‘So now we’re forced to weather out the storm together. Is it any wonder that you might become the focus of my attentions?’
‘Don’t do that,’ he said gruffly.
‘Don’t do what?’
‘Try to convince me that something is happening when it’s not. Try to make it look like you are attracted to me, whatever your reason, when all you want to do is escape from me.’
‘Why can’t the two coexist together? Do I have to hate you to want to not be returned to Rubanestein? Why can’t I appreciate how sexy you are while still not wanting to be forced back to the hell-hole of what will be my future existence?’
He shook his head, trying to shake away her compliment. He would not be touched by her empty compliments. ‘No. Not happening. And you’re getting a bit melodramatic again, Princess.’
‘Am I? Then how about we put the boot on the other foot, as unlikely as it might be. What if you’d been promised in marriage to a fifty-something-year-old woman against your will, when you’d been always told by your father that you could marry for love, and no matter how far you ran, someone would search the world to drag you back to comply with someone else’s wishes? How would you feel?’
He stood stock-still. ‘You’re saying this man your evil brother has promised you to is in his fifties?’
‘Yes, he’s in his fifties. But why should age even come into it? Whatever the age, how is it possible that you could wilfully return me to this hell, and to marrying a man that I have been sold to, a man that I can never love? A man that I will never love, knowing the circumstances of our union.’
Her words were tumbling over each other, her colour was high, her eyes beseeching him to believe her.
Theo had to hand it to her. If she were acting, she was giving one hell of a good performance. Theo knew that the Princess would stop at nothing to prevent her return to Rubanestein, and she’d now supplemented the forced marriage story by adding the age detail, in case he wasn’t already sympathetic. The Princess was twenty-five years old, and to be promised—if that’s what was happening—to someone, a colleague of her brother and not a partner she’d chosen to spend the rest of her life with—that was wrong. And yet, she wasn’t a teenager, she was an adult, which raised even more questions.
‘When did you think you were going to get married?’
‘What?’
‘You’re twenty-five, and I’m guessing, you have no boyfriend waiting in the wings for your return.’
‘And your point is?’
‘My point is, it occurs to me that if you’d already been married, your brother—if I am to believe your story—wouldn’t be able to marry you off so readily.’
She looked up at him with incredulous eyes. ‘You’re blaming me not being married for my brother’s actions? Are you serious?’
‘You have to admit, if you were already married, you wouldn’t have a problem. You wouldn’t have had to flee.’
‘I don’t believe it. You are blaming me.’
‘No, I’m just saying… No, I’m asking. I’m sorry, Princess, because it’s not like you’re unattractive, and yet there’s been nobody you’ve been interested in? Nobody you wanted to spend the rest of your life with?’ He’d met Sophia in university, and what started as a friendship had soon turned to love. ‘I’m having trouble understanding that.’
She blinked. Long slow blinks that told him she had little regard for his words. ‘Thank you, I think. But for the record, there has been plenty of interest—in me. Apparently being a member of the royal family—a “not unattractive” princess with ready access to palaces and riches attracts plenty of interest. My problem has been determining who is more interested in me, for who I am, rather than my place in the monarchy.’ She cocked one side of her mouth. ‘As you admitted, you wouldn’t understand.’
Ouch.
Theo deserved that. The Princess was wiser and more grounded than he’d ever anticipated. He bowed his head. ‘Once again, Princess, I need to apologise.’
‘Accepted,’ she said brusquely. ‘And now, I think I’ll turn in. Sleep well.’
She breezed past him and headed up the stairs. He listened to her footfall, heard the slow click of her door closing, and knew there was no sleep waiting for him. Whatever point he’d been trying to make, he’d badly botched. Although it did help him understand why someone as attractive as the Princess hadn’t been snatched up already.Theos.He’d called her “not unattractive”.
It was a wonder she hadn’t slapped him across the face.
He glanced at his watch. The Princess was right, it was time to turn in. Time to be done with watching her. Time to be out of her presence. He’d told himself he wasn’t attracted to her. He’d tried to convince herself of that. He couldn’t afford to be attracted to her.
But truth was, he needed to get away from her, to get out of her presence, before he started to believe her story.
The night was one howling mess. The wind blew, the rain lashed, and the palm tree fronds rattled as they shook and smacked into each other. Theo barely slept, wishing the storm would die down so that the airport would open, no matter how unlikely that seemed with the racket going on outside, and that they could fly out tomorrow. Hoping that he wouldn’t be hijacked during the night again. He’d employed the same improvised alarms that he’d employed the night before, his bedroom door was still open in case the Princess tried to flee out the front door, but tonight he’d secured his door with a tie to ensure it couldn’t be pushed open enough to allow someone access—if he even managed to snatch a moment of sleep.
He needed desperately to sleep, but it was too dangerous. He turned over in his bed, punching his pillow into submission.
