The Princess and The Masked Man. Valerie Parv

      Prologue

      Bryce Laws fumbled with his black tie and bit his tongue to keep from swearing out loud. “You could lend a hand instead of watching me suffer,” he grumbled.

      His daughter crossed the room with a grace that belied her ten years. Reaching up, she tied the tie with deft efficiency. “There, how’s that?”

      He regarded the neat result in the mirror. He still looked like a penguin, but at least he was a properly attired one. “The ability to tie one of these things must be bred into women. Your mother…”

      Hearing his voice tail off, Amanda smiled wanly. “It’s okay, Dad, you can talk about her. I won’t come apart on you. I’m over that now.”

      The harshness of her words didn’t conceal the hurt he heard beneath them. “You still miss her, don’t you, chicken?” He certainly did, even two years on.

      “Sure. She wouldn’t have let you bring me to this place.”

      He dropped a hand to her shoulder. How delicate she was, this half child, half woman he had sired. Yvette’s long illness had forced Amanda to grow up far too quickly. He had hoped taking a job at Merrisand Castle and giving her the opportunity to act her age around other children would give her back some of her interrupted childhood. After a month at Merrisand, the plan wasn’t working too well. “You’re still determined to hate the castle?”

      She affected a shrug. “The deer park is cool. It reminds me of our old place. Sometimes I pretend we’re back there and everything’s the way it was. But the castle school stinks.”

      She wasn’t the only one who regretted the changes in their life, he thought. He had also loved Eden Valley, their property on the beautiful, fertile island of Nuee. When his parents returned to America to be with his grandfather after a yachting accident had left him confined to a wheelchair, Bryce had taken over management of the ranch. Amanda had been three then, Yvette had been healthy and as excited as he was at the prospect of having Eden Valley to themselves. It hadn’t exactly turned out the way they’d dreamed.

      He shrugged into the jacket of his dinner suit. There were some things he wouldn’t want back the way they had been, such as his grandfather’s constant interference from afar. Amanda didn’t know how frustrated Bryce had been, having the old man second-guess him about every major decision.

      Reminding Karl Laws that Bryce and his parents were also shareholders in the family company that owned Eden Valley hadn’t helped. As long as Karl held the controlling interest—controlling being the operative word—he was the real boss. From his wheelchair, he ruled the American side of the Laws business empire through his son, and the Carramer side through his grandson.

      No, there were some things Bryce didn’t miss.

      He pulled himself back to the present. “Define stinks.”

      Amanda made a face. “The castle school is soooo stuffy. It’s all history, history, history. You’d think Carramer had more past than future.”

      Sometimes he felt the same about himself. “You study modern subjects, I know you do.”

      She gave a snort of derision. “Like you’d know.”

      He felt a smile start. “I went to school in Carramer, too, admittedly in the Dark Ages.”

      She grinned in spite of herself. The transformation was astonishing. From a surly child, she became a real beauty. With the striking blond coloring and glorious hair she had inherited from her mother, Bryce didn’t doubt she’d be a heartbreaker one day. “Thirty isn’t all that ancient, Dad. If we’d moved somewhere more exciting than Merrisand, you might have married again,” she said.

      “I’m not interested in marrying again.” Seeing her face darken, he regretted his sharp tone. Was she trying to tell him she wouldn’t mind if he did? He touched the back of his hand to her cheek as if he could erase the downcast expression. “I have all the family I need right here.”

      He couldn’t imagine risking a repeat of the heartache he’d endured during Yvette’s illness. Amanda had been five when Yvette was stricken with a mysterious blood disease no doctor could diagnose or cure. His heart still bled to think of his wife’s battle to live as the disease took her away in slow, painful increments.

      Twice she had rallied, giving them hope that one of the desperate treatments they’d tried might be working. In the end nothing had, and she had slipped away two years before. The wound in Bryce’s heart felt less raw now, but in a way that was more alarming. Would he eventually be left feeling nothing at all?

      Bryce had expected his grandfather to understand his difficulties, since Karl had lost his own wife to a stroke a decade before. Instead, the specter of Yvette’s illness had seemed to frighten Karl. He had become even more despotic, making no allowances for the vast amounts of time and money Bryce had needed to devote to seeking a cure.

      Not surprisingly, the running of Eden Valley had suffered, displeasing Karl so much that he had used his majority vote to have the land put up for auction. Maybe he had intended the threat to bring his grandson to heel. But Bryce was more like his grandfather than either of them wanted to admit, and had surprised the old man by agreeing that selling was the best option. His parents had taken more convincing that Bryce really did want to strike out on his own before they also voted in favor of selling. The sale had gone through five months ago.

      The auction was the reason he and Amanda were living at Merrisand, he mused. Prince Maxim de Marigny, the administrator of the castle and its estates, had attended the auction to inspect Eden Valley’s renowned stock of Mayat deer, a cross between Chital and Carramer’s native sun deer. Bryce had spent a lot of time with the prince, preferring to talk about deer breeding than focus on what was happening to Eden Valley. Evidently he had impressed the prince, because soon after the auction Maxim invited Bryce to take over management of the Royal Deer Park at Merrisand.

      Bryce planned to build the park up until the herds were the equal of those he’d bred at Eden Valley. Then he intended to use his share of the auction proceeds plus whatever he could save working for the royal family to buy another ranch and start again. Prince Maxim had given him complete authority over the royal park, but it wasn’t the same as having a place he and Amanda could call their own.

      He could have taken her to live in America. His mother had been born on Nuee, but his father was American. Bryce himself had dual citizenship, having been born in America after he arrived early when his parents were visiting his grandparents. But Carramer was where he belonged. Yvette’s parents lived on Nuee but were still coming to terms with her death. Another reason he had for being glad he had brought Amanda to Merrisand.

      “At least you’ll finally get to meet Princess Giselle,” she said now.

      He

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