time he’d been gone.
‘As you weren’t doing the kickboxing class I worked out at the palace gym. It gave me a chance to catch up with my brothers and my grandfather.’
That would be the King and the two other Kalliakis Princes.
‘I thought you went to your gym every night?’
‘I work out every night, but not always at the gym. I try and make it there a couple of times a week when I’m in the country.’
‘Have you been putting yourself out for me, then?’
‘You’re my current project,’ he said with a wolfish grin. ‘As long as I get you on that stage for the gala I don’t care if I have to be inconvenienced.’
That was right. She was his pet project. She had to remember that anything nice he did was with an ulterior motive and not for her.
She took a sip of retsina, expecting to grimace at the taste, which she’d always found rather harsh. It was surprisingly mellow—like an expensive white wine but with that unmistakable resinous tang.
‘You approve?’ he asked.
She nodded.
‘Good. It is our island’s vintage.’
‘Do you make it?’
‘No—we rent out our land to a producer who makes it under the island’s own label.’
The food looked and tasted as divine as its aroma. Amalie happily dived into kleftiko—the most tender slow-cooked lamb on the bone she’d ever eaten—and its accompanying yemista—stuffed baked tomatoes and peppers—eating as much as she could fit into her stomach. She hadn’t realised how hungry she was.
As during their shared meal at his gym, Talos ate heartily. When he’d finished wolfing down every last scrap on his plate, and emptying the takeaway boxes of every last morsel, he stuck his fork into the few leftovers on her plate.
‘For a prince, you don’t behave in a very regal fashion,’ she observed drily.
‘How is a prince supposed to behave?’
She considered, before answering, ‘Regally?’
He burst into laughter—a deep, booming sound that filled the small cottage. ‘I leave the regal behaviour to my brothers.’
‘How do you get away with that?’
‘They’re the heir and the spare.’ He raised a hefty shoulder into a shrug. ‘Helios will take over the throne when my grandfather...’
Here, his words faltered—just a light falter, that anyone who wasn’t observing him closely would likely have missed. But she was observing him closely—was unable to tear her eyes away from him. It wasn’t just the magnetic sex appeal he oozed. The more time she spent with him, the more he fascinated her. The man behind the magnetism.
‘When the day comes,’ he finished smoothly. ‘Theseus has been groomed for the role too, for the remote eventuality that something untoward should happen to Helios.’ He must have caught her shock at his unemotional analysis because he added, ‘No one knows what’s around the corner. Our father was heir to the throne, but life threw a curveball at him when he was only a couple of years older than I am now.’
The car crash. The tragedy that had befallen the Kalliakis family a quarter of a century before, leaving the three young Princes orphaned. Looking at the huge man sitting opposite her, she found it was almost impossible to imagine Talos as a small child. But he had been once, and had suffered the most horrendous thing that could happen to any child: the death of not one but both parents.
The sudden temptation to cover his giant hand and whisper her sympathies was smothered by the equally sudden hard warning in his eyes—a look impossible to misinterpret. I do not want your sympathies. This subject is not open to discussion.
Instead she said, ‘Did your brothers get favourable treatment?’
He relaxed back immediately into a grin. ‘Not at all. I got all the preferential treatment. I was the happy accident. I was raised without any expectations—a prince in a kingdom where the most that is expected of me is to protect my brothers if ever the need arises. Even my name denotes that. In ancient mythology Talos was a giant man of bronze. There are a number of differing myths about him, but the common theme is that he was a protector.’
Goosebumps broke out over her flesh.
Something told her this big brute of a man would be a fierce protector—and not simply because of his physique.
Cross him or those he loved and you would know about it.
She cleared her throat. ‘Aren’t older siblings supposed to protect the youngest, not the other way round?’
His smile broadened. ‘Usually. But I was such a large newborn my parents knew my role would be to protect my brothers from anyone who would do harm to them or our lands.’
‘And have you had to do much in the way of protection?’ she asked.
‘When I was a child it seemed my role was to protect them from each other,’ he said with another laugh. ‘They used to fight constantly. We all did.’
‘Do you get on now?’
‘We all still fight, but nowadays it is only verbally. We are brothers, and we get on and work well together. We protect each other. That said, they are both big enough and ugly enough to take care of themselves.’
Amalie felt a pang of envy. She would have loved a sibling of her own. Any kind of playmate would have been wonderful. Anything would have been better than a childhood spent travelling the world with her parents on their various tours, educational tutors in tow, the only child in a world full of adults.
‘Even so, aren’t princes supposed to travel with a retinue of protectors at all times? And have lots of flunkeys?’ In Paris he’d arrived at her home alone both times. And the only staff he’d brought to the Théâtre de la Musique had been clerical.
‘It would take a very brave person to take me on—don’t you think, little songbird?’
She felt her cheeks turn scarlet. She wished he would stop addressing her as little songbird—hated the rush of warmth that flushed through her whenever he called her it. Instinct told her that to acknowledge it would be like waving a red flag to a bull.
‘Helios always travels with protection—Theseus less so.’ Something sparked in his eyes, as if he were asking a question of himself. ‘If you would like to see me behave in a more regal fashion you can accompany me to the ball at the palace next weekend.’
‘What ball?’
‘It’s something Helios is hosting—a private pre-gala celebration. There will be royal flunkeys and footmen everywhere, princes and princesses from around the world—and I, little songbird, will be in my most princely attire.’
‘And you want me to go with you?’ Was he asking her to go as
