His Princess in the Making (15 page)

Six weeks later

“Y
OU DID SO WELL IN
The Hague, my dear.” The King smiled at her over the dining table. “Your speech to the European Court on the rights of women here has made the Lords aware of how the world will view us. They’re ready to make further changes.”

Lia said quietly, “I’m glad.”

“You look so tired, Lia.” He’d taken to calling her Lia since he’d seen her flinch at the formal name—Toby’s name for her. “Perhaps you should take time off.”

“Thank you, but no.” She ate another mouthful of vegetables, wishing she could taste them. “I have a full schedule for the next three months, and I can’t afford to reschedule anyone.”

“Lia, Grandfather’s right, you look exhausted and pale. You look totally stressed out.” Charlie frowned, searching her face. “When’s the last time you were out in the fresh air? I haven’t seen you walk or run in a long time.”

She felt the deadness touch her soul. “Charlie.” The word wasn’t a plea, it was a command to stop.

He ignored her. “You don’t read or dance, either. And you don’t cook. You love to dance and cook, Lia. Why don’t you—?”

The lump filled her throat, a pain she couldn’t swallow. Walking, running, reading or dancing—it was all Toby. Everything was Toby…

Desperate to avoid the inquisition, she shoved the chair back. “Excuse me.” She was gone before anyone could speak, but she felt four worried sets of eyes follow her out of the room.

And she knew four hearts worried about her as she paced her room that night, walking until her mind finally shut down and she fell to the bed in a dreamless slumber. Three hours until the alarm went off and she started the rounds of life again.

The Coronation of King Kyriacos and Queen Jazmine of
Hellenia

The Archbishop of Orakidis stepped back with a smile, throwing out his arm. “I present to you, King Kyriacos and Queen Jazmine of the Kingdom of Hellenia.”

Looking serious and regal, Charlie and Jazmine stepped forward, resplendent in their scarlet-and-purple robes. The traditional crown of Hellenia rested on Charlie’s head; the newly made matching crown that had replaced the traditional queen’s tiara looked large and too heavy for Jazmine’s small frame.

They must be blinded from all the flashes popping…

Lia watched from the marble balcony in the tiers above the dais beside the King—former king—who could no longer stand. As the third in line to the throne, she was expected to lead the way. She rose to her feet and bowed her head in traditional submission, then she smiled and began the applause.

Theo Angelis followed, smiling up at her in loving encouragement.

He’d been that way since she’d returned from Sydney. He’d handed all reins of power to Charlie and Jazmine, and refrained from asking the hard questions. It was no longer his
place, he’d told her. He hadn’t even complained when Charlie had said the coronation had to be put back four weeks out of respect for Toby’s father’s death.

Theo Angelis had also said nothing when Max had taken matters from everyone’s hands the day after she’d walked out of the dining hall, making a public announcement that there wouldn’t be a second royal wedding that included him.

Lia didn’t understand Theo Angelis’s silence; she was just grateful she didn’t have the daily inquisition to face any more. Just getting through each day was challenge enough.

Charlie and Jazmine walked around the dais, then down the aisle of the cathedral, smiling and greeting every special guest by name.

Then, in the tenth row, the last row reserved for members of the nobility, a big bear of a man in a knight’s cape with dark-and-golden, half-curling hair got to his feet to join the applause…

She swayed where she stood. The warmth and probably the colour drained from her face. Her hands fell to the rail and gripped hard. And she stared in shock and pain hunger and love.

He turned to look up at the balcony and smiled—but for the first time she felt no rush of joy, no gladness. Why,
why,
had Charlie made him come?

How was she going to face a state dinner with a thousand important guests, knowing he was there?

Toby saw her face, so stark and pale, so lovely, the dark hunger and pain too deep even to think of hiding it for the observers and cameras as she stared at him. He knew Charlie was right: he’d had to come today. She needed him…

So why hadn’t she called him? He’d sent her text messages and emails, aiming for the old friendliness, but last week she’d sent her first message back:
please stop. I can’t do this.

By the time they were all seated at the state dinner that night and she hadn’t come anywhere near him, not even to greet him, he realised he’d made it worse for her by being here. She wasn’t the anorexic girl he could cajole into laughter and eating; she wasn’t the homebody who lit up with the prospect of a bushwalk or cooking something. She was a woman strong enough to stand alone—but she was in love, in pain, and he couldn’t save her from that. He wasn’t her hero; he was the man who loved her. The man who’d left her alone in an alien world.

He’d left her as alone as she’d been when he’d gone on those dates, leaving her to imagine the worst. He’d walked out of her life because he couldn’t be her supplicant, her hidden lover, couldn’t stand to be in second place with her.

She needs your friendship to live.

She’ll always have it.

Would he never stop letting her down because of his stupid fears and foolish pride, never feeling good enough?

He came to her room at two in the morning, when she’d finally finished settling all the visiting dignitaries and had made them feel suitably important. Though the room was dark, she wasn’t in bed. She was in jeans and a pullover, barefoot and pacing the room. “I knew you’d come,” was all she said. She didn’t look at him.

He looked at the tiara tossed on the bed, the shoes obviously kicked off and left to fall, the ten-thousand-dollar dress half-lying on the floor. His scrupulously neat Giulia hadn’t even let the maid in the room to tidy it.

The rings he’d given her were on her right hand now. The clothes she wore were bargain-bin stuff from a Sydney store, from her old life. Her eyes had dark hollows beneath them, and she was far too pale.

“Do you want me to go?” She was too on edge for this.

“Yes,” she snapped. “No!” she cried when he turned to go, and when he turned back she was there in his arms. He held her close, breathing in her simple lavender scent with a sense of coming home.

“I
miss
you,” she rasped, holding him so hard his chest hurt. “I don’t feel
alive.
”

“I know, love, I know.” He’d given his life to her so long ago that without her, even with his privacy and his job and all the things he claimed he needed, he’d just existed, stumbling through each day; he hadn’t lived. She wasn’t there. She wasn’t there, and everything he’d wanted in his life was dust and ashes.

“Charlie says he ordered books for you that you didn’t read, arranged a day out in the mountains you didn’t take,” he said softly, kissing her hair.

“I can’t. I can’t do those things any more. They’re all you. They’re you and me, and I can’t bear to.”

He tipped up her face and kissed her with all the aching tenderness in his heart. He didn’t speak. What could he say to that?

“I was—I thought I was—but then you came, and the pain started all over again.” She shook her head against his shoulder. “Please, just go home.”

If there was one thing he knew now, it was that they couldn’t live apart. “Ask me to stay, my Giulia,” he whispered. “Ask me to make love to you, to be here day and night for you for the rest of our lives.”

“Don’t you understand? I couldn’t stand it when I’m only going to lose you again!” She broke away fiercely. “I can’t keep going through this. I cried all night when I got my period. I—It was a week late, and I’d hoped…”

And she’d done that alone, too, and survived. So much strength and courage.

“Then ask me to stay because I need you,” he said quietly. “I’ll stay for ever, beloved. I’ll be whatever you need me to be.”

She shuddered. “Don’t, Toby. I couldn’t do that to you!”

A tiny bud of anger began to blossom in his heart at her constant denials. “What if I said I want to stay—that I
need
to stay—to be with you?”

“You don’t. You’re doing this for me, I know you are.” She was hugging herself, arms around her waist in self-comfort. “I can’t let you sacrifice anything more for my sake. Please, just go!”

He stared at her, wondering when in the past six weeks she’d forgotten all the words he’d said as they’d made love. “Loving you is no sacrifice, Giulia. It never has been. You’re the love of my life. We can compromise. Losing the love we have is the sacrifice neither of us needs to make!”

“You’d hate me in the end. I saw your face when you asked the family if you could live with us. You hated being put in a beggar’s position.” She wouldn’t turn back, wouldn’t look at him. “It’s what you’d always have to be with me. No matter how much I need and love you, it wouldn’t be enough.”

Adrenaline surged through him. Fighting for his love or a fire, it made his pulse pound and his limbs itch with the urge to
do.
He grabbed her shoulders and turned her to face him. “That’s not true. Just having you love me is more than enough, more than I could dream of having. Giulia, don’t you see?” he growled. Frustration filled him when she shook her head again. He hated hearing his own words given back to him with such faith. Damn it, she knew him inside and out; why had she believed him when he’d said he needed freedom and privacy more than he needed her? He’d barely believed it himself. He’d lied to them both for the sake of his pride and to set her free to do what she must, and now they were both paying the price for it.

“Asking for my family was the best thing that ever happened to me, Giulia. It gave me a life I love, with people I belong to, belong with. I know that now, because everything I said I wanted is empty without you.” He looked in her
hurting dark eyes, hoping like hell she’d understand. “Asking for what you need doesn’t make you low, it makes you human. I’m asking, Giulia. I need to stay. I need
you.
”

“Not like this. I know you, Toby.” She smiled at him through lonely tears. She stood in a shaft of cold moonlight, small and fragile, yet too strong to let him in. “Go home. I need you to be happy.”

“I can’t be happy without you,” he rasped, bending to kiss her. God help him, he needed her like air, like sunlight, and she was leaving him in blackness.

A cloud obscured the moon; darkness fell over her as she turned from him. She shook her head as he reached for her. “Please go.”

At that, the fury of her self-image flooded him heart and soul. After all these years, she still couldn’t see how much he needed her. He was furious at himself, because she was only holding to the words he’d told her, but even more so at her because she was trying to give him what she thought he needed, but still didn’t know that life without her—best friend, lover and yes, damn it, even princess—wasn’t
life.

So he’d prove to her he was nobody’s supplicant. And he’d prove that, while she might be able to live without him, she damn well wasn’t going to get the chance to try. He wouldn’t let her!

He scooped her up in his arms, his mouth on hers in a deep, drowning kiss until she was shivering against him and helplessly kissing him back, her hands caressing his skin with feverish hunger. “Now tell me to go,” he snarled.

Great, fawn eyes stared up at him, aching with love. Trembling hands pulled him down to her for another kiss. “I can’t,” she whispered. “I need you, Toby, I need you.”

“Good.” He smiled grimly as he carried her to the bed.

Charlie summoned him to the royal study soon after dawn, and his personal assistant actually laughed as he delivered the
message over the phone. “King Kyriacos requests your immediate presence in his study. He said to tell you it’s either an emergency or a miracle delivered via a lawyer. I’m waiting outside Princess Giulia’s door for you.”

Arrested by the words, by the palace officer’s acceptance of his relationship with Giulia, Toby flung off the covers to dress. “I’ll be back,” he whispered when she stirred, reaching for him in her sleep.

She smiled and drifted back into much-needed rest.

Charlie’s assistant ushered Toby through the quiet palace and into the sitting room that used to be King Angelis’s. It looked like Charlie’s room now, with the gilt-laden furniture taken out and replaced by half the amount, all strong, clean, masculine pieces. “What was worth waking me up for after about an hour’s sleep? If this is about my staying with Giulia—”

“It isn’t. I knew you would.” Charlie wasn’t even looking at him; he was sitting behind his desk, staring down at a sheaf of papers with a stunned look on his face.

“What’s going on, Rip?” he asked, sensing something strange was going on. “What’s that you’re reading? I gather it’s something to do with me?”

“Yes, it is,” Charlie muttered. “The King told me a little secret you saw fit to tell him but not me.” Hellenia’s new king held up a thick file filled with packets and what looked like letters. “These are from Papou, through his
other
lawyer.”

Beginning to understand, Toby sat down. “So this stuff is from Mr Mendoza?”

“Yes—the lawyer with whom he drew up his
real
will, just before he died, with specific instructions,” Charlie said slowly. “The lawyer you always knew about, if the letter that came with Papou’s will is any indication.”

Slowly, he nodded. “I’m sorry, Rip. Yiayia and Papou made me promise to keep it a complete secret.”

“Yes, I understand—but, damn it, knowing this could have
saved us all some heartburn.” Charlie shrugged, face grim. “By Papou’s arrangements, this lot should have reached me before the wedding, but Mr Mendoza passed away just before that, and the new lawyer only found them in the safe after we got ASIO onto the job.”