could dial he’d been faced with a grim reality. No matter how he felt about her, how deeply they had connected, if he wanted to be prime minister, he simply could not have her.
He had accepted a long time ago that getting where he wanted would involve sacrifice. Yet never had it hit home so thoroughly as it did now.
“Is this a bad time?” she asked.
“No, of course not. Come in, please.”
She stepped into his office and shut the door behind her. Though she was, on most occasions, coolly composed, today she seemed edgy and nervous, her eyes flitting randomly about his office. Looking everywhere, he noticed, but at him.
“I’m sorry to just barge in on you this way. But I was afraid that if I called you might refuse to see me.”
“You’re welcome anytime, Your Highness.” He came around his desk and gestured to the settee and chair in the sitting area. “Please, have a seat. Can I get you a drink?”
“No, thank you. I’m fine.” She sat primly on the edge of the settee, clutching her purse in her lap, and he took a seat in the chair. She looked thinner than when he’d last seen her, and her milky complexion had taken on a gray cast. Was she ill?
“Maybe just a glass of water?” he asked.
She shook her head, her lips folded firmly together, and he watched as her face went from gray to green before his eyes. Then her eyes went wide, and she asked in a panicked voice, “The loo?”
He pointed across the room. “Just through that—”
She was up off the settee, one hand clamped over her mouth, dashing for the door before he could even finish his sentence. It might have been comedic had he not been so alarmed. He followed her and stood outside the door, cringing when he heard the sounds of her being ill. There was obviously something terribly wrong with her. But why come to him? They barely knew one another. On a personal level at any rate.
He heard a flush, then the sound of water running.
“Should I call someone for you?” he asked, then the door opened and Anne emerged looking pale and shaky.
“No, I’m fine. Just dreadfully embarrassed. I should have known better than to eat before I came here.”
“Why don’t you sit down.” He reached out to help her but she waved him away.
“I can do it.” She crossed the room on wobbly legs and re-staked her seat on the settee. Sam sat in the chair.
“Forgive me for being blunt, Your Highness, but are you ill?”
“Sam, we’ve been about as intimate as two people can be, so please call me Anne. And no, I’m not ill. Not in the way you might think.”
“In what way, then?”
She took a deep breath and blew it out. “I’m pregnant.”
“Pregnant?” he repeated, and she nodded. Well, he hadn’t seen that coming. He’d barely been able to look at another woman without seeing Anne’s face, but it would seem she’d had no trouble moving on. And what reason had he given her not to? Maybe that night hadn’t been as fantastic for her as it was for him. It would explain why she had made no attempt to contact him afterward.
But if she was happy, he would be happy for her. “I hadn’t heard. Congratulations.”
She looked at him funny, then said, “I’m four months.”
Four months? He counted back and realized that their night together had been almost exactly—
Sam’s gut tightened.
“Yes, it’s yours,” she said.
He really hadn’t seen that coming. “You’re sure?”
She nodded. “There hasn’t been anyone else. Not after, and not a long time before.”
“I thought you said you had it covered.”
“I guess nothing is one hundred percent guaranteed.”
Apparently not.
“If you require a DNA test—”
“No,” he said. “I trust your word.” What reason did she have to lie?
They were going to have a baby. He and the princess. He was going to be a father.
He had always planned to have a family someday, but not until he was a bit more established in his career. And not until he met the right woman.
“You’re probably wondering why I waited so long to tell you,” she said.
Among other things. “Why did you?”
“I just … I didn’t want to burden you with this. I didn’t want you to feel … obligated. Which I realize now was totally unfair of me. And I apologize. I just want you to know that I don’t expect anything from you. I’m fully prepared to raise this baby on my own. Whether or not you want to be a part of its life is your choice entirely.”
What kind of man did she take him to be? “Let’s get one thing perfectly clear,” he told her. “This is my child, and I’m going to be a part of it’s life.”
“Of course,” she said softly. “I wasn’t sure. Some men—”
“I am not some men,” he told her firmly. “I hope that won’t be a problem for you or your family.”
She shook her head. “No, of course not. I think it’s wonderful. A child should have both its parents.”
He leaned back in the chair, shaking his head. “I’m. wow. This is quite a surprise.”
“I can relate, believe me. This was not the way I imagined starting a family.”
“I suppose some sort of announcement will have to be made.” He could just imagine what his friends would say. For weeks after the ball they had tried to bully him into explaining his and the princess’s sudden absence from the party, but he’d refused to say a word. Now everyone would know. Not that he was embarrassed or ashamed of what he’d done. “You know that the press will be brutal.”
“I know. When they learn you’re the father and that we’re not … together, they won’t leave us alone.”
If that was some sort of hint as to the future direction of their relationship, he hated to disappoint her, but he was not about to give up everything he had worked so hard for, his lifelong dream, for a one-night stand.
He cared for Anne, lusted after her even, but a marriage was absolutely out of the question.
Three
“The press will just have to get used to the idea of us being friends,” Sam told her.
“I hope we can be, for the baby’s
