Promoted to His Princess

by Jackie Ashenden

  She arrived at the altar at last, and the look Xerxes gave her was intense and hot, encompassing her uniform and her veil, his approval clear in his gaze.

  ‘Are you here for me, soldier?’ he asked, for her ears alone, as she took her place beside him. ‘Are you here to be my wife?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said with purpose. With conviction. With love burning inside her. ‘Are you here to be my husband?’

  He smiled, bright and fierce and passionate. ‘I would never be anyone else’s.’

  And then the bishop began the ceremony, and when the ring slid on her finger Calista felt as if something had slipped firmly and quietly into place inside her.

  Her future.

  Xerxes lifted her veil and his kiss changed the world, set fire to her heart. And after they went down the aisle as husband and wife, when they reached the steps outside, he swept her up into his arms.

  The crowd roared their approval and Calista looked up into his face, everything inside her aching with happiness. ‘I love you,’ she whispered. ‘And I’m sorry I walked away, that I left without a word. But I was scared of what I felt for you. I loved my mother so much, yet I ended up hurting her, and I couldn’t bear the thought of one day hurting you. So I told myself I couldn’t love you. And that when I was gone, you’d find someone better.’ She swallowed. ‘Does that make me a coward?’

  That smile of his was the summer sun on an icy winter’s day. ‘No. It makes you a soldier. You protect people and that was what you were trying to do.’

  ‘It was myself I was protecting.’ She put her head on his shoulder, the strength of his arms around her after weeks of not having it making her want to weep. ‘I shouldn’t have left. I should have been brave enough to face you. To tell you at least. But I thought you wouldn’t have let me leave if I had.’

  ‘I wouldn’t have, that’s true.’ He began to walk down the steps, still holding her because it was clear he didn’t want to put her down. ‘So what changed your mind? Why did you come back?’

  ‘I came back for you. You showed me that love isn’t a weakness. It’s a strength. It gave you the strength to endure everything you did and it brought you home.’ She reached up and touched his beloved face. ‘And I realised that it could bring me home, too. I couldn’t walk away from you the way my mother walked away from me, Xerxes. I had to come back to you.’

  He turned his head and kissed her fingertips. ‘It was good you walked away, though. Because I didn’t realise until after you’d gone that I wanted you to have a choice. I wanted you to choose me because you wanted to be with me and not because I forced you.’ There was molten gold in his eyes now and his arms tightened. ‘And I hoped you would choose me. In fact, I didn’t cancel the wedding because I believed you would. And you did. And you know what that means, don’t you?’

  They were nearing the car that would take them away and she couldn’t wait. She wanted nothing more than to be alone with him.

  ‘What?’ she murmured, nestling against him, right against his big, strong heart.

  ‘It means you’re mine. For ever.’ He looked so smug she laughed.

  ‘So, do I get to hear it, husband?’

  ‘Hear what?’

  ‘I said I love you and you said nothing.’

  They would be at the car soon, and there were people taking pictures, the world’s media seeing the prince with a soldier in his arms.

  ‘I was formulating a response,’ said Prince Xerxes Nikolaides, Defender of the Throne. ‘But it’s a very long response and it’s going to take a while to tell you all the details.’

  ‘Oh?’ She ran a finger along his beautiful mouth, because he was hers now and she could touch him whenever and wherever she pleased, and she didn’t care who saw. She didn’t care at all. ‘How long?’

  His gaze turned very, very intent. ‘Probably for ever.’

  Calista smiled, her vision wavering through happy tears. ‘Then you’d better start now, hadn’t you?’

  ‘Well, I can give you the short version immediately.’ He paused, bending to kiss her, long and sweet. ‘I love you, Calista Kouros. My goddess. My wife.’

  She would never get tired of hearing that. Never.

  And then they were getting in the car, and at last, as the doors closed, they were alone.

  Xerxes pushed the button that raised a privacy screen between the driver and the back seat, and then proceeded to show her the rest of his response.

  And he wasn’t wrong.

  It did take for ever.

  EPILOGUE

  THE BIRTH WAS long and hard, but his princess was also a soldier and she held her ground. And a day later, Xerxes held his daughter in his arms as his wife lay back in the nest of pillows he’d arranged behind her head, and wondered if it was possible for a man to have too much happiness in his life.

  ‘She’s a fighter,’ he said, looking down at the baby nestled in the crook of his arm, his heart two sizes too big for his chest. ‘Like her mother.’

  ‘She’s also stubborn.’ Calista’s smile lit up the room. ‘Like her father.’

  Xerxes laughed and bent to his wife, kissing her. ‘You’re amazing,’ he murmured against her lips. ‘I’m so proud of you. My sunshine.’

  And he was. She’d proved not only to be a perfect princess, but she was also leading the charge to recruit more women to the Axian army, as well as mentoring existing recruits into elite positions. Her own security detail was all female and she was encouraging the generals to provide more support for female soldiers, as well as better training for males.

  She was a born leader and he could only thank his lucky stars that she’d made the choice to meet him at the cathedral that day.

  Calista flushed, fierce and proud, and all his.

  And he realised he’d been wrong to think that the purpose of his life had started months ago in the little house by the sea.

  It started here. With his family. And that his purpose wasn’t just to protect and defend. It was also to love.

  And he did.

  With all his flawed heart.

  * * *

  Wrapped up in the drama of Jackie Ashenden’s Promoted to His Princess? You’re sure to enjoy the next instalment in the The Royal House of Axios duet: Xerxes and Calista’s story, coming soon! And why not explore these other Jackie Ashenden stories?

  Demanding His Hidden Heir

  Claiming His One-Night Child

  Crowned at the Desert King’s Command

  The Spaniard’s Wedding Revenge

  Available now!

  Keep reading for an excerpt from The Terms of the Sicilian’s Marriage by Louise Fuller.

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  The Terms of the Sicilian's Marriage

  by Louise Fuller

  PROLOGUE

  THE BAR WAS starting to empty.

  Across the room, the blonde sitting at the counter with her friend looked over and gave Vicenzu Trapani a slow, lingering smile. A smile that promised a night, or quite possibly more, of unparalleled, uncomplicated pleasure.

  Under normal circumstances he would have smiled back and waited for her to join him. But nothing was normal any more, and he wasn’t sure he was ever going to smile again.

  Picking up his glass, he stared down into the dark gold liquid. He didn’t normally drink bourbon, particularly when he was back in Sicily, but it had been Ciro who had caught the bartender’s attention. Ciro who had snapped out the order before Vicenzu’s own numbed brain had even fully registered where they were. Ciro who had commandeered the table in the corner and
pushed him into a seat.

  They had left the meeting and come straight to the bar. Vito Neglia was their lawyer, and an old family friend, but today he had also been their last hope.

  A hope that had been swiftly and brutally extinguished when Vito had confirmed what they already knew.

  There was no loophole. Cesare Buscetta had acted within the law.

  He was the new and legitimate owner of both the Trapani Olive Oil Company and the beautiful, beloved family estate where Vicenzu and Ciro had spent an idyllic childhood.

  Vicenzu’s fingers tightened around his glass. The family estate he still called home.

  Home.

  The word stuck in his throat and, picturing his mother’s expression as he’d handed the keys over to the agent, he felt his stomach lurch.

  It had broken his heart, having to do that to her, and the memory of her bewildered, tear-stained face would be impossible to forget. The reason for it impossible to forgive.

  ‘We must fix this.’

  Ciro’s voice broke into his thoughts and, looking up, he met his brother’s gaze—and instantly wished he hadn’t.

  Ciro’s face was taut with determination, his green eyes narrow with a certainty he envied...eyes that so resembled their father’s that he had to look away.

  His stomach tightened. Ciro was his younger brother, but he was his father’s son. Whip-smart, focused, disciplined, he could have taken over the business and run it with his eyes shut—hell, he could have turned it into a household name overnight. And, had their father been cut from different cloth, that was exactly what would have happened.

  But Alessandro Trapani had not been a cut-throat man. To him, family had mattered more than global domination.

  Or had it?

  Vicenzu felt his stomach lurch again and, pushing away the many possible but all equally unpalatable answers to that question, he lifted his glass to his lips and drained it swiftly.

  Meeting his brother’s gaze, he nodded.

  ‘We have to get it back. All of it.’

  Ciro’s voice was quiet, but implacable, and Vicenzu nodded again. His brother was right, of course. Cesare Buscetta was not just a thief, he was a bully and a thug. But it was too soon...feelings were still too raw.

  He’d tried to explain that to his brother—had reminded him that revenge was a dish best served cold. Only Ciro couldn’t wait—wouldn’t wait. His need for vengeance was white-hot, burning him from the inside out. He wanted revenge now and he needed his brother to play his part.

  ‘Vicenzu?’

  For a moment he closed his eyes. If only he could turn back time. Give his father back the money he’d borrowed. Be the son his father had needed—wanted.

  But regrets were not going to right the wrongs that had been done to his family and, opening his eyes, he leaned back in his chair and cleared his throat. ‘Yes, I know what I have to do and I’ll do it. I’ll take the business back.’

  His chest tightened. It sounded so simple—and maybe it would be. After all, all he had to do was get a woman to fall in love with him.

  Only this wasn’t any woman. It was Immacolata Buscetta—the daughter of the man who had hounded his father to death and robbed his beautiful, always-laughing mother of her husband and her home.

  There was not much to go on. Cesare was a protective father, and by all accounts his eldest daughter was a chip off the old block—as ice-cold as she was beautiful. Who better than her to pay for the sins of her father?

  He felt a sudden rush of fury. He would make her melt. Seduce her, then strip her naked—literally and metaphorically—and make her his wife. He would take back what belonged to his family and then, finally, when she was his—inside and out—she would discover why he had really married her.

  A fresh round of drinks arrived and he picked up his glass.

  Ciro’s eyes met his. ‘To vengeance.’

  ‘To vengeance,’ Vicenzu repeated.

  And for the first time since his father’s death he felt alive.

  Copyright © 2020 by Louise Fuller

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  ISBN-13: 9781488068539

  Promoted to His Princess

  Copyright © 2020 by Jackie Ashenden

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

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