Determined to Protect, Forbidden to Love

by Beverly Barton

  “Of course I did,” Odette replied smugly. “She was planning to trick Laurent into marrying her by getting pregnant. I couldn’t let that happen. Laurent kissed me when I was thirteen, and that’s when I knew I was destined to be his princess. With you finally dead, he’ll be free to follow his heart. He will realize that his true princess has always been beneath his nose.”

  “You stabbed the fashion designer, too?”

  Odette shrugged. “He was sleeping with her.”

  Rory couldn’t keep her eyelids open any longer. Regret that she couldn’t protect Laurent from Odette’s scheming flooded her heart. “He might marry you, but he’ll never let himself love you,” she mumbled as she lost consciousness.

  RORY HAD LEFT HIS BED this morning without waking him. Laurent sat at his desk unable to concentrate, knowing the reason she’d left.

  His head jerked up as Heinrich entered the salon accompanied by Franz. Heinrich’s face was bone white. His dark eyes carried news Laurent knew he did not want to hear.

  “It’s Fraulein Schoenfeldt and the princess. They have been lured out of the hotel on false pretenses.”

  Franz flexed his shoulders, shame reddening his tight jaw. “Fraulein Schoenfeldt received a call she believed was from Heinrich. She was told that you had been shot and were taken to the hospital. She ordered me to get the car.”

  Disbelief echoed in Laurent’s heart. The assassin was still at large. “Can you not call the driver?”

  “He’s not answering his phone.”

  Laurent glanced at his watch, horror growing inside him. “When did this happen?”

  “It’s been seventeen minutes since they were last seen by a doorman. Detective Rodriguez is en route,” Heinrich reported solemnly. “They are putting out an APB for the vehicle, and Rodriguez is requesting the assistance of a police chopper.” A flush crept over Heinrich’s collar. “Sir, if you will forgive me for the impropriety, I fitted the princess’s handbags with tracking devices last night. She had already breached her personal protection measures twice. After what happened with Dupont yesterday, I felt the measure justifiable with the assassin still at large.”

  Laurent gripped Heinrich’s shoulders. They’d address the privacy violation later. “Can you track her now?”

  “Ja. If she has her handbag. I would prefer you—”

  Laurent cut him off. “I am coming with you.”

  RORY HOVERED between consciousness and unconsciousness. She felt the hot July sun on her face as she was dragged out of the limo and heaved unceremoniously onto the padded floor of a delivery van. Her bones jarred with the impact. Why were people always tossing her around?

  She flexed her fingers. She was too weak to move. But at least she was awake after a fashion. Maybe the drug was wearing off. She heard voices: Odette’s and a man’s.

  “What do we do now?” Odette asked.

  “I’ve found the perfect place to dump her. The police will be looking for the limousine. This will buy us time to get out of the area. I’ll drop you off near a gas station on the way to El Centro. The police will believe I intended to dump her in the desert. You pretend you escaped, and I’ll expect my final payment within two business days—along with a bonus for the chauffeur. He won’t be talking.”

  Rory kept her eyes closed as they climbed into the van. They crossed her arms mummy-like over her chest, then tore a strip of duct tape and stuck it on her mouth.

  “One more thing,” Odette said. Rory felt her nemesis attach something around her neck. Her birthday necklace!

  “Roll her up now,” the hit man directed.

  No! It took all Rory’s self-control not to scream when she realized what they were doing. Claustrophic panic rioted through her as they rolled her up in a scratchy rug. She couldn’t move, could hardly breathe. The sound of more strips of duct tape being torn almost made her sob.

  The hit man bound the rug snugly around her with the tape. “That should keep her quiet. She won’t last longer than an hour or two in this heat once we leave her in the Dumpster. Best thing is, they’ll never find her body.”

  “Clever man. A garbage dump seems fitting for a trashy American princess. What about her purse?”

  “Tuck it inside the carpet with her. I don’t want any evidence left lying around.”

  Rory felt tears of gratitude as her purse was wedged into the roll above her head.

  She waited until the van pulled onto the road, then she concentrated on the painstaking task of inching a hand up over her face toward her purse. A princess wouldn’t be caught dead without certain essentials.

  THE POLICE HELICOPTER had spotted a limousine parked behind an abandoned building two blocks ahead. Laurent sat in an unmarked police car as it raced through the streets of National City with its lights flashing, watching a blipping dot move on a computer screen. He prayed they would find his princess and his press secretary in time.

  Detective Rodriguez radioed dispatch for an ambulance. Laurent’s stomach felt as if it were being pummeled to dust. “But the dot is still moving east,” he protested.

  “We’ll check the limo first. He may have left Odette there and switched vehicles,” Heinrich explained. “We approach Odette with caution. I am finding it suspicious that she mistook someone else’s voice for mine.”

  “I am wondering the same thing,” Laurent admitted. “Could it have been a tape recording? She was distraught.”

  “But to dispatch Franz to get a car?”

  Laurent stabbed his hair with his fingers as Detective Rodriguez gunned the police car through an intersection and wove through midday traffic at breakneck speed. “I keep thinking about the theft of the princess’s necklace. You know, Odette was on the yacht the night Marielle died. She was a great comfort to me during that time. I secured her a position in the palace press office shortly thereafter and she has done her best to become indispensable to me. I am beginning to see, Heinrich, that we are sometimes blind to the secret ambitions of those around us.”

  The cruiser whipped into the parking lot of an out-of-business furniture store and drove around to the back of the drab building. Laurent’s heart jammed in his throat as the police car screeched to a halt beside the limo.

  Laurent and Heinrich bolted out of the car with Detective Rodriguez and his partner.

  “There’s no one inside the limo,” Rodriguez shouted, trying the driver’s side door. It was unlocked.

  “Pop the trunk,” his partner suggested.

  Detective Rodriguez worked the trunk lever.

  His partner swore. “There’s someone in here.”

  Odette? Rory? Laurent forced himself to remain strong as he looked at the body in the trunk. It was the chauffeur, with a clear plastic bag sealed over his head.

  He was dead.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Princess Charlotte Aurora, contortionist, Rory thought with pride as she squeezed her right hand up past her head toward her purse. She was never going to deride herself for her natural clumsiness. If she hadn’t spilled the drugged water, she’d still be unconscious or maybe even dead.

  Odette and the hit man were not engaging in chitchat. So far Rory had succeeded in peeling the duct tape from her mouth. Although she was suffocatingly hot and terrified, a sense of calm pervaded her. The night on her patio when Claude Dupont had shot at her and Laurent, Laurent had shown her by example to keep a cool head under fire.

  Rory was taking that lesson to heart. She was not powerless. She was a princess of Estaire.

  Odette and the man driving the van had killed her mother, and Rory was determined to survive her ordeal to see justice done. Her fingers were damp with sweat as she fumbled with the clasp of her purse. It finally opened.

  Sweat pearled on her upper lip as she slid her hand into the purse and found the pepper spray pen that Heinrich had given her.

  It took four attempts to flick the cap off the pepper spray with her thumb. Her fingers were so sweaty!

  Rory stretched her arm as close to
the end of the carpet roll as possible and attuned her senses to the movement of the van. Were they in street traffic or on the highway? Heinrich had warned her that a person’s reaction to cayenne pepper spray would be immediate and severe. She didn’t want to cause a highway pile up.

  Unfortunately the van seemed to be moving smoothly with only the occasional tap on the brakes. She guessed they were on Highway 94 headed east.

  “How much longer?” Odette demanded in a strained tone.

  “Relax. We’re right on schedule. Damn!” The hit man slammed suddenly on the brakes. Rory, bundled in the rug, slid a half-dozen inches closer to the front seats. “Geez, people don’t know how to drive. Come on, asshole—” He hit the brakes again.

  Rory felt the van’s deceleration. She had to act now. Praying for deliverance, she took a deep breath, closed her eyes tight and pressed the button of the pepper spray.

  THE TRAFFIC PARTED ahead of them like a school of fish avoiding a predator. They had been joined by several other police cars. Overhead, a police helicopter hovered.

  “We’re drawing nearer,” Heinrich announced. “Just up ahead. The dot shows them merging onto the other highway.”

  “Watch for a truck or a van with dark windows,” Detective Rodriguez said. “Once he sees us, he’ll make a run for it.”

  Up ahead Laurent spotted the sudden erratic movement of a white van. It veered into another lane, sideswiping a silver sedan. “There, the white van!”

  The silver sedan changed lanes to pull over to the shoulder of the highway.

  The white van came to a halt, and the driver and passenger doors flew open. A blonde in a pastel-blue suit staggered out of the passenger side. She was bent over double, clutching her face. “That’s Odette.”

  To Laurent’s shock, the male driver reeled blindly away from the van and was struck by a semitrailer that was braking to avoid him. The man bounced off the truck as if he were made of rubber and landed on the asphalt.

  There was no sign of Rory.

  Pandemonium reigned. The police cars boxed in the scene and officers spilled out, headed toward Odette and the hit man. Detective Rodriguez tried to hold Laurent back, but he broke free of the detective’s hold. The police were shouting warnings about approaching the van, but Laurent ignored them. An officer opened the rear of the van.

  “Mein Gott!” Laurent stared in stupefaction at the roll of carpeting, pain tearing his heart. Were they too late?

  He heard muffled coughing. “Help! Please, help me!”

  “Lorelei, we’re here,” he shouted, coughing, his eyes tearing up as he helped the officer pull her out of the van. The officer cut the tape that bound the rug. And there was his princess, red-faced and rumpled, and very much alive.

  Her beautiful blue eyes opened, filling with tears as he gathered her into his arms.

  She buried her face into his shoulder. “That’s no way to travel.” Then she threw up all over his shoes.

  RORY HUDDLED on the floor of Laurent’s suite, the balcony doors flung open to the ocean, letting the sound of the surf soothe her.

  After a quick trip to the emergency room, she’d returned to the hotel under police escort. Somehow the media had caught wind of her parentage and her title and Laurent’s identity, and they had staked out the hotel’s entrances. News footage of the accident scene was being broadcast on every station.

  The intrusive glare of the cameras had been alarming. She’d been grateful for the protective strength of Laurent’s arm. He’d insisted that she stay in his suite. She’d bathed and he’d joined her in the steamy water. He’d washed her hair and they’d made tender, gentle love. Then he’d carried her to bed and held her until she’d fallen asleep. But he didn’t tell her he loved her, and although Rory needed to say the words to him as much as she needed to hear them, she bit them back.

  A handful of stars shone in a sky that reminded her of the inky depths of Laurent’s eyes. It was two o’clock in the morning. The ceaseless energy of the water called to her, tossing answers to her unspoken worries.

  Rory had lit a white pillar candle for her mother and wore her birthday necklace in quiet celebration.

  Odette was in jail and the hit man was dead. The police had identified him as Elmer Nash. They were searching his home in Long Beach for evidence of his crimes. Rory felt no sorrow for him. Fortunately, the driver of the silver sedan had not suffered any injuries in the collision.

  “Mom, I’m okay,” she whispered to the ocean’s sympathetic ears. “I survived. And I understand why you left Dad and you couldn’t go back. You were right.”

  “Lorelei?”

  Rory turned. Laurent stood in the shadows in a pair of black silk pajama bottoms. His beautiful chest was bare, the muscles gleaming in the flickering candlelight. Her throat ached with love and regret.

  She patted the floor beside her. “Come join me.”

  His lips brushed her hair as he nestled beside her and circled her waist with his arms. “Could you not sleep?”

  “No. There’s too much to think about.”

  “You handled yourself magnificently today.”

  She squeezed his hard thigh. “I had an exemplary teacher. You saved me today.”

  He shook his head. “Heinrich deserves the honors although he broke several rules with his tracking device.”

  “I’m naming my firstborn son after Heinrich, but you were the one who taught me not to let fear overtake me.”

  “I’m flattered.”

  She leaned her shoulder into his chest and felt the steadying pound of his heartbeat. “I’ve made a few other decisions.” She hesitated. “I’m meeting Olivier and Renald in France on Saturday. I’ll be going to Estaire with them. I think it’s time Princess Charlotte Aurora returned to her birthplace and faced up to her responsibilities.”

  “If that is what you wish, my princess.”

  She lifted her face and admired his dark profile and the tautness of his supple lips. “Do you love me, Sebastian?”

  He stiffened, his features wary. “We have talked about this before. Love serves very little purpose in a royal—”

  “Marriage,” she finished for him. “I know. I am prepared to make many sacrifices for Estaire, but the one thing I will not sacrifice is the right to be loved by a man of my own choosing. I love you, Sebastian. Not your crown.” She touched his firm chin. She would miss not having children who bore his aristocratic features.

  “I value your friendship and these moments we have spent together more than you’ll ever know, but I can’t devote my life to a partner who withholds his love from me.” She sniffled, trying to retain her dignity. “I’ll be asking Olivier formally in writing to release me from the terms of the treaty. I thought you deserved to hear it from me first. I hope that working together as colleagues we can bring an end to the feud between our countries.”

  Laurent nodded. He swallowed hard, but he didn’t say anything. Frankly, Rory hadn’t expected a response. She knew him so well. Her heart ached for his pain, his loneliness, his loss.

  She kissed him lightly on the lips, then blew out the candle and walked away. Sometimes a woman needed to take a stand for what she believed in, even at the risk of losing the man she loved.

  THE HEADLINES MOCKED HIM. Laurent wished Heinrich would quit leaving the damn tabloids all over his quarters. For the past six weeks, Laurent had found the newspapers and magazines left in chairs, on tables, even in his private car. It was damn irritating to be constantly reminded that he had been royally dumped.

  Princess Spurns Royal Proposal. Prince Ducharme Has No Heart. Princess Takes Palace by Storm. The Real Reason Rory Dumped Her Prince. Royal Love Triangle.

  The flood of bad press had renewed the feud between Estaire and Ducharme. The world seemed to be cheering that Princess Rory refused to enter a loveless marriage.

  Laurent was not cheering. He was spending long hours working or trying to find enrichment in books that no longer satisfied him as they once did. His pride was brui
sed, and his father had scolded him for bungling the treaty and allowing the situation to escalate into a full-blown scandal. The Schoenfeldt family had left Ducharme in disgrace, creating yet another flurry of headlines.

  No matter how frequently Laurent tossed the tabloids in the rubbish bin, they resurfaced in another location to taunt him. On the one hand Laurent was incredibly proud that Rory was spreading her wings and proving that she could handle her royal responsibilities with confidence and wit. She’d even successfully ridden out the inevitable rumors questioning her legitimacy.

  But he was disturbed to see her smiling picture in the paper at a Paris nightclub with a movie star. Did she really think some poorly shaven actor would know the first thing about raising an heir to the throne?

  With each passing day Laurent felt an ache swell beneath his bruised pride—an ache for his beautiful Lorelei. He missed their stimulating conversations and her adorable faux pas. And the softness in her voice when she called him Sebastian. He missed her riotous curls and the impetuous unchecked heat that made him feel so incredibly alive when he touched her. When he kissed her.

  He missed her. The isolation of his position had never seemed so unbearable. Rory had opened up his emotions like a gutted fish, leaving him with his innards exposed.

  Yet, what was he going to do about it?

  With a sigh, Laurent helped himself to a brandy from the bar in his private quarters and sank down into his favorite club chair. To his irritation a newspaper had been tucked between the arm of the chair and the seat cushion. Laurent removed the newspaper with a grimace.

  The front page headline pushed him beyond restraint: Princess Pregnant with Prince’s Love Child.

  Laurent swallowed the brandy in one gulp. There was rarely any truth in these trumped-up stories, but it was time to reopen negotiations.

  “MESDAMES ET MESSIEURS, it is with great pleasure that I present my sister, Her Serene Highness, Charlotte Aurora, Princess of Estaire,” Prince Olivier announced to the guests and dignitaries gathered in the palace ballroom.