The Prince's Devious Proposal

by Rayner, Holly

That had been a fraught time for the family. Naomi, still grieving her father, had been upset at the idea of her mother with another man. Sarah had taken it in stride, as she did most things, leaving Naomi feeling as if the whole family was ganging up on her.

  Because of her turbulent emotions about the affair, she had only met her mother’s boyfriend a couple of times. She couldn’t even remember his name. But now, as she examined the memory, a detail came to mind.

  “He’s an advisor to the royal family,” her mother had said.

  “What, the Queen of England?” Naomi cringed to remember the nastiness in her own tone. She had been so unkind to her mother during those months. It was a painful regret now.

  “Not that royal family,” her mother had said.

  And then she had named another country.

  Memory was unreliable. It had been a long time ago. And her thoughts had been clouded by anger at the time. What country had her mother mentioned?

  Could it have been Sovra?

  Naomi wasn’t sure. But she thought it just might have been.

  For a moment, she wanted to pick up the phone and call Sarah back. Sarah would know. She probably had it written down somewhere. That sounded like the kind of thing she would do.

  But Sarah would also want to know why Naomi was asking, and Naomi definitely didn’t want to tell her.

  She looked down at the ring on her finger, feeling horrified. What was it she had thought to herself when she had first heard the news of her inheritance?

  I’ve got enough money for the both of us.

  It couldn’t be. It couldn’t be.

  But the puzzle pieces were falling together far too easily now. This was an answer that made sense of everything. The picture that was forming in her mind now accounted for every confusing moment, every detail that hadn’t quite fit.

  It was a scam.

  It had always been a scam.

  Petr had never loved her at all. Not a moment of it had been real.

  No doubt her mother had told that boyfriend, the advisor to the royal family, about her will. She would have confided in him about the money she was leaving to her daughters. She might even have asked him to help her set it up.

  And as the advisor to the royal family, he would have turned around and reported all he knew to the Sovran royals—particularly when they found themselves in debt.

  Petr would have known from the beginning that she would be coming into an inheritance. Naomi’s mother hadn’t told her it would be so much. But she probably had confided in her boyfriend. Which meant that Petr had known before Naomi herself had.

  It would have been a simple matter for him to track her down—she had never left Los Angeles. An internet search for her name would have led him to her place of business.

  He had approached her as a fan because that had been the easiest way to explain his desired to meet her. He had never been a fan of her music. He had probably taken months to learn her album, to choose a deep-cut favorite song and memorize it, practice it so that he could perform it in front of her.

  And she had fallen for it.

  She was pathetic.

  It was all her fault that this had happened. She was the one who had allowed it to happen.

  He had spent extravagantly on her during their courtship because he had wanted to dazzle her, to make her forget about how impractical they were being. Maybe he had hoped to buy her love. Whatever he had been trying to do, it had worked. Six months ago, Naomi would have said she was too smart to be taken in by something like this, but it had worked. Every step of the way.

  And that explained why the luxuries had stopped once he had gotten the ring on her finger. There had been no need to spoil her after that. He had his prize.

  She looked down at the ring. What an idiot she had been, to believe that he’d given her a ring that had belonged to a queen! These gemstones were almost certainly fake.

  And now…

  Now they were married, and there had been no prenuptial agreement. Petr had assured her, over and over, that what was his was hers, that she would be financially taken care of. But in reality, the reverse was true.

  What was hers would now be his.

  She hadn’t even taken possession of her inheritance yet, but the moment she did, half of it would belong to Petr Agridis. A man who had never loved her. A man who had only spent time with her in an attempt to steal her money—an attempt that was going to succeed. She had opened the door to him, and he had walked through.

  Sarah is going to be so disappointed in me.

  Naomi was humiliated, horrified. How could Petr have done this to her? And how could she have allowed it to happen?

  She was going to get answers.

  She started her car and pulled out of the lot, heading for the Crystal Lounge.

  Chapter 15

  He was waiting for her at the very same table they had sat at during their first evening at the Crystal Lounge, and for a moment the symmetry made Naomi pause.

  Petr. It had only been a few days since she’d seen him, but it felt like a lifetime. Now, looking at his face, she felt a rush of unwelcome affection. She wanted to forget all the details she had just pieced together and rush into his arms, welcome him home, step into the life with him she had imagined having.

  He saw her and got to his feet, clearly wanting to greet her just as badly as she had wanted to greet him. With an embrace, and perhaps a kiss.

  But he doesn’t mean it, she reminded herself firmly. He never meant any of it. And if you let him get away with it, you deserve whatever he does to you.

  She summoned her courage and stalked over to the table.

  “Naomi,” he said, reaching out his arms for her. “It’s so good to see you.”

  She held her distance, not stepping into his embrace. “Petr.”

  His smile faltered. “Is something wrong?”

  “Why don’t you tell me?” she asked.

  “I don’t know what you mean,” he said, sitting back down. “I’m sorry that I didn’t call you. I wanted to talk to you about that a little more tonight, actually—”

  “Don’t bother,” Naomi said, pleased with the frosty tone of her voice. “I know you’ve been lying to me.”

  “What?” He shook his head. “I haven’t been lying to you. Of course not.”

  But Naomi could see the sudden doubt on his face. He seemed incapable of looking her in the eye.

  I knew it.

  “Tell me something,” she said. “Were you really in Sovra at all? Or was that just another lie?”

  “It’s…it’s complicated, Naomi,” he said. “I don’t know where to start.”

  “Should I start, then?” she asked. “Why don’t I tell you what I think happened, and you can tell me how close I am to the truth. Sound good?”

  She could see by his expression that it didn’t sound good to him at all. That gave her confidence. She was getting to him.

  It also broke her heart. If her deductions had been wrong, she wouldn’t be having this effect on him. The details she had pieced together must be the truth.

  “When you didn’t contact me for a few days,” she said, “I decided to do some research. I’d realized that I didn’t know what you did for a living. You’re going to laugh, but I actually felt guilty. I felt like I was in the wrong. I was sure that the reason you’d been so standoffish was because you were upset with me for not taking enough of an interest in your life, and I was going to surprise you by learning the details of the business that had kept you in Rome.”

  “Oh,” Petr said quietly.

  “I guess you know what I found?”

  “I’m guessing your searches led you to some unsavory details about my family’s finances.”

  “I can’t imagine why someone dealing with a large amount of debt would choose to fly first class,” she said. “God knows I never asked you for any international plane tickets. You didn’t have to do that to hold my attention. But maybe you thought I was a gold digger. I suppose
it makes sense that you would think of other people that way, since that’s what you are.”

  “I didn’t think that, Naomi,” he protested.

  “My sister called me today,” Naomi said. “It turns out I’m about to inherit some money. Isn’t that something? And just days after I rushed into a marriage with a deposed prince in crippling debt! What a crazy coincidence!”

  “Naomi, wait a minute,” Petr said, holding up his hands. “Are you going to let me explain myself here?”

  “Explain yourself?” she asked. “What are you going to say? Can you tell me that that wasn’t your plan?” She shook her head. “I’m an idiot for not seeing it. I knew that, years ago, my mother was involved with an advisor to the Sovran royal family. I should have remembered when I met you, but I always tried not to think about that man. I put him out of my mind.” She laughed bitterly. “This is all my fault, really, isn’t it?”

  “Of course it isn’t,” Petr said. “Don’t blame yourself.”

  Somehow, the idea of being consoled by him was as offensive to her as anything else he’d done.

  “Stop that,” she said. “What do you think, that I care about your opinion? It doesn’t matter what you say. You’re a con man. Nothing you ever said to me was real. You’re just in this to steal my mother’s money from me.”

  “It’s not like that,” Petr said.

  “It’s not?” she challenged. “So you didn’t know that I would be inheriting that money?”

  Petr hesitated.

  “You did know,” she said.

  “All right,” he acknowledged. “You’re right about Sir Bozik. He did come to my family after his relationship with an American woman—your mother—ended, and he reported that she would be leaving a small fortune to each of her daughters.”

  “I knew it.” Naomi wished she felt as triumphant as she sounded. All she really felt was sadness.

  “He was just doing his job,” Petr said. “It was Sir Bozik’s responsibility to let us know about any potential solutions to our monetary problems.”

  “And I suppose it was his job to target my mother?”

  “He wasn’t targeting her,” Petr said. “The relationship was real. It wasn’t until things ended between them that he informed us of her wealth.”

  “Okay, so he waited until they had broken up to start targeting her.”

  “I’m not saying he was a good boyfriend,” Petr said.

  “There’s a lot of that going around,” Naomi said icily. “I don’t suppose you’re going to try to tell me that you weren’t targeting me, are you?”

  Petr sighed. “You’re not wrong,” he admitted. “When I saw that your mother had passed away, I knew that you would soon be coming into your inheritance. It seemed an opportune time for me to reach out to you.”

  “And try to con me.”

  “Naomi, I could have claimed half of your assets the day I got that ring on your finger,” Petr said. “I’ve had years to research this. I know who your mother’s lawyer is. I knew where the money was before you did, and as your husband, I was legally entitled to half of it. I could have taken my share and disappeared before you had any idea what had happened.”

  “As far as I know, you did do that,” Naomi pointed out. “I found out about this money twenty minutes ago. I haven’t spoken to the lawyer yet. I don’t know if anybody has asked him for a check.”

  “I haven’t,” Petr said.

  “You did disappear, though,” Naomi said. “Which is exactly what a con artist would do at the end of their scheme.”

  “But I came back,” Petr pointed out. “I’m sitting here with you right now. Why would I be doing that if I had taken your money?”

  “Don’t ask me to explain the way your mind works,” Naomi snapped. “I don’t know why you would do any of what you’ve done. Pretending to be a fan—”

  “No,” Petr interrupted. “I never pretended to be a fan of yours, Naomi. That was the truth.”

  “How can I believe that?” Naomi asked. “How am I supposed to believe anything you say, knowing that you deliberately set out to trick me and steal from me?”

  “I was a fan of your music before any of this happened,” Petr insisted. “When Sir Bozik told me that the woman he had been involved with was the mother of Naomi West, I was thrilled that I might get the chance to meet you in person. That was always real.”

  “So I’m supposed to feel honored that you were excited to rip me off because you liked my music?” Naomi felt sick. “That means that all the time I was writing and performing, I was just creating a path for you to infiltrate my life!”

  “You don’t understand,” Petr said, sounding a bit desperate.

  “No,” Naomi agreed. “I really don’t understand. I don’t know why you would do this to me, and I don’t know how you expect me to respond to it. You made me believe that you loved me, Petr. I really thought we had something special.”

  She focused on the anger that fueled her words. If she allowed herself to think too deeply about what she was saying, she knew she would become emotional. She would break down. And that was the last thing she wanted.

  Anger was good. Anger gave her the strength she needed to sever this connection with Petr, to drive home to him the wrongness of what he had done.

  But was there any chance she could get out of this situation without giving him the money he meant to take? Even if they were to divorce, he would be entitled to it. She would have to consult with the lawyer once she got the name from Sarah.

  There must be something I can do, she thought desperately. There must be some way to keep this man from getting his hands on my money.

  “Don’t you want to know why I’m here today?” Petr asked her. “Don’t you want to know why I haven’t taken your money?”

  “I assume it’s because you weren’t able to access it,” Naomi said. “That’s what you were really doing, right? When you told me you were in Sovra? The ‘royal emergency’ was your family’s debt. And you hadn’t been called back to Sovra to deal with it at all. You were trying to get your hands on my money. Now you’re here because you weren’t able to do it, and you need to manipulate me into giving it to you.”

  She was sure she was right, and she didn’t know how she felt about it. On one hand, that would mean she still had some power, that the ball was still in her court. She would be able to say no to whatever Petr was about to ask her to do.

  On the other hand, though, Petr was a smart man. She didn’t like to admit it, but it was true. What if he had some kind of leverage to use against her?

  But Petr shook his head. “I haven’t been trying to get my hands on the money,” he said. “Naomi, this was a plan years in the making. If I had wanted to get that money, I could have gotten it. I knew what I needed to do. There’s a reason I didn’t.”

  “What reason?” she asked.

  “You,” he said simply, looking directly into her eyes.

  “I don’t know what that means.”

  “All the time we spent together,” he said. “Everything that happened between us—I didn’t expect it, Naomi. I didn’t expect to feel the way I did about you. I didn’t expect that I would fall in love.”

  Naomi felt sick. “Stop,” she begged. “No more lies.”

  “I’m not lying,” he said. “My feelings for you were real. I tried to deny them. The plan was always for me to distance myself from you after we were married, to take half of your money and disappear. As we got to know one another in Europe, I began to realize how difficult that was going to be. How painful. I wasn’t lying when I told you that I tried to talk myself out of proposing to you, but I was lying about my reason. I knew that it would be better for you if we didn’t get married. I almost had myself convinced to call the whole thing off that night.”

  “But you went ahead with it,” she said.

  “I did,” he said. “I felt awful. But I told myself that you and I would find a way to make it work. I told myself that maybe when I came clean abou
t my family, you would want to help. That you wouldn’t hate me for putting you in that position.”

  She didn’t know what to believe. Was this possible? Could it be that he really had loved her?

  It doesn’t matter.

  “The messed-up thing is that I might have been willing to help you,” she said. “But you lied to me. If you’d told me the truth from the beginning, things might have been different.”

  “That’s why I came here tonight,” Petr said. “I had to come clean. I had to let you know that my intentions might have been wrong at the start, but that my love for you was real.”

  “But you didn’t tell me the truth after we were married,” she said. “You say that you thought we’d find a way to make it work, that maybe I’d choose to help you. But you went ahead with the original plan. Instead of confessing what you’d done, you distanced yourself from me so that you would be in a position to take my money.”

  “That’s not why I distanced myself,” Petr said. “I know it might be difficult to believe, because that was the original plan. But when the time came, I stayed away from you for a different reason.”

  “What reason?” Naomi asked.

  “I had to let my family know that I wasn’t going to go through with the plan,” Petr said. “I had to come clean with them and tell them that I’d fallen in love. They still have financial problems, and those problems are still going to have to be solved.” He sighed. “And they’re all very angry with me, of course, because they thought I was going to be the solution.”

  “You mean, they thought I was going to be the solution,” Naomi corrected him.

  “Yes,” Petr admitted. “I suppose they did.”

  “So that’s what you’ve been doing all this time?” Naomi asked. “Telling your family that you’re not planning to con me out of my inheritance anymore?”

  “That’s right.” He reached out his hand for hers.

  Naomi didn’t take it. She didn’t know what to think of the things he’d said. She didn’t know whether she could believe him.

  “You still never told me the truth,” she said. “I had to figure it out for myself. You had lots of opportunities to come clean with me, but you never did.”