“It would be best if you shared a bed with me. I will rest assured of your safety that way.”

“We agreed we’d be platonic,” she said firmly. “Sex complicates things.”

“So you indicated last night,” he said, looking grumpy.

She laughed and then adopted a prim manner. “Putting off gratification is good for one’s character, Your Highness.”

“Or it may drive me to desperate acts,” he retorted, and looked her over as if thinking of seizing her and making off for parts unknown.

Even if the danger he’d mentioned was real, she thought, it was worth it for these moments and the closeness she felt to this man. She suddenly wanted to say yes to his marriage proposal and to making love…and to anything else he had in mind.

LAURIE PAIGE

“One of the nicest things about writing romances is researching locales, careers and ideas. In the interest of authenticity, most writers will try anything…once.” Along with her writing adventures, Laurie has been a NASA engineer, a past president of the Romance Writers of America, a mother and a grandmother. She was twice a Romance Writers of America RITA® Award finalist for Best Traditional Romance and has won awards from RT Book Reviews for Best Silhouette Special Edition and Best Silhouette Book in addition to appearing on the USA TODAY bestseller list.

Settled in Northern California, Laurie is looking forward to whatever experiences her next novel will bring.

USA TODAY Bestselling Author

Royal Affair
Laurie Paige

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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Because birthright has its privileges and family ties run deep.

Their passionate encounter had more than one consequence…!

Prince Maxwell von Husden: He needed to find a bride—and quickly. He’d seduced beautiful Ivy Crosby and now she carried his baby—the future king of Lantanya. His country needed leadership, and he needed Ivy. Could he convince her to walk down the aisle?

Ivy Crosby: A night of passion with a mysterious man landed Ivy Crosby in the tabloids. When she’d met Max, she’d had no idea he was royalty. And now this prince was offering her the chance to be his princess! But she’d have to teach him a thing or two about love—and romance—first!

Everett Baker: He had a wicked crush on Nurse Nancy, but was there another reason he was courting the warm and trusting R.N.?

Because birthright has its privileges and family ties run deep.

AVAILABLE JUNE 2010

1.) To Love and Protect by Susan Mallery

2.) Secrets & Seductions by Pamela Toth

3.) Royal Affair by Laurie Paige

4.) For Love and Family by Victoria Pade

AVAILABLE JULY 2010

5.) The Bachelor by Marie Ferrarella

6.) A Precious Gift by Karen Rose Smith

7.) Child of Her Heart by Cheryl St. John

8.) Intimate Surrender by RaeAnne Thayne

AVAILABLE AUGUST 2010

9.) The Secret Heir by Gina Wilkins

10.) The Newlyweds by Elizabeth Bevarly

11.) Right by Her Side by Christie Ridgway

12.) The Homecoming by Anne Marie Winston

AVAILABLE SEPTEMBER 2010

13.) The Greatest Risk by Cara Colter

14.) What a Man Needs by Patricia Thayer

15.) Undercover Passion by Raye Morgan

16.) Royal Seduction by Donna Clayton

For Di and friends—

we are the stuff that dreams are made of.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

One

I vy Crosby stood in the checkout line at the drugstore and wished someone would remove the display of gilt-framed mirrors, marked down fifty percent for quick sale, from the wall to her right. The mirrors reflected multiple images and she really didn’t want to see herself just now.

With a grimace she reached up to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. It didn’t stay, of course.

Her hair was naturally blond, not always an asset, and naturally curly, which meant it did as it pleased. On an impulse she couldn’t explain, she’d had the long tresses cut off last week.

A mistake, that. Now it lay in ringlets around her face, making her look about seven instead of twenty-seven. She was also cursed with big blue eyes and a natural fringe of dark lashes that curled at the tips just like her hair.

The combination lent her a fragile innocence that was sometimes useful in business, but was mostly irritating as people took her at face value.

Because of her looks, she’d been treated like a pet or a doll all her life. By family. By teachers. By boyfriends who’d been protective and possessive, as if they wanted to put her in a pocket and only let her out when it was convenient. For them.

Except for one man. Once upon a fairy tale time out of time, she’d met her prince—a man who’d treated her as a woman, a very desirable woman, an equal in wit, intelligence…and passion.

Oh, yes, passion. A faint tremor ran through her blood, the first warning of the volcanic explosion that was to come. Just the thought of him, six weeks later, could do that to her.

Max. I need you.

No, she mentally chided. She was an adult and she could figure this out. But first things first, as one of her business professors used to say. That was why she was at this pharmacy in a strip mall where she wasn’t likely to be recognized.

Her many images glowered at her from the mirrors. She smoothed out the frown and laid her purchases on the counter. She’d gotten lotion and shampoo and a couple of other things she didn’t need in hopes that no one would notice she’d also gotten a pregnancy test kit.

“Sorry, I have to change the tape,” the clerk said, opening the top of the cash register and removing the spent roll of paper. When she attempted to thread the new roll through the machine, it jammed. The woman muttered a curse.

Ivy tamped down the impatience that made her want to turn and walk out as fast as she could. She’d stood in line this long, what was a few more minutes? Besides, she would have to do it all over again someplace else.

Schooling herself to calmness, she absently glanced over the tabloids while she waited. The headlines were amusing as usual—Woman Gives Birth to Martian and other interesting tidbits.

She skimmed the large print. A movie star was getting a divorce. Ho-hum. The Lion Roars, proclaimed another above a picture of a handsome man holding the arm of a fragile beauty—

Ivy gasped. She grabbed the edge of the counter as the room went into a dangerous spin.

“Are you all right?” the clerk asked, leaning close and peering into her eyes.

Ivy blinked several times and the world righted itself. Except for the abyss giving way under her feet. “Yes, just a…a sort of…of a dizzy spell. I’m fine now.” She smiled to prove that she was.

The clerk nodded sympathetically. “When I was pregnant with my first, I fainted at the drop of a hat. Blood was especially bad. My sister cut her finger one night when we were having dinner at her place. I fell right out on the kitchen floor. Scared my husband to death. He didn’t know I was expecting. Neither did I, come to think of it.”

Ivy dredged up a smile while the clerk and the woman behind her in line laughed nostalgically. “I’ll take this, too,” she said, and put the tabloid on the counter.

By the time she’d paid cash for her purchases and rushed to her car, every nerve in her body was quivering like an aspen leaf in a playful breeze. As she got in, she tossed her purchases into the passenger seat, grabbed the tabloid and read the article that went with the headline.

Her eyes widened and narrowed by turns as she skimmed through the hyperbole to get to the meat of the story. It seemed Prince Maxwell von Husden, Crown Prince of Lantanya, who was soon to be king, had been seen at a popular tourist resort in the tiny country with a mysterious beauty in July. After a romantic night of dining and dancing and passion, the woman had disappeared.

Ivy gasped and felt faint again. How could they have known about the passion?

Reporters always made up the stuff to fill in the blanks, she decided grimly, trying to calm the emotions that roared through her like a tsunami. She read on.

The prince was furious that the woman had slipped out on him before he grew bored and dropped her, according to one “close palace source.” Another source contended that the prince was heartbroken but covering it with anger.

Ivy pressed a hand to her thundering heart. “Liar,” she said. She’d been right to leave without waking him the next morning, although it had been difficult to do.

He’d looked so handsome lying in the king-size bed, his hair mussed and a morning beard shadowing his face, his expression one of contentment. She’d contemplated kissing him goodbye, but she’d had a plane to catch and she wasn’t sure they could stop at one kiss.

Again passion flared at the memory. She clenched the steering wheel and closed her eyes, slowly winning control of the hunger running through her.

“Are you sure you’re all right?” a voice asked through the window.

She opened her eyes with a jerk and stared at the woman who’d been in line behind her. “Oh. Oh, yes. Thank you.” She smiled brightly, her heart pounding so hard she could hear each beat in her ears.

The woman, who looked fortyish and had a certain world-weariness in her eyes, smiled, too. “Take care of yourself,” she advised in a kindly tone and walked to a car in the next row.

Ivy composed herself and drove out of the parking lot to an apartment complex recently built on the outskirts of the city. Portland General Hospital was the next exit off the highway. At least she was close to medical care in case her heart gave out completely.

The cynical thought evaporated after she got inside her place, the door closed and locked as if a whole platoon of reporters might come charging after her.

She read the article again, then looked through the whole tabloid in case there was more information. There wasn’t. All the reporter really knew was that she and Max had had a late supper at the resort. And that the prince seemed to have been in a bad mood of late.

For a while she sat there in a stupor, shocked that the handsome, humorous, beguiling man she’d met wasn’t Max Hughes, a foreigner attending to business matters in Lantanya the same as she was. She stared at the grainy print as if that could change the images in the photo that was snapped without her knowledge six weeks and four days ago.

However, the woman, whose face was partially turned from the camera, was her, and the man, who was smiling right into the lens, was apparently the man who was due to be crowned Maxwell V, King of Lantanya, in a few weeks.

The tiny island country was nestled in the Adriatic Sea, a perfect Brigadoon hidden from the rest of the world and far from reality.

Way far from reality, she silently admitted, feeling beyond foolish. Her family was right to treat her like a baby. She needed a keeper.

Laying the paper on the coffee table and leaning her head on the sofa back, she closed her eyes and groaned. A playboy prince. She’d fallen right into the lying, deceitful arms of a playboy prince. A last fling before he assumed the duties of king?

Get real. Did leopards change their spots? He would simply move on to being a playboy king. And she’d fallen for his charm, his wit, his warmth…the timbre of his deep voice, the passion in his eyes, the odd glimpses of sadness in his expression…. She’d thought they were soul mates.

A lie. It had all been a lie. And she’d believed it. Every word. He must have thought it amusing—the naive American…the shy virgin….

“Ohhh,” she moaned and buried her face in her hands.

How could she have allowed herself to be taken in like that? She was smart. She’d graduated with honors in systems management and computer science. With her team of workers, she’d devised a brilliant network for the kingdom’s education program—

Oh, no! She would have to go back. She might even have to face him.

The plastic bag containing her purchases rattled against her leg as she shifted in despair. Slowly she removed a small square box and stared at it as if viewing a poison potion she was supposed to drink.

“The moment of truth,” she said to it.

This was indeed such a moment. It was time to confirm her direst suspicions and find out if her magical night of passion had left her with a little souvenir of the evening.

She dropped the satiric mood at the thought of a child, a sweet innocent who’d had no say in its conception, and laid a hand protectively over her abdomen.

Her home life hadn’t been great during her growing years. She’d wanted better for her children. A loving family. A faithful mate. Honor and integrity and caring. She had screwed up royally.

“Ha-ha,” she muttered at the unintended pun.

Rising, she walked down the short hallway to the master bedroom. Its furnishings didn’t comfort her as they usually did. She’d picked them out upon leaving the family mansion and moving to the apartment in a bid for independence shortly after agreeing to work at the family business.

Well, she’d needed a job. The dot-com where she’d started right out of college had made it four years before crashing. She’d learned a lot about computer systems during that time, so she was a valuable employee.

Not that anyone else thought so. Her fellow analysts thought she was a pretty face who’d gotten her position due to family connections. That much was true, in that her sister had pressured her to come into the company.

Ivy had gladly taken on the job of bringing Lantanya’s educational facilities into the twenty-first century when no one else had wanted the time-consuming task, which had included long flights across the Atlantic to Rome. She’d then had to take a puddle jumper, as some called the small jet, to Lantanya, which lay off the eastern coast of Italy in the Adriatic Sea, which was really an arm of the Mediterranean.

On the latest trip, she’d stayed in the tiny country for two months, then on her last night she’d met Max. Her own Prince Charming.

The royal liar, she dubbed him, seizing anger as a means to control the hurt she didn’t want to recognize.

Going into the bathroom, she closed the door and locked it behind her. Which was ridiculous since there was no one in the apartment but her.

Really, it was a tad late to be locking herself into bathrooms to ensure that she was alone. She should have done that six weeks and four days ago, in the middle of July when she was in Lantanya instead of the first Tuesday in September, back at her apartment in Portland, Oregon.

In reality, she should have returned home before she gave in to the madness that had danced through her like bubbles from the finest champagne. She frowned and opened the pregnancy kit.

A few minutes later she emerged, shaken and chastened. She studied the results again. There was no mistake. She was expecting a child, a royal baby…and heir to the House of von Husden.

Well, probably not. Illegitimate children didn’t inherit anything. She sighed shakily. As long as she kept the father a secret people might wonder about the sire, but her child wouldn’t be made to feel he or she had been rejected. She would see to that. She would love her child so much, he or she would never notice the lack of a father’s care.

Going out on the balcony, intending to think the situation through and come to a decision, she stared at the hills and thought of another place and another time….

“What do you think?” an amused male voice had asked.

Ivy had turned from the painting she’d been studying to the source of the question. A tall man, probably six feet or so, a good seven or eight inches taller than she was at any rate, stood a couple of feet behind her.

He had black hair and deep-brown eyes. His skin was tanned, making his smile brilliant. His face was lean, all hard planes and angles, but put together so the whole was very handsome. There was a hint of silver at his temples, lending a distinguished air to his appearance. In spite of that, she judged his age to be in the midthirties at most.

“I’m not sure what to think,” she admitted, turning back to the painting so she wouldn’t stare at the alluring stranger. “I’m sure the artist has a point, but I don’t think I get it.”

“Same here,” her fellow museum visitor agreed. “I like faces in the ordinary arrangement. Which can sometimes be quite lovely.”

He gazed at her appreciatively.

A slight disappointment rose in her. Just another Lothario, she deduced. “Yes,” she said coolly, as if speaking of the picture, and walked on to the next gilt-framed oil.

“I’ve offended you. I’m sorry. You are quite lovely, you know, but I’ll try to refrain from mentioning it again.”

His candor surprised her, causing her to meet his eyes. His smile was so engaging, she had to return it.

“There’s a wing on this side that I think you might enjoy more,” he said, gesturing to a wide, elaborately framed wooden archway and bowing in a brief but stately manner. He didn’t try to guide her or touch her in any way.

“Ah,” she murmured at the doorway.

A huge painting of flowers, done in the loveliest hues imaginable, was the focal point at the end of the gallery.

“It’s like stepping into a garden, isn’t it?” he said softly. “You can almost feel the warmth of the sunshine striking the treetops, then the coolness of the shade as you walk into the shadow of the leaf canopy.”

The oddest thing was that she could. She looked at him in amazement. His smile…oh, his smile. It knew everything she was thinking….

Returning to the present, Ivy stared at the colors of the sunset lightly grazing the maple trees on the lawn and the alders closer to the creek that separated the residential complex from the golf course. The creek flowed into the Columbia River that had awed Lewis and Clark on their expedition. A much smaller river ran from the Lantanya mountains where the resort was perched down to the wine-colored sea where St. Ansellmo, the capital city of the island kingdom, lay against the shore.

She and the man who introduced himself as Max Hughes had wandered through the rest of the museum and taken tea in the garden there. They’d had the place to themselves. It had seemed as if they were the only people in the world as they talked. He’d admitted he liked to sketch the odd scene now and then, even to paint if he had time.

“Like Churchill,” she’d said, “something to relax you.”

“What do you do in your spare time?” he’d asked.

“Read. Go on long walks. Work on computer programs.”

That was when he’d questioned her about her work. She’d told him about Crosby Systems and her job in Lantanya. He’d been keenly interested and had asked a thousand questions. When she’d asked, he said he was in business, too, mostly as a consultant. His manner had been sardonic as he admitted that last one.

Consultant? Yes, if one stretched the definition of king. Maybe he was more of a figurehead than a ruler, though.

Not that it mattered to her. He’d walked her partway back to the resort, then had to leave for a meeting. She’d been disappointed as she wound her way up the steep slope to the castle-like building on a rocky promontory.

“I’ll see you again,” he’d promised, briefly lifting her hand to his lips.

And he had.

Hearing music from a car passing on the street, Ivy was thrust back into the recent past and that magic night….

A cool breeze blew off the sea and music that filled her soul wafted over her as she’d stood on the patio and observed the very last of the colors in the sunset sink into the sea. She’d been alone.

“Let’s not waste the music,” an amused voice said from the shadows.

A man, tall, with dark hair and eyes and a brilliant smile, stepped into view. Max held his hands out and she stepped into them as if they’d done this a thousand times before. The music rose and throbbed and they dipped and swayed to the notes, wrapped in the magic of it all.

When it stopped, they did, too. They dropped their arms, but didn’t move away.

“That was enchanting,” he murmured, his gaze warm and filled with laughter as he studied her.

“I feel like an enchanted princess,” she said, then looked at him quickly to see if she’d been too bold.

“And I, your devoted knight,” he murmured, a devilish light in his eyes. He executed a smart little bow.

On impulse she nodded regally, her mouth curling with laughter at their acting. And the fact that he’d returned.

“Your meeting, did it go well?” she asked.

He shrugged. “It is concluded.” His smile flashed again. “Please, Your Highness,” he begged, “give me some daring feat to perform so that I may show my devotion and my sorrow that I had to leave you this afternoon.”

She looked around the darkened patio, at the sky, then the capital city lying on the coast, its lights glittering like jewels. On a nearby trellis, she saw what she wanted.

“Sir Knight, there is one thing, a rose, the most perfect bloom of them all, that I crave, but it is out of my reach.”

“Show it to me and it shall be yours.” He dropped to his knee. “Or by my honor and my good name, I shall perish in the attempt.”

“Nay,” she whispered, held by the strong, sensuous line of his lips. “You shall not perish. I won’t allow it.”

“Then tell me where it is.”

“There.” She turned from him and the allure of his smile, of his eyes and the fires that now burned hotly in those dark depths. Pointing to the highest branch and the farthest rose that wafted beyond the stone of the patio’s walls, she waited breathlessly to see what he would do.

“An easy task,” he told her.

He leaped to a chair, a table, then the top of the wall. Without testing the support of the trellis, he stepped upon it and climbed upward, careful of the thorny vines. When he was as high as he could go, he leaned out…and out…and out…

For a moment it seemed to her that he hung between earth and air, attached to neither, as the land dropped sharply off the bluff where the resort was built. Then he deftly plucked the rose she’d indicated, leaped back to the wall, then onto the patio and, again kneeling on one foot, presented the prize to her.

When she hesitated, feeling it was too intimate a gift, he stood and moved close. “You cannot refuse,” he said in a low, husky voice, “when I have risked all for it. And for you.”

He removed the thorns from the stem and tucked the pure white rose into the bosom of her blouse.

“That is where it belongs, next to your heart,” he said in the same tone that sent sprinkles of stardust swirling down to the innermost parts of her.

The music began again, and they danced without speaking for a long time. From the town a clock struck the hour, a plangent vibration that echoed in her heart with each peal.

“Midnight,” she whispered.

“Must you leave?”

She shook her head and looked at her feet, half expecting to find glass slippers. He followed her gaze.

His chuckle made her laugh, too. “We are foolish together, but it is fun, yes?”

She nodded. They danced some more, then went inside for a late supper. Over the meal, they talked about everything. Their lives. Their early dreams. Then later ones. Their sorrows. His mother had died two years ago, his father last fall. Max had traveled the world since then, but there had been no escaping the mourning. He had loved them very much.

“I’m so sorry,” she said, taking his hand and pressing it to her cheek. “My parents are divorced, but at least I still have them both. And a stepmother.”

“She doesn’t like you?” His eyes became dangerous.

“Oh, yes. She’s very nice.”

“But?” When she looked at him perplexed, he added, “There’s always more after such faint praise.”

“Well, she’s always been closer to my sister, Katie. Katie’s a year older than I am and my best friend. I’m the baby of the family. They treat me like a pet.”

He laughed at that and playfully patted her head. She snarled and pretended to bite his hand. Then they fell silent and simply observed each other over the flicker of the candle.

“I have a suite,” he finally said. “I will make for you the most delicious dessert. Will you come with me and let me serve you, sweet princess of the rose?”

She nodded.

He stood and took her hand, helping her from the chair, then they drifted up the marble stairs and along a silent corridor until they came to two magnificent doors carved with two lions raised on their hind legs, their forepaws touching as they gazed fiercely at the onlooker.

“Lions rampant,” he said, seeing her interest. “From the royal crest.”

“A crest, like a family crest, dukes and all that?”

“Or a king, yes. The lions depict a battle between two brothers of the same house. After nearly killing each other, they decided to join forces and save the kingdom from outsiders, hence the two lions.”

“Is that what happened in Lantanya?” she asked.

He nodded, then swung open one of the doors, disclosing an opulent room of crystal chandeliers, polished black granite and mirrors softly reflecting the view from every wall. She was speechless. Not even her father’s house was this grand.

“This is magnificent. Who are you?” she asked, knowing she must look like a wide-eyed naif.

“Just a man,” he said, turning her toward him and holding her lightly, carefully in his arms. “One who has been enchanted by moonlight and music…and one very special rose.”

She shivered at the intensity in his voice and looked away as the innate shyness possessed her.

“You are a shy princess,” he murmured.

“Yes. Katie and I are the quiet ones,” she explained, referring to her sibling. “We have two brothers, both older. Trent is CEO of the company. Danny…well, he’s been living in seclusion since too many tragedies took their toll on him.”

“I see.” He took her hand. “Now about that dessert.” Ivy was glad he picked up on the fact that discussing Danny was too personal.

In a kitchen that had more marble and polished granite than a museum, he prepared cherries jubilee. After flipping out the lights and setting the cherries aflame, he spooned the concoction over ice cream and set a large bowl in front of her.

“I can’t possibly eat this much,” she protested.

He handed her a silver spoon with the lion crest and took one for himself. “Not alone perhaps. I shall help.”

With her sitting on one side of a marble counter and him standing on the other, they ate spoonfuls of the dessert when the flames died and gazed at each other, their eyes saying more than the few words they shared. Soon the treat was gone.

When she started to pat her mouth one last time with the linen napkin, he caught her hand, then kissed her with the greatest tenderness she’d ever known.

Underscoring the tenderness was the passion.

She sensed it in him as a great force, a river that ran silently and deep, a part of his being, and she knew instinctively that it was more than desire, although that was there, too.

She gave herself to the kiss and to the passion and the desire…and to him….

Two

M axwell von Husden, Prince Regent of Lantanya, was having a bad day. He’d had a bad week…month…in fact, the whole year had been rotten.

His restless gaze stopped on a vase of roses, white with a coral blush, fresh from the royal gardens.

Except for one night of splendor, he amended his earlier observation. That one night with the rose, as he thought of her to himself in the few moments of privacy he had before falling into an exhausted sleep, had been the one grace note of the summer, a gift he’d never expected. The gods had been kind—

A discreet knock on the door preceded the entrance of his valet. “Ready, Your Highness?” Ned Bartlett asked, looking him over like a mother with a youngster heading for his first day of school.

The man’s ancestors had served the kings of Lantanya, the third longest continuous monarchy in Europe after Britain and the Netherlands, almost as long as the kingdom had existed. And they were as thoroughly English as the British crown.

“Yes.”

Their eyes met in the mirror. Max recognized sympathy in the valet’s familiar gray eyes. Fifteen years older than his own thirty-three years, Bartlett was the only person alive who had witnessed the tears and sorrows of a young prince growing to manhood under the watchful eyes of his parents and the residents of the kingdom. The valet had been his most constant companion from the time he was six.

Taking a deep breath, Max let it out and with it the doubts and pain of what was to come. Today he would pass a life sentence on his uncle, his dead father’s half brother, and on the former minister of state, for high treason.

During the traditional year of mourning after his father’s death, the two men had planned a coup to take over the country before Max was formally crowned at the end of the grieving period. With the deed accomplished, they would then deny him reentry into the country.

Max had unexpectedly returned from eight restless, sorrow-driven months abroad a day before the attempt. That night, hired assassins had broken into his bedroom, planning to kill him.

Only he wasn’t there. He’d been at the resort, sleeping peacefully—his last night of rest in over six weeks—in the arms of the rose. The need to be with her had been stronger than the prickles of his conscience, urging him to return to the palace.

Staying with her had saved his life.

As for the traitors, confusion at not finding the prince in his bed had destroyed the attackers’ plans and timing. The royal palace guards had seen the men and arrested them.

The next morning, upon his return, he and the guards, assisted by his security advisor, had arrested the main culprits, his uncle and the minister, and quelled the coup before it had a chance to get started, much less succeed.

During the past month, the culprits had been tried by the High Court, composed of the twelve lord mayors, each representing one of the twelve counties of the country. The three members of the Supreme Court had sat as judges over the proceedings.

Today was the last step—the formal sentencing. Only the king could do that since it was a case of high treason. His title was Prince Regent until the coronation ceremony, but he was the ruler and the job was his.

“Will I do?” he asked impatiently.

After Bartlett had pronounced him fit to be seen, he left his suite in the residential side of the palace and strode toward the justice chamber where much of the business of the kingdom was conducted. He glanced at a portrait of a sixteenth-century ancestor as he strode the long corridor separating the two areas.

That particular king had been beheaded by a trusted friend while they were having dinner in the king’s apartment. Again loyal officers had saved the day and the infant prince and, therefore, the kingdom.

“There, but for the grace of God and an ironic twist of fate, I almost went,” he murmured, his blood warming at the memory of that night and the woman who had been as stirred as he by their kisses.

A door opened to his left, and his security advisor, who’d been his roommate and best friend at university in the U.S., stepped out. Like Bartlett, Chuck Curland looked him over as if to detect any cracks in his armor.

“I’m all right,” Max said tersely, although he hadn’t been asked.

His friend opened a door with a digital security lock, something new in the palace. All outside doors had already been converted. Inside ones were next, particularly his quarters. Dead bolts and high-tech locks. In a palace that hadn’t been locked since being built two hundred years ago.

Max entered the armory and strapped on the golden jewel-encrusted sheath and sword of the head of state. He left off the sash with its brooches and badges of honor. This was not a ceremonial occasion, only a punishing one. The sword of justice represented that fact.

“Do I look regal enough?” he asked, his smile tinged with bitterness at the thought of what was ahead.

“Royal to the bone,” Chuck assured him, grasping his shoulder briefly.

Few men would have dared touch him, but Max knew the gesture from his friend was one of solidarity. He turned and walked into the Justice Chamber before he blubbered like a baby at the betrayal of his uncle and the minister he’d also trusted. Kings were not allowed emotion.

“All rise,” the sergeant-at-arms intoned.

The court and its audience rose as one, heads bowed, as he took his place on the high seat behind the three justices. When he was seated, the crowd sat, too.

The bailiff presented the case to the king.

“Has the jury reached a verdict?” Max asked. As if he didn’t know.

“We have, Your Majesty,” the lord high mayor said.

The sergeant-at-arms received the signed verdict from the mayor and delivered it to the senior judge of the Supreme Court, who silently read it, let his two cohorts see it, then presented it to the prince regent.

Max read the paper, then, setting his face to no expression, spoke, “Lord High Mayor, how find the jury on the first charge?”

“We, the jury, find the defendants guilty,” the man said.

“Lord High Mayor, how find the jury on the second charge?” Max continued the formalized ritual.

“Guilty.”

The third charge?

“Guilty.”

The fourth?

“Guilty,” the head of the jury replied.

Max experienced not satisfaction but a great sorrow as the men were found guilty on all counts—treason, attempt to murder a head of state, conspiracy to overthrow the rightful succession of the kingdom, use of violence against a member of the royal house.

Gloom settled in his spirit like great weights strapped to his soul. Through the high, stained-glass windows of the courtroom, the world seemed to darken.

Ah, rose, I need you.

“Is the court ready for the sentencing?” he asked.

“The court is ready,” the senior supreme justice told him. “The defendants will rise,” he instructed.

Max sentenced his uncle and the minister to ninety-nine years in prison. Even after their deaths, their remains would stay in the prison cemetery until the full ninety-nine years were up before relatives could claim the bodies.

The two captains of the Royal Dragoons who had joined them in the conspiracy were given life sentences with no chance of parole.

The two hired assassins, who were not citizens of Lantanya, had already been tried in a lower court and sentenced to life. The men would work at hard labor and have no chance of getting out for thirty years.

At the end of two hours it was finished.

When Max returned to his quarters, his dress uniform was damp under the arms and down his back from the tension of sentencing four men he’d known from birth to a prison routine filled with work and, when not working, isolation.

Their lives would be almost as lonely as that of a king.

Bartlett quietly entered and removed the used clothing. “Will you be needing anything further?” he asked in the gentle tones he’d always used when Max had been a child and suffered some bereavement to his young soul.

“No, thanks. I’ll take a shower, then ring for Chuck when I’m dressed. Perhaps coffee when he arrives?”

“Muffins and fruit would be nice, too,” the valet suggested. “You haven’t eaten.”

Max nodded. “Okay. Give me twenty minutes. And, Ned, thank you.” He wasn’t sure what he was thanking him for. Perhaps for his unspoken sympathy, or his eternal kindness, or for simply being here when things got tough.

The older man nodded solemnly. “My pleasure, sir.”

Alone, Max quickly showered and dried, then returned to the bedroom to dress. Stopping by the reading table, he lifted one perfect rose from the bouquet and sniffed the delicate perfume.

He closed his eyes as memory poured through him. In an uncharacteristic gesture, he brought the flower to his lips, feeling the fragile coolness of its petals. A shudder went through him as the vast emptiness of his chambers assailed his heart. For that one night he hadn’t been alone….

“You’re trembling,” he had said, drawing back a little from the kiss, reluctant to let go of the treasure of her mouth.

“It’s…I don’t know what it is,” she’d admitted. “It’s all so strange. The night…the whole day…seems like a dream. Unreal.” She laid her hands against his chest. “And yet so real.”

“I know.” He gazed deeply into her eyes, their blue depths so clear it was like looking into her innermost thoughts. He saw doubt and uncertainty, but also passion and intrigue. All the things that raged through him in undulating waves of desire. “I’ve never felt this way before, not about anyone.”

“Nor have I,” she said, gazing at him with a worried frown on her beautiful face.

He kissed her cheek, along her jaw, then behind her ear, careful of the tiny gold earrings she wore. Against his chest, he felt her breasts rise with a quickly drawn breath. A groan of need escaped him as the passion rose higher between them. Her arms crept around his neck as he drew her tight against him, unable to disguise the strength of his response to her.

For a time he was content to hold and kiss her, to stroke her back, her arms, her sides. Then that wasn’t enough. He’d always made it a point never to become involved with anyone not of his set, women who knew the rules and expected only a night of pleasure with no promises.

He wanted to make promises to this woman, he found. Words like forever danced on the tip of his tongue. He closed his eyes and tried to clear his mind.

When she swayed against him in sweet surrender, rational thinking scattered like birds before a storm. He cupped her hips in both hands and rubbed against her, needing full body contact.

“Beautiful princess, will you stay?” he asked, oddly humbled by the passion in her eyes and the sweet confusion in her trembling lips. “Say yes,” he urged, afraid she was going to say no.

“I…I may not please you,” she whispered.

A realization came to him. “Are you an untried rose, opening her petals for the first time?”

White teeth sank into beguiling pink lips, kissed bare of makeup long ago. He hardly heard her answer.

“Yes,” she finally said, pressing her face against his throat in sweet embarrassment.

A tenderness, so strong it was almost an ache, spread through him. “I’ll be gentle,” he promised, “if you’re willing. If this is what you want.”

An eternity passed between one heartbeat and another, then she lifted her head, met his eyes and nodded. She was brave, and she was his. His.

Golden stardust seemed to shower them in magic. They were surrounded by it, then suffused with it as they kissed again. He touched her hair, her face, then her breasts, feeling the hard points of passion there at the tips.

Without releasing her lips, he lifted her, then carried her to the bedroom. Although she was shy, there was no awkwardness between them as he undressed her, then himself.

Once nude, he clasped her slender body to his, letting the full tactile sensation of skin against skin flow over them as they touched, chest, belly, thighs. When he stripped back the covers, they fell onto the sheets as one, laughter bubbling between them in that mysterious sharing of feelings that had happened nearly from the first moment they met.

When he pressed lightly on her shoulder, she lay back and let him gaze his fill at her.

“Breathtaking,” he murmured.

“So are you,” she said with a little catch as her gaze ran over him.

He wondered if he frightened her with his blatant male desire that couldn’t be hidden as easily as hers could. With the gentlest touch, he stroked from her shoulder, over her breast, down her abdomen and to her thigh. Then he paid homage to her breasts with his hands and his mouth.

When he probed her belly button with his tongue, it made her laugh. He smiled at her, then went back to the exploration that tantalized them both to near madness. When he kissed along her thighs, first one, then the other, she gasped.

Her eyes grew big when he glanced up, then nudged her legs apart, asking entry to the secret treasure that was hers to give or withhold.

“Please,” he murmured, “I need to taste you.”

When he’d brought her to the peak once, then twice, he finally heeded her little cries that he come to her.

“At once,” she said. “Now. I want you. I want everything.”

The red heat of desire shimmered between them. He observed the flush that caused her skin to glow as it swept up her chest and into her cheeks, telling him of her growing hunger and feeding his own until his mind was hazy with it.

“I’ve never wanted a woman this way,” he whispered. “This much.”

“How much?” she asked with such innocence it seared his heart.

“With everything in me. As if the world would perish in one of your tender sighs if we didn’t share this. As if my life depended on this one moment. On you—”

Max crushed the rose in his fist, jolted out of the lovely remembrance by the knowledge that his life had depended on her at that exact moment. Their passion had literally saved him from the assassins. Would he ever get a chance to tell her?

“I must leave tomorrow,” she’d said when they had consummated the union and lay entwined in blissful contentment after he’d taken care of her with a warm washcloth and a towel tucked under her hips.

He smiled now, recalling the blushes and her embarrassed protests, which he’d ignored.

“No,” he’d said, the command of a king if she’d but known it.

“I have to. I have a job to do.” She’d sighed plaintively.

He’d tightened his arms around her. “I will follow you to the ends of the earth,” he’d vowed.

Releasing the crushed rose, he dropped it into the wastebasket. The conspiracy had taken all his time and attention during the next six weeks. His presence as king, in deed if not yet in name, had been required. Now that the trial and sentencing were finished, he could think of other things, like finding his rose.

Quickly dressing in jeans and a T-shirt, he grabbed the phone and punched in his security advisor’s private number.

Chuck answered on the first ring.

“Can you come to my quarters?” Max asked.

“Be right there.”

No sooner had he hung up, than a knock sounded on his door. “Come in.”

Bartlett entered with a serving cart. On it were a coffee urn, two cups, two plates and a platter of muffins, plus another with a variety of fruit. He didn’t know how the man knew exactly when to arrive, but it had been this way since Max’s earliest memories in the palace.

“Thanks, Bartlett. I’ll be going out for a hike in about an hour.”

“Very good, sir.” The man left as quietly as he’d entered, leaving the door ajar and speaking to someone in the hall.

Chuck Curland came inside and closed the door, then pulled the pocket doors from their hiding place and closed them, too. Two sets of doors had been built into all the king’s rooms when the palace was constructed to ensure privacy in conversation. Max, upon his father’s advice, used them.

“Coffee?” Max asked.

“Please.” The American glanced around the room the way he did each time he entered.

Once, Max had teased him about expecting a spy behind every curtain. Lately the idea didn’t seem funny.

Chuck’s eyes were light blue and seemed to see everything that might be the slightest suspicious. His hair was brown with blond streaks from their hours of jogging on the beach. His frame matched Max’s inch for inch, pound for pound. In college they’d shared a room the first semester, then, finding they got along superbly, an apartment after that until they graduated.

Chuck was five years older than Max and had been an Army Ranger before going to school on the G.I. bill. That the two had met at all was a demonstration of American democracy in action when they’d been randomly assigned to share a room.

Max’s father, the late king, had suggested Chuck come to Lantanya and advise them on security matters. Perhaps the king had known at that early stage of their friendship that Max would need a friend in the palace. Chuck, with his all-seeing gaze, had detected the conspiracy and warned Max, thus bringing him home early.

Max poured the coffee and filled a plate, then sat in his favorite chair. Chuck did the same.

“This reminds me of days with my father,” Max told his friend. “Except, the king sat where I am, in a big black leather chair, and I sat in this chair, which was located where you are.”

“What happened to the king’s chair?” Chuck asked, taking a muffin and several spoons of fruit.

“I had it placed in the royal museum along with his suit of armor and ceremonial outfits.”

Chuck smiled. “Are you going to have armor made for yourself?”

“No. The bulletproof vest you insisted I buy is more than enough for my tastes.”

“It’s more effective when it’s worn,” Chuck said dryly.

Max cocked one eyebrow. “I’m not going to sleep in it, and that’s final.”

They smiled at each other with the ease of companions who’d seen each other puking their guts out after their first—and last—overindulgence in beer, moaning over the fickleness of college girls who threw them over for the captain of the football team and cursing their professors for tests that were impossible to pass.

“Speaking of sleeping. Or not sleeping, as the case may be…” Chuck said, the words trailing off as he studied Max with his omniscient gaze.

Max tossed him a questioning glance as he bit into a muffin. It seemed odd, in light of the morning activities, to realize he was hungry. Life had a way of going on, he reasoned.

Chuck lifted a muffin. “You gotta get married,” he said, and took a bite.

Max nearly choked. “What the hell brought that on?”

His friend chewed and swallowed, then took a sip of coffee. “Last year, before he died, your father made me promise to see that you found a bride by the end of the mourning period. You must produce an heir.”

Max muttered a curse, then another. Neither helped calm the swirl of emotion in his breast.

Chuck observed him with an odd little smile playing about the corners of his mouth. “An heiress will do,” he continued. “Either English or European would be acceptable to your people. Or American.”

Max glared when a full smile broke over his friend’s face. There was knowledge in those blue eyes that said Chuck knew more than he was saying.

“Spit it out,” he invited, knowing there was more.

“Your tryst at the resort probably saved your life, or at least prevented a nasty injury. I like to tell myself that the guards, whom I trained, would have interceded before great bodily harm was done.”

“Yeah. Me, too.”

“So?”

“So?” Max echoed, not sure what the question was.

“Is it the American?”

Like the petals of a flower suddenly clamping shut, Max withdrew, not wanting to share that night with anyone, not even his best friend. He shook his head slightly, not in denial of the possibility, but of sharing it.

“She might be pregnant,” Chuck said and calmly put the rest of the muffin in his mouth.

Max sprang to his feet as if an electric current had suddenly run through his chair. He paced to the window. The vase of roses blew gentle kisses of sweet scent at him. He paused and touched one.

“What makes you think that?” he finally asked.

“I’m your security chief, Your Highness. I’m paid to know what goes on around you.”

Chuck always reverted to formalities when he gained insights into Max’s life that might transgress friendship. Max appreciated the gesture. That left it up to him to decide the level of the discussion.

“She was a virgin,” Max said softly.

“Yes, sir.”

“It was a night like none other,” he continued. “When I ran out of condoms, I took a chance with her. How did you know that?”

“There was, uh, evidence on the sheets. I took the liberty of confiscating them…in case there were future questions about the child’s conception, if there should happen to be a child.”

“In case I got whacked,” Max said sardonically, catching on to his advisor’s line of reasoning.

However, his demise wasn’t uppermost in his mind at the moment. He recalled pulling the petals from a dozen roses and sprinkling them over the bed and her. His friend would have seen those, too, and known what a sentimental fool Max had made of himself. He groaned internally.

Chuck studied him for a long minute, then smiled in understanding. “Are you in love with the American beauty?” he asked, one friend to another.

“Love? I’m not sure what that means at the present. I loved my uncle and trusted him with a child’s belief in those close to him. That nearly got me killed.”

“Does she know who you are, or did you go by Max Hughes?”

“Isn’t there anything you don’t know?” Max spoke in irritation. His alias, like that night, was his alone to enjoy, his little secret from the demanding public of his world. Secret? Ha!

“It’s my job—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Max interrupted impatiently. “Due to the circumstances, the treason and all, I’m cutting you some slack here, but you’re on dangerous ground.”

Chuck raised his eyebrows and showed no signs of quaking in his boots. “Crosby Systems is headquartered in Portland, Oregon. If you leave on the nine-twenty flight tonight, you can be there tomorrow morning.”

“Why would I do that?”

“To woo the American beauty. It wouldn’t be a bad match. She’s smart, well-educated and used to moving among the elite of her society.”

“In other words, she wouldn’t be an embarrassment as my queen,” Max cut in dryly.

“She’s also compassionate and does more than take part in charity auctions. She volunteers at a clinic called Children’s Connection. It’s an adoption agency, mostly funded by another family in the area, the Logans.” Chuck paused. “The Logans and the Crosby family are enemies, I think. Twenty-eight years ago, two of the sons were best friends, then six-year-old Robbie Logan was kidnapped while playing at Danny Crosby’s house. His mother was supposed to have been watching them.”

“The year before Ivy was born,” Max said, combining what she’d told him with Chuck’s information.

“Yes. The families are also rivals in the high-tech-systems business world.”

“You have been busy,” Max murmured.

“Once the conspirators were behind bars, I had time to check out…other things.”

“Like my wild, passionate night with the rose.” Max gave his friend a sardonic glance. “Have you booked my reservation on the nine-twenty flight?”

“Well, I did take the liberty of reserving a seat for you. And alerting Ned to pack a bag.”

Max exhaled heavily. “Are you coming, too?”

“If you like. Someone has to, but it can be another security agent, if you prefer.”

Max laid a hand on his friend’s shoulder. “You’ll do. Who, besides Ned, knows me better?”

“Are we going as prince and bodyguard?”

“This isn’t an official visit, else I’d have to contact the White House, then the press would be all over us. Let’s go as Max Hughes and Chuck Curland. We’re consultants on the educational system Crosby is planning for the country.”

“Fine by me.”

Another worry came to Max. “I’ve never investigated a woman with an eye toward her being my queen. You have any suggestions?”

Chuck stared at him for a full fifteen seconds, then burst into guffaws.

“If you weren’t my friend and security advisor, I’d have you thrown in irons for that,” Max told him, becoming somewhat irritated at the joke he didn’t get.

Chuck laughed harder. Finally he clamped an arm around Max’s shoulders and said in a conspiratorial whisper, “Try flowers. That usually works when courting a woman.”

“This is not a courtship,” Max informed the American coolly. “This is business.”

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