell how long the prince stayed there—if it was just overnight or possibly longer, but someone had stayed long enough to build a campfire. As for the scarf, we don’t know if the prince dropped it or just forgot it, but it was on a log near the campfire.”

“Do you trust this Cranshaw fellow?” the king asked with a frown. “What do you know about him? Could he have found the scarf at the crash site and just made this all up so we would think Lucas is still alive? There are sick people out there who get their kicks doing that kind of thing, you know,” he told her grimly. “Gwendolyn and I found that out after Lucas turned up missing. Unfortunately, we live in a twisted world.”

“Willy has his moments,” she said honestly, “but I trust him. He’s not lying about where he found the scarf. He wouldn’t do that.”

She would have said more, but Duke Lorenzo arrived then, and the second he saw her sitting with the king and queen, he stiffened, his sharp green eyes dark with irritation as they locked with hers. Ignoring his aunt and uncle, he growled, “I don’t know what the devil you think you’re doing, but you’re not getting away with it.” Striding over to the chair where she sat, he grabbed her arm. “C’mon, you’re leaving. And this time, I’ll make sure you don’t sneak back in.”

Shocked, Queen Gwendolyn cried, “Lorenzo! What in heaven’s name has gotten into you? Eliza has brought us news of Lucas. Stop that!” she cried when he hauled Eliza to her feet. “Have you lost your mind? You know better than to treat a guest that way!”

“She’s just a reporter looking for headlines,” he retorted with a scowl. “Don’t believe anything she says. I caught her wandering the halls earlier and had Rudy escort her out of the building, but I guess she found a way to break back in.”

“She didn’t break in,” his uncle said, frowning. “We invited her in. She has news of Lucas. He’s alive. Look.” Holding out the scarf to him, he made no attempt to blink back the tears that pooled in his eyes. “This was found five miles from the crash site, Lorenzo. At an abandoned campsite,” he added huskily. “Can you believe it? He must be alive!”

Seeing the hope in his uncle’s and aunt’s eyes, Lorenzo wanted more than anything to believe that his cousin had somehow survived the plane crash. But how could he? It had been a year. If Lucas had walked away from the crash, where had he been for the past year? Where was he now? And even though he knew in a glance that the scarf Marcus held was Lucas’s, how much stock could he put in the word of an American reporter who no doubt lived and died by the outrageous headlines she wrote?

“I think it’s a little too early to jump to that conclusion,” he told Marcus stiffly. “This woman is a reporter. She’s just looking for a sensational story.”

“I am not!”

“She writes a gossip column about royalty,” he continued, ignoring her indignant cry. “I thought her name sounded familiar when I ran into her in the hall, so I did a little investigating. She writes for the Denver Sentinel, and she prides herself on beating the competition to a story. She’ll go to any lengths to get material for her column.”

“I don’t lie!”

“No? So you’re going to stand there and say Count Baldwin really had a child with his governess?” he taunted, referring to a twenty-five-year-old English count who had a reputation for being as pious as a monk. “That’s the most ridiculous thing I ever heard. The woman’s fifteen years his senior!”

“And a paternity test proved the child was his,” she retorted. “If you don’t believe me, I have a copy of the test results back in my office in Denver. I’ll send it to you when I get back home.”

Her blue eyes sparking fire at him, she dared him to top that, and with nothing more than that little act of defiance, she set his teeth on edge. And for the life of him, Lorenzo didn’t know why. He liked women and enjoyed their company. He didn’t usually get short with them, let alone hostile, especially with someone he didn’t even know, but there was something about this little redhead that rubbed him the wrong way.

“The point is,” he said through his teeth, “that that was a private situation that you had no business exposing. You have no boundaries, and neither does the paper you write for.”

“Oh, really?” she snapped. “Then if I’m the monster you think I am, why did I even bother to come all this way in the first place? I certainly didn’t need anyone’s permission to write this story. I had the scarf and knew where it came from. I could have splashed pictures of it all over the front page and let the wire services pick it up. Wouldn’t that have been a nice way for the king and queen to find out their son was alive? They could have read all about it in the papers.”

Far from impressed, he laughed shortly. “Yeah, right! That sounds good, but I’m not buying it. You saw a bigger story and you came after it.”

Expecting her to deny it, she caught him off guard when she admitted the truth without batting an eye. “Of course I want the bigger story! Unlike you, Your Grace, I don’t have a trust fund or a king for an uncle. I work for a living and I make no apologies for that. That doesn’t make me a bad person…or unprincipled. If I had lost a son, I wouldn’t want to learn that he was alive by reading it in the paper. That’s why I’m here.”

With that, a heavy silence fell, and her sincerity seemed to echo throughout the room. Suddenly realizing what he’d said to her in the heat of his anger, Lorenzo felt like a heel. “If I misjudged you, I’m sorry,” he said stiffly. “But I still don’t trust you.”

“Don’t shoot her, Lorenzo,” his aunt said with a smile. “She’s just the messenger, and she’s brought amazing news. Why should we begrudge her a story? What’s important here is that Lucas is alive. We’ve waited a year for this day. Now we have to figure out a way to find him.”

“That’s right,” King Marcus said. “I’m reopening the investigation.”

Relieved, Eliza considered childishly sticking her tongue out at the duke—it was no more than he deserved. If she’d known just how arrogant he was, she wouldn’t have been nearly as complimentary of him as she had been in her columns all these years. Irritating man. It would serve him right if the king gave him a royal dressing-down.

But instead of chastising him, the king said, “Eliza got the scarf from a man named Willy Cranshaw, who found it in the mountains in Colorado. I want you to return to America with her and talk to this man. He may be able to tell you something else that will lead us to Lucas.”

Stunned, Eliza couldn’t believe she’d heard him correctly. After all the awful things Lorenzo had said to her, the king actually expected her to travel all the way back to Colorado with him? “What? Oh, no! He can’t.”

“He has to, dear,” the queen replied. “He can’t very well carry on the investigation from here. And you did say you wanted to help us find Lucas,” she reminded her. “Here’s your chance.”

“But you don’t understand,” she protested. “Willy won’t talk to him.”

“He’s in charge of the investigation,” the king said with a frown. “He has to talk to him.”

If she’d been dealing with anyone but royalty, Eliza would have laughed. How did she explain Willy to people who only had to snap their fingers to have anything in the world they wanted? They lived in a palace, for heaven’s sake! How could they possibly comprehend a man who avoided other people like the plague and lived in a shack that looked like it was going to fall down about his ears any moment?

“Willy’s different,” she said. “He fought in Vietnam, and it must have done something to his mind. He’s a little squirrelly.”

Queen Gwendolyn lifted a delicately arched brow. “Are you saying he’s crazy?”

“No, actually, I think he’s quite sane,” she replied. “I guess the best way to describe him is eccentric. He doesn’t trust many people. He sees intruders in the shadows, and he’s called the police so many times that they put him on hold whenever they recognize his voice. That’s why he called me when he found Prince Lucas’s scarf. I’m the only one who’ll listen to him.”

“Lorenzo will listen to him.”

“I’m sure he will. The problem is Willy won’t talk to him. He won’t talk to anyone but me.”

“I knew it!” Lorenzo snorted in disdain. “This is nothing but a scam.” Turning to his aunt and uncle, he said, “Can’t you see she’s just stringing you along? How do we know this Willy character even exists? She could have made this all up, bought the scarf over the Internet and trampled it in the dirt to make it look like it had been in the weather.”

Indignant, Eliza snapped, “And why would I do such a thing? For a story? According to you, there is no story. And that would come out soon enough if I tried to slip something so outrageous past my readers. I’d lose my job, and I’m not going to risk that for a story that doesn’t exist.”

“Then tell us more about Mr. Cranshaw,” the queen said. “If he truly does exist, Lorenzo really needs to meet with him. There might be something he didn’t think to tell you about the scarf that could lead us to Lucas.”

She had a point, one Eliza couldn’t disagree with. But they were talking about Willy, for God’s sake! How in the world was she going to get him to cooperate? If he got it in his head that the duke was suspicious of him, he might take off up into the mountains because he was afraid he was going to be arrested or something, and there was no telling how long he’d be gone.

“Willy is a hermit, Your Highness. I can’t predict how he will react to Duke Lorenzo—or me, for that matter, if I introduce them. But I’ll try,” she promised. “I came here because I truly believe Prince Lucas is alive. I’ll do anything I can to help find him.”

“For a price,” Duke Lorenzo said dryly. “You want the story.”

“I already have the story,” she reminded him. “I’ll admit that I would love an exclusive, but whether the king grants me that or not, I’ll do whatever I can to help find Prince Lucas. That’s the real story here.”

“I agree,” King Marcus said in a tone that warned them that he had had enough of their bickering. “The only thing of importance is finding Lucas. You can’t do that from here, Lorenzo. Not when he may be wandering around the mountains of Colorado, lost and confused and no doubt suffering from some serious injuries. So I’m reopening the investigation and sending you home with Eliza.”

“What?!”

“Your Highness, Duke Lorenzo doesn’t need me to show him the way to Colorado.”

“That’s true,” he replied, his lips twitching. “But he needs you to take him to Willy. And you did say you would help in any way you could. You meant that, didn’t you?”

Trapped, Eliza could hardly add that her help didn’t include doing any favors for the duke. She’d just have to bite her tongue and learn to tolerate him, like it or not. After all, it wasn’t as if she was going to have to spend weeks at a time with the man. The minute they reached Denver, she’d arrange a meeting with Willy, and drive him out to his place. Willy, of course, wouldn’t have anything to do with him, and that would be that. The Duke would admit defeat and fly back home, end of story.

So what was she worried about? She might have to spend another twenty-four hours in the duke’s company? If she couldn’t handle that in order to get a story, she had no right being in the newspaper business.

“Of course I meant it,” she said quietly. “I’ll call Willy as soon as we get back to Denver and set up a meeting.”

Pleased, he smiled. “Then it’s settled. You and Lorenzo will work together. Between the two of you, with your investigative skills and his years in intelligence, you’re bound to find Lucas.”

Lorenzo wasn’t too sure of that—the prince had been missing for a year and could be anywhere!—but at the moment, the king had another pressing problem to handle. Down the hall, family and new allies were waiting for him to announce his successor. Now that there was a strong possibility that Lucas was alive, that announcement would, of course, be put on hold.

“For the moment, I think it would be wise if you didn’t say anything specific about this new evidence, Your Highness,” Lorenzo said quietly. “Just as a precaution.”

“I agree,” he replied solemnly. “Lucas obviously isn’t himself or he would have been in touch with us by now, so we must do what we can to protect him.” Turning his attention back to Eliza, he gave her a hard look. “I need your word that you won’t reveal my son’s whereabouts until he is safe, Eliza. If you can’t do that and still write your story, then I need to know now.”

Eliza didn’t pretend to misunderstand what he was saying. If she couldn’t promise to write the story the way the king wanted, there would be no exclusive. “I like to think I’m a responsible reporter, Your Highness. I believe in freedom of the press, but I also realize that what I write can have repercussions. I don’t like withholding information from my readers, but in this case, I agree that there is a need to protect the prince as much as possible. What I’d like to do is write a feature story on him—his life, and hopefully, his rescue. The search for him will have to be included in that, of course, but the story won’t be printed until after Prince Lucas is back home, safe and sound.”

“And your editor will agree to this?”

Simon would have a stroke, but that was something she had no intention of telling the royals. “He won’t like it,” she said honestly. “He would much rather cover the search as it’s happening, but he’ll accept whatever terms I agree to.” He had to. She was writing the story. He couldn’t force her to divulge anything she didn’t want to. “I give you my word that I won’t write anything that will place the Prince in danger.”

Considering that, the king glanced at the queen. “What do you think, sweetheart? Should we even consider giving anyone an exclusive at this point? We have to do what’s right for Lucas.”

Before she could respond, Lorenzo said, “Then the real question here is whether you can trust a woman you don’t know from Adam. She’s a reporter. She has her own agenda.”

Her eyes flashing with irritation, Eliza didn’t say a word in her own defense. How could she? He was right. She was a reporter and she did have her own agenda—she wanted a story that would rock the world back on its heels. That didn’t mean, however, that she was a liar.

“We all have our own agenda,” Queen Gwendolyn replied. “I want my son back, and just this morning, I didn’t think that was possible. Thanks to Eliza, now I do.”

Turning to Lorenzo, she said, “So the answer to your question is yes, I think we can trust her. By granting her an exclusive, it’s in her best interest to keep Lucas’s whereabouts a secret. Not only will she have more to write about, but she’ll protect her source so someone else won’t find him before we do and steal the story right out from under her.”

“I agree,” the king said. “Eliza will do the right thing. The exclusive is hers. Lorenzo, find my son for me.”

“I’ll do my best, Your Highness.”

“I know you will,” he said gruffly. “Now that that’s settled, I have an announcement to make. I’ve kept my guests waiting long enough.”

Only he and the queen knew for sure who he had chosen to succeed him, and that was information they chose to keep to themselves. Watching them stride out, Eliza couldn’t help but envy Lorenzo as he joined them. Given the chance, she would have found a way to follow them, but before she could even think about moving, Rudy stepped into the doorway, blocking her path.

“Duke Lorenzo will meet you at the airport for your return flight to the United States. You do not need to make flight arrangements, as you’ll be traveling on one of the king’s private jets,” he informed her. “The king has ordered a car to drive you there now.”

When he motioned for her to proceed him out another door across the room, she could hardly take offense. What did she care if she missed out on the king’s announcement? She had the real story. The prince was alive, and she had an exclusive! Life didn’t get any better than that.

With every tick of the clock, the volume of the conversation in the throne room seemed to escalate as more and more guests speculated about the growing lateness of the hour and the king’s tardiness. Standing off to the side of the podium that had been set up earlier for the king’s announcement, Kyle Ramsey could well understand the concerned whispers being bandied about by the other guests. The king, as a rule, was generally a punctual man. Unlike some men of power, he respected other people’s time as much as he did his own. He wouldn’t be this late unless something was seriously wrong.

“What do you think’s going on?” his brother, Tyler, asked as he propped a shoulder against a pillar and studied the crowd with watchful eyes. “Something’s happened.”

“I don’t know,” he murmured, “but I don’t like it.”

He had just cause to be concerned. Last year, as a top gun pilot and newly recruited member of the Noble Men, a covert team of peacekeepers that traveled the world protecting women and children, he had, along with the rest of the team, helped restore relations between Montebello and its neighbor, Tamir, after a century-long feud. Peace in the region was of utmost importance, and for the past few weeks, he’d been training his brother to help with the monitoring of the skies over the eastern Mediterranean. When they’d received an invitation to the palace to witness the king’s announcement of his new heir, Kyle had assumed the invitation was just a matter of courtesy. Now he wasn’t so sure.

Before he could start to worry about what was going on, there was a stir at the door and the king and queen entered, followed by their nephew, Duke Lorenzo. Considering the fact that with the naming of a successor, the king was virtually acknowledging the death of his son, Kyle was surprised to see him smiling. He’d expected the meeting to be tense and tearful. Instead, King Marcus was almost beaming as he moved to the podium.

Silence fell over the elegant confines of the throne room. “I apologize for the delay,” the king said, greeting his elite group of guests with an easy smile. “First, I would like to thank you all for coming. As you must all know by now, I invited you here to name my successor to the throne.”

The guests exchanged speaking glances, and suddenly, there was a tension in the air that hadn’t been there before. Who would be king? The question seemed to float around the room, but if the king noticed, he gave no sign of it. Still smiling, he held out his hand to the queen, and with a love that lit up her entire face, she moved to his side.

Together, they faced their family, friends and allies. “As you all know, the past year has not been easy for us,” King Marcus continued. “Queen Gwendolyn and I both believed with all our hearts that Prince Lucas was alive, but with each passing day, it was harder to hang on to hope. Eventually, we reached a point where we had to face the fact that life had to go on. I had to have an heir. Choosing someone to succeed me other than my son was not something I was looking forward to. Now, thankfully, it turns out that I don’t have to.”

When a collective gasp rose from his guests, he had to smile. “No, it’s not quite what you think. We haven’t found Prince Lucas…yet. But there are some new developments in the case, and although I’m not at liberty to tell you what they are at this time, the queen and I wanted you to know that we have high hopes that he will be back with us soon. Thank you all for coming. You’ll never know what your prayers and support have meant to us.”

Chapter 3

With the king and queen’s exit, silence fell like a shroud, and for what seemed like an eternity, the guests just stood there, unable to believe the sudden turn of events. Then, an invisible switch seemed to be flicked, and in the next breath, everyone was talking at once.

“Can you believe that?” Hassan Kamal exclaimed. “Talk about timing!”

“I personally find it a little too convenient,” Butrus Dabir replied, his hawklike features hard with suspicion. “Think about it. The prince has been missing for a full year, then the very day the king is prepared to announce a successor, suddenly there’s some mysterious news that he may be alive, after all. Obviously, he doesn’t want to name Princess Julia and Sheik Rashid as his successors.”

“You always were suspicious of the Sebastianis, Butrus,” Sheik Ahmed said dryly. “It must be that legal mind of yours. You see a conspiracy around every corner.”

Not the least offended, he didn’t deny it. “They are too closely aligned with the West, sire. They do not think like us.”

“That, unfortunately, is too true,” he agreed. “In this particular instance, however, I don’t think King Marcus is deliberately conspiring to deny his daughter the throne. He’s just a grieving father who isn’t ready to acknowledge his son’s death. I can’t say I blame him. I would find that equally difficult.”

Standing nearby, overhearing the entire conversation, Princess Julia could have hugged her father-in-law for that. There was no question that her family did think differently from her husband’s family, but much of that had to do with the feud that had existed between their two countries for the past century. Trust was not something that came automatically just because peace had been declared.

When it came to family, however, there was very little difference between the Sebastianis and the Kamals. They believed, as she and her parents did, that nothing was more important in life than the love of family.

Reading her thoughts, her father-in-law looked right at her at that moment, his black eyes alight with sympathy and understanding, and it was all she could do not to cry. She missed her brother terribly and couldn’t blame her parents for wanting to believe Lucas was still alive. She did, too.

At her side, Rashid took her hand and twined his fingers with hers, his dark eyes smiling into hers when she looked up. He didn’t say a word—he didn’t have to. After everything they’d been through, they had a knowledge of each other that went soul deep.

“The king may be grieving, but he understands that it’s his duty to protect the monarchy at all costs,” Rashid told Butrus and his father. “He wouldn’t postpone naming a successor unless he truly believed Lucas was alive.”

“I agree,” Hassan said. “Whatever’s going on, it has nothing to do with some kind of secret plot to deny Julia and Rashid the throne. They never had much of a chance at it anyway. No offense,” he told his brother and sister-in-law with a quick grin. “It’s just a matter of common sense. If the Sebastiani monarchy is to continue, it has to be handed down through the male line.”

Julia agreed. “That doesn’t mean there won’t be a strong alliance between our two countries,” she said. “Now we are not only linked by marriage, but by blood, thanks to baby Omar. The friendship between Montebello and Tamir can only grow stronger.”

“I hope so,” Butrus said coolly. “I just don’t like this new development.”

He wasn’t the only one. Moving to join his brother, Desmond couldn’t imagine what new evidence the king was talking about, but he was absolutely livid. Lorenzo would be king, dammit! It was his right. Marcus had raised him like a son, and it was time he let go of this pipe dream that Lucas was still alive and give Lorenzo the position he deserved in the family. Then, when his dearly loved brother ascended to the throne, he, Desmond, would have the position he, too, deserved. He would be the next best thing to king! That was only just. After all, as the oldest son of the king’s deceased brother, Antonio, he was also the king’s nephew. It wasn’t his fault his mother had been a household maid, he thought bitterly. If he had been legitimate instead of his father’s bastard child, he would the one the king was now considering as his heir to the throne.

His resentment of that was, however, something he had kept well hidden over the years. So when his brother joined him again, he greeted him with a pretended look of pleased surprise. “This is wonderful news, Lorenzo! So what is this new evidence the king was talking about? Does he really have proof that Lucas is alive?”

“You know I’m not at liberty to say anything about the investigation,” he said. “All I can say is that there’s some new evidence.”

“Oh, come on,” Desmond chided him. “I’m your brother. You can trust me. I won’t say anything to anyone.”

“I didn’t say that you would,” he replied smoothly. “But the case has been reopened, and I don’t talk about active cases. Especially when the palace is virtually surrounded by reporters. The very walls have ears.”

Left with no choice, Desmond graciously accepted the fact that he would have to wait just like everyone else to find out what this new evidence was. But he didn’t like it. He didn’t like it all. Forcing a smile, he said, “You know best, little brother. I’m sure you’ll tell me when you can.”

From across the room, the Ramsey brothers silently gauged the guests’ reaction, and neither liked what they saw. “That one bothers me,” Kyle said quietly, flicking a look toward Desmond. “His eyes are cold as hell.”

“He’s close to the king,” Tyler reminded him.

Unimpressed, Kyle shrugged. “That’s only one more reason to watch him…along with everyone else. In case you haven’t noticed, he’s not the only one who’s less than happy with the king’s announcement.”

Tyler had noticed, all right, and he didn’t mind admitting he was worried. Some of the Kamals had been openly speculative, and where there was speculation, there was still distrust. “Peace with Tamir is still fragile. Anyone who wanted to shatter the Kamals’ relationship with Montebello could find a way to use this to their advantage.”

His expression grim, Kyle had already thought of that. “It’s our job to make sure that doesn’t happen.” It went without saying that they had their work cut out for them.

* * *

Cooling her heels at the airport, Eliza could just imagine the scene at the palace when the king announced that his son was alive. The place was probably in an uproar. Simon was going to hate that she missed that, but she hadn’t wanted to push her luck by asking to be present when the king gave his friends and allies the news. Not when she’d been granted an exclusive in the search for Prince Lucas! That alone was going to be worth a small fortune in headlines.

And the only fly in the ointment was that she had to work with Duke Lorenzo.

Irritating man, she thought, grimacing. She didn’t know how he’d developed a reputation as a flirt with the ladies. Granted, he had the Sebastiani looks—her heart had shifted in her breast just at the sight of him. Then he’d opened his mouth and ruined all her expectations.

That didn’t, however, mean that she wouldn’t be able to work with him. He had an attitude, but she’d dealt with worse. He might be a duke and come from a long line of royalty, but she was confident she could handle him. For the kind of headlines this story was going to generate, she could handle the devil himself.

“Speak of the devil,” she muttered to herself as she spied Lorenzo making his way toward her through the crowded airport. Carrying a small suitcase in his hand, he looked like he owned the place, she thought, then had to grin ruefully. He was a Sebastiani. Maybe he did!

His green eyes narrowing at the sight of her, she wasn’t surprised when he appeared to be less than pleased to see her. The only reason he was even associating with her at all was because the king had ordered him to. Lovely, she sighed. This was going to be just lovely. This was going to be worse than working with Deborah.

“Your Grace,” she said by way of a greeting. “I’m ready when you are.”

“Let’s go, then,” he said curtly, and motioned for her to follow him.

So much for common courtesy, she thought with a grimace as he led the way to the boarding gate the royal jet had been brought into. It was going to be a long flight. Hopefully, though, once they were on the plane, she wouldn’t have to deal with him until they got to Denver. She’d been too excited to sleep during the flight over, and exhaustion was quickly catching up with her. Lorenzo would, in his search for the prince, no doubt hit the ground running when they reached Denver, so she was going to need all the rest she could get. Hopefully, the jet had a sleep cabin in the back she could take advantage of. She wouldn’t mind using it—mainly to put more distance between herself and the duke.

“I hope you don’t mind if I sit in the back and catch a few winks,” she said as she followed him on to the lavishly appointed plane, trying not to gawk too much at the expensive furnishings.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he retorted. “I can’t talk to you when you’re at the back of the plane. You’ll sit with me.”

“Your wish is my command,” Eliza muttered under her breath, rolling her eyes. So this was what it was like to be royalty. No wonder so many of the children grew up to lead wild lives. They were spoiled rotten!

Lorenzo, to his credit, didn’t take advantage of the flight attendant’s offer to bring him food or drink immediately. “No, thank you,” he told her with a charming smile he’d never once directed at Eliza. “We have a great deal of business to discuss right now. We’ll have some wine later.”

“As you wish, Your Grace,” she said and disappeared behind a curtain at the back of the plane, leaving them seated comfortably in the expensive leather seats in the first cabin.

And just that easily, Eliza found herself flying in a private jet, seated next to one of the best-looking men in Europe. Any other woman might have let it go to her head, but she wasn’t foolish enough to think that the duke had requested she fly in the same cabin because he wanted her with him. They were together for one reason and one reason only—business. It was his job to find Prince Lucas and hers to write about it. She’d be wise to remember that.

She told herself that wouldn’t be difficult. He didn’t like her—he was only tolerating her presence because he had to. And the feeling was mutual. That wasn’t going to change, she assured herself, just because he fairly oozed charm when he smiled. Let him charm someone else. That wasn’t what she was here for.

Still, once he settled next to her, buckled in, then turned the full force of his beautiful green eyes on her, her heart started to sputter and she wasn’t nearly as indifferent as she would have liked.

“Tell me more about Willy,” he commanded coolly as he pulled a small notebook out of the inside pocket of his suitcoat. “I need to know everything there is to know about the man. Do you think he really found the scarf? Or did he steal it? Is he capable of harming the prince? You said he fought in the Vietnam War. Does he suffer from flashbacks? Just how dangerous is he?”

He threw questions at her like she was some kind of underling, not even giving her a chance to answer one before he tossed another one at her. And that, on top of the heated words they’d exchanged at the palace, was too much, as far as Eliza was concerned. Settling into a more comfortable position, she leaned back in her seat and surveyed him with a jaundiced look in her eyes that he would have been wise to be wary of.

“Since we’re going to be working together, Your Grace,” she said silkily, “I think it’s important that we begin as we mean to continue. I know you’re the head of Montebello Intelligence, and I understand you’re used to grilling people, but in the future, I would appreciate it if you didn’t treat me as if I was some sort of suspect. For the record, I don’t take orders well and I appreciate the word please when I’m asked to do something. I’m also reasonably intelligent. If you’ll remember that, we’ll get along just fine.”

Just that easily, she put him in his place and made him feel like a jackass, all without breaking a sweat. He was the one with royal blood, but she was the one acting like a damn princess. And Lorenzo couldn’t help but admire her for that. She’d had every right to tell him off—he’d acted like a jerk, and he didn’t know why. There was just something about this tall, skinny American that really set his teeth on edge.

She was a reporter, he reasoned, and he’d yet to meet one that he liked. They were all a bunch of leeches. There wasn’t a royal in the world who could make a move, however innocent, without a reporter somewhere jumping on the story and making money off of it. And he hated that. Other people were allowed their privacy and the right to occasionally do something stupid in public without it making headlines, but not a royal. Because of reporters like Eliza.

All right, so maybe he couldn’t hold her responsible for what her cohorts did. He was still stuck with her, like it or not. He had to tolerate her, but that was it. He didn’t have to like her ingenuity, didn’t want to admire her tenacity, and sternly ordered himself not to find her Katharine Hepburn-type looks attractive in any way. He couldn’t allow himself to forget that anything he said or did while he was with her could be splashed all over the front page. He hated that, but there was nothing he could do about it—the king had ordered him to accompany her back to Colorado. His objective was to find Lucas, hopefully alive, and he couldn’t do that without Eliza.

And that meant he had to find a way to work with her. “Look,” he sighed, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to insult you and it certainly wasn’t my intention to treat you like a suspect. I’m not happy with the king’s orders, but I had no right to take that out on you. I won’t do it again.”

As far as apologies, it was much more than she’d expected. Pleasantly surprised, she said, “Thank you. I appreciate that.” Now that peace was established, she was more than willing to cooperate. “I don’t know what else I can tell you about Willy other than what I already have. He doesn’t deliberately lie—he’s just so suspicious that he’s paranoid sometimes.”

“But you believe him? You think he really found the scarf where he said he did?”

“Yes, I do.”

“But you just said that he’s paranoid sometimes. How do you know that he didn’t find the scarf at the crash site and just imagine it was somewhere else? He doesn’t sound very stable, if you ask me.”

Eliza couldn’t argue with that. There were times when Willy wasn’t very stable. But she believed him, and she couldn’t even say why. “I don’t know how to explain him to you. After he found the scarf, he must have called me a dozen times at work. He was truly concerned that the king was going to accept the fact that the prince was dead and name a new successor to the throne.”

“It wouldn’t have mattered if he had,” Lorenzo replied. “Everyone knows that if Lucas showed up alive, even if it was years from now, that he would be the king’s heir. He’s his son. No one else could ever take his place.”

“You and I know that, but Willy isn’t always playing with a full deck. In his eyes, once the king named a successor, Prince Lucas would lose his place in line forever, and he couldn’t let that happen.”

Still skeptical, he could only shake his head in wonder. “And this is the man who’s going to lead us to the prince. God help us all.”

Eliza couldn’t argue with that. Prince Lucas had been missing for a year, and what clues there were that might lead to his whereabouts had probably long since dried up and blown away. Every major law enforcement agency in the country had already looked for him, without success. If they were going to find him, they were going to need all the help they could get.

Lorenzo had never met anyone who could fall asleep so easily. After Eliza told him everything she could about Willy Cranshaw, she pulled her notebook computer from her satchel, busily typed her notes, then tucked it away again. Just seconds after that, she leaned back in her seat and was out like a light almost immediately. Not knowing her intentions until she dosed off, he felt guilty for not offering her a bed in the lounge at the back. Then, as he found himself studying her in spite of his best efforts not to, he was glad he hadn’t.

Why did she have to be so pretty?

The thought slipped into his head uninvited, irritating him no end. He would have sworn he didn’t care much for redheads, but there was something about her corkscrew curls that he found incredibly feminine and appealing—especially when they were piled on top of her head as they were now. He wanted to touch them to see if they were as soft as they looked—but he didn’t dare.

Glancing away, he sternly ordered himself to ignore her. He might as well have told himself not to breathe. She’d forgotten to take off the small, hornrimmed glasses she wore when she worked, and they’d slipped down on her pert nose. He should have left them alone, but before he could stop himself, he found himself reaching for them.

Too late, he realized his mistake. When he gently lifted the glasses from her nose, she sighed in her sleep and turned slightly toward him, snuggling too close for comfort. The faint scent of her perfume drifted to his nose, teasing him. Swearing soundlessly, he clenched his teeth on an oath and carefully laid her glasses on the tray in front of her, then quickly turned his attention to a news magazine he retrieved from his briefcase. The words blurred before his eyes, but he didn’t look at his companion again. It was just safer that way. And though he realized it might be even safer for him to move to another seat in the otherwise empty cabin, he couldn’t bring himself to leave her presence. It was as if she held him there, by her side.

“Your Grace, we will be landing in Denver in approximately ten minutes,” the flight attendant said.

Jerked awake by the softly spoken words, Eliza sat up with a start, only to frown when her gaze fell on the tray in front of her…and her glasses. She had no memory of taking them off, let alone laying them on the tray.

Suddenly suspicious, she glanced at her companion, but he never raised his eyes from his magazine. Had he taken them off for her? she wondered, only to dismiss the idea with a soundless snort. Not likely. He might have apologized for his curt behavior, but he’d admitted he wasn’t happy about working with her. He would tolerate her, but she didn’t expect him to be considerate. She’d probably removed her glasses herself and just forgotten about it.

And that was for the best, she assured herself. She didn’t want any favors from him, didn’t want any reason to like him. They didn’t have to be friends for her to do her job—they just had to be civil. Then when they each returned to their very different worlds, they could part company without any regrets.

So she tucked her glasses back into her purse and didn’t say a word, and neither did he. For the next ten minutes, the silence between them was deafening—until they landed and passed through customs. Then suddenly they realized there was a lot to do, and they hadn’t discussed any of it.

“We need a rental car…”

“I need to call my boss…”

“I’ll make sure the luggage is brought to the rental office…”

“I should have called Simon from Montebello. The paper might pay for the rental…”

“The king authorized me to pay for all expenses—”

Both speaking at the same time, they froze abruptly and only just then realized what the other had said. Frowning, Lorenzo said stiffly, “There’s no reason to call your boss. I’m paying for everything.”

His tone dared her to argue with him, and for a moment, Eliza had to struggle not to smile. If he thought Simon was going to object to him using his American Express card, he was in for a rude awakening. “I’m sure Simon will appreciate that, but I still need to call the office and check in. It won’t take long.”

“Then I’ll collect the luggage while you’re doing that and meet you at the rental car office.”

His head high and his bearing regal, he strode off, and watching him, Eliza could well understand why King Marcus had considered Lorenzo as his successor. Confident and proud, he looked like he could take on the world with one hand tied behind his back.

Not, she reminded herself, that he was ever likely to be king. Not now that there was a good chance that Prince Lucas was alive. Was that a disappointment to him? she wondered. She’d have to ask him and include that in her story.

Her mind already working on the opening paragraph, she stepped over to the bank of phones against the wall and quickly punched in Simon’s number. “Hey, LaGree,” she teasingly greeted him when he answered with a rough hello. “I’m back and you’re never going to guess what happened.”

“It better be good, Red,” he growled, “because you’ve got a column to file and a four o’clock deadline. Or did you forget that while you were having tea with the king and queen?”

“We never got around to tea,” she chuckled, “but you don’t have to worry about the column. Thanks to an exclusive the king granted me, I’m going to have enough material to fill the entire front page section.”

“Get out of here! You got an exclusive?”

“Oh, I got more than that,” she replied, grinning. “Duke Lorenzo flew back with me to talk to Willy and investigate where he found the scarf, and I’m going to be working with him during the search. Of course, this means I’ll be out of the office for a while. I hope that’s not going to be a problem.”

“Are you kidding?! Damn it all, Red, I underestimated you! Listen, you follow this to the end, you hear me? Keep good notes and check in every couple of days so I’ll know what’s going on, okay? This is going to get you a Pulitzer, Red. And if you pull this off and help find Prince Lucas, you deserve it.”

It wasn’t often that he called her by her first name, and just that easily, he touched her heart. “Thanks, Simon,” she said huskily. “Knowing you believe in me means a lot.”

“You better believe I believe in you,” he retorted. “Why do you think I didn’t let Little Miss Priss steal this story right out from under you? She wouldn’t know what to do with it if you handed it to her on a platter. And don’t you worry about her while you’re gone,” he added. “She’s happy in La-la land, and I plan on keeping her there as long as possible.”

Her smile rueful, Eliza appreciated that, but they both knew Deborah would be a threat to her as long as her daddy owned the paper and she wanted to play Brenda Starr. “Maybe Brad Pitt’ll fall for her and she’ll never come back.”

“We can only pray we get that lucky,” he said dryly.

Grinning, she said, “I’d better go—I’ve got to meet the duke at the rental car office. Thanks again, Simon. I’ll be in touch.”

“Hey, who’s paying for this?” he said quickly before she could hang up. “You didn’t commit the paper to anything, did you?”

He suddenly sounded so worried that she couldn’t resist stringing him along a little. “What do you think? I know how badly you want this story.”

“Dammit, Red, don’t do this to me!”

Laughing, she hung up.

She was still smiling when she reached the rental car office and found Lorenzo loading their luggage into the back of the Tahoe SUV he’d rented. “I thought we might need something rugged since we’re going up into the mountains,” he told her. “Were you able to talk to your boss?”

Grinning, she nodded. “He told me to take all the time I need.”

“Good. Then let’s go.” Always the gentleman, he opened the passenger door for her, then stepped around the vehicle and slid behind the wheel. Starting the motor, he put it in gear, then arched a brow at her. “Willy lives north of here, correct? In Boulder?”

“That’s right,” she said as he pulled away from the curb. “Turn right at the signal light.”

Without a word, he followed her directions, and within moments, they were on their way to Boulder. It seemed like she’d been traveling for a week, but as far as Eliza was concerned, they couldn’t get there fast enough. There was, however, little point in hurrying. It was already late in the day. They’d have to wait until tomorrow to see Willy.

“When we get to Boulder, we might as well go ahead and get a motel for the night,” she said as they left the city behind. “Willy doesn’t like visitors after three, so I’ll call him in the morning and set up a meeting for tomorrow.”

“But it’s early yet,” Lorenzo replied with a scowl. “Surely he can see us today. I wanted to head up into the mountains tomorrow to the campsite where he found the scarf.”

“You can’t rush Willy, Your Grace,” she replied. “He has his own rules when it comes to dealing with the outside world, and if we don’t play by those rules, we can forget seeing him at all. I know it’s frustrating, but it’s his way or no way.”

Frustrated didn’t begin to describe what Lorenzo was feeling. It had been a full year since Prince Lucas’s plane had gone down, and now that a new lead had surfaced that might eventually point to his whereabouts, he couldn’t even check it out. The Prince’s safety was in the hands of a crazy old mountain man who wouldn’t cooperate until he was good and ready.

And then, there was Eliza. From the moment he’d found her wandering the halls at the palace, he’d somehow lost control of everything. He’d ordered her shown to the door, but she’d still managed to finagle her way in to see the king and queen. When he’d wanted to fly to Colorado to interrogate Willy himself, she’d dropped the bombshell that the hermit would only talk to her. Because it was the king’s wish, Lorenzo had been forced to endure her company, and now she was trying to control the investigation itself!

He wouldn’t have it, dammit! He was the head of Royal Intelligence, and he wasn’t going to allow a gossip columnist, of all things, to control how and where and when he did his job. And what the devil kind of perfume was she wearing, anyway? The fresh, light scent of hers drifted through the confines of the SUV, teasing his senses, teasing him. He told himself he was just tired—they’d been traveling nonstop for hours and they could both use some rest and a break from each other—but he knew it was more than that. He wanted to ignore her and he couldn’t, dammit! And he didn’t like it.

“We need to get something straight,” he growled as they reached the outskirts of Boulder. “This is my investigation, and I’ll run it as I see fit. You’re just along for the ride.”

He watched her eyes narrow, but to her credit, she merely said, “You think so, do you?”

“You’re damn straight I think so. I know so! You’re obviously very good at your job, but you’re just a reporter. You have no experience in investigating—”

“Really?” she challenged, irritation glinting in her eyes. “Would you care to make a bet on that?”

Something in her tone warned him she wasn’t the type of woman who made a bet unless it was a sure thing, but it was too late for him to backpedal now. “So now you’re telling me you worked in intelligence? Yeah, right!”

Color seeped into her cheeks. “No one said anything about intelligence, Your Grace. I believe we were speaking about experience in investigating, and when it comes to that, I could tell you things about your own family that you probably don’t even know.”

“Like what?”

“Well, let’s see,” she said, considering. “If I remember correctly, you have a cousin on your mother’s side who was arrested in Portugal last year for shoplifting.” When his eyes widened in surprise, she added, “Apparently, this isn’t the first time she’s deliberately walked out of a store without paying for the merchandise she stuffed in her purse, but it is the first time a merchant actually dared to press charges. It took some fast talking on your part and a very generous contribution to the merchant’s retirement fund to convince him to forget this ever happened.”

Her smile more than a little smug, she said, “So, what were you saying about me not having any experience in investigating, Your Grace?”

Swearing under his breath, Lorenzo couldn’t help but wonder how she’d dug this all up. He would have sworn he’d buried it so deep, the story would never see the light of day again. “Where the hell did you get your information?” he demanded. “There was no police report, and the merchant signed a settlement agreeing to keep the matter quiet.”

“And he kept his word,” she replied with a sassy grin. “He wasn’t my source. I don’t reveal them.”

Torn between irritation and more than a little admiration—dammit, how had she found out about cousin Louisa?—he warned himself he was going to have to watch himself with her. She was turning out to be far more interesting and intelligent than he’d anticipated. And it didn’t help matters that she was so pretty. He’d always had a weakness for a woman with brains and looks, and he couldn’t allow himself to think of her as anything other than a reporter…or he’d find himself in more trouble than cousin Louisa had last year in Portugal.

“Fine,” he retorted. “Keep your sources to yourself. We both know this isn’t about Portugal. The prince is obviously in trouble or he would have found a way to get in touch with the family by now. My objective is to find him—yours is to get the story. I don’t have a problem with that. Just don’t get in my way.”

Eliza had no intention of doing that, but she wasn’t going to stand around with in her hands in her pockets while he took charge and scared Willy off, either. Then they would lose the prince and the story!

“And just how am I getting in your way, Your Grace?” she asked archly. “Is it something I said? What I’m wearing? My hair?”

“Don’t be ridiculous!”

“So it’s not me, personally?”

“Of course not.”

“Then there’s no reason why we can’t work together, is there?”

She’d neatly cornered him, and they both knew it. He scowled at her, and for a moment, she thought he was going to tell her exactly what he thought of her. Then a reluctant grin curled one corner of his mouth. “Very clever, Ms. Windmere. I can see right now that I’m going to have to watch myself around you.”

“You certainly are,” she agreed with twinkling eyes. “Don’t underestimate me. You might live to regret it.”

“I’ll remember that,” he promised. “And you’d be wise to do the same with me.”

Blue eyes meeting green, they silently acknowledged mutual respect for each other’s intelligence. It wasn’t peace, but it was a start.

Eliza had often wondered what it must be like to be royal. She found out when Lorenzo pulled up before one of the most expensive hotels in town and flipped the keys to the valet. Before she knew it, she had her own private suite—with a Jaccuzi whirlpool and room service at her disposal—without Lorenzo even bothering to ask the price. He’d even tipped the bellboy to bring up her small overnight bag.

If she hadn’t been so exhausted, she might have enjoyed staying in the lap of luxury. As it was, all she needed was hot and cold running water and a bed. Peeling off her clothes, she stepped into the shower and washed the dirt from what felt like three continents from her body. Fifteen minutes later, she fell in bed and was asleep before her head hit the pillow.

Dead to the world, she didn’t know anything until the next morning, when there was a loud banging at the door. Startled, she jumped awake, her heart pounding. “What in the world—”

“Eliza?! Dammit, open this door! I need to talk to you!”

Not what in the world, but who, she thought with a groan. What was wrong with the man? It was barely eight o’clock in the morning and they weren’t supposed to meet in the lobby until nine-thirty since she couldn’t get in touch with Willy until after ten. So what was so important that he had to talk to her now?

Muttering curses under her breath—she and the Duke were going to have to get a few things straight!—she rolled out of bed, grabbed her robe, and marched to the door. Her green eyes blazing, she jerked it open and glared at him. “Do you have any idea what time it is? Do you even care that you’re waking up everybody on this floor? What is wrong with you?”

“I’ll tell you what’s wrong,” he growled. Snapping open the morning paper, he held it up right in front of her nose. “This! You’ve got some explaining to do, lady. Where would you like to start?”

Her eyes on the bold headline spread across the front page of the morning edition of the Denver Sentinel, Eliza hardly heard him. Prince Lucas Alive! she read with a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. Duke And Reporter Follow New Leads In Search.

And there, right below the headlines, was a very flattering picture of Lorenzo.

Chapter 4

“Well, hell,” she sighed. This was just what they needed. They didn’t have a clue what circumstances Prince Lucas was in or what was preventing him from getting in touch with his family, which was why the investigation had to be done quietly. And now with Lorenzo’s picture splashed all over the paper, that was going to be impossible. “This is great. Just great.”

And she knew exactly who to blame. Simon.

Oh, he’d claim he’d just picked up the story from the wire service, but she knew better. She’d been very careful to make sure that she’d told no one about the scarf except the royal family and Simon, and she’d bet the Pulitzer she one day hoped to win that the Sebastianis hadn’t said a word to the press. They wanted their son back and they’d given her their word that she had an exclusive. They wouldn’t have leaked the story.

That left only Simon. The crafty old buzzard had splashed the headline across the front page on purpose. When the prince’s plane had first gone down, the story had been firmly lodged on the front page for weeks. But when there was nothing new to report, interest in the prince’s disappearance had grown stale. It had been months since there’d been any coverage about the search, and the public had a short memory. Simon knew that. Eliza could make a zillion agreements with the Sebastianis, but he was in the business to sell newspapers. And he was making damn sure he did that by stirring up attention about the prince again before she’d even written her feature, let alone turned it in for publication.

The only problem was, by plastering Lorenzo’s picture on the front page and letting the world know he was coming to the States to take up the search, he may have sabotaged the search before they’d even begun.

She was, Eliza decided, going to kill him. The only question was how. If he blew this exclusive for her, she swore she’d be satisfied with nothing less than boiling him in oil.

“Well?” Lorenzo said. “What have you got to say for yourself?”

What could she say? “I didn’t know anything about this, Lorenzo. You have to believe me. Evidently my boss thought he needed to generate a little interest in the Prince again.”

“A little interest?” he choked. “With four-inch headlines? Dammit, every paper in the country’s going to pick this up! Do you know what kind of problems that’s going to cause?”

“It won’t be that bad,” she began.

That was as far as she got. “The hell it won’t! The search is supposed to be on the Q.T. I realize that in your world, that’s probably not in your vocabulary, but this isn’t about you. It’s about the prince, and we don’t have a clue where he is or what kind of danger he could be in. Which is why

I wanted to keep the search for him quiet. Now that we wouldn’t even be able to look for the campsite where Willy found the scarf without every Tom, Dick and Harry dogging our steps!”

He was furious, and Eliza couldn’t say she blamed him. Finding the prince after all this time was going to be difficult enough without God knows who interfering with the search. “I’ll call Simon right now and chew him out,” she promised. “This won’t happen again.”

Silently cursing Simon for putting her in this position, she quickly punched in the number to his direct line. The second he came on the line, she let him have it with both barrels. “You’re a dirty rotten scoundrel, LaGree. Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”

“Now, Red, don’t get your girdle in a twist—”

“I don’t wear a girdle!”

“Aw, c’mon, you know what I mean,” he said, wheedling. “You want your Pulitzer, don’t you? How’re you going to get it if you don’t advertise?”

“This isn’t advertising, dammit, it’s sabotage! A man’s life is at stake. A prince, for heaven’s sake! From now on, don’t you dare publish anything else about the prince. Understood?”

If anyone else but Simon had been her boss, she probably would have been fired right there on the spot for speaking to him so, but he was a big enough man to admit when he was in the wrong. “All right, all right,” he grumbled. “Quit your crying. I won’t give away any more information that will put the prince in danger.”

“Yes! As long as you keep the duke’s picture out of the paper. He’s not the story here, Simon. The prince is.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he chided. “Duke Lorenzo would have been named the next king if Willy Cranshaw hadn’t found the scarf. And now he’s out searching for the man he could have replaced. Talk about ironic—of course he’s part of the story! The readers are going to love this!”

Eliza knew he was right—there was nothing readers loved more than a tragic tale of what might have been—but that was beside the point. “They can love it when the feature is published and without having the duke’s picture splashed across the front page,” she retorted. “I mean it, Simon. He’s not as well known as the rest of the family, and he wants to keep it that way. I want your word that there’ll be no more pictures.”

For a moment, she thought he was going to argue, but he knew her well enough to know that she wasn’t going to budge on this. “Okay,” he sighed grudgingly. “No more pictures. I promise. Though I don’t know what all the fuss is about,” he muttered. “There wasn’t any harm done.”

“That’s easy for you to say,” she told him. “You’re not standing where I am.”

Hanging up, she turned to face Lorenzo. “For what it’s worth, he promised. I should warn you, though, that Simon has printer’s ink in his blood. He lives and dies for a headline, and if he thinks he’s got a good one, he’s going to print it.”

It was the nature of the business, and they both knew it. “You did what you could,” he acknowledged. “I can’t ask for more than that.”

“I’ll do what I can to see that it doesn’t happen again,” she promised. “I have to check in with Simon on a regular basis, but I have no intention of telling him where we are or doing anything that will endanger the prince. This isn’t just a headline for me, Lorenzo,” she added quietly. “I know he’s your cousin and you care about him, but a lot of other people do, too. I’m one of them.”

There was no doubting her sincerity. His eyes searching hers, Lorenzo suddenly felt like a heel. From the moment he’d met her, he’d done nothing but give her a hard time. And he wasn’t proud of that. Yes, she was after a story—what reporter wasn’t?—but she wasn’t one of those piranhas who sold her soul to the devil just to make the evening edition. If she had been, she wouldn’t have cared less about the morning headlines, and she certainly wouldn’t have stood up to her boss the way she had.

“I’m sorry I woke you up,” he said gruffly. “I was just so mad when I saw the paper that I didn’t even look at the clock. I guess I dragged you out of bed.”

Since she was dressed in her nightclothes and her hair was still tangled from sleep, that was obvious, but Lorenzo regretted bringing the subject up the second the words were out of his mouth. With a will of their own, his eyes skimmed the blue nightshirt and robe she wore and he couldn’t help but notice how touchable she looked in the morning. Her skin was soft, her cheeks flushed, her mouth bare of lipstick—

Suddenly realizing where his thoughts and his eyes had wandered, he swore silently and took a quick step back. “I just remembered that I have some calls to make,” he said, taking another step back. “I’ll meet you in the lobby at nine-thirty, just as we planned. Okay? We can eat breakfast at the diner across the street, then go see Willy.”

He was gone before she could say a word, rushing out of her room like a man with a train to catch. Puzzled, Eliza caught sight of herself in the mirror and didn’t have time to wonder what had lit a fire under the duke. If she was going to be ready by nine-thirty, she had to get moving.

Eliza was still brushing her teeth when the bellhop arrived at nine-fifteen to collect her bag, and she had to laugh. Lorenzo was making damn sure she met him on time in the lobby. Hurriedly packing the last of her things in her bag, she gave it to the bellhop, checked the suite to make sure she hadn’t left anything, then carried her satchel—complete with her computer—down to the lobby herself.

“Why didn’t you let the bellhop carry that?” he asked with a frown as he took the bag from her and escorted her outside to where the valet had brought up their rental. “That’s why I sent him up.”

“That’s my livelihood,” she said simply. “I don’t trust it to anyone I don’t know.”

She didn’t expect him to understand—he’d been born with a silver spoon in his mouth and couldn’t possibly know what it was like to have to scrimp and save to buy something like a Notebook computer—but he didn’t question her about it. Instead, he said, “I’ll remember that,” and opened the door of the SUV for her.

He’d done it before when they rented the vehicle at the airport, and this time, as before, the courteous gesture caught her off guard. She liked to think she was an independent woman who didn’t need a man to open her door for her or carry her groceries or anything else for her. But he had a way of treating a woman that she found incredibly flattering. And he didn’t even seem to be aware of it—his good manners were just ingrained.

Don’t be too flattered, a voice in her head drawled. He’s way out of your league, and he doesn’t like reporters. Remember that, and you’ll get along just fine.

Jerked back to reality, she felt heat climb into her cheeks as she realized where her thoughts had wandered. What in the world was wrong with her? Less than twenty-four hours ago, she’d wanted to shake the king for forcing her to work with the man, and now she found herself flattered that he’d opened the door for her? She had to be losing her mind.

Thankfully, she didn’t have time to dwell on that. They reached the diner in a matter of moments, and once again, Lorenzo was opening a door for her, only this time, it was to the diner. “A table for two,” he told the hostess who greeted them with a smile. “Non-smoking.”

“This way,” the woman said, only to glance at him again and frown. “Hey, don’t I know you? You look awfully familiar.”

At his side, Eliza felt him stiffen ever so slightly, but his smile was easy when he said, “Sorry, but I’ve never been here before. You must have me mixed up with someone else.”

“Oh. Sorry. It’s just that I’d swear I’ve seen you before,” she said. Then it hit her. “Oh, my God, you’re that duke, the one who’s looking for Prince Lucas! I saw your picture in the paper this morning.”

Beaming, she said, “Oh, this is wonderful! I was telling my husband, Fred, not even an hour ago, that I bet someone kidnapped the prince and is hiding him out at Elk Canyon. It’s a box canyon and you’ve really got to know where you’re going or you’ll lose all sense of direction.

“I could take you up there,” she offered eagerly, her eyes shining at the sudden thought. “Of course, I’d have to take off from work, and I don’t have any leave, so I’d need some kind of compensation, but we could work that out. I wouldn’t be unreasonable or anything. I just want to help find the prince.’ Cause it’s the right thing to do, ya know.”

“I appreciate that,” Lorenzo said with the inbred politeness that royalty always seemed to possess when it came to dealing with the public, “but I have some other leads to run down at the moment. If those don’t pan out, I’ll get back with you. Do you normally work the morning shift?”

With that simple enquiry, he dazzled her right out of her shoes. “Every morning,” she said, beaming. “Oh, wow! Wait’ll I tell Fred! He’s going to drop his teeth!”

“I’m sure he will,” Lorenzo said dryly. “Now…if we could have a table? We’re really in a hurry.”

“Oh, my gosh, what an idiot I am! I’m so sorry, Your Highness. Right this way.”

Grabbing a couple of menus, she rushed them over to a booth next to the window, apologizing all the while and promising Lorenzo that he was going to have the best breakfast he’d ever eaten. “Your waitress will be right with you. Just ask for the special, and I promise you won’t regret it.”

Gracious, Lorenzo thanked her, his smile never wavering, but Eliza was starting to recognize that particular look on his face. He already had regrets, and she didn’t doubt that if he had it all to do over again, he would have gone through a McDonald’s drive-thru. As it was, just about everyone in the place was shooting him covert glances and whispering among themselves, and it was obvious that they, too, had seen the morning paper.

Coming to the same conclusion, Lorenzo swore softly, his expression grim. “I was afraid of this. It’s that damn picture! How the hell am I going to conduct a search when the whole world is watching and offering their opinion?”

He didn’t, thankfully, blame her, but Eliza wouldn’t have blamed him if he had. If it hadn’t been for her and her overzealous boss, he could have been well into the search and might have even found the prince before anyone knew what he was about.

“I’m sorry,” she said quietly as soon as they’d given their order to the blushing young woman who rushed forward to wait on them and deliver two steaming cups of coffee to their table. “The damage is done. It won’t do any good to retract the story—people have already seen your picture. They’re going to recognize you unless you grow a beard or something. Of course, that takes time. It won’t do you any good now.”

In the process of stirring cream into his coffee, he glanced up sharply. “What did you say?”

Surprised, she blinked. “About what? The beard? It’s not going to do you any good today.”

“No,” he said thoughtfully, “but a disguise isn’t a bad idea. I’ll change my clothes, put on some sunglasses, even wear a hat. How do you think I’d look with a cowboy hat? I could get some jeans and boots and pass myself off as a cowboy.”

If he hadn’t been so serious, Eliza would have laughed at the very suggestion that Duke Lorenzo Sebastiani pass himself off as a cowboy. He looked and dressed like he’d just stepped out of the pages of GQ. She didn’t care what he wore, it wasn’t going to change the sophistication that was as much a part of him as the green of his eyes.

“I don’t know,” she said doubtfully. “Cowboys are a pretty rugged lot. It’s more than just the clothes.”

“Are you saying I’m not rugged?”

Put on the spot, she said, “No!” But then she immediately changed her mind. “Yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying. You’re a duke, for heaven’s sake! Dukes and cowboys are as different as day and night.”

Lorenzo appreciated her honesty, but his title had been granted to him by the king in appreciation of his military service for Montebello. Just because he’d been raised by Marcus and Gwendolyn after his parents died and the palace had become his home didn’t mean he was some kind of pampered royal who was afraid to get his hands dirty. He hadn’t received any special treatment when he was in the military; he’d carried his own weight.

“We’ll see,” he said as the waitress arrived with a breakfast fit for a king. “You just might be surprised.”

She had her doubts and she didn’t make any effort to hide them, but Lorenzo wasn’t worried. Digging into the ham and eggs and hashbrowns he’d ordered, he could already see himself dressed as a cowboy. A slow grin tugged at the corner of his mouth. His mission was a serious one, but he had to admit, this was going to be fun.

“The mall is the other direction,” Eliza told him thirty minutes later when he pulled out of the diner parking lot and turned left. “I thought you wanted to get some western clothes.”

“I do,” he said. But instead of turning around, he drove slowly down the street, reading the signs of every business they passed. “Here we go,” he said suddenly, grinning as he turned into the parking lot of a used-clothing store.

Eliza took one look at it and said, “You can’t be serious.”

“Oh, ye of little faith,” he teased, and got out to open her car door for her.

The shop was everything he’d hoped it would be. Crowded and musty, it was packed full of everything from used Levi’s jeans to old prom dresses from the fifties. And somewhere in all those old castoffs was his disguise.

“I can’t believe you’re doing this,” Eliza said when he moved to a rack of used jeans and started going through them. “I thought you’d buy something new.”

“And look like a drugstore cowboy? I don’t think so. I want to look like the average John Wayne on the street, and I can’t do that in new clothes.” Glancing up from the jeans he was checking out, he arched a brow when he saw her smile. “What’s so funny?”

“There was nothing average about John Wayne. That’s why he was John Wayne.”

He couldn’t disagree with that. “Okay, poor choice. Let’s try for a hired hand who doesn’t have two nickels to rub together. That means I need worn jeans and faded shirts that are frayed at the cuffs.”

“And something to drive around in besides a brand-new Tahoe SUV,” she pointed out dryly. “It doesn’t fit the image.”

“Good point,” he replied. “We’ll take care of that later. Right now, let’s work on the clothes.”

With her help, it didn’t take long to find exactly what he was looking for. The shop even had an old, scuffed pair of cowboy boots that were just his size. When Eliza looked aghast at the idea of him wearing someone else’s used boots, he laughed. “Don’t worry. I’m not going to ruin my feet. I just want to see how they look.”

He disappeared into the small dressing area, only to emerge a few minutes later in his disguise. Settling the used and abused black Stetson hat he’d picked out on his head, he opened the dressing room door to find Eliza waiting for him outside. “Well?” he asked, spreading his arms wide. “What do you think?”

Stunned, she blinked, wide-eyed. “I don’t believe it.”

She’d always heard that the clothes made the man, but she’d never quite understood what the phrase meant until now. She’d covered the Sebastianis for years in her column, and during that time, she must have seen dozens of photos of Lorenzo in his military uniform tuxedos, and suits that came right out of Saville Row. And in each of those pictures, he’d always looked every inch the duke.

There was no sign of that man now. She didn’t know how he’d done it, but even his posture had changed. With the scarred cowboy hat set low on his head, concealing his sandy-brown hair, the pointed old boots on his feet and the faded clothes molding his lean body, he looked like he’d just walked in off the range.

“Incredible,” she said, amazed. “I never would have believed it if I hadn’t seen it with my own two eyes.”

Pleased, he grinned and tipped his hat back slightly, and just that easily, he changed the image again. He still looked like a hardworking cowboy, but now he had the look of a rogue, a flirt. With nothing more than a crooked grin, he set Eliza’s heart pounding.

Shocked, she pressed a hand to her heart before she realized it, drawing a curious look from Lorenzo. “Are you all right?” he asked with a sudden frown. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” she said quickly, and blushed to the roots of her hair. “You just surprised me. I never thought you’d be able to pull it off.”

“I told you I could,” he said with another grin that made her heart trip. “Now, what about you?”

She blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“You can’t dress like that when I look like I just walked off a roundup,” he explained. “You’re too citified. We don’t look like we belong together.”

Eliza wouldn’t have described her black wool slacks and black and white sweater as citified, but she had to admit, he had a point. “I’ve got jeans in my suitcase. I’ll change.”

“You need a flannel shirt,” he insisted, grabbing one off the rack. “And a sheepskin coat. It’s cold out.”

Eliza had never had a sheepskin coat in her life—the western style had never suited her. But even as she started to tell him no, she made the mistake of touching the one he held out to her. “Oh! It’s so soft!”

“C’mon,” he urged, grinning. “Try it.”

Her eyes met his, and she couldn’t resist the sparkle of fun she saw there. This was a side of him she hadn’t even known existed. “Oh, all right. But I probably won’t buy it. After we find the prince, I’ll have nowhere else to wear it.”

“So wear it to the grocery store,” he said with a grin as he held it open for her to slip her arms in. “It’s a used coat, Eliza. Have fun with it.”

“Easy for you to say,” she retorted sassily. “You look like the Marlboro man. I look like…” She glanced in the mirror and groaned “…a redheaded Olive Oyle being hugged by a sheep.”

Any other man would have laughed, but Lorenzo was truly amazed that she thought she looked anything like Pop-eye’s girlfriend. Did she truly not see how pretty she was?

“Why do you do that?” he asked in puzzlement, stopping her when she would have turned away and shrugged out of the coat. “Look at yourself.” And not giving her time to object, he turned her back to the mirror, then stepped behind her, holding her in front of him with his hands on her shoulders.

“Look at you,” he said again, this time huskily. “You’re not skinny like Olive Oyle. You have the slenderness and grace of a young Katharine Hepburn. Can’t you see it? Can’t you see the passion and fire in your eyes? Look at your bone structure, the line of your throat. You’re beautiful and you don’t even know it. Look.”

In the mirror, she watched as he pulled her fiery curls up off her neck, then cradled her face between his hands. His eyes met hers, and with nothing more than a look and the touch of his hands, he made her feel beautiful for the first time in her life.

And it shook her to the core.

Who was this man? she wondered wildly. How could he make her feel pretty when no one else ever had? For as long as she could remember, she’d been in that gangly stage where she was all arms and legs, angles and planes. Most girls outgrew that by the time they were sixteen. At twenty-seven, she never had.

He was a magician, she thought, dazed. A sorcerer with supernatural powers who painted images with words. Nothing had changed—she was the same person she’d always been—but when she saw herself through his eyes, images of the old Eliza Windmere fell away. And just that easily, she was pretty.

She wanted to laugh and cry and turn and throw herself into his arms. But she couldn’t do any of those things. She didn’t dare. Her heart was already pounding, her senses in a whirl, and it was all because of him. If she made the mistake of touching him now, she would be in serious trouble.

And that was the last thing she needed right now, she reminded herself. She wasn’t looking for a man, especially one like Lorenzo. Not when her breakup with Robert was still an open wound. He’d been jealous of her job and the time she gave to it, and that had destroyed their relationship. And now, here she was, attracted to another man who didn’t approve of what she did for a living. She wasn’t going there again. She couldn’t.

“I don’t know that I’d go so far as to use the word beautiful,” she said with a forced laugh as she took a step away from him, freeing herself from his touch. “But thanks for the compliment. Maybe I’ll buy the coat, after all. It’s really warm.”

The magic mood shattered between them, she hurried to the checkout counter and could feel his eyes on her every step of the way. He let the moment pass, however, and she told herself she was relieved. Unfortunately, she’d never been very good at lying to herself.

True to his word, Lorenzo was nothing if not thorough. From the used-clothing store, they went straight to a usedcar dealership and bought a ten-year-old pickup truck that looked like it had seen better days. It had a good motor, though, so they turned in the rented Tahoe without fear that they were going to break down in the middle of nowhere, then headed up into the mountains where Willy lived. Anyone seeing them in their new old clothes and the battered pickup would have never guessed that Lorenzo was a duke or she was a city girl who interviewed kings and queens and wrote for the Sentinel.

Smiling at the thought, she was just about to tell him how much she was enjoying going undercover with him when he ruined everything by saying, “When we reach Willy’s, I want to do the questioning. I know you’re friends and he trusts you, but he may know more than he realizes he does. He’s going to have to talk to me.”

Everything he said made perfect sense—to Eliza. It wouldn’t mean a hill of beans to Willy. “If we were talking about an average man on the street, I’d agree with you. But as I’ve told you before, Your Grace, Willy dances to the beat of a different drummer. He doesn’t have to do anything, and he knows it. He won’t talk to you.”

“Of course he will,” he said stubbornly. “You said yourself how upset he was at the thought of the king naming another heir when his son was still alive. He obviously wants to help find Lucas. To do that, he’s going to have to talk to me.”

Eliza could have told him that Willy wouldn’t even talk to her if she didn’t call him ahead of time and make arrangements to meet him, but what was the point? His mind was made up, and Eliza only had to look at the stubborn set of his jaw to know that nothing she could say was going to make a difference. He was determined to do things his way. He’d find out for himself that wasn’t going to work.

“Turn left at the next four-way stop,” she told him. “Then just keep going straight for ten miles until we reach a dirt road. After that, it gets a little tricky.”

Tricky was, in fact, an understatement. When they reached the dirt road that led to the box canyon where Willy lived, Eliza knew from experience just how easy it was to lose your way. Off-road drivers had carved out dozens of tracks that intersected the main road and it was very confusing.

Frowning, she leaned forward to study the terrain and said suddenly, “Turn left here…I think.”

A quarter of a mile later, the road turned as rough as a washboard, just as it should have, and Eliza breathed a sigh of relief. “This is it. Watch the odometer. His house is exactly two miles from the cattle guard we’re coming up on.”

Because of the roughness of the drive, they were forced to go slowly, and it was another ten minutes before they actually reached the trees that surrounded Willy’s house on all sides, completely concealing it from the untrained eye. When Eliza told him to pull over and park, Lorenzo looked around in confusion. “Here? I thought we were going to his house.”

“We are,” she said, nodding toward the trees. “It’s back there.”

When he lifted a brow in surprise, Eliza had to smile. Willy’s cabin was only a hundred yards from the road, but from where they were parked, it looked like there wasn’t another living soul for a hundred miles. “I told you he likes his privacy. C’mon.”

Leading the way, she picked her way through the trees to a small log cabin that had to have been built by one of the original settlers in the area. Not quite plumb, it leaned to the left and had a front porch that appeared to be on the verge of collapsing. There were only two windows, which were dark and locked tight, and a formidable wooden door. Dark and dusty and less than welcoming, the place didn’t encourage visitors any more than Willy did.

Knowing that, Eliza felt she had to try to talk some sense into Lorenzo one more time. “This isn’t going to work, Your Grace. If you’d just listen to me…”

For an answer, he stepped forward and knocked loudly on the door. Not surprisingly, no one answered.

“Obviously, he’s not home,” he said, scowling.

“Oh, he’s here,” she said, and nodded to a metal loop on the door where it could be padlocked from the outside. “When he’s not here, he padlocks the door.”

“But there’s no vehicle.”

“Not that you can see,” she replied. “He drives an old army jeep that he hides in the woods.”

She didn’t say another word, but she didn’t have to. She’d made her point. Willy was home, and she knew him better than Lorenzo did. If he wasn’t answering his door, it was because he was feeling threatened.

Glaring at the closed door, Lorenzo swore softly and shot Eliza a hard look. “I screwed up, didn’t I? Don’t answer that,” he said quickly. “I know you told me he didn’t trust outsiders. I just thought I could get him to talk to me.”

“Why? Because royal blood flows through your veins? Trust me, Willy couldn’t care less about that. In his eyes, you’re a stranger. You could be the president of the United States, and he still wouldn’t open his door to you.”

“But he will for you.”

She shrugged. “If conditions are right and he wants to.”

Frustrated, Lorenzo knew he had no one but himself to blame for this little setback—she’d warned him that he needed her if he expected Willy to cooperate, but he hadn’t believed her. As head of Royal Intelligence, he didn’t have to go through someone else to get the information he needed. And he didn’t like it, dammit, but what choice did he have?

His pride stung, he said stiffly, “Would you call him, then, and see what you can arrange? We can’t even hope to find the prince without knowing where Willy found the scarf.”

For an answer, Eliza pulled out her cell phone and punched in Willy’s number. When she got a scratchy answering machine, she wasn’t surprised. Willy always retreated when he was upset. Hopefully, he’d surface soon.

“Willy, this is Eliza,” she said quietly when the machine began to record. “I apologize for intruding. Duke Lorenzo and I are leaving now, but it’s very important that I speak to you. Please meet me tomorrow morning at nine at the waterfall. The duke will be with me, but I’m the only one you have to speak to, okay? Please don’t let me down, Willy. We need your help.”

She hung up and found herself face-to-face with a very irritated duke. “What the hell did you do that for?” he demanded. “I don’t want to meet him tomorrow. What’s wrong with today? It’s not even eleven-thirty in the morning. We’ve got the whole damn day ahead of us.”

“Willy needs time.”

“We don’t have time! Don’t you get it? Thanks to your boss, the word is out that the prince is alive. And that means he’s in danger. Do you know how many con artists, opportunists and outright thugs read the headlines this morning and saw this as their lucky day? They figured out—like we did—that the prince had to be in some kind of distress or he would have contacted his family by now. And they’re going to go after him.”

The thought sickened Eliza, but there was nothing she could do about it. “I’m doing the best I can, Your Grace,” she replied. “If I could hold Willy’s feet to the fire and make him talk, I would. But all we can do now is wait. Trust me. He won’t talk until tomorrow.”

If they were lucky. She didn’t say the words, but she knew he heard them, nonetheless. His green eyes dark with fury, he struggled with his own impatience, and she knew exactly how he felt. She hated Willy’s phobias, hated the way he called her with a press-stopping story he’d somehow stumbled across, only to retreat like a scared turtle when she needed more information. Sometimes, his tips paid off. Many times they didn’t. She could handle that because she knew whenever she followed up a tip from anyone, there was always a chance it would fizzle into nothing. What drove her crazy, though, was the number of times Willy had left her cooling her heels. Patience wasn’t her strong suit, and she could well understand Lorenzo’s frustration.

To his credit, though, he knew when he was beat. Sighing in disgust, he said, “All right. It looks like we’re going to play this Willy’s way. We might as well go back to the hotel.”

Chapter 5

They stayed at the same hotel they had before, this time in a suite with two connecting bedrooms, and Eliza spent the day working on the opening of her feature. It should have been easy, but she felt as if her entire career was on the line, and with good cause. Not only was Deborah waiting in the wings to take over her column, but no one else in the world had this story. She had to do it right. So she struggled with words and couldn’t seem to find a place to start the story…until she shifted her focus to her meeting with the king and queen of Montebello. As she described the palace and the reaction of the prince’s parents to the news that there was a good chance their son was still alive, she knew her readers would be more than satisfied with the story.

“I want to read that.”

Lost in the quiet world she always retreated to in order to write, it was several long minutes before Lorenzo’s words registered. When they did, she glanced up, startled, to find him scowling at her from the overstuffed chair from which he’d apparently been watching her for some time. Looking over the top of her glasses, she said, “I beg your pardon?”

“You heard me,” he said flatly. “I want to read that. If there’s anything that might be harmful to the prince, you’ll have to take it out.”

Her eyes narrowed fractionally. “Really? I don’t remember anything in my agreement with King Marcus that gives you the right to censorship.”

“That’s because there isn’t one.”

“You’re damn straight, there isn’t one! I never would have agreed to it if there had been. This is the United States, Your Grace. We’re real big on freedom of speech, not to mention freedom of the press, around here.”

The citizens of Montebello were, too, but he only said, “It’s my duty to protect the prince. If I say there’s something in your writing that could be harmful to him, it’s coming out. End of discussion.”

She would have never deliberately placed anyone in danger with her writing, but what went into her column was for her and Simon to decide, not a fairy-tale duke who would be king. And it was high time he realized that.

“You think so, do you?” she taunted, arching a brow. “Well, take that!” And with a single key stroke, she sent the beginning of the feature in an e-mail to Simon.

Later, she realized it was her red hair that got her into trouble. The spark of temper that went along with that hair had been her cross to bear all her life. It had just flared like a match. She knew they were both under a great deal of strain, knowing the prince was out there somewhere, in possible danger, and they couldn’t discover where because her informant wasn’t in the mood to cooperate yet. She felt guilty and frustrated…and resentful that Lorenzo thought so little of her just because she was a reporter.

Stunned, Lorenzo couldn’t believe her defiance. No one had ever challenged him so openly before! Outraged, he stormed over to her, so frustrated that he stupidly thought there had to be a way he could retrieve the e-mail. “Give me that!”

“No! What are you doing? Let go!”

Jumping to her feet, she grabbed her computer and clutched it to her chest even as he reached for it, and for a second, they acted like two children fighting over a favorite toy. Then his fingers accidentally brushed against her breast and everything changed. In a heartbeat, awareness flashed between them like heat lightning.

Drawing in a sharp breath, Lorenzo froze. He was, he liked to think, a man who knew women. But in that instant, he felt like a sixteen-year-old who’d experienced the kick of sexual attraction for the first time in his life and didn’t have a clue what to do about it. With a will of their own, his eyes dropped to her lips, which had parted in a soft gasp, and his mind blurred. All he could think about was kissing her.

And it was all her fault. That soft, fresh scent of hers was driving him crazy. He’d dreamed of her last night, replayed in his sleep that moment in the used-clothing store when he’d helped her into the sheepskin coat and turned her in front of the mirror so she could see how pretty she was. He should have kissed her then. He’d wanted to, but the store clerk had watched them with an eagle eye, and the time hadn’t been appropriate.

But now they were alone and he could already taste her….

Need clawing at him, he reached for her…and saw his own need reflected in her eyes. And just that quickly, the fog of desire misting his brain cleared. What was he doing? he wondered wildly, stiffening. They didn’t even like each other! The only reason they were working together was because they were being forced to. And she was a reporter, for heaven’s sake! How had he allowed himself to forget that? God only knew what would end up in her column if he was stupid enough to drop his guard with her.

That brought him back to his senses as nothing else could, and with a softly muttered curse, he abruptly stepped back. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking of rushing you like that. I’m just going crazy sitting around here twiddling my thumbs, and then when you sent that e-mail, all I could think of was getting it back. If anything happened to the prince because of something you wrote—”

“It won’t,” she said hoarsely, her heart pounding crazily. He’d almost kissed her, she thought, dazed, then told herself she had to be mistaken. She had a real talent for pushing his buttons. He was furious with her—why would he want to kiss her? Her imagination was just playing with her mind and her lonely heart, and if she wasn’t careful, she was going to make a complete fool of herself.

Focus on what’s important here, a voice in her head said sternly. If you want hearts and flowers, pick up a romance novel!

The story, she reminded herself, drawing in a calming breath. This was the biggest story of her life. Nothing else mattered but that. If the nights were long and she ached to feel a man’s arms around her again, holding her close, that was something she would just have to deal with.

“It was just the opening of the feature on the prince,” she said stiffly. “It was harmless.”

“Then why didn’t you let me read it?”

“Because I don’t have to.” It was as simple as that. “If we’re going to work together with any degree of success, you’re going to have to trust me. I know you don’t like reporters, and we both know how badly I want this story, but not at the expense of anyone’s life, especially the prince’s. That’s not who I am, Your Grace. If something happens to him before you find him, it won’t be because of me.”

For a long moment, he just stared at her with those probing, all-seeing eyes of his, and she was afraid that he would somehow see how much she regretted that he hadn’t kissed her. But she didn’t flinch, and something he saw in her steady gaze must have finally gotten through to him. The stiff set of his shoulders relaxed, and in his sigh, she finally heard acceptance.

“You’re right,” he said gruffly. “I’ve been acting paranoid just because you’re a reporter and that’s not fair to you. You’ve done nothing but be upfront and honest, and I owe you an apology.” Holding out his hand, he said, “I’d like to start over, this time as partners instead of adversaries. What do you say? Do we have a deal?”

She’d never been one to hold a grudge, especially when an apology was so sincerely delivered. Relieved, she smiled and shook his hand and tried not to notice how nice his fingers felt when they closed around hers. “Deal.”

The next morning when they left to meet with Willy, there was no question that Eliza would do the talking. Lorenzo no longer had a problem with that. He’d set his ego aside and made peace, and as he drove over the rough terrain to their meeting place, he thanked God that he had Eliza along. They’d taken so many turns and twists on dirt roads that were little more than faint deer paths that he was completely turned around. That wasn’t to say he couldn’t find his way back to town if he had to—he had a compass and a damn good memory. But it would take him a while.

“This is it,” Eliza said when the terrain turned to almost pure rock. “We stop here and walk the rest of the way.”

Glancing around, Lorenzo frowned. There was no sign of another vehicle. “We’re early. Willy doesn’t appear to be here yet. Do you think he’s coming?”

“If he is, he’s here already. He would never take a chance of walking into something he’s not sure of. If he decided to meet with us, he got here hours ago so he could check the place out. C’mon, I’ve got something special to show you.”

Puzzled, Lorenzo stepped out of the truck, only to glance around in surprise as she joined him. “What’s that noise?”

“The waterfall,” she said with a grin. “Willy likes to meet here so he doesn’t have to worry about anyone overhearing us.”

In his travels, Lorenzo had seen everything from Niagara to Angel Falls in Venezuela, but when he followed Eliza through the trees to the foot of a waterfall that appeared out of nowhere, nothing had ever touched him quite like the falls that cascaded over the canyon wall six hundred feet above them. He didn’t even know the name of the river that crashed to the rocks below to kick up a haze of icy mist, but it had a rugged, untouched beauty that left him awestruck. They were miles from anywhere, in the middle of a mountain wilderness that appeared untouched by man. Who else had seen this besides himself, God, Willy and Eliza?

“Like it?” Eliza asked, grinning.

“It’s magnificent.” And just the place for a meeting, he realized. The roar of the falls did, indeed, drown out all sound that was more than a foot or two away. No wonder Willy insisted on telling Eliza his secrets there. It was as safe as a soundproof room.

The thought had hardly registered when he glanced past Eliza and saw a middle-aged man of medium height cautiously approaching them. Stoop-shouldered and scruffy, his beard, mustache and shoulder-length hair gray with age, he looked right past Lorenzo and focused on Eliza. This was, Lorenzo knew without a doubt, the infamous Willy Cranshaw. Dressed in camouflage, from his boots to his waterproof jacket and skull cap, he would have blended into the terrain if Lorenzo hadn’t been watching for him.

Eliza turned then and spied him, too, and grinned. With nothing more than that, Willy’s entire demeanor changed. He grinned back at her, and for a short while, at least, his blue eyes were free of suspicion and he seemed happy to see her. Then his gaze once again shifted to Lorenzo, and the wariness was back, transforming his entire body. There wasn’t the slightest doubt in Lorenzo’s mind that the older man would have scurried off into the woods like a scared rabbit if he’d so much as looked at him wrong.

“Hey, Willy,” Eliza said, drawing his attention back to her. “I’m glad you could make it.”

“I like your new clothes,” he said shyly. “They look good on you. Are you going to buy a ranch?”

“Not unless I win a million bucks in the Publisher’s Clearinghouse sweepstakes,” she retorted with a chuckle. “But, thanks. I like them, too. Duke Lorenzo helped me pick them out. He thought it might be safer for the prince if we disguised ourselves a little.”

“So you’re undercover? Like the CIA?”

“Not quite,” she replied, smiling, “but close enough. The duke doesn’t want anyone else to find the prince before he does and possibly hurt him. That’s why I need to ask you a few questions for him, if that’s all right.”

“I dunno,” he mumbled, ignoring Lorenzo completely. “Depends on what you want to talk about. You don’t think I hurt the prince, do you?”

“Oh, no!” she assured him. “Thanks to you, his family knows he’s alive. No one is blaming you for anything. But we do need to know exactly where you found the scarf. There may be other clues at the campsite that tell us more about the prince and where he may have gone when he left there.”

Hesitating, Willy cocked his head at her. “You’re going to put this in your story, aren’t you? All about your search for the prince? Are you going to mention me? Will my name be in the paper?”

Expecting the question—he asked her the same thing every time he gave her a tip—she shrugged. “That depends on you. I know how you value your privacy, and I wouldn’t want to do anything to destroy that. I can either mention your name or just refer to you as an unnamed source. The choice is yours.”

When he considered his options, Eliza couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. There was a part of him that longed for fame and fortune, but the war in Vietnam had scarred him, and as much as he yearned for publicity, his fear of people—and the government, in particular—sadly ruled his life. Not surprisingly, he said, “I think I like the sound of an unnamed source.”

“That’s fine,” she replied easily. “But in the meantime, where did you find the scarf, Willy? We can’t do anything until we know that.”

“I just want to make sure I’m not going to get in trouble,” he hedged, shooting Lorenzo another wary look. “I don’t like the law, and if they find out I was hunting without a license up on Walnut Ridge, they’re going to send someone after me.”

“No one will know except you and me and the duke,” she promised. “And we’re not telling anyone. You know you can trust me, Willy. And the duke has no reason to wish you harm. He’s very appreciative of your help. Because of you, the king and queen now know there’s a good possibility that their son is alive. You gave them hope. Now help us find the prince. Where’s the campsite? Up on Walnut Ridge?”

Nodding, he said, “It’s on the backside of the ridge, about a mile straight north from where the forest service road forks. You can’t miss it. It’s back in a stand of aspen not too far from Elk Creek.”

“And where did you find the scarf at the campsite? Was it just laying on the ground by the deserted campfire or what?”

He shook his head. “It was hanging on a dead tree branch a few feet away from the campsite. I think it got caught there when the prince got scared for some reason and ran away.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Eliza saw Lorenzo roll his eyes, but he thankfully didn’t say anything. If he had, Willy would have shut up like a clam and scurried back into the woods. “Why do you think he was scared, Willy? Was there some sign that he might have been in some kind of distress when he abandoned the campsite?”

“Not that I could tell,” he replied honestly. “But the creek’s not that far from the campsite…or where the prince’s plane went down. I figure he wandered alongside the creek after he crashed and eventually built himself a campsite on the ridge. Some of the people looking for him had to figure the same thing.”

It made sense. After the prince’s plane had finally been found, the FBI and local police had scoured the woods for several miles in every direction of the vicinity of the crash, searching for Lucas. It was the others, however, the fortune hunters and nutcases who had been lured to the crash site by the false rumor of a reward offered by a Hollywood gossip magazine, that worried Eliza the most. If any of them had decided to follow the creek in search of him, they might have surprised him into running. The question was, where would he have gone from there?

Glancing over at Lorenzo, she expected him to be at least somewhat impressed with Willy’s theory, but judging from his set expression, he was reserving judgment. Disappointed, she told Willy, “You might be right, but we won’t know until we see the campsite. Tell me more about the scarf and the log it was caught on. Where was it in relation to the campfire?”

“On the north side,” he said promptly. “Maybe about ten yards away. If he was trying to get away from someone, that was the easiest way to go. It’s rough country up there. There are cliffs on either side, and the creek’s impossible to cross.”

“So you think he went north?”

He shrugged. “He didn’t have much choice if someone was trailing him from the south. It’s the only way out.”

As far as theories went, it was as good as any other, and only time would tell if he was right. Sensing Lorenzo’s impatience to get on with the search, Eliza said, “Well, I guess we’ll find out, won’t we? Thanks for your help, Willy. We couldn’t have gotten this far without you.”

“I know what it’s like to be missing,” he said simply. “It’s the loneliest, scariest feeling in the world.”

There’d been a time in Vietnam when he’d been missing in action and on his own in the jungle, and the shadows of that still lingered in his eyes, decades later. For a long second, he just stood there, reflecting. Then he quietly turned and disappeared into the trees.

Staring after him, Eliza couldn’t help but feel sorry for him, but there was nothing she could do for him, nothing he would let her do for him…except give him the space he needed. So she didn’t call him back, but turned to Lorenzo instead. “Well, what do you think? Could the prince have headed north?”

“Maybe,” he said with a shrug. “Maybe not. It’s too soon to tell. I prefer to make my own conclusions once I’ve investigated the campsite.”

Personally, Lorenzo didn’t put much stock in anything Willy said. The man obviously had problems. He didn’t seem quite in touch with reality, and if Lorenzo hadn’t seen Lucas’s scarf with his own two eyes, he never would have believed it was found by the old man. Did the abandoned campsite even exist? He hoped so. They’d find out soon enough.

They started the search at the spot where Lucas crashed his plane into the side of the mountain. The last time Lorenzo had been there, it had looked much different. The crash had only happened days before, and the shock had still been fresh. When Lorenzo had seen the wreckage for the first time, he’d sworn he could smell the prince’s pain and horror as he’d realized he was going down. In spite of the fact that Lucas’s body hadn’t been discovered in the wreckage, Lorenzo had felt little hope that he would be found alive.

Time, however, had a way of healing all wounds. The fuselage and debris that were all that was left of the small plane had blended into the mountainside, and the snow nearly covered that. Anyone seeing the site for the first time would have thought the crash happened decades ago instead of just last year.

And this time, Lorenzo really believed Lucas had somehow managed to survive the crash. Oh, he hadn’t changed his opinion about Willy, but he knew his cousin. He loved life and wouldn’t have let go of it easily. If anyone could survive not only a plane crash, but the wildness of the Rocky Mountains in the dead of winter, it was Lucas.

“Where is the forest service road Willy mentioned?” he asked Eliza as she stood solemnly beside him, surveying the scene. “How would you get there from here on foot?”

Considering a moment, she frowned. “I’d head northeast as long as I could, then cross the creek and head north. I don’t think the prince could have made it any other way if he was hurt. It’s too rugged.”

“Then let’s try that,” he said.

Surprised, she said, “You don’t want to drive from here to the forest service road and start the search there? That’s closer to where the scarf was found.”

“But we aren’t positive that the prince is the one who actually dropped the scarf at the campsite where it was found,” he pointed out. “It could have been anyone—which is why I need to see if it would be possible for a man who walked away from a plane crash to make it from here to there on foot.”

She hadn’t thought of that. “Then I guess we’ll leave the truck here and come back for it.”

They started off through the woods, heading northeast, as she had suggested. Within minutes, they’d left the crash site behind and were completely surrounded by the forest. Following Lorenzo as he took the lead, Eliza tried to imagine what it must have been like for the prince after the crash. He had to have been dazed, probably hurt, and in all likelihood, he hadn’t had a clue where he was or how far he was from civilization.

It must have been quite frightening, she thought with a shiver, especially when nightfall had approached. Darkness came early in the winter in the mountains, and he’d been all alone. Eliza liked to think she was pretty gutsy, but just thinking about that gave her the willies. There were wolves in the mountains. And bears…

Sure she felt the touch of eyes on her, she glanced over her shoulder, but there was nothing there. Nothing but trees. Goosebumps racing up her arms under the soft sheepskin of her coat, she moved closer to Lorenzo.

She hadn’t thought he noticed, but suddenly, he, too, was examining the trees around them, his narrowed eyes missing little as he studied their surroundings. “Is something wrong?” he asked quietly.

Caught letting her imagination run away with her, she felt a blush sting her cheek. “I was imagining what it must have been like for the prince to find himself all alone up here,” she admitted with a grin. “Then I got to thinking about wolves and bears…”

“And suddenly you could hear one sneaking up behind you,” he guessed with a chuckle. “Don’t worry, we’re not going to be anyone’s dinner. Whatever bears are in the region are hibernating, and the wolves are probably just as scared of you as you are of them. They won’t bother you.”

Logically, she knew that. But when they started through the trees again, she made sure she was just a few steps behind Lorenzo.

They crossed the creek at its narrowest point, then began the slow climb up to Walnut Ridge. It was a fairly steep hike, but not as difficult as it would have been if they’d taken a path to either the east or west. And even though the prince had probably been hurt after the crash, there was no question that he could have made the climb if his injuries weren’t too severe.

“I don’t know how the hell he walked away from that crash,” Lorenzo said with a frown as they broke through the trees and reached the forest service road, “but he always was a lucky devil. I think he could have easily made it this far. But why didn’t he call home, dammit? Or at least call for help? He had his cell phone with him.”

“He must have been confused,” Eliza said, “and who can blame him? You saw what the crash did to his plane. He couldn’t have been thinking clearly.”

Lorenzo agreed. He could well understand Lucas’s muddled thinking after he’d plowed into the side of a mountain. But that didn’t explain his continued silence. It had been a year since the crash, dammit! Where was he? Was he still walking around in a daze or had he somehow fallen into the hands of someone who meant him harm and wouldn’t let him call his family?

Frustrated, the questions he had far outnumbering the few speculative answers he had, he said, “The answer has got to be here somewhere. C’mon. Let’s find the campsite.”

Given Willy’s oddities, Lorenzo hadn’t put much stock in the directions he’d given them, and with good reason. The man had refused to even look him in the eye! But when they headed due north, just as the old hermit had instructed, it wasn’t any time before they came to the stand of aspen he’d told them about. And there in the middle of the trees was a small circle of stones that could only be the remains of a campfire.

“This must be it!” Eliza said excitedly. “Listen! You can hear the creek.”

Cocking his head, Lorenzo caught the gurgle of a small creek in the distance. Eliza was right. This had to be the place where Willy had found the scarf. “I’ll be damned,” he said softly, impressed. “I didn’t think the old geezer had it in him.”

“I knew he wasn’t lying,” she replied, then sighed in relief. Suddenly realizing that she’d given herself away, she grinned ruefully. “Okay, so maybe I had a few doubts. Sometimes it’s hard to know with Willy.”

Having now met the old man, Lorenzo could well understand that, but at least he appeared to have told the truth this time. And if they were lucky, there would be a clue somewhere in the vicinity that would tell them why Lucas had left and where he might have gone.

Surveying the area, however, he didn’t see signs of much life. It was a stark place for Lucas to take refuge. The aspen, naked of their leaves in the dead of winter, offered little protection from the weather, and the snow seemed to collect in unusually high drifts on the east side of trees. When the north wind blew, it was colder than hell.

“What was he doing here?” he murmured to himself as he began to inspect the campsite. “He apparently traveled five miles from where he crashed and stopped here long enough to at least make a firepit and start a fire. Why? Was he just too tired to go on or what?”

“Maybe it was getting dark and he didn’t have any choice,” Eliza suggested. “If he was going to survive the night, he had to have a fire.”

“Or some other kind of shelter,” he replied, his green eyes speculative as he slowly turned a full three hundred and sixty degrees and tried to imagine why Lucas had stopped here, of all places. Then his eyes landed on a dead tree that had fallen at an awkward angle at the base of a snow covered hill. Located just a matter of feet from the firepit, the tree should have lain flat at the base of the hill but it didn’t. And it was that, Lorenzo decided, that bothered him. What was under that tree?

“What are you doing?” Eliza asked when he suddenly grabbed a stick off the ground and poked through the branches of the fallen tree. When he met no resistance, he started to smile. “What?” Eliza said in confusion. “What’s so amusing?”

“The tree’s covering the entrance to some kind of small cave,” he told her, grinning, and proved it by pulling the decomposing tree away from where it lay. There, jutting out from the side of the hill, was a small rocky opening that appeared to be the entrance to a shallow cave.

“I knew it!” he said, pleased. “I bet the cave wasn’t covered when he found it, so he dragged the tree over the opening to conceal it so he’d be safe.”

Stepping closer, he knelt down at the opening and peered inside, only to feel his heart stop in midbeat when he saw the contents of the cave. There on the ground was a red thermal blanket that was identical to the ones carried on all of the king’s aircraft. The queen had insisted that all blankets be red in case there was ever a crash—the blankets would be nearly as effective as a flare when they were spread out on the ground to flag down rescue planes.

“What is it?” Eliza asked quietly when he turned to stone. “Did you find something?”

“This,” he said huskily, and pulled out the blanket. “It’s from Lucas’s plane. I’m sure of it.”

Protected from the weather all these months, it was clean and dry and neatly folded, as if the prince had just left it. And that made little, if no, sense. Glancing around, Eliza scowled. Damn, she hated it when things weren’t logical!

“It seems like he would have stayed here until help came for him,” she told Lorenzo with a frown. “The man had a blanket and cave to keep him safe from the elements, a firepit and plenty of firewood to warm him, not to mention water from the creek to drink. It was the middle of winter, he couldn’t have known where he was, but he still walked off and left the safest place he’d found. Why? What possessed him to do such a thing? The authorities had dogs and helicopters looking for him all over these mountains. You know he had to at least hear the helicopters. Why didn’t he spread the blanket out in the clearing? Somebody would have found him.”

He shrugged, worry darkening his eyes as he looked around. “I don’t know. Maybe he was so shaken from the crash that he wasn’t thinking clearly and didn’t realize anyone was looking for him.”

“Or something spooked him,” she said. “Think about it. Why else would he have left the blanket? He thought to dig it out of the wreckage of the plane, but then he walked off without it when he left here. I can’t think of any reason why he would do that unless he was scared and he left in a hurry.”

His brows knit in a frown, Lorenzo didn’t like the sound of that, but he had to agree that there was little other reason for Lucas to abandon the cave. Unless, he was out in the surrounding woods, searching for food, and wasn’t able to make it back to camp for some reason. He could have fallen and broken a leg or hit his head and knocked himself out. In the dead of winter, that would have been a costly mistake.

No! he told himself fiercely. Lucas wasn’t dead! He couldn’t be. Not when they were so close to finding him. There had to be another explanation.

“I want to look around,” he told Eliza hoarsely. “Just in case.”

He didn’t say just in case of what, but he didn’t have to. If he’d learned anything about Eliza over the past few days, it was that she wasn’t a slow-witted woman. “Let’s spread out,” she suggested. “We can cover more territory. I’ll meet you back here in a half hour.”

Moving to opposite sides of the campsite, they began the search with grim expressions. Later, Lorenzo couldn’t have even said what he was looking for…except a body. Thankfully, they didn’t find one. They didn’t find anything, in fact, and Lorenzo had just about resigned himself to the fact that he might never know what had led Lucas to abandon the campsite when he inadvertently stumbled across a deer stand half-hidden in some trees about a quarter of a mile from the camp.

“It had to be hunters,” he told Eliza when they met back at the campsite. “He heard the guns and must have thought someone was shooting at him.”

“So he took off.”

Lorenzo nodded grimly. “He wouldn’t have gone south, that’s where the hunters were.”

“And the cliffs on either side of the creek made it impossible for him to go east or west. He had no choice but to go north.”

“Just like Willy said,” he retorted. “Crafty old goat. I bet he knew about that deer stand all along.”

Eliza shrugged, a rueful smile curling the corners of her mouth. “I wouldn’t put it past him. Willy doesn’t always feel the need to share everything he knows.”

“Now you tell me,” Lorenzo retorted, but he couldn’t complain. Willy had put them on the right path to finding the prince, and he owed him for that. There was no question that the king and queen would reward him for his help if he would let them, but for now, he couldn’t worry about Willy. Half the day was gone, and he had a feeling they had a long way to go before they tracked down Lucas. By mutual agreement, they headed north.

For a while, they made good time. Hurrying to keep up with Lorenzo’s long stride, Eliza didn’t notice that the terrain had become progressively rougher until she unexpectedly stepped in a hole. Between one heartbeat and the next, she went down.

She didn’t remember crying out, but suddenly, Lorenzo was there, his handsome face lined with worry. “Are you all right? What happened? Here, let me help you up.”

“I stepped in a hole,” she said, dazed. She struggled to her feet, only to wince, and in the next instant, he’d swept her up off her feet and set her head spinning. “Lorenzo! What are you doing?”

“Making sure you didn’t break your ankle,” he growled, and carried her over to a nearby log. Setting her down, he immediately dropped down to a knee in front of her and began gently tugging off her right boot and sock.

Eliza told herself there was nothing personal in his touch—he would have done the same for anyone. Then his hand closed around her bare ankle, and just that easily, he set every nerve ending in her body tingling. Startled, she gasped softly…and drew his eyes to her.

“Does that hurt?” he asked huskily.

He knew it didn’t—she could see the awareness in his eyes, the same awareness that now had her heart thundering in her breast—but she only shook her head. “No,” she choked. “It’s just a little tender. I’m sure I’ll be fine.”

He frowned at that. “Maybe we should call off the search for the rest of the day.”

“No! I appreciate the offer, but it’s not necessary. Really,” she insisted when he hesitated. “I’m fine. Look.”

She wiggled her foot, testing her ankle. Under his hand, Lorenzo felt the delicacy of her bones, and in spite of himself, he was fascinated. Because she was such a tiger when it came to her job, he tended to forget just how delicate she was as a woman…until he touched her. Then he found himself wanting to run his hands over her. Just once, he told himself, he wanted to see how soft she was.

Don’t even think about going there, a voice in his head growled. Not unless you want the story to end up on the front page.

That brought him back to his senses as nothing else could, and with a hastily swallowed oath, he jerked his hand back and handed her her sock. “If you’re sure. Tell me if it starts to hurt you.”

Rising to his feet, he vowed he wasn’t going to touch her again. But as soon as she’d pulled her sock and boot back on and they continued moving north, he couldn’t stop himself from reaching out to help her whenever they reached a rough spot. And with every touch of their hands, he found it harder and harder to let her go.

When they finally reached the end of the narrow valley and stumbled onto a road, Lorenzo was torn between relief and frustration. He didn’t have to touch her anymore, but they’d come to the end of the trail. Once Lucas reached the road, he could have gone anywhere.

Chapter 6

The town of Lightning, Colorado, might have only been fifty miles from Boulder, but it was as far from the city as Jupiter was from the sun. With a population of three hundred, there was no hotel, no sophisticated restaurants, nothing that would appeal to royalty. The local café wasn’t open for dinner, but the bar next to the town’s only motel was. Divided by the two lane highway that went right through the middle of the town, Lightning was little more than a wide spot in the road. It couldn’t even claim a traffic light.

When Lorenzo pulled up in front of the motel, Eliza half expected him to suggest that they drive on to the next town before stopping for the night. The Lightning Bolt Motel was little more than an old-fashioned motor court that must have been there since the forties. A neon sign blinked in the office window, the parking lot was full of potholes and what little paint there was on the long, narrow ranch-style building was faded and chipped. To put it bluntly, the place looked like a dump.

But Lorenzo didn’t even blink twice at the sight of the place. “I’ll check in,” he said as he cut the engine. “There’s no use both of us going in. You can stay in the car and rest.”

Exhausted, Eliza could have hugged him for that. After they’d lost the prince’s trail when they’d come to the two-lane highway, they’d hiked back to the truck, retraced their route, then discreetly checked the towns up and down the highway in either direction, stopping at local restaurants, gas stations and hotels to see if anyone favoring a candid picture of Lucas had come through there during the past year. It was a tedious exercise in futility, and not surprisingly, no one had been able to help them.

Logically, they had both known finding the prince wasn’t going to be easy, not after so much time had passed since the crash, but the enormity of what they were up against hadn’t hit them until they kept running into one brick wall after another. The prince could be anywhere. For all they knew, he’d left the state of Colorado and could be sunning himself on the beaches of Florida…or Hawaii, for that matter. If he was even in the United States. At this point, there was no way to know.

They’d set themselves an impossible task—they were looking for a needle in a haystack—but Eliza knew Lorenzo was as dedicated as she to finding the prince. That wasn’t the problem. It was the realization that they were going to have to spend a lot more time together than either of them had anticipated.

Hours after she’d nearly twisted her ankle, she could still feel the touch of his hand on her. And he’d touched her countless times since. Every time they came to a stump or the creek or rocky ground when they were hiking through the woods, he’d held out his hand to her, his eyes had met hers, and something had passed between them that still had the power to make her heart turn over in her breast.

“Stop thinking about it,” she told herself sternly, but she couldn’t. Her imagination was a blessing and a curse at one and the same time. With no effort whatsoever, she only had to close her eyes to feel his hand slide slowly up her calf to her knee, then her thigh—

The driver’s door opened with no warning and Lorenzo slid behind the wheel. “Okay, we’re all set,” he began, only to stop when he noticed her face. “Are you okay? What’s wrong?”

Mortified by her thoughts, she quickly glanced away, pretending to study the long line of empty rooms and the equally empty parking lot. “Nothing. I’m just tired. I guess you didn’t have any problem getting two rooms.”

“The clerk said we could take our pick,” he replied, “so you’re in three and I’m in nine. Unless you’d rather switch. They’re the same.”

“Three’s fine,” she replied as he pulled up before her room. “You don’t have to get out. I can get my bag.”

She might as well have saved her breath. He was out of the truck before she was and pulling her small suitcase from behind the seat, where they’d stored the luggage. “No problem,” he assured her. “Here, let me get your door for you, too.” And before she could stop him, he unlocked the door to her room for her and escorted her inside.

There was nothing redeeming about the room, other than the fact that it was clean, but Eliza hardly noticed. In the small room, which was barely bigger than the full bed and dresser it held, Lorenzo stood so close she could smell the woodsy scent clinging to his skin and clothes. Long after he left to go to his own room, she knew the scent of him would linger to tease her senses.

“It’s not much to look at,” he said, surveying the room, “but the clerk assured me the beds are new and the linens are clean. If you’re half as tired as I am, you’ll sleep like the dead.”

“I’m sure I’ll be fine, thanks,” she replied.

They agreed to meet at the truck at nine the following morning, and with a soft good-night, Lorenzo left to go to his own room. Watching the door shut quietly behind him, Eliza knew she was in trouble when she wanted to call him back. Suddenly lonely, she told herself they were spending too much time together. A break would do her good.

But even as she acknowledged that she needed some time to herself to get her head on straight, she knew she couldn’t just sit in her room the rest of the evening and watch TV. She needed a distraction, something, anything, to get her mind off Lorenzo. Glancing out of the room’s narrow window, she found herself studying the bar next door. The bright neon sign in the window advertised food and live music. She and Lorenzo had had an early dinner, but that had been nearly an hour ago, and she hadn’t eaten much. Her stomach rumbled at the thought of some nachos, and she welcomed the distraction. Grabbing the key to her room, she shut the door behind her and headed for the bright lights across the parking lot.

It was Friday night, and Eliza wasn’t surprised that the place was packed—nothing else in town was open. The parking lot was full of pickups, and inside, cowboys and their girls occupied every table. “It’s a twenty-minute wait,” the harried hostess told Eliza as a party of six walked in right behind her. “Sorry I can’t promise you anything sooner, but we’re shorthanded tonight, and it’s Friday.”

That was all she needed to say. “I know what you mean,” Eliza told her with a smile. “I’ll wait at the bar.”

She’d wanted a distraction, and she’d gotten one. As she took one of the few empty seats at the bar, she took in the sight and sound and smell of the place and its clientele for her story. She wanted to remember everything for her readers.

“White wine,” she told the bartender when he was finally able to take her order.

“Put that on my tab,” the cowboy sitting next to her said, shooting her a bold grin. “A lady shouldn’t have to pay for her own drink.”

She saw the leer in his eyes and swallowed a groan. This wasn’t what she needed tonight. She was tired, she just wanted her wine and an order of nachos, and to be left alone. In the scheme of things, she didn’t think that was too much to ask.

“Thanks,” she said shortly, “but I can buy my own drink.” Turning her attention back to the bartender, she lifted a brow at him. “How much do I owe you?”

If she hadn’t been so tired, she would have noticed the cowboy was more than a little inebriated and, consequently, handled the situation differently. But she never saw the alcoholic glaze in his eyes—or the spark of anger that flared there at her words—until it was too late. The second the bartender took her money and walked away, her unwanted companion was leaning close and letting her have it with the sharp edge of his drunken tongue. “What’s the matter, Red? My money not good enough for you? Is that what you’re saying?’ Cause if it is, I don’t like your attitude, little girl. You hear me?”

Oh, she heard him, all right. How could she not? He had her pinned in her seat, trapping her there, and suddenly, her heart was slamming against her ribs in fear. She might have been slender, but she’d never thought of herself as little—until she found herself being glowered at by six feet four inches of very angry cowboy.

They were surrounded by people, she told herself. Nothing was going to happen to her in a crowded bar. But everything about the cowboy was threatening, and no one so much as glanced her way. The bartender was occupied at the other end of the bar, and everyone else was involved in their own conversations. Given the chance, he could have snapped her in two, and no one would have noticed until it was too late.

“Look,” she said quickly, “I didn’t mean to offend you. It’s nothing personal—”

“She’s with me,” a familiar male voice said suddenly from behind her. “Have you got a problem with that?”

Eliza had never been so glad to see anyone in her life. Glancing back over her shoulder, she smiled broadly. “Lorenzo! Thank God!”

She knew she must have lit up like a Christmas tree at the sight of him, and the cowboy didn’t like it one bit. Giving Lorenzo a hard glare, he growled, “Who the hell are you?”

“Her fiancé,” he lied without missing a beat. And just to be sure the cowboy understood, he laid his hand on Eliza’s shoulder, claiming her as his.

For one heart-stopping moment, Eliza was sure the man was going to belt him. His dark eyes narrowed dangerously, and even as she watched, his hands clenched into fists. But then the bartender made his way back to their end of the bar, another couple waiting for a table took seats on the other side of them, and the cowboy thought better of causing any more trouble. Backing off, he muttered, “You can have her, man. She’s too skinny, anyway. I like my women with some meat on their bones.”

Weak with relief, Eliza waited only until the man had turned and walked away before she burst out laughing and threw herself into Lorenzo’s arms. “Thank you! I was so scared! Did you see the size of his hands? I thought he was going to snap me in two like a toothpick.”

“What did you say to him?” he asked with a grin, chuckling as he returned her hug. “For a minute there, I thought we were both toast.”

“I don’t know what he was so bent out of shape about. All I did was insist on buying my own drink. Geez! You’d have thought I insulted his family name or something.”

“If that’s his usual way of picking up a woman, no wonder he’s alone,” Lorenzo retorted. “Are you all right?”

She laughed, feeling foolish. “Yeah, he just caught me off guard. I just came in for some nachos, and the next thing I know, a man’s trying to take my head off.”

“Eliza, your table’s ready,” the hostess said over the speaker system that was wired into the bar and hostess area. “Table for Eliza.”

“Finally!” she sighed, relieved. Completely forgetting the fact that she’d wanted some time away from him to get her head on straight, she smiled and said, “Would you like to join me? We can split an order of nachos…or something else, if you like. I lost my appetite, so it doesn’t matter to me.”

“Nachos sound great—if you’re sure you want company,” he added. “After dealing with that jerk, I wouldn’t blame you if you wanted to be alone for a while.”

“Oh, but you didn’t do anything! And if I hadn’t been so tired, I would have handled him with one hand tied behind my back.”

Lorenzo didn’t doubt that. If there was one thing he’d discovered about Eliza during the time he’d spent with her, it was that the lady was nothing if not self-sufficient. She carried her own bags, had no trouble taking the lead and never, ever, played the helpless female. A randy cowboy wouldn’t present any more of a problem for her than a flat tire. She’d deal with both, then go on her way.

And he liked that about her. The women he knew cringed at the thought of breaking a nail. None of them would have been caught dead traipsing through the mountains like he and Eliza had all day. They were too delicate for that, too cool to sweat. Not Eliza. She’d thrown herself into it with enthusiasm and never once complained. And she had no idea how much he admired her for that.

Still, he should have politely turned down her invitation. He hadn’t come into the bar in search of her—he’d wanted a drink to help him get her out of his head. Considering that, spending more time with her was not a wise thing to do. He should have said thanks but no thanks, and left her to his own devices while he ordered a double scotch. Instead, he heard himself say, “Lead the way.”

“Great! I hope you don’t mind jalapenos. I like my nachos spicy.”

Two steps behind her as they followed the hostess to their table, Lorenzo had to grin at that. Why wasn’t he surprised? She liked hot peppers, driving fast and doing whatever was necessary for a story. Whatever else the lady was, no one would ever accuse her of being a Milquetoast.

They arrived at their table then to discover it was located in a dark, intimate corner of the bar, away from the noise of the music and the conversation of the other customers. Lorenzo took one look at it and stiffened. Suddenly, splitting an order of nachos had become something else entirely, and he didn’t know how the hell it had happened.

He didn’t say a word, but he didn’t have to. Eliza wasn’t any happier with the situation than he was. Frowning at the candle in the middle of the table, she muttered, “This is a bar, for heaven’s sake, not a romantic hideaway. We need another candle,” she told their waitress when she suddenly appeared with menus. “It’s dark back here.”

The waitress could have told her that bars were supposed to be dark, but she only shrugged. “I’ll see what I can do. What else can I get you?”

“Nachos,” Lorenzo said. “And another glass of wine for the lady, and a beer for me.”

She didn’t even write it down. “It’s coming right up,” she promised, then grabbed a candle from a nearby table where four young cowboys sat eating greasy burgers and drinking beer. Not missing a beat, she set the candle down in front of Eliza and moved on to the next customer. The cowboys didn’t so much as sputter in protest.

Her blue eyes twinkling, Eliza grinned. “I like her style.”

“She reminds me of you.”

That caught her by surprise. “Really? How? We don’t look anything alike.”

Since the waitress outweighed her by a good forty pounds and was a bleached blonde with a Dolly Parton hairdo, Lorenzo could understand her confusion. “Not in looks,” he explained. “It’s her attitude. She doesn’t let the cowboys around here make anything off of her. You don’t have any problem standing up for yourself, either. I heard how you spoke to your boss that morning he published the news that Lucas was alive. I was surprised he didn’t fire you.”

A rueful smile curled the corners of her mouth. “Simon wouldn’t do that. He might want to tar and feather me, but trust me, he’s not stupid enough to let the competition snap me up. Anyway, right’s right and wrong’s wrong, and he screwed up. Not that he would admit it,” she added. “There’s no fun in that.”

“It sounds like the two of you bicker like an old married couple.”

“Oh, we’re worse than that,” she laughed. “His wife said so!”

Chuckling, Lorenzo could just imagine them arguing over her column. She might gripe about Simon, but there was no question that she was fond of him…and that the editor brought out the best in her. Lorenzo had read her column. She was good.

“Your office must be a pretty wild place then,” he said as the waitress set the nachos they’d ordered in front of them. “How’d you get into writing? And about royalty, of all things?”

“Fairy tales,” she replied simply. “I’ve loved them since I was a little girl. When I discovered I had a way with words, it just seemed natural to write about the only people living modern day fairy tales.”

“Just because we live in palaces doesn’t mean life’s a fairy tale,” he said. “The prince’s plane crash is a fine example of that.”

“Fairy tales are full of tragedy,” she said with a shrug. “They just end with happily ever after.”

“And you think that’s how the prince’s story is going to end? All tied up with hearts and flowers and pink ribbons?”

He wasn’t the first person to react to her love of fairy tales with cynicism—she encountered it all the time. With him, as with the others, she merely smiled. “Time will tell, won’t it?”

She hadn’t meant to reveal so much of herself, but talking to him was so easy. As they munched on nachos and the waitress brought them fresh drinks, she told him about the screenplay she one day hoped to write, and he opened up about the years he’d spent in the military and how much he enjoyed being in charge of Montebello’s Royal Intelligence.From there, the conversation moved to their childhoods, their hopes and dreams, and where they each wanted to be when they were fifty. And somehow, time just seemed to slip away.

Eliza would have sworn they’d been there just a little over an hour when she glanced at her watch and saw that it was going on eleven. Shocked, she set her wineglass down with a thump. “Oh, my God! Look at the time!”

“Don’t panic,” Lorenzo laughed. “You’re not going to turn into a pumpkin at midnight.”

“Cute,” she retorted, wrinkling her nose at him. “I’ve still got to write my notes for today and check in with Simon. He’s going to kill me for calling so late.”

“He’ll get over it,” he assured her as he rose to his feet. “But it is getting late.”

When he reached into his back pocket for his billfold, Eliza knew she only had to let him pay and the evening would have been a date. She was horrified to discover that she’d never wanted anything more. “No!” she said quickly when he tossed down a twenty to pay the entire tab. “I’ll pay for mine.”

She watched his eyes narrow and knew he knew exactly what she was doing, but he didn’t argue. “That’s fine. We can go dutch.” And picking up his twenty, he exchanged it for a ten.

Eliza added her own ten, then followed him outside. Her heart thundering, she half expected him to insist on walking her to her motel room door, but she could just imagine what would happen if he did. He’d open the door for her, check inside to make sure her room was safe, and somehow or other, they’d end up in each other’s arms.

Just the thought of him touching her, kissing her, left her weak at the knees. How long had she wanted him to kiss her without even knowing it? she thought, stunned.

“…if that’s okay with you.”

Lost in her thoughts, she didn’t realize he’d spoken until he looked at her expectantly. Brought back to their surroundings with a blink, she wanted to crawl in a hole. “I beg your pardon?”

“I’ll watch you from here,” he said, coming to a stop in the parking lot midway between their two rooms, “to make sure you make it to your room without any problems. If that’s okay with you.”

“Oh, no…I mean, yes! That’ll be fine.” Disappointed, she forced a smile and was thankful he couldn’t see her blush in the poorly lit parking lot. “Then I guess I’ll see you in the morning. Good night.”

She could feel his eyes on her all the way to her room, but Eliza never looked back. She didn’t dare. Her key clutched in her hand, she slipped inside and quietly shut the door. A split second later, she called Simon. They might argue like cats and dogs, but when she needed advice, whether it was business or personal, she could always trust him to say the right thing.

“This better be good, Red,” he growled the second he came on the line and recognized her voice. “I was really sawing wood.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, stalling for time. Because she needed to think of some excuse why she had been too distracted to call in. She couldn’t very well tell her boss she was in over her head with a certain devastatingly handsome duke.

Slouched on her couch and feeling sorry for herself because her boyfriend, Derek, had dumped her for no reason, Ursula Chambers stared at the TV with a jaundiced eye and paid little attention to the local news anchor, who read the lead story with an irritating nasal drawl. So what if some missing prince was believed to be alive, she thought sourly. She missed Derek. And she still didn’t know why he’d walked out. They were good together, dammit! If he’d resented it when she joked around with his buddies, he should have told her he didn’t like it, and she would have stopped. She wasn’t a mind reader. But had he opened his mouth? Hell, no! He’d shut up like a clam and hadn’t talked to her for days, then the next thing she knew, he was packing his things. It wasn’t fair!

Frustrated and starting to get angry, she grabbed the phone and was just about to punch in Derek’s number to give him a piece of her mind when her eyes fell on the TV screen and a picture of the missing prince that flashed there. Confused, she frowned. What the devil was the reporter talking about? The man in the picture wasn’t a prince. He was her sister’s ranch hand, Joe.

“Prince Lucas has been missing since his plane crashed in the mountains near Boulder last winter,” the reporter said. “New evidence, however, has been recovered that leads authorities to believe the prince may be alive. The investigation has been reopened, and a search is expected to be underway shortly.”

Confused, Ursula told herself she shouldn’t have had that second drink after dinner. Her eyes were playing tricks on her. But even as she tried to convince herself she was seeing things, pictures didn’t lie. Unless Prince Lucas of Montebello had an identical twin brother, he and Joe, the ranch hand her sister had been all lovey-dovey with a couple of weeks ago when Ursula had dropped in to see her, were one and the same.

Unable to take her eyes off the television screen until long after the news anchor had gone on to the next story, Ursula just sat there, stunned. Then it hit her. Her big break had arrived.

“My God! My sister’s hiding a prince—at my family ranch no less. This is it! I’m going to be rich!”

Laughing, she jumped up from the chair and danced a jig. She could see it now…her picture all over the papers and flashing on every TV screen in America. And the headlines—oh, they were going to be beautiful! Struggling Actress Finds Prince! She’d be a hero! Every producer in Hollywood would be kicking himself for not recognizing her talent when he’d had the chance. And she’d make them pay for that when they finally came knocking on her door, she promised herself smugly. Oh, yes, they’d pay.

And so would the king and queen of Montebello. What would they pay to have their only son back? They had to have billions. Just thinking about how grateful they would be made her weak at the knees. She would be invited to the palace, to balls and parties and fancy soirees. Hell, they might even ask her to move to Montebello and live with them! If she played her cards right, she could be sitting pretty for the rest of her life.

Oh, this was going to be good, she thought, purring in delight. Everyone who’d ever slammed a door in her face was going to regret it—she’d make sure of it—starting with Derek. The jerk! She’d loved him—and trusted him to make her a star. Then he’d walked out on her, and she’d lost her lover and manager at one and the same time. She’d been devastated, but had he cared? Hell, no! He’d laughed in her face and told her she would never be anybody. He was going to regret that.

Then there was the family. Oh, she supposed Jessica was sympathetic enough, but everyone else had snickered at her dreams of being a famous actress and made fun of her behind her back. And she’d hated them for that. For as long as she could remember, she’d been sick of being poor, sick of trying to get ahead and getting nowhere. She’d left home at eighteen because she couldn’t stand it anymore, because Hollywood was the dream factory of the world, and she wanted the life that Julia Roberts and Meg Ryan had. She could act as well as they could—she knew she could!

But she never got the chance. Her parents had died before she could even land her first part—small though it was. Without an agent, the only steady job open to her was waiting tables. Then she’d met Derek and he’d promised her he would make all her dreams come true. But the only part he ever got her was a bit in a porno flick, and what good was that when she couldn’t even brag about it to anyone, least of all her goody-goody sister?

He’d failed her and so had everyone else, and when she was finally forced to return to Colorado and her hometown of Shady Rock because she didn’t have a dime to her name, she’d been so bitter and disillusioned that she hadn’t come out of her apartment for days. That was weeks ago, and nothing had changed. All she’d been able to see ahead of her were days and weeks and months of blandness and poverty for the rest of her life.

Until now. Now she was going to have the last laugh.

Anticipation glinting in her blue eyes, she whirled around, looking around her messy apartment for her purse. She had to go to Jessica’s, had to see for herself that Joe and the prince were one and the same man. She didn’t understand what the prince was doing hanging around her sister—or why he didn’t seem to want to be found—but she didn’t care. As soon as she verified he was her man, she was calling King Marcus of Montebello. By the time she got through talking to him, she was going to be richer than Cleopatra!

Already spending the money in her mind, she had just found her purse and was in the process of digging for her car keys when there was a knock at her door. “Damn!” she swore. If that was old lady Baker from next door, there to complain because her TV was too loud again, she was going to tell her off. Let her go to the apartment manager—she didn’t care if they threw her out on her ear. She was about to come into money!

Prepared to tell the old goat exactly what she thought of her, she stormed across to the door and jerked it open, only to gasp, “Jessica! What are you doing here? I was just on my way out to the ranch to see you.”

“Oh, Ursula!” her sister sobbed. “I need your help. Joe left me!”

“What?!”

Caught up in her own misery, Jessica didn’t even notice that her sister paled at her words. Her heart hurting and tears flooding her soft, wide blue eyes, she stumbled into the apartment like a wounded animal and fell into Ursula’s arms. “I don’t know what happened,” she sobbed. “One second, everything was fine, and the next, we were arguing and he walked out.”

“What do you mean he walked out?” she demanded, awkwardly patting her. “He’ll be back, of course. He just needs some time to cool off. You’ll see. Leave him alone tonight, and by morning, he’ll be ready to kiss and make up.”

“No, he won’t,” she sniffed, pulling back to wipe her eyes. “He’s gone to find himself.”

Her heart breaking, Jessica knew she shouldn’t have said any more. Joe was entitled to his privacy, and even though he’d only met Ursula once, he hadn’t trusted her from the moment he’d first laid eyes on her. He’d asked Jessica to keep his secret to herself, and she should have done that. But she dissolved in tears just at the thought of never seeing him again, and she had to talk to someone. And even if they weren’t all that close, Ursula was her sister, and the only family she had left now that her parents were gone.

“What do you mean he’s gone to find himself? Where?” she asked sharply. “What do you know about Joe, Jess? And don’t start crying again, dammit! This is important. Has he gone home?”

“I don’t know,” she sniffed. “He doesn’t know where home is.”

Ursula had never had much patience with emotional displays, and when Jessica saw her start to scowl, she cried, “It’s true! He has amnesia. That’s why he jumped at the chance to work for me when he came to the ranch all those months ago. He had nowhere else to go!”

Ursula had heard her fair share of tall tales, but this one was over the top. The man was a prince, for heaven’s sake! His family was rolling in dough, and as King Marcus’s only son, he stood to inherit a lion’s share of that. A man didn’t just forget that. Not unless he was crazy or something, and from what she’d seen of Joe the only time they’d met, he was a far cry from crazy. So what kind of scam was he trying to pull? Whatever it was, he had to know he wasn’t going to get away with it. She’d make sure of it, she vowed grimly.

“Let me get this straight,” she said with a frown. “He doesn’t know who he is, but he’s gone to find himself. How the hell is he going to do that, Jess, if he doesn’t know who he is?”

Tears still streaming down her face, she couldn’t answer that one. “I don’t know!” she cried. “I just know he’s gone, and I don’t know where. And I never got to tell him—”

When she broke off abruptly, Ursula pinned her with a hard look that would brook no opposition. “You never told him what? Tell me, Jess. You might as well. You know I’m going to find out anyway.”

She’d always had a way of getting secrets out of her little sister, and they both knew it. It only took another chiding look for Jessica to cave in like a stack of dominoes. Hugging herself, she blurted out, “I’m pregnant! And Joe doesn’t know.”

Stunned, Ursula just looked at her. Then her condition—and its repercussions—registered, and with a shriek, she swept Jessica into her arms. “Honey, that’s wonderful!” If they didn’t have the prince, they had his heir! And that sweet, adorable baby that was destined to be king would be her nephew! “When did you find out? Why haven’t you told me? Here, sit down. We have to make plans!”

Hustling Jessica over to the nearest chair, she plopped her down in it, then grabbed a footstool for her to rest her feet on. “Can I get you something? Are you drinking plenty of milk? We want the baby to have strong bones. When’s he due?”

“I don’t even know if he is a he,” her sister replied. Frowning in confusion, she looked at Ursula like she’d suddenly grown two heads. “This wasn’t the reaction I expected from you. I thought you’d be upset with me…especially now that Joe’s taken off. How am I going to run the ranch and have a baby? There’s so much to do around there already. I can’t do everything by myself.”

Far from concerned, Ursula only laughed. “Don’t you worry about that, honey. Trust me, you’re going to be well taken care of—Joe’s family will see to that.”

“His family? What are you talking about? I told you he has amnesia. He doesn’t even know what his real name is, let alone who his family is.”

“He may not,” her sister retorted slyly, “but I do.” Snatching up the morning newspaper, she opened it to the front page and wasn’t surprised to find Prince Lucas’s picture there for all the world to see. “Look,” she said, pushing the paper at her. “You fell in love with the prince, Cinderella! His real name is Prince Lucas Sebastiani of Montebello.”

Not even looking at the picture, Jessica laughed. “Right! And I’m Queen Elizabeth. Stop fooling around, Ursula.”

“I’m not joking. Look!”

With the picture shoved right under her nose, she had no choice but to look at it. Humoring her, she said, “Okay, so he’s a prince—”

Her gaze dropped to the smiling man in the picture, and between one heartbeat and the next, her world turned upside down. Though the beard was gone and the face younger and less care-and weatherworn, she couldn’t deny the resemblance. Stunned, she gasped, “Oh, my God, that’s Joe! How—”

“No,” her sister corrected her, “that’s Prince Lucas. Read the article, Jess.”

Her blood roaring in her ears, Jessica tried to read the article that accompanied the bold headlines, but all she saw was the prince’s name before her gaze was tugged back to the man in the picture. Joe. It had to be him. There couldn’t be another man in the world who had that same engaging smile and twinkle in his eye. But he wasn’t a prince. How could he be? He was just a drifter who’d showed up at the ranch one day looking for work.

“I don’t understand,” she said huskily, glancing back up at Ursula in confusion. “How can this be?”

“He crashed his plane into the side of a mountain somewhere outside of Boulder last year, and he’s been missing ever since. He must have hit his head, sweetie.”

“And all this time, he’s been wandering around, trying to find out who he is. My God, that’s so sad! I’ve got to find him!”

She would have struggled up from her chair and hurried out to her truck to begin immediately looking for him, but Ursula moved lightning quick to stop her. “Oh, no you don’t! The prince can take care of himself. You’ve got other more important things to do—like taking care of yourself and the baby. I think you need to go to Montebello.”

“What?!”

“It’s the only logical thing to do,” she retorted, already picturing where she would live in the royal palace. She might even find herself a royal husband! “The king needs to know that he’s about to become a grandfather. I’ll go with you to tell him. He can see that you’re taken care of—after all, you’re the mother of his grandson. Then when his son is found, he’ll make sure he does the right thing and marries you.”

“Oh, no! I would never use the baby to force a proposal out of Joe,” she said, horrified. “He doesn’t even know I’m pregnant.”

“He’ll know soon enough when we find him.”

“No! If he loves me, he’ll come back to me without knowing about the baby.”

“But the baby could one day be king of Montebello,” she pointed out. “You have to tell the king!”

Her heart bruised and aching, Jessica didn’t care two cents about that. It was Joe she cared about, Joe she loved. She desperately needed him to return that love, and for the last few months, she’d convinced herself that he did. She’d seen the emotion in his eyes, felt it in his touch, tasted it in his kiss. But he’d left without ever saying the words, and that hurt.

“The only thing I care about is Joe,” she cried as tears once again welled in her eyes. “What if he never comes back?”

But even as she cried out in pain, memories stirred, and suddenly, she had a vague recollection of Joe talking about his duty to himself and others. And just that easily, she knew Ursula was right. He had left her to go back to his real life! And he hadn’t said a word about who he was. Why? Because he was afraid she would want something from him or his family.

Hurt, her pride stung, she wiped away the last of her tears and squared her shoulders. He didn’t have to worry about her trying to contact him, she thought grimly. It wasn’t going to happen.

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