‘Your chauffeur…’
‘Would it be too much trouble to ask if you could ring for a taxi to take me back into town when we’ve spoken? I don’t like to keep my chauffeur waiting.’
‘There’s no taxi service out here.’
‘Oh.’
Now what? What was a woman to say when a prince didn’t want to keep his chauffeur waiting? She needed an instruction manual. Maybe she was still verging on the hysterical.
She gave herself a swift mental shake. ‘I’m sorry. A taxi won’t come out here but we have a car. It’ll only take us fifteen minutes to run you back into town. I’m not normally so…so inhospitable. It’s the uniform.’
‘I expect it might be,’ he said and smiled, and there it was again, that smile-a girl could die and go to heaven in that smile. ‘I don’t want to put you to trouble.’
‘If you can cope with a simple sandwich, you’re welcome to lunch,’ she managed. ‘And…of course we’ll drive you into town. After all, you’re Christos’s cousin.’
‘So I can’t be all bad?’ It was a teasing question and she flushed.
‘I loved Christos,’ she said, almost defensively. ‘And I loved Amy. Zoe’s mama and papa were my closest friends.’ She managed a shaky smile. ‘For their sake…you’re welcome.’
The house was saggy and battered and desperately in need of a paint. A couple of weatherboards had crumbled under the front window and a piece of plywood had been tacked in place to fill the gap. The whole place looked as if it could blow over in the next breeze. Only the garden, fabulous and overgrown, looked as if it was holding the place together.
Stefanos hardly noticed the garden. All he noticed was the woman in front of him.
She was…stunning. Stunning in every sense of the word, he thought. Natural, graceful, free.
Free was maybe a dumb adjective but it was the thought that came to mind. She was wearing nothing but shorts and a faded white blouse, its top three buttons undone so he had a glimpse of beautiful cleavage. Her long slim legs seemed to go on for ever, finally ending in bare feet, tanned and sand coated. This woman lived in bare feet, he thought, and a shiver went through him that he couldn’t identify. Was it weird to think bare sandy toes were incredibly sexy? If it was, then count him weird.
But it wasn’t just her toes. It wasn’t just her body.
Her face was tanned, with wide intelligent eyes, a smattering of freckles and a full generous mouth with a lovely smile. Breathtakingly lovely. Her honey-blonde hair was sun-kissed, bleached to almost translucence by the sun. There was no way those streaks were artificial, for there was nothing artificial about this woman. She wore not a hint of make-up, except the remains of a smear of white suncream over her nose, and her riot of damp, salt-and-sand-laden curls looked as if they hadn’t seen a comb for a week.
Quite simply, he’d never seen a woman so beautiful.
‘Are you coming in?’ Elsa was standing on the veranda, looking at him with the beginnings of amusement. Probably because he was standing with his mouth open.
‘Is this a holiday shack?’ he managed, forcing his focus to the house-though it was almost impossible to force his focus anywhere but her. The information he’d been given said she lived here. Surely not.
‘No,’ she said shortly, amusement fading. ‘It’s our home. I promise it’s clean enough inside so you won’t get your uniform dirty.’
‘I didn’t mean…’
‘No.’ She relented and forced another of her lovely smiles. ‘I know you didn’t. I’m sorry.’
He came up the veranda steps. Zoe had already disappeared inside, and he heard the sound of running water.
‘Zoe gets first turn at the shower while I make lunch,’ Elsa explained. ‘Then she sets the table while I shower.’
It was said almost defiantly. Like-don’t mess with the order of things. She was afraid, he thought.
But…This woman was Zoe’s nanny. She was being paid out of Zoe’s estate. He’d worried when he’d read that-a stranger making money out of a child.
Now he wasn’t so sure. This wasn’t a normal nanny-child relationship. Even after knowing them only five minutes, he knew it.
And the fear? She’d be wanting reassurance that he wouldn’t take Zoe away. He couldn’t give it. He watched her face and he knew his silence was being assessed for what it was.
Why hadn’t he found more out about her? His information was that Zoe’s parents had died in a car crash four years ago. Since then Zoe had been living with a woman who was being paid out of her parents’ estate-an estate consisting mostly of Christos’s life insurance.
That information had him hoping things could be handled simply. He could take Zoe back to Khryseis and employ a lovely, warm nanny over there to care for her. Maybe this could even be seen as a rescue mission.
This woman, sunburned, freckled and barefoot, standing with her arms folded across her breasts in a stance of pure defence, said it wasn’t simple at all. Mrs Elsa Murdoch was not your normal nanny.
And…Christos and Amy had been her best friends?
‘I’m not here to harm Zoe,’ he said mildly.
‘No.’ That was a dumb statement, he conceded. As if she was expecting him to beat the child.
‘I just want what’s best for her.’
‘Good,’ she said brusquely. ‘You might be able to help me. There are a couple of things I could use some advice over.’
That wasn’t what he meant. They both knew it.
‘Did you know Zoe’s the new Crown Princess of Khryseis?’ he asked, and she froze.
‘The what?’
‘The Crown Princess of Khryseis.’
‘I heard you. I don’t know what you mean.’
‘I think you do,’ he said softly. ‘Your face when I said it…’
‘Doesn’t mean a thing,’ she whispered. ‘I’m tired, confused and hungry, and your uniform is doing my head in. Come in and sit down while I make lunch and take a shower. But if you say one word-one word-of this Crown Princess thing to Zoe before we’ve discussed it fully, you’ll be off my property so fast you’ll leave your gold tassels behind. Got it?’
‘Um…got it,’ he said.
‘Right,’ she said and turned and marched inside, leaving him to follow if he felt like it. Or go away if he felt like it.
Her body language said the second option was the one she favoured.
The moment he got inside he took his jacket off. He pulled off his tie, undid the next two buttons of his shirt and rolled up his sleeves.
It was a casual gesture of making himself at home and it rendered her almost speechless.
Outside he’d seemed large. Inside, tossing his jacket on the settee, rolling up his sleeves, taking a slow visual sweep of her kitchen-living room, he seemed much larger. It was as if he was filling the room, the space not taken up with his sheer physical size overwhelmed by his sheer masculinity.
He was six one or six two, she thought. Not huge. Just…male. And more good-looking than was proper. And way too sexy.
Sexy. Where had that word come from? She shoved it away in near panic.
‘This is great,’ he said, and she fought for composure and tried to see the house as he saw it.
It was tumbledown. Of course it was. There was no way she could afford to fix the big things. One day in the not too distant future Zoe might be able to go to school and she could take a proper job again and earn some money. But meanwhile they made do.
‘Where did you get this stuff?’ he asked, gesturing to the room in general. ‘It’s amazing.’
‘Most of it we found or we made.’
He gazed around at the eclectic mix of brightly coloured cushions and faded crimson curtains, the colourful knotted rugs on the floor, lobster pots hanging from the ceiling with shells threaded through to make them look like proper decorations, a fishing net strung across the length of one wall, filled with old buoys and huge seashells. There were worn pottery jugs filled with flowers from the garde
n; bird of paradise plants, crimson and deep green.
‘You found all this?’ he demanded.
‘I used to have an apartment at the university,’ she told him. ‘Small. My parents left me this place and I came here at weekends. I’m a marine biologist and we…I used the cottage as an occasional base for research. Zoe’s parents were what you might call itinerant. They had a camper van and most of what they owned was destroyed in the accident. So Zoe and I scrounged what we could find, we made a bit and we filled the rest by beachcombing.’ She met his gaze full on, defying him to deny her next assertion. ‘Zoe and I are the best beachcombers in the world.’
‘I can see you are,’ he said. He paused. ‘You’re a marine biologist?’
‘Yes.’ She faltered and tried for a recovery. ‘Very part-time until Zoe goes to school.’
‘Zoe doesn’t go to school?’
‘I home-school her here at the moment.’
‘So meanwhile you’re living off Christos’s life insurance.’
She’d opened the refrigerator and was lifting out salad ingredients. She froze.
She didn’t turn around. She couldn’t. If she had he might have got lettuce square in the middle of his face. What was he suggesting?
‘That’s right,’ she said stiffly. ‘I’m ripping Zoe off for every cent I can get.’
‘I didn’t mean…’
‘I’m very sure you did mean.’ Finally she turned, carefully placing the lettuce out of throwing range. ‘What is it you want of us, Mr Whoever-The-Hell-You-Are, because there’s no way I’m calling you Prince. I don’t know why you’re here but don’t you dare imply I’m acting dishonestly. Don’t you dare.’
‘I already did,’ he said, holding his hands up as if in surrender. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘So am I.’
The door swung open. Zoe appeared, looking wary. The little girl was in clean T-shirt and shorts. Her hair was a tangle of dark, wet curls. She was far too thin, Elsa thought, trying to see her dispassionately through Stefanos’s eyes.
She was so scarred. The burns had been to almost fifty per cent of her body, and twenty per cent of those had been full thickness. She’d had graft after graft. Thankfully her face was almost untouched but her skinny little legs looked almost like patchwork. Her left arm still needed work-her left hand was missing its little finger-and there was deep scarring under her chin.
She’d protect this child with her life, she thought, but protection could only go so far. This man was part of Zoe’s real family. She had to back off a little.
‘Okay, it’s my turn for the shower, poppet,’ she said, trying to make her voice normal.
‘You sounded angry,’ she said, doubtful.
‘I’m crabby ’cos I’m hungry.’ She tugged Zoe to her in a swift hug. ‘I’ll have a shower in world record time. Can you set the table and talk to…Stefanos. He’s your papa’s cousin. He knows all about Khryseis. Maybe he could show you exactly where he lives on the Internet. We have pictures of Khryseis bookmarked.’
And, with a final warning glance at Stefanos, she whisked herself away. She didn’t want to leave at all. She wanted to bring Zoe into the bathroom with her. She wanted to defend her with everything she had.
Zoe, Crown Princess?
Zoe had far too much to deal with already. If Stefanos wanted to take on part of Zoe’s life, then he had to contend with her. Zoe’s life was her life. She’d sworn that to Zoe’s mother, and she wasn’t backing down on it now.
She couldn’t. She was so afraid…
CHAPTER THREE
Z OE set the table while he watched her. The little girl was watching him out of the corner of her eye, not meeting his gaze directly. Table done, she turned to a corner desk holding a computer. The machine looked like something out of the Dark Ages, big, cumbersome and ugly. She checked the Internet, waiting until the Khryseis information downloaded-seemingly by slow-boat from China.
But finally the websites in Khryseis were on the screen. By the look of the bookmarks, she and Elsa spent a lot of time browsing them.
He tentatively showed her where he lived on the island-or where he’d lived as a child. She reacted with silent politeness.
He checked the other bookmarks for the island. They were marine sites, he saw. Research articles about the island.
Worth noting.
‘So you and Elsa spend a lot of time studying…fish?’ he ventured and got a scornful look for his pains.
‘Echinoderms.’
Right. Good. What the hell were echinoderms?
And then Elsa was back. Same uniform as before-shorts and faded shirt. She was tugging her curls back into a ponytail. Still she wore no make-up, and without the suncream her freckles were more pronounced. Her nose was peeling and her feet were still bare.
She walked with a slight limp, he noted, but it was very slight. A twisted ankle, maybe? But that was a side issue. He wasn’t about to focus on an ankle when he was looking at the whole package.
She was so different from the women in the circles he moved in that her appearance left him stunned. Awed, even.
He’d implied she was dishonest. There was nothing in this place, in her dress, in anything in this house, that said she was taking advantage of Zoe. His investigator had shown him Christos’s financial affairs. If they were both living totally on Christos’s life insurance…
‘How much outside work do you do?’ he said, carefully neutral, and Elsa pulled up short.
‘You mean how much of my obviously fabulous riches are derived from honest toil and how much by stealing from orphans?’
He had to smile. And, to his relief, she returned a wry smile herself, as if she was ordering herself to relax.
‘I’m not accusing you in any sense of the word,’ he assured her. ‘What’s in front of my eyes is Zoe, in need of your care, and you, providing that care. Christos’s life insurance wouldn’t come close to paying for your combined expenses.’
‘You don’t know the half of it.’
‘So tell me.’
She shook her head. ‘I’m sorry, but Christos never spoke of you, as a cousin or as a friend. As far as I know, neither Christos nor his mother ever wanted to have anything to do with anyone from Khryseis. How can my finances have anything to do with you?’
‘I do want to help.’
‘Is that right?’ she said neutrally. She shook her head. ‘I’m sorry. Look, can we eat? I can’t think while I’m hungry and after a morning on the beach I could eat a horse.’
She almost did. There was cold meat and salad, and freshly baked bread which she tipped from an ancient bread-maker. She cut doorstop slices of bread and made sandwiches. She poured tumblers of home-made lemonade, sat herself down, checked Zoe had what she needed-the sandwich she’d made for Zoe was much smaller, almost delicate in comparison to the ones she’d made for herself and for him-and then proceeded to eat.
She ate two doorstop sandwiches and drank three tumblers of lemonade, while Zoe ate half a sandwich and Elsa prodded her to eat more.
‘Those legs are never going to get strong if they’re hollow,’ she teased, and Zoe gave her a shy smile, threw Stefanos a scared glance and nibbled a bit more.
She was trying to eat. He could see that. Was his presence scaring her?
The idea of frightening this child was appalling. The whole situation was appalling. He was starting to have serious qualms about whether his idea of Zoe’s future was possible.
Except it must be. He had to get this child back to Khryseis. Oh, but her little body…
It didn’t take his medical qualifications to realise how badly this child was damaged. The report he’d read had told him that four years ago Christos, his wife and their four-year-old daughter had been involved in a major car accident. Christos had died instantly. Amy, his wife, had died almost two weeks later and Zoe, their child, had been orphaned. No details.
There was a story behind every story, he thought, and suddenly he had a flash of what must have ha
ppened. A camper van crashing. A fire. A death, a woman so badly burned she died two weeks later, and a child. A child burned like her mother.
He knew enough about burns to understand you didn’t get these type of scars without months-years-of medical treatment. Without considerable pain.
He’d arrived here thinking he had an orphaned eight-year-old on his hands. On his hands. She’d seemed like one more responsibility to add to his list. Her nanny was listed as one Mrs Elsa Murdoch. He’d had visions of a matronly employee, taking care of a school-aged child in return for cash.
His preconceptions had been so far from the mark that he felt dizzy.
Despite the man-sized sandwich on his plate, he wasn’t eating. The official reception had been mid-morning, there’d been canapés, and he’d been watched to see which ones he ate, which chef he’d offend. So he’d eaten far more than he wanted. Elsa’s doorstop sandwich was good, but he felt free to leave the second half uneaten. He had a feeling Elsa wasn’t a woman who was precious about her cooking.
Actually…was this cooking? He stared down at his sandwich and thought of the delicacies he’d been offered since he’d taken over the throne-and he grinned.
‘So what’s funny?’ Elsa demanded, and he looked up and found she was watching him. Once more she was wearing her assessing expression. He found it penetrating…and disturbing. He didn’t like to be read, but he had a feeling that in Elsa Murdoch he’d found someone who could do just that.
‘I’ve had an overload of royal food,’ he told her. ‘This is great.’
‘So you wouldn’t be eating…why?’
‘I’m full of canapés.’
‘I can see that about you,’ she said. ‘A canapé snacker. Can I have your sandwich, then?’
He handed it over and watched in astonishment as she ate. Where was she putting it? There wasn’t an ounce of spare flesh on her. She looked…just about perfect.
Where had that description come from? He thought of the glamorous women he’d had in his life, how appalled they’d be if they could hear the perfect adjective applied to this woman, and once more he couldn’t help smiling.
Crowned: The Palace Nanny Page 2
