‘You destroy everything that is good,’ his adoptive father had told him, and he knew now for certain that Ralph Saunderson had been right.
His phone was blinking, indicating that he had new messages. He pulled on a pair of jeans and walked out onto the balcony to read the email from the DNA testing clinic. Shock ripped through him, even though he had been half expecting to have confirmation that he was Prince Jarrett of Vostov.
There was a certain irony in the fact that he had received the result of the test on the same day that his amnesia had lifted, Jarek brooded. He was finally able to remember his parents, and he felt a deep sadness for what had happened to them and to him. He had spent most of his life unaware of his true identity, but now memories flooded his mind of his mother and father, and finally he was able to grieve for them.
His phone pinged constantly with new messages. Social media had gone mad, and he quickly discovered why when he read the news story that was making headlines around the world.
Vostov’s Prince: Alive but Elusive! screamed one front page.
Where is Prince Jarrett hiding? asked another paper.
One of the tabloids had a photo of him and Holly on the boat, with the caption Playboy Prince caught in Secret Tryst with Mystery Brunette.
Who could have tipped off the press that he was Vostov’s missing Prince? It had to be someone who worked at the DNA clinic, or even a member of Vostov’s National Council, Jarek thought grimly. This was how his life would be from now on. The paparazzi were already fascinated by his playboy image, but their interest in him and those around him would be relentless now they knew that he was a prince.
He studied the images on his phone. At least Holly’s face was obscured in the picture, and she was huddled on the floor of the sailing dingy. But it would only be a matter of time before she was identified, and then the paparazzi would stalk her and dig up every personal detail they could find about her.
He went cold at the thought that journalists might somehow get access to her medical records. Holly would be distraught if it was made public that she had been born with the rare syndrome. Despite his assurances that she was perfect, Jarek knew she struggled with body image issues.
The media machine was merciless, and he would have to move fast to protect her. The only way he’d be able to save her from unwanted press attention would be to make sure that Holly’s identity remained a mystery.
He would not destroy her too, he vowed grimly as his adoptive father’s accusation reverberated in his head. But that meant he must send her away from him and never see her again. He would accept his destiny, as Holly had once told him he must do, but he was aware that his life as a prince would be played out in the full glare of the public and the media spotlight.
A small sound from behind him made him turn his head, and he swallowed when he saw her standing there, wearing his shirt that she had never given back.
‘I woke up and you were gone,’ she said, her voice softly sleepy and so sexy that he was instantly painfully hard. Her dark eyes searched his face. ‘Is everything all right?’
Nothing would ever be right again, but he did not tell her that. He shrugged. ‘I’ve had the result of the DNA test and it proves beyond doubt that I am the only remaining male from the House of Karadjvic.’
‘So you are Prince Jarrett. But in your heart you already knew that,’ she murmured, ‘because you’d remembered that Asmir worked for your father, Prince Goran.’
‘I remember everything,’ he bit out, and silently cursed himself—because he had not meant to say those words. He certainly did not intend to confide in Holly or confess his sins. Even an angel could not give him absolution.
‘That’s good,’ she said gently. ‘The secrets in your past have tormented you for too long.’
‘Believe me, there is nothing good about my memories.’
She said nothing, and Jarek looked away from the deep pools of her eyes before he drowned in them.
‘Tarik wasn’t a person—he was a dog. My parents gave me a puppy when my sister was born.’
The words spilled out of him and he was unable to stop them. His grim little story had festered in his subconscious for so long, and in a strange way it was a relief to unburden himself to the one person he trusted absolutely.
‘I was jealous of Eliana—Elin, as she is called now. Everyone made a fuss of the new baby, and I...’
He gripped the balcony rail as memories flooded his mind. He hadn’t been a nice child, Jarek thought. He remembered feeling angry because his parents had loved the new baby more than him.
‘I threw tantrums to gain attention. But then one day there was a puppy in the nursery—a cute little thing. Tarik was my dog, my father told me. But I would only be allowed to play with the puppy if I behaved like a young prince should.’
He closed his eyes and saw himself at six years old.
‘One night my mother woke me up and told me that we were going on a trip in the car. We had to hurry, she said. But I couldn’t find Tarik, and I had a tantrum because I didn’t want to leave without the puppy. My father was shouting at my mother to put me in the car.’
He let out a harsh breath.
‘I’d never heard my father raise his voice before. My mother said I couldn’t waste any more time searching for the dog. I had to be good and get into the car so that we could leave, or something bad would happen.’
He shook his head.
‘I had no idea, of course, that Vostov had been invaded and my parents had been tipped off that the military dictatorship planned to ambush and kill the royal family.’
He swung round to face Holly.
‘Don’t you see?’ he said savagely. ‘It was my fault that my parents died. My bad behaviour caused my parents to delay escaping from the palace. Because of me something bad did happen—just as my mother had told me it would. My parents were trapped in the car when it exploded. My sister and I only lived because Asmir managed to get us out of the car in time, and then hid us at the orphanage in Sarajevo to protect us from being discovered by the military who ruled Vostov in place of my father.’
He stared at Holly and wondered why she hadn’t recoiled from him in horror.
‘Ralph Saunderson believed I was responsible for Lorna’s death, but my ability to destroy began when I was a child,’ he said rawly.
She shook her head. ‘You said it yourself. You were a child.’
She walked across the balcony and stood in front of him, and the compassion in her eyes stunned Jarek because he knew he did not deserve it.
‘Six-year-old boys have tantrums,’ she said steadily. ‘And an older child will often feel jealous of a new sibling. These things happen in families everywhere, and just because you behaved like a normal six-year-old it does not make you responsible for the atrocity committed against your parents in a time of war.’
He almost believed her. But he heard his mother’s voice telling him that something bad would happen if he wasn’t good, and he saw the car with his parents inside burst into flames. He heard a shot fired from a gun and saw his adoptive mother fall to the floor, and he listened to Ralph Saunderson telling him he was reckless, destructive.
He tensed when Holly stepped closer to him and breathed in the sweet fragrance of her hair, which gleamed like raw silk in the pale gold light of early morning.
‘I wish you could see the man I see,’ she said softly. ‘You don’t destroy people. You saved your sister. You created a charity to help children living in orphanages have better lives.’ She hesitated and lifted her eyes to his. ‘You saved me.’
‘It was my fault you were on the mountain when the avalanche struck,’ he growled.
‘I don’t mean then. You didn’t reject me when I told you about my medical condition. You were patient, and you helped me to accept my body instead of feeling ashamed that I need to use dilators so that I can have sex.’ Soft colour came into her cheeks. ‘And you made love to me with such wonderful passion that it’s hardly surp
rising I... I fell in love with you.’
Jarek wanted to believe her. He wanted it so badly that he almost reached for her.
But he stopped himself because he knew the truth. He had been his adoptive father’s heir but his parents had loved only his baby sister. Ralph Saunderson had barely tolerated him and his adoptive mother had pitied him. Elin had loved Lorna Saunderson, until he had ruined that for her, and now she loved Cortez.
No one had ever loved him, and he could see no reason why that would change—or why he should want it to, he reminded himself. Despite Holly’s assurances he knew what he was, that he ruined lives. He was determined not to ruin hers.
‘I warned you against falling in love with me,’ he drawled, finding it harder that he’d expected to slip into the role he had carved out for himself years ago.
But somehow he needed to find the careless playboy who drank too much and laughed too hard. God, he would never laugh again—not the way Holly had made him laugh, with her wicked sense of humour and her warmth that felt like permanent sunshine.
He watched her expression change and become guarded, and the knowledge that she was guarding herself against him felt like a knife in his heart even as he told himself it was what he wanted. It was best for her.
‘Could it be that you have ideas about being a princess?’ His brows arched. ‘You must admit that your timing is off. You tell me you love me ten minutes after learning that I am royal by birth?’ he mocked.
She pressed her lips together and Jarek sensed that she would rather die than cry in front of him.
‘You don’t believe that,’ she said, with a quiet certainty that rocked him. ‘And, if you care to remember, I told you I love you the first time we slept together.’
He frowned. ‘I assumed you said it in the heat of the moment and didn’t mean it.’
‘I never say things I don’t mean. I’ve told you that I believe you are a good man and that you will be a great sovereign of Vostov. I understand why you are pushing me away, Jarek...’
Her gentle tone ripped him apart.
‘But if you shut love out for ever I fear you will find life lonely at the top.’
It killed him to smile the lazy smile that had always come so easily to his lips at parties and meant nothing. But he had to protect her from the danger he knew he was.
‘You obviously didn’t read fairy tales when you were growing up,’ he said, with a laugh that sounded fake to his own ears. ‘Every woman wants a prince, and I don’t imagine I’ll be lonely for long.’
He turned away from the hurt in her eyes and curled his hands around the balcony rail. The sun was rising over paradise, heralding a new day, but Jarek knew that from this day forward he would never watch the beauty of a sunrise without thinking of Holly.
‘It will be better if we are not seen together, so we’ll leave the island separately,’ he told her. ‘The helicopter will take you first and come back for me later today.’
‘So this is goodbye?’
He did not hear her bare feet walking across the balcony, and he tensed when she was suddenly standing beside him. She put her hands on either side of his face and the ache inside him grew worse when she reached up and covered his mouth with hers. Somehow he held himself stiffly, and after a moment she ended the kiss and stepped back from him, her cheeks flushed and a betraying shimmer in her eyes.
‘Be happy,’ she whispered.
Jarek stared at the beach and did not turn to watch her walk away from him. He stood there, frozen, until he heard the helicopter take off, and when he looked up at the sky the sun was so bright that his vision was blurred.
It must be that, for it could not be tears that blinded him, Jarek assured himself. A man with an empty heart could not cry.
* * *
The window boxes outside the flat in Greenwich that Holly co-owned with her best friend Kate were ablaze with yellow daffodils. According to Kate, there had been snow in March, while Holly had been abroad, but April had arrived with pale sunshine, and the trees were sporting vibrant green leaves.
‘A couple of items of mail arrived for you, but I couldn’t forward them to you while you were staying at your secret location,’ Kate told her. ‘Are you allowed to reveal why you spent a month in Florida? Not that I’m jealous of your gorgeous tan!’
‘I can’t break a patient’s confidentiality, but I can tell you I was giving counselling to a famous golfer who needed to work through some issues,’ Holly explained. ‘He chose not to check into the Frieden Clinic in Austria, so I stayed with him and his family at a secret location in Florida because he wanted to avoid the press finding out that he was seeing a psychologist.’
She found her unopened mail on the kitchen worktop, next to a pile of old newspapers ready to go into the recycling bin. Although Holly knew it was a form of masochism, she couldn’t help herself from reading the numerous headlines about Vostov’s return to a constitutional monarchy and its plans for the inauguration of Prince Jarrett. The Vostovian people were delighted to have their royal family back, and there had been many pictures of Princess Eliana, with her impossibly handsome husband Cortez and their two young children, when they had visited the Principality.
Elin was very beautiful, Holly thought as she studied a picture of Jarek’s sister. It must have been a great shock to her when she had learned of her royal heritage.
There was much speculation in the press about Prince Jarrett’s need to find a bride to be his royal consort. The names of several minor royals and the daughters of aristocratic families across Europe were being mentioned. No doubt Jarek would marry a stunning bride with an impeccable pedigree and they would have beautiful children, Holly thought miserably.
While she had been in Florida she had focused on her job as a way of supressing her heartache, but as she stared at a photo of Jarek it all came hurtling back—his cold rejection and her stupid hope that if she kissed him she would reach the heart that she had glimpsed during those heavenly two weeks when they had been lovers in paradise. Holly went hot at the humiliating memory of how she had thrown herself at him.
She flicked through the pile of mainly junk mail addressed to her and opened a gold envelope, expecting it to contain advertising material.
An embossed card fell out, and she saw that it was an invitation to the Prince Jarrett’s inaugural ball to be held at the royal palace in Vostov on the tenth of April.
The tenth was in two days’ time, she realised.
Reading down, she discovered that she should have responded to the invitation a few days ago. At the bottom was a handwritten message, and her heart slammed into her ribs when she saw that it was from Jarek and said simply—Please come. I need you.
* * *
Twenty-four hours later Holly was following a footman along a corridor on her way to meet Jarek at his private apartment in the palace.
Everything had been a blur from the moment she had called the phone number on the invitation and given her name. A palace official had told her that a car would collect her from her London flat and take her to the airport, where Jarek’s private jet would be waiting to bring her to Vostov.
She’d barely had time to pack, let alone question why she had agreed to see him when it was bound to end badly. But he had written on the invitation that he needed her, and like a fool she had rushed to him—again, she thought ruefully.
From the air, Vostov’s royal residence had looked like a fairy tale palace, perched on a mountain, surrounded by higher snow-capped peaks and overlooking a gentian-blue lake. Inside, parts of the palace were still undergoing extensive restoration work, following the dark period of Vostovian history when a military dictatorship had imposed rule over the principality and the palace had been left to fall into ruin.
But now it was a new era, with the return of the monarchy, the footman told Holly. Prince Jarrett was already hugely popular, and he had published his plans to turn Vostov into a business hub and tourist venue which would bring wealth to the country.<
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The footman opened a door and stood aside for Holly to enter an elegant sitting room. Her stomach swooped when she saw Jarek standing in front of the fireplace. He looked like a prince. That was her first thought. His blond hair was shorter, although she noticed that he still pushed it off his brow, and for once he was clean-shaven. His face was leaner and even more handsome than the image of him that haunted her dreams.
The suit he wore was exquisitely tailored to show off his broad shoulders. But it was his eyes that held her attention: brilliant blue, and glittering with an expression she could not define but which made her heart-rate quicken when he crossed the room to stand in front of her.
‘You look beautiful,’ he rasped, almost as if it hurt his throat to speak.
She saw now he was closer that his skin was drawn tightly over his sharp cheekbones, making his resemblance to a wolf even more marked. She felt his gaze burn through the white silk jersey dress with its deep vee at the front. She had bought it in Florida and it had somehow seemed less revealing in the Sunshine State than it did in a palace. She was conscious of how the material clung to her curves and showed plainly that she wasn’t wearing a bra. Jarek’s eyes lingered on her breasts and she flushed as she felt her nipples harden.
‘Where the bloody hell have you been for a month?’ he demanded, making Holly flinch at the whiplash of his voice. ‘Professor Heppel at the Frieden Clinic refused to reveal where you were, and your phone number was unavailable.’
‘I had to get a new phone because I dropped mine over the side of the boat,’ she reminded him.
She wished she could act cool, but she could feel the erratic thud of her pulse at the base of her throat, and with a flash of despair she realised that she would never escape from the spell he had cast over her—and she would never stop wanting him or loving him, a little voice in her head taunted her.
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