“Well, it won’t be a surprise if I tell you,” he teased. “Look and see.”
She was already opening the drawer. Inside was a credit card with her name on it. She picked it up and sighed. “Gabriel, I appreciate the gesture, but—”
“I know, I know. You’re too proud to take anything from me. But I want to do this for you.”
“I just don’t feel comfortable spending your money. You’re doing enough already.”
“Suppose you see something in the village that you like? I know you have limited funds. I want you to have nice things.”
“I have you, that’s all I need.”
“And that, my dear, is why you are such an amazing woman. And why I love you. Promise me you’ll keep it with you, just in case. I don’t care if it’s five euros or five thousand. If you see something you really want, please buy it.”
“I’ll keep it handy,” she said, dropping it back in the drawer, knowing she would never spend a penny.
“I’ve missed you, Vanessa. I’m eager to start our life together.”
“If I stay,” she reminded him, so he knew that nothing was set in stone yet.
“You will,” he said, as confident and certain as the day he’d asked her to marry him. Then there was the sound of voices in the background. “Vanessa, I have to go. The doctor is here and I need to speak with him.”
“Of course.”
“We’ll chat tomorrow, yes?”
“Yes.”
“I love you, my sweet Vanessa.”
“I love you, too,” she said, then the call disconnected.
She sighed and set her phone on the desk, hoping there would come a day when she could say those words, and mean them the way that Gabriel did. That there would be a time when the sort of love she felt for him extended past friendship.
It wasn’t that she didn’t find him attractive. There was no doubt that he was an exceptionally good-looking man. Maybe his jaw wasn’t as tight as it used to be, and there was gray at his temples, and he wasn’t as fit as he’d been in his younger years, but those things didn’t bother her. It was what was on the inside that counted. And her affection for him felt warm and comfortable. What was missing was that…zing.
Like the one you felt when you took Marcus’s hand?
She shook away the thought. Yes, Marcus was an attractive man, too, plus he didn’t have the sagging skin, graying hair and expanding waist. He also didn’t have his father’s sweet disposition and generous heart.
When Gabriel held her, when he’d brushed his lips across her cheek, she felt respected and cherished and safe. And okay, maybe those things didn’t make for steamy hot sex, but she knew from personal experience that sex could be highly overrated. What really mattered was respect, and friendship. That’s what was left when the zing disappeared. And it always did.
Men like Marcus thrilled, then they bailed. Usually leaving a substantial mess in their wake. She could just imagine the string of broken hearts he’d caused. But Gabriel was dependable and trustworthy, and that’s exactly what she was looking for in a man now. She’d had her thrills, now she wanted a mature, lasting relationship. Gabriel could give her that. That and so much more, if she was smart enough, and strong enough, to let him.
Four
Marcus was halfway through his second set of laps that evening, the burn in his muscles shaking off the stress that hung on his shoulders like an iron cloak, when he heard his cell phone start to ring. He swam to the side of the pool, hoisted himself up onto the deck and walked to the table where he’d left his phone, the hot tile scorching his feet. It was his father.
He almost didn’t answer. He was sure his father would have spoken to Miss Reynolds by now, and she had probably regaled him with the story of Marcus’s less than warm welcome. The first thing on her agenda would be to drive a wedge between him and his father, which the king would see through, of course. Maybe not right away, but eventually, and Marcus was happy to let her hang herself with her own rope. Even if that meant receiving an admonishment from his father now. So he took the call.
“Father, how is Aunt Trina?”
“Very sick, son,” he said.
His heart sank. He just wasn’t ready to say goodbye to yet another loved one. “What’s the prognosis?”
“It will be touch and go for a while, but the doctors are hoping she’ll make a full recovery.”
He breathed a sigh of relief. No one should ever have to endure so much loss in the span of only eight months. “If there’s anything you need, just say so.”
“There is something, but first, son, I wanted to thank you, and tell you how proud I am of you. And ashamed of myself.”
Proud of him? Maybe he hadn’t spoken to Miss Reynolds after all. Or was it possible that he’d already seen though her scheme and had come to his senses? “What do you mean?”
“I know that accepting I’ve moved on, that I’ve fallen in love with someone new—especially someone so young—has been difficult for you. I was afraid that you might treat Vanessa…well, less than hospitably. But knowing that you’ve made her feel welcome…son, I’m sorry that I didn’t trust you. I should have realized that you’re a man of integrity.”
What the hell had she told him exactly?
Marcus wasn’t sure what to say, and his father’s words, his misplaced faith, filled him with guilt. How would he feel if he knew the truth? And why had she lied to him? What sort of game was she playing? Or was it possible that she really did care about his father?
Of course she didn’t. She was working some sort of angle, that was how her kind always operated.
“Isn’t her daughter precious?” his father said, sounding absolutely smitten. Marcus couldn’t recall him ever using the word precious in any context.
“She is,” he agreed, though he’d seen her do nothing but scream and sleep. “Is there anything pressing I should know about, business that needs tending?”
“There’s no need to worry about that. I’ve decided to fly my staff here and set up a temporary office.”
“That’s really not necessary. I can handle matters while you’re away.”
“You know I would go out of my mind if I had nothing to do. This way I can work and still be with Trina.”
That seemed like an awful lot of trouble for a short visit, unless it wasn’t going to be short. “How long do you expect you’ll be gone?”
“Well, I told Vanessa two weeks,” he said. “But the truth is, it could be longer.”
He had a sudden, sinking feeling. “How much longer?”
“Hopefully no more than three or four weeks.”
A month. There was no question that Trina—family—should come first, but that seemed excessive. Especially since he had a guest. “A month is a long time to be away.”
“And how long did Trina give up her life to stay with us when your mother was ill?”
She had stayed with them for several months in the final stages of his mother’s illness, then another few weeks after the funeral. So he certainly couldn’t fault his father for wanting to stay with her. “I’m sorry, I’m being selfish. Of course you should be there with her. As long as she needs you. Maybe I should join you.”
“I need you at the palace. Since Tabitha will be with me, it will be up to you to see that Vanessa and Mia have anything they need.”
“Of course.” He could hardly wait.
“And I know this is a lot to ask, but I want you to keep them entertained.”
Marcus hoped he didn’t mean that the way it sounded. “Entertained?”
“Make them feel welcome. Take them sightseeing, show them a good time.”
The idea had been to stay away from her as much as humanly possible, not be her tour guide. “Father—”
“I realize I’m asking a lot of you under the circumstances, and I know it will probably be a bit awkward at first, but it will give you and Vanessa a chance to get to know one another. She’s truly a remarkable woman, son. I’m sure that o
nce you get to know her you’ll love her as much as I do.”
Nothing his father could say would make Marcus want to spend time with that woman. And no amount of time that he spent with her would make him “love” her. “Father, I don’t think—”
“Imagine how she and her daughter must feel, in a foreign country where they don’t know a soul. And I feel terrible for putting her in that position. It took me weeks to convince her to come here. If she leaves, she may never agree to come back.”
And that would be a bad thing?
Besides, Marcus didn’t doubt for an instant that she had just been playing hard to get, stringing his father along, and now that she was here, he seriously doubted she had any intention of leaving, for any reason. But maybe in this case absence wouldn’t make the heart grow fonder. Maybe it would give his father time to think about his relationship with Miss Reynolds and realize the mistake he was making.
Or maybe, instead of waiting for this to play out, Marcus could take a more proactive approach. Maybe he could persuade her to leave.
The thought brought a smile to his face.
“I’ll do it,” he told his father.
“I have your word?”
“Yes,” he said, feeling better about the situation already. “You have my word.”
“Thank you, son. You have no idea how much this means to me. And I don’t want you to worry about anything else. Consider yourself on vacation until I return.”
“Is there anyplace in particular you would like me to take her?”
“I’ll email a list of the things she might enjoy doing.”
“I’ll watch for it,” he said, feeling cheerful for the first time in weeks, since his father had come home acting like a lovesick teenager.
“She did mention a desire to tour the village,” the king said.
That was as good a place to start as any. “Well then, we’ll go first thing tomorrow.”
“I can’t tell you what a relief this is. And if ever you should require anything from me, you need only ask.”
Send her back to the U.S., he wanted to say, but he would be taking care of that. After he was through with her, she would be sprinting for the plane. But the key with a woman like her was patience and subtlety.
He and his father hung up, and Marcus dropped his phone back on the table. He looked over at the pool, then up to the balcony of Miss Reynolds’s room. He should give her the good news right away, so she would have time to prepare for tomorrow’s outing. He toweled off then slipped his shirt, shorts and sandals on, combing his fingers through his wet hair as he headed upstairs. He half expected to hear her daughter howling as he approached her room, but the hallway was silent.
He knocked, and she must have been near the door because it opened almost immediately. She had changed into snug black cotton pants, a plain pink T-shirt, and her hair was pulled up in a ponytail. She looked even younger this way, and much more relaxed than she had when she stepped off the plane. It struck him again how attractive she really was. Without makeup she looked a little less exotic and vampy, but her features, the shape of her face, were exquisite.
He looked past her into the suite and saw that she had spread a blanket across the carpet in the middle of the room. Mia was in the center, balanced on her hands and knees, rocking back and forth, shaking her head from side to side, a bit like a deranged pendulum. Then she stopped, toppled over to the left, and rolled onto her back, looking dazed.
Was she having some sort of fit or seizure?
“Is she okay?” Marcus asked, wondering if he should call the physician.
Miss Reynolds smiled at her daughter. “She’s fine.”
“What was she doing?” Marcus asked.
“Crawling.”
Crawling? “She doesn’t seem to be getting very far.”
“Not yet. The first step is learning to balance on her hands and knees.”
She apparently had a long way to go to master that.
Mia squealed and rolled over onto her tummy, then pushed herself back up and resumed rocking. She seemed to be doing all right, until her arms gave out and she pitched forward. Marcus cringed as she fell face-first into the blanket, landing on her button nose. She lifted her head, looking stunned for a second, then she screwed up her face and started to cry.
When Miss Reynolds just stood there, Marcus asked, “Is she okay?”
“She’s probably more frustrated than injured.”
After several more seconds of Mia wailing, when she did nothing to comfort the child, he said, “Aren’t you going to pick her up?”
She shrugged. “If I picked her up every time she got discouraged, she’d never learn to try. She’ll be fine in a second.”
No sooner had she spoken the words than Mia’s cries abruptly stopped, then she hoisted herself back up on her hands and knees, starting the process all over again. Rocking, falling over, wailing…
“Does she do this often?” he asked after watching her for several minutes.
She sighed, as if frustrated, but resigned. “Almost constantly for the past three days.”
“Is that…normal?”
“For her it is. She’s a very determined child. She’ll keep doing something over and over until she gets it right. She gets that from my father, I think.”
He could tell, from the deep affection in her eyes, the pride in her smile as she watched her daughter, that Miss Reynolds loved the little girl deeply. Which made her attempts to con his father all the more despicable.
“I’m sorry,” she said, finally turning to him. “Was there something you wan…” She trailed off, blinking in surprise as she took in the sight of him, as if she just now noticed how he was dressed. Starting at his sandals, her eyes traveled up his bare legs and over his shorts, then they settled on the narrow strip of chest where the two sides of his shirt had pulled open. For several seconds she seemed transfixed, then she gave her head a little shake, and her eyes snapped up to his.
She blinked again, looking disoriented, and asked, “I’m sorry, what did you say?”
He began to wonder if maybe he’d been mistaken earlier, and she really was a brainless blonde. “I didn’t say anything. But I believe you were about to ask me if there was something that I wanted.”
Her cheeks blushed bright pink. “You’re right, I was. Sorry. Was there? Something you wanted, I mean.”
“If you have a moment, I’d like to have a word with you.”
“Of course,” she said, stepping back from the door and pulling it open, stumbling over her own foot. “Sorry. Would you like to come in?”
He stepped into the room, wondering if perhaps she’d been sampling the contents of the bar. “Are you all right?”
“I took a nap. I guess I’m not completely awake yet. Plus, I’m still on California time. It’s barely seven a.m. in Los Angeles. Technically I was up most of the night.”
That could explain it, he supposed, yet he couldn’t help questioning her mental stability.
She closed the door and turned to him. “What did you want to talk about?”
“I want to know why you lied to my father.”
She blinked in surprise, opened her mouth to speak, then shut it again. Then, as if gathering her patience, she took a deep breath, slowly blew it out, and asked, “Refresh my memory, what did I lie about?”
Did she honestly not know what he meant, or were there so many lies, she couldn’t keep track? “You told my father that I made you feel welcome. We both know that isn’t true.”
She got an “oh that” look on her face. “What was I supposed to tell him? His son, who he loves and respects dearly, acted like a big jer—” She slapped a hand over her mouth, but it was pretty obvious what she’d been about to say.
Marcus had to clench his jaw to keep it from falling open. “Did you just call me a jerk?”
She shook her head, eyes wide. “No.”
“Yes, you did. You called me a big jerk.”
She hesitated, look
ing uneasy. “Maybe I did.”
“Maybe?”
“Okay, I did. I told you, I’m half asleep. It just sort of…slipped out. And let’s be honest, Marcus, you were acting like a jerk.”
He was sure people said unfavorable things about him all the time, but no one, outside of his family, had ever dared insult him to his face. Twice. He should feel angry, or annoyed, yet all he felt was an odd amusement. “Are you trying to make me dislike you?”
“You already don’t like me. At this point I doubt anything I say, or don’t say, will change that. Which I think is kind of sad but…” She shrugged. “And for the record, I didn’t lie to Gabriel. I just…fudged the truth a little.”
“Why?”
“He has enough on his mind. He doesn’t need to be worrying about me. Besides, I can fight my own battles.”
If he didn’t know better, he might believe that she really did care about his father. But he knew her type. He’d dated a dozen women just like her. She was only after one thing—his legacy—and like the others, he would make sure that she never got her hands on it.
“I would hardly call this a battle,” he told her.
She folded her arms, emphasizing the fullness of her breasts. “You would if you were me.”
Marcus had to make an effort to keep his eyes on her face. But even that was no hardship. She was exceptionally attractive and undeniably sexy. A beautiful woman with a black heart.
Her eyes wandered downward, to his chest, lingering there for several seconds, then as if realizing she was staring, she quickly looked away.
She didn’t strike him as the type to be shy about the male physique. Or maybe it was just his that bothered her.
“Look,” she said. “You don’t like me, and that’s fine. I can even understand why. It’s disappointing that you aren’t going to give me a chance, but, whatever. And if I’m being totally honest, I’m not so crazy about you either. So why don’t we just agree to stay out of each other’s way?”
“Miss Reynolds—”
“It’s Vanessa. You could at least have the decency to use my first name.”
“Vanessa,” he said. “How would you feel if we called a truce?”
Princess in the Making Page 4