meet Stella.’
Stella didn’t even glance at the doctor. She was too surprised by the charming, ‘glossy-pages prince’ look that suddenly lit up Eduardo’s face.
‘I understand there may be good news today?’ The doctor couldn’t quite hide the excited note in his voice as he quickly crossed the room.
‘We hope so.’ Eduardo placed a hand on her shoulder in a mockery of a loving gesture.
‘That is very exciting.’ The doctor smiled as he put his bag on the big desk and opened it. ‘I’m sure you’re desperate for confirmation, so shall we do that right away?’
The man lifted out a small box and turned to her, still with that smile. But his eyes were wide and sharp and prying.
‘You know how to use this?’ He handed her a commercial pregnancy test.
‘Yes.’ Mortified, Stella wanted to hide.
‘This way, Stella.’ Eduardo took her hand and pulled her out of the chair. He wrapped his arm around her waist and walked her to the doorway. ‘There is a powder room second door on the left,’ he murmured, but there was steel beneath the soft tone. ‘One of my assistants will help you if you can’t find your way back.’
This wasn’t pleasant courtesy. He was issuing a warning. She was under surveillance and she couldn’t escape.
‘Why don’t you just wait here for me?’ she whispered back snappily.
‘Good idea.’
He walked with her right to the bathroom door. For a horrified second she thought he was actually going to go into the room with her, but he paused and she shut the door in his face.
Her palms were damp and she grimaced, but the indignity of doing the pregnancy test paled in the light of what the result might show. In her heart she knew her army medical tests wouldn’t have been mixed up. The San Felipe army was too good for such a mistake to be made. It was Stella who’d made the mistake and the result could be catastrophic.
Eduardo De Santis leaned against the wall and waited, furious and impatient that he’d found out so late. That she’d nearly escaped from the country. Where had she been going to go? What had she been planning to do? He couldn’t figure it out. Couldn’t figure her out.
She finally emerged and walked back to the library. She held the test tightly in her fist and wouldn’t meet his eyes. Wouldn’t speak either.
She barely came to his shoulder. Her blonde hair was scraped back into a straggly ponytail, her skin was shiny and her loose clothes old. He still thought she was beautiful. And dangerous.
She placed the test on the desk by Dr Russo. Eduardo watched as the result was revealed. It didn’t take the two minutes it was supposed to. The word was illuminated almost immediately.
Pregnant.
The last hint of colour drained from her cheeks. Her lashes lifted and she looked up at him. The intense emotion in her expression struck deep and burned hot within his belly.
Stark fear.
She was right to be afraid. He’d never felt so angry—not since the last time he’d seen her. Was her wide-eyed, wounded reaction all an act? Had she somehow planned this? He knew that was impossible, but there was something he couldn’t trust in her.
It took him a moment to simmer down enough to think—though he’d been doing nothing but thinking since his aide Matteo had phoned this morning, to relay information about a certain young lieutenant Eduardo had asked him to keep tabs on.
Inexplicably, as that burst of anger settled, another ferociously hot feeling surged in its place. Satisfaction? As if he were some Neanderthal, proud of his success in procreating and preserving the species—the family name.
His name.
But Eduardo did not have the same liberty as others. He could not do entirely as he wanted. He was part of the royal family and with that came restrictions, responsibilities and requirements not to get in trouble. He was the public ‘face’ of his country, and one day he would have to marry.
He was eighteen months off thirty. Palace aides had been dropping hints about a royal wedding for the past year. They’d even gone so far as to invite every European society princess or supermodel to the upcoming annual autumn ball, in the desperate hope that one might catch the princes’ eyes. They were dreaming if they thought any would interest Antonio. And if Eduardo had to marry eventually, what better bride than the woman already carrying his baby?
So was it any surprise that the plan had come to him half formed as soon as he’d found out this morning? Now it only needed to be enacted—quickly, quietly, incontrovertibly.
He took her hand in his. Her fingers were freezing. Instinctively he tightened his grip and rubbed this thumb over her knuckles.
‘Darling,’ he muttered roughly. ‘I’m so pleased.’
Startled, she choked on a gasp. He leaned close and kissed her temple, so his head hid her suddenly astounded—and angry—expression.
He had absolute faith in the discretion of his physician, but Dr Russo was also his brother’s doctor. Patient confidentiality might not hold when it was the Crown Prince asking questions. Eduardo had to sell this as a love match—starting now.
When he drew back a flush of colour had returned to her cheeks, but she still looked so slim and vulnerable.
He knew she wasn’t. Those apparently skinny biceps could support her entire body weight, and her legs could wrap around a man and lock him in close. She was strong, powerful, and he wanted to kiss her properly—her mouth, her body. Latent and unwelcome desire rippled in his gut—like a beast beneath the surface of an eerily still lake.
‘You are in good health?’ Dr Russo turned to Stella.
Eduardo listened impatiently as the doctor asked her preliminary questions. He wanted the man to do his job, but he also wanted him gone so he could ensure his control over Stella and this situation.
Stella nodded.
‘Do you have any idea of the date of conception?’
Precisely. But Stella didn’t answer.
Eventually Eduardo did. ‘Possibly late July.’
There was a startled look in the doctor’s eyes as he worked out how far along Stella must be, but the man was wise enough not to comment. He kept asking his routine questions. ‘You’ve had no morning sickness?’
‘No symptoms at all. I have an irregular cycle,’ she said in a strangled voice. ‘Apart from that I’ve always been very healthy.’
‘From your army medical file it seems that indeed you are,’ the doctor said jovially, apparently ignorant of the tension swirling in the room. ‘So there’s nothing else—no family history that we ought to be aware of?’
Her
