The Wedding Bargain

by Yvonne Lindsay

  “What mischief is she up to?” Gabriel demanded.

  Christian cursed beneath his breath. “Something newsworthy, no doubt.”

  “I can’t afford anything to interfere with the wedding.” Sherdana’s future was riding on the deal he’d struck with Lord Darcy. A deal that wouldn’t be sealed until Olivia became a princess.

  Gabriel glanced around to see if anyone had noticed their exchange and met Olivia’s level gaze. She was beautiful, his future wife. But he’d chosen her for more than her appearance. She had a purity of spirit he knew would charm the Sherdanian people and her efficient, calm way of handling problems would see her through the hectic days ahead.

  Beside her his father was laughing at whatever story she was telling him, looking years younger. Recent economic difficulties had taken their toll on the king. Once vibrant and strong, he’d begun to tire faster in recent months. It was why Gabriel had taken on more and more of the day-to-day running of the country.

  Although she returned her attention to the king, the slightest lift of her delicate eyebrows let Gabriel know her curiosity had been aroused by his exchange with Christian and Stewart. Awareness surged through him. It was the first time that they’d connected at a level deeper than politeness. Anticipation sparked. Perhaps they would be able to share something more than a bed.

  “Please, Your Highness.”

  Glancing toward Christian, he said, “Will you go entertain my fiancée while I discover what’s going on?”

  “Don’t you mean distract?” Christian countered, his expression sour.

  “Just make excuses for me until I can get back.”

  And then he was slipping through the multitude attending the ball honoring Sherdana’s independence from France back in 1664, smiling and greeting the guests as if nothing in the world was wrong. All the while two words pounded in his head: Marissa Somme. What could this be about?

  Since it first declared itself a principality, Sherdana had survived as an agrarian economy. But Gabriel wanted his country to do more than survive, he wanted it to thrive. Tucked between France and Italy on a verdant plane resplendent with grapevines and fertile fields, Sherdana needed an active technological culture to move the economy into the twenty-first century and beyond. Olivia’s father, Lord Edwin Darcy, held the match that would light the fuse. Nothing must interfere with that.

  Entering the green salon, Gabriel strode over to greet the man who’d barged in unannounced. The lawyer wore his gray hair short, making no attempt to hide the bald patch that caught the light from the wall sconces behind him. His clear gray eyes had few lines at the corners. This was not a man who smiled often. Dressed in a navy suit and black overcoat, the only spark of color about him was a thin line of yellow in his striped tie.

  “Good evening, Your Royal Highness,” the gentleman said, bowing respectfully. “Forgive me for interrupting, but I’m afraid the matter is quite urgent.”

  “What mischief is Marissa up to now?”

  “Mischief?” The man looked dismayed at Gabriel’s harshness. “You misunderstand the reason I’m here.”

  “Then enlighten me. I have guests waiting. If you have a message from Marissa, then deliver it.”

  The man straightened his shoulders and tugged at his coat lapel. “It’s a little more complicated than a message.”

  “My patience is wearing thin.”

  “Marissa Somme is dead.”

  Dead? Gabriel felt as if he’d been clobbered with a poker. For a second he couldn’t process the man’s words. Brilliant, beautiful, vivacious Marissa dead? His gut twisted.

  “How?”

  The older gentleman nodded in sympathy. “Cancer.”

  Even though he hadn’t spoken with her in a very long time, the news rocked him. Marissa had been the first woman he’d ever loved. The only one. Their breakup three years before had been one of the most painful experiences of his life. But nothing compared to knowing she was gone for good. Wounds he’d thought healed were reopened, the pain as fresh as it had ever been. Never would he see her again. Hear her laugh.

  Why hadn’t she called him? He would have helped her out.

  “You came all this way to deliver the news of her death to me?” Had she still cared about him? Despite her final angry words? Impossible. She’d never once tried to contact him.

  “And to bring you something she said you should have.”

  “What?” Gabriel demanded. Had she returned the diamond heart pendant he’d given her for their first anniversary? He’d been a romantic fool in those days. Young. Rebellious. Caught up in a passionate affair that had no future. And a fool. “What did you bring me?”

  “Your daughters.”

  “Daughters?” As in more than one? Gabriel wondered if he’d heard the man properly.

  “Twins.”

  “Marissa and I had no children together.”

  “I’m afraid that’s not true.”

  The man pulled out two birth certificates and extended them. Gabriel gestured to Stewart to take them and watched as his private secretary scanned the documents. Stewart’s blue eyes were awash with concern as he glanced up and met Gabriel’s gaze.

  “They bear Marissa’s last name, but she listed you as the father,” Stewart said.

  “They can’t be mine,” Gabriel insisted. “We were careful.” Perhaps not careful enough. “How old are they?”

  “They will turn two in a month.”

  Gabriel quickly did the math. They’d been conceived in the week he’d been in Venice shortly after their breakup. Marissa had come and thrown herself at him in one last attempt to make him abandon his duty. They’d made love all night, their kisses frantic, embraces feverish. When she’d awakened to find him departing the room before dawn, she’d lashed out, claiming that he’d led her on, accusing him of indifference. Despite her antagonism, regret had stuck with him for months afterward.

  They’d had no future. His duty was to his country. She couldn’t accept that and he’d let the relationship go on too long. She’d begun to hope he would give up everything for her and he’d enjoyed shirking his responsibilities. But it couldn’t last. Sherdana always came first.

  What would he have done if he’d known she was pregnant? Set her up in a villa nearby where he could visit? She would never have put up with that. She’d have demanded his complete and total devotion. It was what had torn them apart. He belonged to the people of Sherdana.

  “This could all be a huge hoax,” Stewart said.

  “Marissa might have loved drama, but pulling a stunt like this goes beyond anything she’d do.”

  “We’ll know for sure after a DNA test,” Stewart said.

  “And in the meantime? What am I to do with the girls?” the lawyer asked impertinently.

  “Where are they?” Gabriel demanded. He crackled with impatience to see them.

  “Back at my hotel with their nanny.”

  He didn’t hesitate to ponder the consequences. “Get them.”

  “Think of your upcoming wedding, Highness,” Stewart cautioned. “You can’t have them brought here. The palace is crawling with media.”

  Gabriel aimed a disgusted look at his secretary. “Are you telling me you’re not clever enough to transport two toddlers here without being seen?”

  Stewart’s spine snapped straight as Gabriel knew it would. “I will see that they are brought to the palace immediately.”

  “Good.”

  “In the meantime,” Stewart said, “I suggest you return to the gala before you’re missed. I’m sure the king and queen will wish to discuss the best way to handle things.”

  Gabriel hated every bit of Stewart’s sensible advice and the need to play host when his attention was shackled to reckless urges. He didn’t want to wait to see the girls. His instinct demanded
he go to the lawyer’s hotel immediately. As if by taking one look at the toddlers he could tell if they were his. Ridiculous.

  “Find me as soon as they’re settled,” he told Stewart.

  And with those parting words, he exited the room.

  Knowing he should return immediately to the party but with his mind racing, Gabriel strode into the library. He needed a few minutes to catch his breath and calm his thoughts.

  Twins. His heart jerked. Did they have their mother’s clear green eyes and luxurious brown hair? Had she told them about him? Was he insane to bring them into the palace?

  A scandal could jeopardize his plans for stabilizing Sherdana’s economy. Would the earl still allow Olivia to marry him if word got out that Gabriel had illegitimate twin daughters? And what if Olivia wasn’t willing to accept that her children wouldn’t be his only ones?

  Gabriel left the library, burdened by a whole new set of worries, determined to make sure his future bride found him irresistible.

  * * *

  From her place of honor beside the king of Sherdana, Olivia watched her future husband slip through the guests assembled in the golden ballroom and wondered what was so important that he had to leave the Independence Day gala in such a hurry.

  It continued to bother her that in less than four weeks, she was going to become a princess, Gabriel’s princess, and she had very little insight into the man she was marrying. Theirs was not a love match the likes of which Kate had found with William. Olivia and Gabriel were marrying to raise her father’s social position and improve Sherdana’s economic situation.

  While that was great for everyone else, Olivia’s London friends wondered what was motivating her. She’d never told anyone about the dream conceived by her three-year-old self that one day she’d become a princess. It had been a child’s fancy and as she’d grown up, reality replaced the fairy tale. As a teenager she’d stopped imagining herself living in a palace and dancing through the night with a handsome prince. Her plans for the future involved practical things like children’s charities and someday a husband and children of her own. But some dreams had deep roots that lay dormant until the time was ripe.

  Before Olivia considered her actions, she turned to the king. “Excuse me.”

  “Of course,” the handsome monarch replied, his smile cordial.

  Released, she left the king and headed in the direction her fiancé had gone. Perhaps she could catch Gabriel before he returned to the ballroom and they could spend some time talking, just the two of them. She hadn’t gone more than a dozen steps before Christian Alessandro appeared in her path.

  His gold eyes, shadowed and wary around most people, warmed as he smiled down at her. “Are you enjoying the party?”

  “Of course,” she replied, bottling up a sigh as the youngest Alessandro prince foiled her plan to speak to his brother alone.

  She’d encountered Christian several times in London over the years. As the wildest Alessandro brother, in his university days, Christian had spent more time partying than studying and had barely graduated from Oxford. He’d earned a reputation as a playboy, but had always treated her with respect. Maybe because Olivia had recognized the clever mind he hid beneath his cavalier charm.

  “I noticed Prince Gabriel left the party in a hurry,” she murmured, unable to conquer the curiosity that loosened her tongue. “I hope nothing is wrong.”

  Christian had an impressive poker face. “Just some old business he had to take care of. Nothing important.”

  “He looked a bit shaken up.” She stared at her future brother-in-law and saw the tiniest twitch at the corner of his eye. He was keeping something important about Gabriel from her. Olivia’s pulse skipped. Seemed she wasn’t the only one with secrets.

  Since Gabriel had opened negotiations with her father a year ago, Olivia hadn’t had much opportunity to get to know the man she would marry. The situation hadn’t improved since she’d arrived in Sherdana a week ago. With the wedding only a month away and parliament in session, they’d barely spent an hour alone together and most of that had been divided up into one-to five-minute snippets.

  A stroll in the garden the day after she’d arrived, cut short when they’d met the queen’s very muddy vizsla. Gabriel had commended Olivia’s nimbleness in dodging the dog and retreated to the palace to change his trousers.

  A moment in the carriage before the parade yesterday. He’d complimented her hat.

  A whole five minutes during the waltz this evening. He’d told her she looked lovely.

  Their exchanges were polite and cordial. At all times he’d been the perfect prince. Courteous. Gallant. Cultured. And she’d been seized by the absurd desire to muss his hair and shock him with outrageous remarks. Of course, she would never do that. The daughter of an earl, she was acutely conscious of her image and position.

  Christian refocused her attention on the crowd around them and began filling her ear with all sorts of salacious gossip about the local nobility. Normally she’d be amused by his outrageous slander of Sherdana’s wealthy and powerful, but with each new dance the air in the ballroom grew stuffier and she wanted to spend time getting to know her fiancé.

  What did Gabriel expect from her? A political partner? Or an attractive figurehead that he could trot out for state occasions? She hoped it was the former.

  Firstborn, he’d won the right to inherit the throne by a mere forty minutes. But there was no question in anyone’s mind that he was utterly and completely suited to the role.

  His commitment to Sherdana was absolute and apparent to all. He’d been educated here and rarely left, except on official business. While in contrast, his two younger brothers had both chosen to spend as little time in their native country as possible.

  Drawn by a magnetic pull too great to resist, her attention returned to the ballroom doors that Gabriel had passed through. What could have taken him away in the middle of the party? As if her thoughts had summoned him, she spied the prince coming through the crowd toward her.

  Her gaze traced the sculpted breadth of his shoulders, the way his white jacket stretched across his broad chest, providing an abundance of room for the medals pinned there. A blue sash cut diagonally from shoulder to hip.

  “Forgive me for neglecting you,” he said as he came to a stop before her. “I hope my brother has kept you sufficiently entertained.”

  “Christian has been filling me in on your guests.”

  For the first time in her company, Gabriel’s courteous mask slipped. He shot his brother a hard look. “What have you been telling her?”

  “Things most people, including you, wouldn’t. If she’s going to be Sherdana’s princess, she needs to know where the bodies are buried or she’ll be no help to you at all.”

  Gabriel shook his head. “She doesn’t need to know all the ins and outs of our politics to help out the country or me.”

  Olivia’s heart sank. Now she knew what he expected from her. There would be no partnership, no working together. She would attend ceremonies and support charities while he ran the country and dealt with its problems alone.

  “She’s smarter than you’re giving her credit for, Gabriel. You should use her to your best political advantage.”

  “Thank you for your opinion, brother.” And his tone said that was the end of the conversation.

  With a mocking bow, Christian retreated. While part of Olivia regretted his departure, she was glad for a moment alone with Gabriel. Or she was until he began to speak.

  “I know you haven’t seen much of Sherdana since your arrival,” he said, his polite formality pushing her to greater impatience. “But maybe that can change in the next week or so.”

  “That would be lovely.” She bit back her thoughts on how unlikely it was. With the wedding only a month away she would scarcely have the opportunity to sleep, much less
take a tour of the countryside. “I’m eager to visit the wine country.”

  “Sherdana takes pride in its wine as you well know.”

  “As it should,” she murmured, her boredom coming through in her tone. “I’m glad you were able to get your business resolved so you could return to the party so quickly.”

  “Business?” There wasn’t the least suggestion of understanding in his manner.

  “I saw your private secretary approach you with some news. It seemed to be something unpleasant. And then you left. Christian explained it was old business you needed to take care of.”

  “Ah, yes. Just a misunderstanding with Stewart. It was nothing.”

  “I’m glad.” But her mind was busy cataloging all the nuances of his tone and expression. Her future husband was skilled at deflection.

  “Would you care to dance?” he asked, his deep voice rumbling through her like distant thunder.

  Not really. She was tired and her shoes pinched. But she smiled. “Of course.”

  A waltz began to play as Gabriel took her hand and led her onto the dance floor. Keeping her expression pleasant and neutral was torture as his palm slid against her back. The gown she wore had a modest cut, showing no cleavage or bare shoulders, but the material was silk and the heat of Gabriel’s hand burned through the fabric and set her on fire.

  “Are you feeling compelled to marry because your father wishes it?”

  The abruptness of his question was so unexpected, she almost laughed. “Why would I need to be compelled by my father? You’re rich, handsome and going to be king one day. What girl wouldn’t wish to be queen?”

  “You didn’t answer my question.”

  “I’m not being forced to marry you. I have been given an opportunity many would envy.” She assessed his expression, curious where this line of questioning originated. “Are you worried that down the road I’ll regret my choice?” She cocked her head and regarded him intently. “Or are you looking for an excuse to break our engagement?”

  “Nothing like that. I am just wondering if perhaps you’d have preferred a different life.”