The Prince's Love-Child (The Royal House 0f Cacciatore Book 2)

by Sharon Kendrick

  When they were out together she could see people looking at them, sighing wistfully—and part of her could see why. They made a textbook couple, and she was the textbook working woman who had ended up with a fairytale marriage. If only they knew that her husband had never once told her he loved her and that she did not dare to tell him how much—despite all the odds—she loved him.

  For love was blind to reason. It wasn’t a balance sheet on which you weighed up all the pros and cons of why you should or should not love someone. Either you did or you didn’t, and Lucy did.

  Sometimes she wanted to burrow deep into that cold, clever mind of his and ask him what he really felt about her—except that such a question would sound like the mark of a desperate woman. And what if he told her the truth? Could she face the rest of her life living with it?

  She stared at him one morning when they were finishing breakfast. Guido was scanning the financial pages of the newspapers, though she sometimes wondered why he bothered. He had all the wealth a man could want and more—and yet it was never enough. He always seemed to have the burning need to prove himself. To keep climbing the slippery slope of success, even though he had already conquered it.

  ‘Guido?’

  ‘Mmm?’ His eyes were watchful as he glanced up from his newspaper, but this morning she seemed composed enough. He was never quite sure what kind of a mood she was going to be in—but he put that down to her hormones. In a way, he would be glad when the pregnancy was over and they could address the matter of just how their life was going to be lived from then on.

  ‘I want to go back to Mardivino.’

  A small frown pleated his forehead. ‘What is your hurry, cara?’

  ‘I thought the baby had to be born there.’

  ‘So it does…but—’

  ‘Well, I’m not allowed to fly after thirty-six weeks, and can only fly then if I have a doctor’s note,’ she said crisply.

  He felt the violent pounding of his heart as he stared into her eyes, realising with a start that the time was almost upon them. Had he been deliberately putting it out of his mind? And did all prospective fathers—even normal ones—feel this powerful and rather terrifying realisation that their lives were never going to be the same again?

  ‘Well, that’s no problem. If we can’t take a scheduled flight I’ll charter a plane, or we’ll get Nico to fly out from Mardivino closer to the time. He is a fine pilot.’

  The last thing she wanted to talk about was his brother’s dexterity with a joystick! It was Guido’s reluctance to fly home which disturbed her more than anything. Was he hoping to win her round so that she would adapt to motherhood in his adopted city?

  ‘We can’t, Guido,’ she said practically. ‘Airlines, even private jets, impose rules like this for a very good reason. They don’t want to risk a woman giving birth early—which they can. Imagine if the baby was born thirty-five thousand feet up?’

  His eyes narrowed. Over his dead body! ‘Very well,’ he said coolly. ‘We will return to the Principality.’

  It was the wrong time to ask it, but Lucy was fed up with always waiting for a right time which never seemed to come. ‘And…afterwards? What are we going to do then?’

  There was an uneasy silence. ‘How would you feel about bringing the baby up here, Lucy?’

  ‘In New York?’

  ‘Why not? They do have babies here, you know.’

  So her suspicions had been right all along. Well, she couldn’t. She just couldn’t. New York was a wonderful place, but here she felt like an outsider in a way she never had done on Mardivino.

  She shook her head. ‘This apartment isn’t right for a young child.’

  ‘Then we’ll move further out! Buy a big house with a garden. Think about it, Lucy.’

  She didn’t need to; she already had. She wanted a safe harbour for her and for the baby. A flare of stubbornness reared its head, for this was, after all, her part of the pre-nuptial. That she got to choose where they would live.

  ‘No, Guido,’ she said doggedly. ‘I want to go back to Mardivino.’

  He slammed the newspaper down on the table. She had made it unshakably clear where she stood. He turned away and gave a wry, slightly bitter smile. She certainly wasn’t letting him think that she was one of those women who followed her man to the ends of the earth. But then, only women in love did that, and she had never given him any indication of being that. Not even before all this happened…

  She had never been like other women, with their wistful sighs and hints about the future. That had been one of the things he had admired about her—her no-nonsense independence.

  And now?

  He shook his head, trying to rid it of the mists of damnable confusion.

  ‘Very well,’ he said curtly. ‘We’ll fly back to the island at the end of the week. And who knows? You might feel differently once you’ve had the baby.’

  She opened her mouth to say that she wouldn’t, but then shut it again, rubbing her fingertips distractedly at her temples.

  Spring had come early to Mardivino, and Lucy’s breath caught in her throat as the plane descended towards Solajoya, for there were fields of yellow, purple and white flowers. It was like a miniature world all on its own, she thought—a place where you could see beaches and mountains at the same time.

  Yet now, as she looked down at the island, which was growing larger as the plane descended, she realised that Mardivino had crept in and captured some of her heart. It was as much her home as anywhere now, for her child was to be born here. A sudden wave of emotion rocked her, as if she was one of those tiny, vulnerable little boats which were bobbing around in the harbour beneath.

  ‘Oh, Guido,’ she sighed. ‘Just look at it.’

  But he was not looking at the view, which he had seen countless times before. His associations with flying home had never been happy ones. He preferred to look at Lucy. At the way her lips had parted, and the way she seemed suddenly to have come to life, trembling with an excited kind of anticipation.

  She really had taken to life as Princess, he thought wryly, but especially here. In New York it didn’t mean much—it was only another title—but on Mardivino itself she had real power and real status. Things which obviously meant more to her than the husband she had been forced to marry…

  As soon as they arrived at the Rainbow Palace Guido turned to her. ‘I’m going to see my father,’ he said briefly. ‘I’ll see you at dinner.’

  Lucy watched him go, feeling their closeness—however superficial it had been—evaporating into the warm spring air.

  At least the others seemed overjoyed to see her. Ella was chattering with excitement, and Lucy saw Gianferro’s hard face relax with relief when he saw her.

  ‘Why, you are blooming, Lucy,’ he observed with a smile. ‘The pregnancy progresses well, I understand?’

  ‘Very well.’

  ‘And how was New York?’

  ‘Oh, it was just like New York,’ she said lightly. ‘It’s good to be…back.’

  ‘Indeed,’ he agreed, and although a look of curiosity flashed into his black eyes he said nothing.

  Lucy was walking around the Palace gardens on a warm, bright afternoon when the first pains began, and she doubled over, trying like crazy to shallow breathe, as she’d been taught.

  Stopping every few minutes, she managed to make her way back to their suite and Guido was brought to her. Concern and fear etched deep shadows on his hard face as he saw the doctor bending over her.

  ‘Come e?’ he demanded.

  ‘Highness,’ said the doctor, straightening up. ‘For a first baby, this one is intent on arriving very quickly. We must get the Princess to hospital.’

  ‘Then do it!’ he said urgently.

  It all became very blurred after that—the screeching of wheels and the flashing of lights, and the pain getting more and more intense. In the back of the ambulance Lucy’s nails bit into Guido’s palm.

  ‘Don’t leave me,’ she gasped. ‘Will
you?’

  He wanted to tell her that Royal husbands did not stay with their wives during labour, but he saw the stark terror in her eyes and sensed her isolation with a perception which he would have usually blunted.

  ‘Of course I will stay,’ he bit out. ‘Don’t worry, Lucy—it’s going to be all right. Everything is going to be all right.’

  But he was aware that his words were hollow—for who could utter them with any degree of certainty? Nature was in charge now—random and cruel nature—who could change lives at one capricious stroke. His mouth tightened and he smoothed a damp strand of hair back from Lucy’s brow. He wasn’t going to think about that now.

  Lucy’s preconceived ideas about how she’d wanted to have the baby, while floating in a tank of water, were immediately banished by the midwife, and soon she was on a hard bed with her legs in stirrups. She tried not to thrash around.

  ‘Oh, what must you think of me, Guido?’ she moaned.

  He was having difficulty speaking. ‘I think you’re pretty damned wonderful, if you must know.’

  Had the gas and air made her completely uninhibited? ‘You’ll never fancy me again now you’ve seen me like this!’ she wailed.

  This was more like the Lucy he knew! A wry smile curved his mouth as he saw the midwife’s look of horror. ‘Let us not concern ourselves with that right now, cara,’ he murmured smoothly. But then he saw her face twist with pain once more, and an unfamiliar wave of helplessness washed over him.

  ‘Can you not help her?’ he demanded.

  ‘We are doing everything we can, Highness!’

  Lucy was in a hot, dark tunnel of torture. There were instructions not to push when she wanted to push, and then to push when she was so tired she could barely open her eyes. And the pain! She whimpered, and then drew in all her strength for one last, huge effort.

  The midwife was encouraging her, and Guido was saying something disbelieving in Italian, and then their baby daughter was born—all black-haired, like her daddy, and covered in gunk.

  They put her on Lucy’s stomach, and she stared down at her with a kind of wonder.

  ‘Hello,’ she said tremulously, and a tear of relief began to slide from between her eyelids. She scrubbed it away with her fist before she looked over to see Guido’s reaction.

  But he had gone to the window and was standing there, completely motionless, staring out at the fresh, pale light of the spring day.

  ‘Guido?’ she whispered tentatively.

  He turned round, but his proud and beautiful face gave nothing away. As usual.

  He bent to gently kiss her forehead, and then to brush his mouth against the cheek of his daughter.

  It took a moment or two before he was able to speak with the composure which was expected of him.

  ‘Well done, Lucy,’ he said. ‘She is very beautiful.’ Then he turned to the midwife and the doctor with a formal smile. ‘And may I thank you for all your hard work?’

  Lucy sank back onto the pillows as they took her daughter away to clean her, and an overwhelming wave of sadness swelled up to hit her like a fist. She did not know what she had been expecting him to say, but it had not been enough.

  Maybe she was chasing the impossible—for with Guido it was never enough.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THE books said that having any new baby was exhausting, but Lucy decided that it must be especially so if you had one as lively—and intelligent!—as Nicole Katerina Marguerite Cacciatore. The new Princess seemed to have an aversion to sleeping at times when babies should be sleeping. It was a good thing, thought Lucy, that she compensated for her active nature by being the most beautiful baby in the entire world. But then she would be, wouldn’t she?

  For she looked exactly like her father.

  Guido glanced up one morning to find Lucy yawning, dark shadows having planted faint blue thumb-prints beneath her eyes, and he frowned.

  ‘Cara, this cannot go on.’

  ‘What can’t?’ The fact that he hadn’t come near her since the baby had been born, bar the odd brief, perfunctory hug? Or that he had gone back to being that restless and wary Guido, who walked around like a caged lion?

  He seemed to have slipped away from her again, and she wondered if he would ever come back. A woman who had newly given birth didn’t usually feel beguiling enough to play the temptress. Even in normal circumstances…

  ‘You are exhausted,’ he pointed out. Her tiredness was almost palpable. He had taken to sleeping in an adjoining room, because the last thing she needed at a time like this was a husband who couldn’t keep his hands off her. ‘I have never seen anyone look so tired.’

  ‘Well, new mothers generally are.’

  ‘Then why not engage a nanny?’ he questioned.

  Lucy bit her lip and poured herself a cup of coffee. She could go on bottling up her fears for ever, but that meant that nothing would change and she would be destined to spend a life only half lived. Trying to be all things to a man who seemed content to operate on such a superficial level of existence that he didn’t even want to share her bed now the baby had been born!

  ‘Because I don’t need a nanny,’ she said stubbornly.

  ‘Maybe you do. Look at you! A nanny would take over at night—at least let you get some proper sleep.’

  ‘I want to do it all myself,’ she emphasised. ‘All my friends do.’

  He wanted to point out that her friends were not princesses, except he suspected the argument would fall on deaf ears—for Lucy was weaving a strong bond with their baby which, as a father, he should commend. So what, exactly, was the problem? He drank a mouthful of inky coffee which was much too hot, but he didn’t wince.

  Sometimes he watched as she played with Nicole, thinking herself unobserved. From the shadows he saw the way she kissed the tiny baby head, listened to the crooning little sounds she made, and long-buried memories resurfaced. He remembered standing by the door while his mother cradled his new brother, experiencing a sense of being an outsider—which every older sibling must feel.

  And then…

  He drew a deep breath, pushing the pain to the back of his mind. Patience was not one of his virtues, but he was beginning to recognise that it was what new mothers needed more than anything else.

  ‘Okay,’ he agreed. ‘But she could help you during the day. How about that?’

  Lucy looked at him—casting him the bait and hoping that he would take it. ‘But the baby gives me a raison d’être,’ she said quietly. ‘You’ve set up an office for yourself and you spend all day working in it. What else am I going to do if someone else is taking care of her?’

  ‘Ella manages.’

  But Ella had Nico, and they were a couple in the truest sense of the word. She drew a deep breath. ‘Ella is settled.’

  His eyes narrowed. ‘And you’re not?’

  ‘Not really, no. How can I be? Everything feels so…so…temporary. You don’t want to be here.’

  ‘That is not true,’ he said heavily.

  ‘Guido, you know it is! If I said yes, you’d be out of this room booking tickets to New York this morning!’

  ‘Then say yes,’ he said softly.

  She saw the appeal in his dark eyes. Was it pride which was stopping her, or fear of the unknown? Didn’t there have to be compromise for marriage to work? And if he wouldn’t—then wasn’t it down to her?

  ‘If that’s what you really want,’ she said woodenly. ‘Then I will.’

  How plain she made her feelings for him! His voice was cold as he put his napkin down on the table and stood up. ‘Oh, please, Lucy! Anyone would imagine that I was proposing rehousing you in some slum! There is no problem—we will stay here if that is what you prefer. That was, after all, the agreement.’ He paused. ‘My father would like you to take Nicole to visit him this morning.’

  Lucy’s eyes grew wider. The King had been very sick and unable to see his new granddaughter. His sons visited him daily, but he had been advised against all other callers.r />
  ‘He’s better?’ she questioned hopefully.

  ‘Well, he is better than before.’ He shrugged. ‘There is no magic cure—but it will bring him great joy to see his granddaughter.’

  ‘You’ll…you’ll come with me?’ Her voice was nervous. Her meetings with Mardivino’s ruler had been infrequent. He had shown her nothing but kindness, but, despite his frailty, he was still a formidable man.

  He shook his head. ‘I have work to do.’ He saw the hurt which clouded her eyes. ‘And he wants to see you alone,’ he finished softly.

  She knew that it was pointless to ask him why. He would shrug and give her that mocking look of his, tell her that she would find out soon enough, that it was not his place to tell her of his father’s wishes—if indeed he knew them—or to second-guess them if he did not.

  She took ages dressing Nicole in a pretty little Broderie Anglais dress—which she was promptly sick over. By the time she had changed her she had time only to throw on a floaty dress which she hoped disguised her post-pregnancy tummy. She brushed her hair until it shone, then shot a slightly despairing look at herself in the mirror. Hardly the image of the calm and composed Princess which no doubt the King would be expecting!

  But for once Nicole behaved like a little angel—or maybe it was the quietness and calm of the King’s apartments which quietened her, for she was fast asleep in Lucy’s arms by the time they were summoned inside.

  The King lay resting in a bed which had been turned to face the gardens outside, where the bright and beautiful flowers danced. He was very old now, but you could see that he had once been a strong and powerful man, and his face bore the hallmarks of pride and dignity. His faded eyes had once been black, like his sons’, and for the first time Lucy realised that his mouth was very like Guido’s.

  She managed some sort of awful attempt at a curtsey, but he shook his head and patted the side of the bed.