by Romancing the Crown Series (13-in-1 bundle) (v1. 0) (lit)
She smiled up at him now, a full, flirtatious two hundred watts, and batted her graziosi verdi occhi. "I just can't bear to think of life without you, Giorgio."
"I am flattered, signorina." He grinned, which made him look like a direct descendant of Apollo. "Does that mean the signorina would like the strawberries and cream?"
"You read my mind," Sarah said with a laugh.
After she had consumed the perfect red berries and the thick cream served in a small porcelain bowl featuring the black and gold royal crest of the House of Sebastiani, Sarah visited the royal lavatory, a paradise of black marble and solid gold fixtures, where she attempted to make repairs to her sleep-deprived, nonroyal face. Luckily, her undulating hair only required a quick swipe of a comb and a swing of her head to fall into place.
After she brushed her teeth with a royally monogrammed toothbrush and the royal Colgate tartar control, she returned to her seat—actually it was an enormous buttery leather club chair—and fastened her seat belt in preparation for landing.
"Look down there, signorina." Giorgio angled a lean hip onto the arm of her seat and pointed toward the window just as the plane banked to the right. "Montebello. She is beautiful, is she not?"
Beautiful, even in Giorgio's sexily accented Italian, didn't come anywhere near describing the island kingdom below. Montebello rose out of the turquoise Mediterranean like a rough jewel. Its central mountains, green and glorious, sloped to bright blue coves and wide white beaches. High above one of those beaches, the capital city of San Sebastian hugged the mountainside and glittered in the morning sun.
And somewhere down there, Sarah thought, was a troubled little boy in need of her help. Suddenly she wasn't quite so tired anymore. She was ready to go to work.
Half an hour later, when the royal limousine rolled to a stop on the cobbled drive in front of the palace, Sarah drew in a deep and calming breath.
Okay. Just breathe. Settle down. Don't even think of it as a palace, she told herself. Think of it as the home of one of your father's oldest and dearest friends. That's all.
Oh, right. The fact that her father's oldest and dearest friend was the monarch of a Mediterranean kingdom was a minor detail. And his home, the building looming outside the limo's window, was just your everyday marble-columned, fifty- or sixty-room palatial residence with armed, uniformed guards standing sentry at the front entrance.
The stone-faced chauffeur opened the door for her and held out a gray-gloved hand. "Signorina."
Sarah was the sort of person who never rode even a few blocks in a taxi without learning the name of the cabbie, along with the names of his wife and children, their hopes and dreams, their peccadilloes and political affiliations. People were naturally drawn to her, as she was to them. And it was her business, too—knowing people, children mostly. Listening to them. Drawing them out. But in the royal stretch limo there hadn't been a chance to chat or listen because the driver had sat about a quarter mile ahead of her, separated by several layers of dark velvet curtains and multiple panes of glass.
It was all so official. So—so damn royal. Regal beyond belief. She wasn't the sort of person who was easily rattled, but now there was a definite tremor in her hand as she placed it in the waiting gray glove.
"Gracias," she said, using Spanish rather than Italian in her agitated state, cursing herself for this uncharacteristic case of nerves. It wasn't like her at all.
Much to her relief, the chauffeur cracked the tiniest of smiles before he murmured "De nada, senorita," in sympathetic Spanish.
"Welcome, Miss Hunter."
The greeting came from a woman who was descending the broad marble steps in front of the palace. She was slim and elegant, the picture of sleek organization in an exquisitely tailored navy suit Her dark hair was pulled back in a severe bun and a pair of tortoiseshell glasses were perched on her nose. She was probably Sarah's age—just shy of the big Three-O—but gave the impression of being much older, not to mention far more sophisticated, or at least better put together. "Welcome to Montebello," she said in a voice that was more official than friendly.
"Thank you," Sarah replied.
"I am Sophia Strezzi, the royal appointment secretary," the woman said briskly, her accent in that vague Continental range, somewhere between British and Italian and French, but elegant nonetheless. She grasped Sarah's hand in a firm, dry, perfunctory shake. "The king's personal secretary, Albert, asked me to greet you. I trust you had a pleasant flight."
"Yes, I did. Very pleasant."
Sarah was about to pass along a few words of praise for gorgeous Giorgio and the rest of the crew who'd taken such good care of her, but Sophia Strezzi was clearly finished discussing the flight. She dropped Sarah's hand like a hot potato and began snapping directions at the chauffeur.
Temporarily forgotten, Sarah took that moment to gaze around the palace grounds, the centerpiece of which appeared to be an enormous and magnificent marble fountain. There were bright rainbows in the cascading water, and the surrounding landscape was lush, a brilliant sunlit green. Beneath the tall and stately royal palm trees, the grounds nearly exploded in colorful hibiscus and oleander and other flowering shrubs. There were geraniums spilling from huge pots in colors that Sarah had never seen before. Crimson and cardinal and sizzling pink.
All around her, the air was warm and exotically perfumed. No wonder her parents had bought property in Montebello for their eventual retirement. No wonder her brother, Elliot, and her best friend, Katherine Remson, had fallen in love here last year. It was paradise. Absolute paradise.
"Your luggage will be taken to Sir Dominic's residence," Sophia said, and before Sarah could even blink or ask why, the woman continued, "And now, if you'll follow me, Miss Hunter." She swiveled on her polished black pumps and headed toward the grand entrance of the palace with Sarah tagging along behind.
At the main door, a uniformed guard held up a hand and murmured, "Scusa, signorina" as he slowly passed some sort of metal detector up and down the length of her.
While she was being screened, Sarah couldn't help but notice that Sophia Strezzi was also giving her a fairly thorough once-over with her dark brown eyes. Judging from the woman's taut mouth and pinched expression, Sarah assumed she hadn't passed the inspection with flying colors. Well, if her father hadn't rushed her so this morning, she might have worn something a little spiffier than black linen slacks and a plain, rather mannish white cotton blouse. She probably looked as wrinkled as a shar-pei puppy and not half as adorable. Certainly not fit to meet a king.
"I wonder if I could change clothes and freshen up a little before—"
Sophia cut her off with a brusque wave of her hand. "That won't be possible. It's half past eleven already. The king is expecting you."
"Oh." Looking at her watch, Sarah stifled a groan, not to mention a yawn. Actually it was half past midnight in San Francisco as well as on Sarah's body clock, but the royal appointment secretary didn't seem to recognize any time zones or itineraries other than her own.
At least she didn't set off any security bells, Sarah thought, as she followed the woman into the huge marble floored reception hall of the palace.
"This is magnificent," she murmured, gazing around her at all the gleaming marble, the gold-and-crystal chandeliers, the huge royal portraits in gilded frames, dozens of flags in stanchions and more uniformed guards standing sober post.
"Yes," Sophia tossed over her shoulder. "Perhaps there will be time for a tour after your appointment with the king."
If she wasn't too tired to put one foot in front of the other, Sarah thought, continuing in Sophia's wake around the grand staircase and down a long wide corridor lined with huge potted palms and more royal portraits in gilded frames.
"This is the solarium," Sophia said at last, opening a door and gesturing Sarah ahead of her. "I'll inform His Highness of your arrival. He'll be with you in a moment. Please make yourself comfortable Miss Hunter."
Comfortable. Oh, sure. That was obvio
usly a palace joke.
To truly make herself comfortable, Sarah would've had to put on a pair of old gray sweats and her pink bunny slippers! But her nerves settled down a bit when she realized Sophia hadn't ushered her into a gilded formal throne room, but rather a lovely glassed-in sitting room with gold-and-cream-colored upholstered furniture that actually looked inviting and appeared to be used on a regular basis. There were magazines on a glass coffee table and there was even a big screen TV peeking out from a discrete entertainment center. If Sarah lived here, this would definitely be the room where she'd hang out.
"The view is spectacular, no?" Sophia pointed toward the wall of windows where in the distance the brilliant blue sky met the azure, sun-kissed sea.
"Quite spectacular," Sarah agreed. Much as she loved San Francisco and its breathtaking views, she had to admit her hometown paled in comparison to San Sebastian. "Have you always lived in Montebello?" she asked. "Yes. Always."
The woman's reply was cool and rather curt, leading Sarah to believe that Sophia Strezzi didn't like her very much. She wondered what she could possibly have done in a mere five minutes to alienate the woman so. Usually people warmed to her instantly. Her parents hadn't nicknamed her Sunshine for nothing. Even Warren, who didn't have much of a sense of humor, occasionally called her Miss Congeniality. But it seemed it would take more than Sarah's natural warmth and sunshine to melt a human ice carving like Sophia.
"May I offer you something while you wait?" the appointment secretary asked on her way to the door. "Tea? Or perhaps you prefer coffee?" At the moment, a couple fingers of Jack Daniel's on the rocks didn't sound all that bad. She wondered bleakly if the palace bar was open this early in the day even as she replied, "Nothing, thank you," and wandered toward the wide windows. "I'll just savor the view."
"Very well. After your appointment, I'll show you to Sir Dominic's residence." If the woman hadn't seemed in such a rush to escape, Sarah might have asked her about Sir Dominic Chiara. Especially the "sir" business. What was this all about? Was he royalty, too? A duke or a baron or some sort of grand poobah?
Her father hadn't had time to explain much—only that Sir Dominic was the palace physician and that his five-year-old son, Leo, had stopped speaking several weeks ago. According to Gordon Hunter, the king was far more concerned about the boy's condition than his own father was. But that didn't strike her as so strange or unusual. Physicians were renowned for ignoring illness and disabilities in their own families. It had something to do with their God complex, Sarah had decided.
Still, to ignore sudden muteness in such a little boy was rather extreme, even for a godlike physician. Somehow she pictured Sir Dominic as an older man, her father's age perhaps. Maybe he was simply too old to mount a great deal of concern for a child he'd had so late in life. She wondered how much Sophia knew about the relationship between Dr. Chiara and his son.
"Ms. Strezzi, if I could just ask you..."
Too late. The solarium door was just closing on the secretary's stiff shoulder blades. With a sigh, Sarah turned back to the window, reminding herself that her own ruffled and anxious feelings were unimportant right now. The only feelings that were important at the moment were those of the little boy who'd gone suddenly and quite inexplicably silent.
In her practice as a psychologist at her sister-in-law's clinic in San Francisco, she'd worked with two cases of selective mutism, but neither child had exhibited symptoms suddenly after years of normal speech. Both children had had language problems, not to mention various behavior problems, from infancy.
Dr. Chiara's son, on the other hand, had apparently talked a proverbial blue streak until several weeks ago, when he stopped speaking completely. That sudden onset suggested trauma to Sarah. There was still so much she didn't know.
Her gaze drifted across the lovely blue sea where a cruise ship slowly nosed into a pier. For a moment she wished she were here in Montebello under different circumstances. She wished she were a happy vacationer rather than a working psychologist. Someone footloose and fancy-free. A honeymooner, perhaps.
The thought made Sarah roll her eyes in exasperation. She wasn't going to have a honeymoon, was she? Warren—utterly practical Warren—had already determined that a hefty down payment on a house was far smarter than pouring money into a frivolous trip. He'd used that word. Frivolous. Well, maybe so, but...
For someone who loved to travel, she really hadn't done all that much of it. Not lately, anyway. When she was young there had been wonderful family excursions with her mother and father and big brother, Elliot, to the national parks and treasures of the U.S.A. Yosemite. Yellowstone. Crater Lake. The Grand Canyon. The Great Smoky Mountains. The Ozarks. The Everglades.
When she was in high school, her father often would pull her out of Friday classes to attend weekend medical conferences with him in cities across the country. She'd been whisked away to all the major attractions and through all the major museums in the country. One summer in college she'd backpacked through Europe for three lovely months, but that seemed like a million years ago now.
And then, of course, after college, there had been her two-year stint in El Salvador with the Peace Corps, but she'd been anything but a carefree tourist there. Time off was rare while she was helping to set up a mental health clinic in Zacatecoluca. When she wasn't conducting workshops or teaching women to read or laying bricks, she was catching up on sleep.
Just once she'd like to go somewhere as a carefree spirit, with no one to tend to, with no obligations or agendas, with nothing more to do than laze on a sun-struck beach and float in turquoise seas.
Just once...
"Ah, Sarah. Daughter of my dear friend. Welcome. Welcome to Montebello."
Hearing the deep, melodious voice at her back, Sarah turned with a startled little gasp to see King Marcus Sebastiani, the ruler of Montebello. She hadn't anticipated that his entrance would be accompanied by a trumpet fanfare exactly, but she hadn't expected His Highness to sneak up on her, either. In her surprise, Sarah managed a clumsy curtsey. Actually two of them. Two and a half. Jeez. She probably looked more like a bobble-headed doll than a respectful visitor.
The king extended his hand. He was a tall, ruggedly handsome man in a dark business suit. His hair was thick and perfectly white. His kind eyes were twinkling, as if he were accustomed to people making complete fools out of themselves in his presence, and his smile was as warm as the Montebello sunshine that flooded the room.
"No need for formalities, my dear," he said. "Tell me, how is your father? He sounded well when I spoke to him yesterday. And your lovely mother?"
"They're both fine, sir. They send their very best. My brother, Elliot, as well."
"I'm indebted to your brother and Dr. Remson for their service at our hospital last year. The newlyweds are doing well, I presume?"
Sarah smiled, thinking how Dr. Katherine Remson Hunter no longer arrived at the clinic at the crack of dawn as she had before she and El were married. These days she was more likely to arrive half an hour late, with a very satisfied, thoroughly sated expression on her face. "Quite well. They're deliriously happy."
"Good. Good." King Marcus gestured toward a chair. "Please have a seat, Sarah, my dear."
The man put her at ease immediately, bless his royal heart, and soon Sarah almost forgot she was in the presence of a monarch as they chatted about her family and the stunning view through the windows. The king had a wonderful, deep-throated laugh that reminded her more than a little of her father's. After a while, though, his face changed from sunny to somber, as he leaned forward in his chair, sighed deeply and said, "The queen and I are extremely grateful for your help, Sarah. We're both quite fond of Sir Dominic and his little son, Leo. Quite worried, too.
Sarah nodded solemnly. It was time to go to work. "The child isn't speaking at all?" she asked.
King Marcus shook his head. "No. Not to my knowledge. Not a word in the past few weeks."
"Does his father have any idea of an event th
at might have set this off?"
"His father refuses to speak about young Leo's condition." The king scowled. "The man has his own case of muteness, it would seem. The stubborn donkey."
Sarah was thinking the same thing herself about Sir Dominic, only the word in her mind was a bit more crude than "donkey." The more the king disclosed to her about the man, the less she liked the palace physician.
His wife—young and very beautiful, according to the king—had been diagnosed with a virulent form of leukemia when she was newly pregnant. But because she'd wanted to give her husband a child so badly, the woman had kept her condition a secret and had refused the treatments that might have saved her life. Once the baby was born, once the young mother's illness was disclosed, it had been too late for chemotherapy to have much effect on her condition, and she had died when Leo was just a few months old.
Dr. Chiara had apparently been inconsolable. But in the traditional way of physicians and workaholics, he'd poured himself and his sorrows into his work, leaving the motherless child to the care of assorted housekeepers and nannies.
"All in all, though, the child seemed happy enough," said the king. "He was a little chatterbox, always talking. And then..." He shrugged. "We're all at a loss, I must say."
"I'll do my very best to help," Sarah told him. I'd like to see Leo as soon as possible. I'd also like to interview his father and anyone who's been closely associated with him. An impartial observer can often find clues where none seem apparent to those directly related or involved."