How to Love a Princess (4 page)

She heard the bitterness
in his voice and understood his anger. “Our electronic equipment picked up an
unusual frequency within minutes of lifting anchor. Gascon pushed me into the
river and jumped after, to see me safely to shore. Another two of my bodyguards
remained aboard to investigate. We didn’t know.” Her voice broke and she had to
take a moment to regroup. “We didn’t know it was a bomb for sure, until the
explosion almost blew us clear from the water.”

“So you fled the scene?”
Some of the colour was restored to his face, blackening his expression.

“Gascon’s first priority
was to get me to safety. Afterwards, he contacted the Metropolitan Police and
issued the names of the two men, and explained the circumstances.”

“And I suppose a cloak of
secrecy was ordered.” Anger fed his voice, making it harsh. “I couldn’t get any
decent information from the Met. I guess I should have realised. The whole
thing stank of a cover up. Every way I turned for answers, I reached a hastily
bricked up wall.” He jumped to his feet and glared down at her. “Then again, I
shouldn’t be so hard on myself.” He sounded more sarcastic now than angry. “I
was an idiot in my grief, blinded by misplaced love.
Cazzo.
I was so
caught up in misery, I didn’t even give your goodbye note a second thought.
Fool that I was, I convinced myself that I’d misread your intention, that you
meant to come back, that you’d simply been called away unexpectedly, that your
engagement ring had mistakenly slipped from your finger.”

“I
was
called
away,” Catherine said quietly. “My brothers had just been assassinated. I had
to return home.”

“I read something about
the Ophella Princes.” His expression softened for a moment; sympathy, compassion,
and something more, as if he had a deeper understanding than most she’d
received condolences from, as if he’d shared the experience with her.

Her throat clogged with
emotion as she, too, suddenly understood. It
was
a shared experienced.
He’d thought her dead. How many times in the last four years had he, too,
turned a corner, heard a laugh, seen a face in the crowd and, for just a split
second, imagined what wasn’t there, forgotten that a loved one was no longer
with them?

She watched as Nicolas turned
and descended the stairs, helpless to call him back, wanting to offer him more,
a better explanation, belated consolation, but not knowing how to. Not even
knowing where to start.

Before he reached the
bottom, he stopped and swung back to her. His jaw was etched in steel, no
remnant softness to betray his earlier compassion. “I know grief. I know all
about losing someone you thought you loved. But tell me,
cucciola
,
surely at some point during these four years, your grief subsided long enough
to remember me?”

The endearment sounded
anything but. Still, her heart went out to him. “I’m sorry, Nicolas.”

What else was there to
say? She didn’t have the words. She wanted to jump up, fold her arms around
him, assure him that he was never far from her thoughts. She couldn’t do that
either. She didn’t have the right.

“I don’t think you are.”
His hard gaze burned into her. “You
did
intend to leave me, to turn your
back and disappear with nothing but that callous note.”

Catherine lowered her
eyes. She had no defence. Every word he spoke was true. And nothing had
changed. She couldn’t have him now anymore than she could have had him four
years ago. Better he keep his bitter memories and hate. Hadn’t that been part
of her intent? Better she remain the cold, duplicitous woman who’d made
promises she couldn’t keep. Who’d written that empty goodbye and left her ring
behind.

“Why did you summon me
here?” Nicolas demanded suddenly with hard suspicion. “To gloat? To make
amends? Surely this is not some deluded ruse to try to win me back?”

Her gaze flew up to him,
eyes wide and startled and, if he wasn’t mistaken, filled with panic. “Of
course not.”

“Then you’d better start
talking, because I’m not in the mood to linger.” He should just leave. Walk
straight out those gates. There must be at least one taxi somewhere in this
godforsaken kingdom.

Instead, he looked at her.
The foolish heart that had let him down so badly in the past still clutching at
an impossible explanation, a miraculous resolution that would right his upside
down world and make the last four years of heartbreak disappear.

He wanted to crush her in
his arms.

He wanted to forgive.

“My mother needs you,
Nicolas,” she said, speaking slowly, each word brimming with emotion. “If you
leave now, my mother will die.”

As unlikely as it may have
seemed, her answer achieved the impossible anyway.

She hadn’t called him back
for herself. His heart turned as cold and hard as the stone used to build her
elaborate castle.

If her mother weren’t
dying, if he weren’t their last hope, he’d never have heard from Catherine
again.

His world spun on its axis
and came to a tottering halt, right side up.

She hadn’t spent the last
years pining for him, regretting her actions, driven to a point where she
simply had to see him again, beg forgiveness, plead for the sake of a love that
refused to be pushed aside. Nothing could ever take away the heartache he’d
already suffered, but the supply could be shut off.

She begged him with
shimmering blue eyes. She pleaded with trembling lips. She implored him with a
quivering chin that could not be lifted in the stubborn defiance he waited for.

All in vain. He took the
steps back up, two at a time. When he reached the top, he looked down at her
with cold, empty eyes. “I’m not doing this for you, Catherine.”

He pushed through the
doors and into the dim hall, for the first time in his life wishing he could
walk away from responsibility, conscience and duty. But somewhere in this
palace a woman was dying, somewhere he was needed, somewhere years of research
might just possibly save a life. He came to a stop in the cavernous hall,
suddenly at a loss.

He felt lost, he felt
dead, he felt as if his heart was pumping icicles.

A whoosh of cold air hit
his back as the door behind him opened. He swirled around and found himself
confronted by Gascon, the man who’d come to him in London to plead on behalf of
the de’Ariggos.
Gascon pushed me into the river…

Nicolas swore under his
breath. Wasn’t hindsight a completely useless thing. Now, he recognised the
bald-headed giant as the man who’d been with Catherine that day on the Thames.
Now, when he already knew that he’d walked into a haunted scene from his past.

Disgusted at everyone and
everything, he gave the man his back again and called out loudly, “Serge. Serge.
Dammit man, where are you?”

The aged butler appeared
from one of the many doors leading off the hall, approaching slowly with the
decorum of a man who would not be rushed or put into a panic.

“There are buttons in
every room which may be used to summon me, sir,” he said, pointing to a small,
obscure blue button well blended into the patterned decor on the wall. “You
wish to be shown to your rooms?”

“I wish to be shown to the
patient,” Nicolas corrected.

Serge gave a small bow of
his head, then beckoned for him to follow.

Gascon watched Nicolas
ascend the stairway in silent contemplation. Once again, he wondered if
Catherine hadn’t been mistaken. If
this
man wasn’t very different from
all the rest. Unbeknownst to Catherine, he’d been there the day the two had
met.

Such an innocuous meeting,
a bump of shoulders on the busy Oxford Street. From the other side of the wide
street, he’d observed the exchange with a wry grin, but his bemusement had soon
changed to concern. They’d paused for but a moment, that all too usual
apologetic smile, maybe a mumbled apology, then Catherine had proceeded on her
way. Nicolas, on the other hand, hadn’t moved a muscle. He’d stood there,
staring after her, distracting Gascon enough to wait with him instead of
hurrying quietly after his charge. Just as she rounded a corner, however,
Nicolas found his legs. By the time Gascon had caught up, they were sharing a
table in the cosy coffee shop that was to become their favourite.

And then everything had
fallen apart and, as ridiculous as it might be, he felt as if he’d had a heavy
hand in it.

Once Nicolas had
disappeared onto the landing, he pushed back through the door to join Catherine
on the steps. “He’s angry.”

“He’s not angry,”
Catherine exclaimed. “He’s absolutely furious.”

Gascon narrowed his gaze
on her. “He has reason.”

“More than you know.” She
sighed, closing her eyes for a moment. “He must have seen me board the
Blueberry.
He thought that I’d been killed in the blast.”

Gascon said nothing, but
inside his despair increased ten-fold.

She opened her eyes to
look at him. “All that matters is that he has agreed to stay for my mother,”
she said evenly.

Gascon wasn’t fooled. He’d
carried her through that first year of grieving that was as much for Nicolas as
for her brothers. He alone saw the clouds dull her eyes whenever the name of
Nicolas Vecca came up. The tightening at her lips. Even after all this time, he
watched her stroll often through the gardens with tears glittering her eyes and
her hands clutched to her heart. And what could he do but stand up there in one
of the turrets and watch?

“This is too difficult for
you,” he said at last. “Tell me what I can do to help.”

Catherine gave a sad
laugh. Dearest Gascon. How would she have survived without him? “I’m no longer
a little girl, Gascon. I can look after myself.”

“And this is not some
minor knee scratch that needs only a kiss and band-aid to make it better.” He
grabbed her hand. “You could go away for a while. I’ll deal with Nicolas and
see to your mother’s care.”

“No.” She withdrew her
hand to stand up. “I will not leave my mother. I’d never forgive myself if I
wasn’t here when—if—” She ran, unable to finish that sentence.

As she opened the door,
Gascon called out, “He’s with your mother.”

She nodded, then slammed
the door behind her and rested against it. What was done was done. He was here.
He was staying. What kind of ruler would she make one day if she couldn’t put
her country before herself? And right now, healing Ophella’s queen was of
paramount importance.

To save her mother, she’d
suffer much more than a few weeks of Nicolas’s hate.

She found Nicolas standing
beside her mother’s bed.

He put a finger to his
lips and whispered, “She’s sleeping.”

She waited, watching him,
wondering what he saw when he looked at the frail woman in the bed.

Hope?

Imminent failure?

She blinked back a tear
and rebuked her lack of faith. She couldn’t give up now. She notched her chin
up high. She wouldn’t give up. Tears and morbid thoughts were signs of defeat
she’d no longer tolerate. Not for her mother. And certainly not for a man she’d
already given up.

As if to deliberately
spite her new resolution, her mind wandered back in time and her hungry gaze
feasted on the man she’d loved and left behind.

His hair was longer than
the clipped style he used to prefer, a glossy brown and incredibly thick. Her
blood heated at the memory of his warm, firm lips, so capable of driving her to
distraction. His eyes, so dark, always alive, either with laughter or in busy
contemplation, or smouldering even darker with passion.

Dear God, how she loved
him. How protected from the world she’d felt in his arms. His shoulders were
broad enough to bear the universe…and therein lay the problem.

She sighed and caught his
frown. The next moment, he was ushering her out the room into the passage
beyond.

“Your mother needs
optimism,” he barked. “Not sighs and tears.”

“I’m well aware of that.”
Her shoulders straightened to match the irritation in his eyes. But she didn’t
want to fight with him. “Tell me what you need. I’ll do everything I can to
help.”

His gaze locked her down
for a long minute, then disconnected with a brief nod. “Serge is setting a room
up for me to use as a lab. Once he’s done, I’ll move in my equipment. The
sooner I run some tests, the better, but we’ll wait until tomorrow. Your mother
needs her rest.”

“What of the other doctors
attending her? Should I dismiss them?”

“I won’t be taking on the
duties of physician. Your mother needs constant care. Too many opinions,
however, are worse than none.” He paused, rubbing at his jaw, then added, “Does
she have a family doctor? Someone who knows her body and reactions well?”

“Dr. Stanzis.”

“Engage him alone and
dismiss the others. I want him here immediately and I want him in residence at
all times.”

“That’s not possible,”
Catherine exclaimed, amazed at the arrogance she’d forgotten. “He has other
patients.”