‘That’s the secret of its allure,’ she assured him with a cheeky smile. ‘Ma Brown,’ she whispered discreetly.
‘Well, wherever it came from, you couldn’t look lovelier.’
‘Well, thank you, kind sir...you don’t look too bad yourself.’
She was in his arms, and, as far as he was concerned, that was all that mattered. ‘Do you find it warm?’ he asked.
‘Is this another of your euphemisms, which could be interpreted as let’s find a tree?’
‘Callie Smith,’ he scolded softly with his mouth very close to her ear.
‘You left me alone, abandoned me, and now you can’t get enough of me?’
‘Correct.’
‘Don’t you have any scruples?’
‘Hardly any,’ he confessed. ‘I’m planning to take you to see a magical gazebo.’
‘Filled with your etchings?’ she guessed.
He laughed, and was further amused by the fact that people dancing close to them were hanging on their every word. Leading Callie off the dance floor, he led her through towering glass doors onto a veranda stretching the entire length of the palace. Even this late in the year, plants illuminated by blazing torches still flowered profusely, and their fragrance filled the air. He wouldn’t usually notice such things, but being with Callie always heightened his senses. A pathway led through the formal lawn gardens, and where they ended there was a lake with an island at its heart. Lights glinted on the island, and a rowing boat was moored alongside the small wooden pier that stretched out into the lake.
‘Really?’ Callie queried with a pointed glance at her dress and shoes.
‘Where’s your sense of adventure?’ he demanded.
Slipping off her shoes, she accepted his steadying hand as she gingerly boarded the boat. ‘I used to escape the palace by rowing out to the island,’ he explained when he joined her. He’d left his uniform jacket and white bow tie on the shore with his highly polished shoes. Freeing a few buttons at the neck of his shirt, he sat across from her and reached for the oars.
‘I can understand why you might want to be alone here,’ Callie agreed as she trailed her fingertips in the water. ‘It’s so beautiful and peaceful on the lake.’
‘I didn’t notice that when I was a youth,’ he admitted, plunging the oars into the mirror-smooth water. ‘It took time for me to trust the Prince, my father, and sometimes I was just angry for no reason and just wanted to get away. Now I think I was afraid of disappointing him. I’d only known rare acts of kindness on the streets, and the fact that he never gave up on me seemed to be just one more reason for me to put him to the test.’
‘That’s only natural.’
‘I was lucky.’ He put his back into the stroke and as he saw Callie’s appreciative gaze focus on his bunching muscles his impatience to reach the opposite shore grew.
‘How did you live,’ she asked, ‘back before the Prince found you?’
He shrugged and dipped the oars again. ‘I cleaned around the market stalls in return for spoiled fruit, stale bread, and mouldy cheese. I had some good feeds,’ he remembered, ‘but the stallholders had many calls on their time, and I was proud even then. I might have been filthy and wearing rags but I vowed that I would never sink any lower and would always strive to rise. My bathroom was the Tiber, and my bedroom better than most people could boast.’
‘What do you mean by that?’ she asked.
‘I slept at the Coliseum,’ he explained. ‘I came to know a member of the security staff, and he turned a blind eye when I curled up in the shadows of that great arena.’
‘You make it sound romantic,’ Callie said with a frown, ‘but you must have been freezing in winter.’
‘It was certainly a challenge,’ he recalled, ‘but atmospheric too. I used to sleep in Caesar’s box, rather than in the dungeons where the poor victims used to languish as they awaited their terrible fate. I had nothing in the material sense,’ he added as their small craft sliced through the water, ‘except when it came to determination. I had plenty of that, as well as the freedom to change my condition, which I did.’
‘What age were you when this was happening?’
‘I was grubbing around the streets from the age of four. That was when my mother died,’ he explained. ‘The whorehouse where she worked kicked me out. In fairness, no one could spare the time to take care of me. I think now that I was better off by myself. The clientele at the brothel weren’t too choosy who they abused, if you take my meaning.’
‘I do. But how did you manage on your own on the streets at the age of four?’
‘There were other, older children on the streets. They showed me how to stay alive.’
‘How did you end up at the Coliseum?’
‘A lot of homeless children slept there. I saw the tourist posters advertising this colossal building, and I wanted to see it for myself. Getting inside was easy. I just joined the queue of tourists and walked straight in. I soon learned that if I pretended to be a lost child, concerned attendants would feed me. It worked for quite a while until they began to recognise me, but by then they had developed a soft spot for the boy from the gutters and so they turned a blind eye. The people who worked at the Coliseum didn’t have much money, either, and so they saved food from the trash for me to root through. There were plenty of half-eaten burgers and hot dogs for supper. I don’t remember being hungry. The Coliseum was like a hotel for me, growing up, so don’t feel sorry for me. I did fine. The Coliseum was both my home and my school. I saw everything you can imagine during my time there. I learned about sex, violence, thieving, unkindness, and great acts of kindness too.’
‘Can you remember your parents?’ she asked as he took a deep pull on the oars.
‘Nothing I care to bring to mind,’ he admitted dryly. ‘My mother was always harassed and often sick. I think now that she was what we would call depressed. No surprise there, but a child can’t understand why a person behaves the way they do. A child only knows that it’s hungry, or frightened, and I knew I had to fend for myself long before she died.’
‘And your father? Did you ever meet him?’
‘He turned up one night,’ Luca recollected. He huffed a short, humourless laugh. ‘My mother’s colleagues pelted him with rotten fruit and worse. I remember him standing on the street, shouting up at her open window. I remember his angry voice, and his soiled white shirt and the glint of his gold earrings.’
‘He doesn’t sound very nice.’
He shrugged. ‘Who knows?’
‘And now you’re a prince with a country to rule and a palace to live in. It must all seem quite incredible, even now?’
‘No. It seems right,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘If there was luck involved, it was that I met the Prince, the best of men, and a man who changed my life. Though even that wasn’t as simple as it sounds,’ he admitted. ‘After everything I’d seen, I wasn’t easily impressed—not even by the Prince of Fabrizio.’
‘How did he persuade you to leave the streets and come to live with him?’
‘He was a patient man,’ Luca said, thinking back. ‘From the moment he found me stealing food from the bins and the buffet table during his royal visit to the Coliseum, he was determined to save me. He told me this years later.’
‘What did he do about your stealing?’ Callie asked as he shipped the oars.
‘He asked his attendant to find me a shopping bag, so I didn’t have to hide my hoard down my shirt.’
‘Cool,’ she said, smiling.
‘Oh, he was that,’ he agreed as he sprang onto the shore to moor up.
She placed her hands in his as he helped her onto the dock. He wanted to take her right there. Throw her down on the cool wood and make love to her until she didn’t have the strength to stand, but delay was its own reward.
It was just a small island. She could probably walk around it in ten minutes, Callie thought. The grass was cool and green, and felt lush and thick beneath her naked feet. Picking up the hem
of her dress, she stared around. The clustering trees were lit with thousands of tiny lights in celebration of the ball. And then she saw the gazebo he’d talked about ahead of them. ‘Is this where you used to come and sulk?’ she asked.
‘How did you guess?’
As he swung around to face her, the pulsing heat of desire surged through her. ‘I’ve been a teenager too.’
He laughed and held out his hands. She felt so safe and warm when he took hold of her, and Luca’s kisses were always a drugging seduction. They seemed even more so here on this magical island. Just occasionally, fairy tales did come true. She wanted to believe it so badly as he kissed her again. She’d spent so much of her life bottling up emotion, but Luca knew how to set it free, and as his kisses grew more heated she knew she would take any and every chance to hold onto happiness.
He swung her off her feet and strode quickly to the entrance to the gazebo. Lowering her down, he steadied her and then pressed her back against the wooden structure. Caging her with his arms either side of her face, he brushed his lips against her mouth and smiled. It was the most romantic moment, but if she’d written the fairy tale herself she could never have predicted what he’d say next. ‘Marry me, Callie. Marry me and become my Princess.’
At first she thought she was imagining it, and it was all a dream, until Luca repeated softly, ‘Marry me, Callie.’
She stared into his eyes, struggling to compute what he’d said. Embarrassed, uncertain, she resorted to teasing him. ‘Shouldn’t you be down on your knees? Or, one of them, at least?’
‘I need an answer,’ Luca said, refusing to respond to her lighter tone. ‘Just a straight yes or no will do. Or are you playing for time?’
‘No,’ she argued. ‘I’m playing for the highest of stakes of all. I’m playing for my heart, and for the future of our child.’
‘Then, marriage makes perfect sense,’ he insisted.
‘Does it?’ She frowned.
‘You know it does.’
Smiling into her eyes, he kissed her again, and because she wanted him she was foolish enough to believe in the fairy tale for now.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
‘TRUST ME,’ LUCA said as he took her slow and deep. They had been making love on the soft cushions in the gazebo for what felt like hours. ‘Trust me,’ he said again as he soothed her down.
‘Shouldn’t you get back to the ball?’ she asked. She was snuggled up tightly against Luca, whose protective arms wrapped securely around her.
‘If you’re ready, we’ll go back,’ he murmured as he planted a kiss on the top of her head.
‘Bathe in the lake first?’ she suggested.
They swam, then dried off together, and Callie dressed quickly, thanking her lucky stars she had short hair that didn’t take long to dry in the warm night air. Slipping her simple dress on, she took hold of Luca’s hand and they walked back to the boat; back to reality, she thought, but if he could carry this off—their absence would have been noted—then so could she.
* * *
‘My lords, ladies and gentlemen, I have an announcement to make...’
Silence fell the instant Luca’s deep and distinctive voice was heard through the hidden speakers in the ballroom. ‘I realise the clock is about to strike midnight, so I won’t keep you long.’
A ripple of laughter greeted this remark.
‘I’m taking this opportunity to introduce you to the woman I intend to marry.’
Not the woman he loved, Callie thought, cursing herself for being such a doubter. Luca had to wait a moment until the exclamations of surprise had died down.
‘Signorina Callista Smith is an exceptional woman, whom I am lucky to have found.’
As he beckoned Callie forward and she joined him in the centre of the ballroom, the surprise of the sophisticated onlookers gradually turned to muted applause. They were shocked to the heels of their highly polished footwear, she thought as Luca lifted his hands for a silence that had already fallen deep and long.
‘It goes without saying,’ he added, ‘that all of you will receive an invitation to our wedding.’ He gave a fierce, encouraging smile into Callie’s eyes, before turning back to address his riveted audience. ‘I invite you all to enjoy the rest of your evening, while I continue to celebrate with my beautiful fiancée.’
As if by magic the orchestra struck up a romantic Viennese waltz, which allowed Luca to prove that not only could he sweep Callie off her feet, but he could provide the prompt necessary to shake everyone out of their stupefied trance, and soon the dance floor was ablaze with colour and the flash of precious jewels.
Callie told herself that everything would work out. Yes, there would be problems, but they’d get through them. Luca was right. This was the best solution. It was only when the clock struck midnight, and he was briefly distracted by one of the many ambassadors present, that everything changed.
She’d seen pictures of Max in various magazines back home. In the flesh, he was even more striking. As tall as Luca, he looked quite different, which was only to be expected when they weren’t related by blood. Where Luca’s features were rugged and sexy, Max’s face was thin and hard, and, quite unlike Luca, Max’s manner was unpleasantly autocratic.
Dressed entirely in black, his blood-red sash of office the only bright thing about him, Max was the haughtiest man in the room by far. And he was heading her way surrounded by cronies, all of whom were viewing Callie with what she could only describe as amused contempt. There was a beautiful woman on Max’s arm, who was also dressed in black, with the addition of half a hundredweight of diamonds. Her tiara alone could have settled most countries’ debts, Callie guessed. Knowing she was the target of the advancing party, she stood her ground and lifted her chin, then shrank inwardly when Max stopped directly in front of her.
‘Well, my dear,’ he said, keeping his stare fixed on Callie as he turned to address his obviously heavily pregnant companion, ‘this is the little snip my brother intends to put on our throne.’
‘Surely not?’ his elegantly dressed companion protested as she stared disapprovingly at Callie. ‘Who is she, anyway? And where did she get that dress?’
Callie ground her jaw, refusing to demean herself by responding. Max’s friends could laugh all they liked. They wouldn’t drive her away.
‘Goodness knows, my dear,’ Max replied, still staring at Callie through mocking eyes. ‘Perhaps she got it from the same thrift store that sold her the dye for that ridiculous hair colour.’
As everyone laughed Callie reached up instinctively to touch her hair, and regretted the lapse immediately. She hated letting them see they’d upset her. ‘Well, at least I don’t have a cruel tongue,’ she said mildly.
‘Oh, she speaks,’ Max exclaimed, turning to look at his friends. ‘I imagine she learned that skill in the pub back home.’ He made each vowel sound grotesque and ugly.
As Max and his friends roared with laughter, Callie made sure to remain impassive.
‘He only keeps her around because she’s pregnant,’ Max drawled, quirking a brow in an attempt, Callie thought, to elicit some sort of response from her. ‘He’s desperate for an heir, and when you’re as desperate as Luca I suppose it’s a case of any port in a storm. Seeing you pregnant,’ he added to the woman at his side, ‘must really have disturbed him. That’s the only reason he’s chosen this girl. He’s trying to compete with me—imagine that?’
‘He’s quite obviously failed,’ one of Max’s cronies derided.
‘That’s all this is,’ Max assured Callie, bringing his cruel face close. ‘Don’t think for one moment that you’ve bagged yourself a prince, let alone that this is a fairy tale. This is a cold-blooded transaction, my dear. Luca doesn’t want you. He doesn’t want anyone. The only thing Luca wants is an heir. That’s the only way he can hope to keep the throne of Fabrizio. It’s written into our constitution. Two years, one baby at least, or I take over.’ Coming even closer, he sneered. ‘You’re nothing more than a convenien
t womb. Shall we?’ he added to his gloating companions with an airy gesture. ‘I’ve had enough of this ball. The quality of guests at the palace has really gone down. The casino beckons. A few spins of the wheel holds far more appeal than these provincials can ever hope to provide me.’
* * *
‘She’s gone? What do you mean, she’s gone?’ Luca stared down at Michel in surprise. The elderly retainer seemed more than usually confused. ‘Take your time, Michel. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to shout at you.’
‘I saw her talking to Max,’ Michel told him in a worried tone.
‘What?’
‘You said you wouldn’t shout,’ Michel reminded him.
‘You’re right,’ he admitted, placing a reassuring hand on the older man’s shoulder. ‘But who invited Max?’
‘Does Max need an invitation to visit his family home?’
Luca ground his jaw. He should have known that Max would never keep to their agreement that he stay out of Fabrizio. ‘So, where the hell is she?’ he repeated as he raked his hair with tense fingers.
‘I saw her running out of that door not ten minutes ago,’ Michel informed him, staring across the ballroom towards the French doors leading onto the garden and then the lake. ‘And that was straight after talking to Max.’
‘Ten minutes?’ Luca exclaimed, frowning. ‘Did I leave her alone for that long?’
‘The ambassador can be garrulous and difficult to get away from,’ Michel said in an obvious attempt to placate him. ‘And His Excellency was more than usually talkative tonight.’
Luca could not be placated. His one concern was Callie. He should have told her long before now what she meant to him. The convenient plan that had fallen into place when he found out she was pregnant hadn’t figured in his thinking when he’d made the announcement that they would be married.
All right, so maybe it had, he conceded grimly as he made a visual search of the ballroom to make sure she’d gone. Would he stick around under similar circumstances? So, where could she be? In her room, or had she tried to return to the island? His heart banged in his chest at the thought that she might have taken the rowing boat. Navigation was easy for him in the dark. He’d been rowing on the lake for most of his life. So he knew about the clinging weeds and treacherous rocks. If Callie took the wrong route, she could be in serious trouble. He didn’t wait to consider his options. Cutting through the crowd, he hurried away.
A Night of Royal Consequences Page 13
