Turning to the media, Edwin gave them a nod before he led her away, much too quickly, across the courtyard.
When they were out of earshot he said, ‘You’re trembling.’ His mouth tightened. ‘Forgive me, I got a little carried away proving that I don’t do chaste kisses.’
She had to downplay this. She couldn’t let him know just how disconcerted she was, how he had just blown her mind.
So tell me, Kara, are you still convinced that you can walk away from this pretend marriage unscathed?
She withdrew her hand from his, gave him a disapproving tap on his forearm, and in the best blasé voice she could muster, answered, ‘I could hardly breathe. Thank goodness we won’t need to do that too often.’
CHAPTER FOUR
STANDING IN THE hall lined with mirrors, overlooking the formal gardens of the palace, spotting the telltale claret-red patches appearing on her dad’s neck, Kara edged closer to him. ‘I wonder what Aunt Joan will be wearing today?’
For a brief moment her dad smiled. ‘Whatever it is, I’m sure they’ll be able to spot it from outer space.’
Aunt Joan liked to wear colour, the brighter the better in her view, to counteract the greyness of so many Irish days. Unfortunately she didn’t seem to understand the concept of clashing colours or that sometimes, less was more. Keen to keep her dad distracted in their long wait for Edwin to appear, and in truth looking for something to focus on other than her annoyance with her fiancé, she said, ‘It’s great that the entire family could make the wedding.’
When had the deep grooves in his cheeks appeared, the greyness in his hair? She hadn’t seen him in over two years. Had it been during that time or had they been accumulating for ever and she had just been too preoccupied to notice? Her dad tugged at his shirt collar. ‘Sure, wild horses wouldn’t have kept that lot at home—this is the most exciting thing to have ever hit the Duffy family.’
Yesterday lunchtime they had finally managed to squeeze in the wedding rehearsal. Not only had the logistics team had to contend with Edwin’s father’s schedule, which had him out of the country on a tour to Sweden and Norway from which he had only returned yesterday morning, but also Edwin’s ever-changing travel plans.
She had found the rehearsal in the cathedral exhausting. It had taken all of her will not to stare at Edwin, as was her wont recently. Since their engagement kiss she was constantly finding herself staring at him, daydreaming about him in all types of inappropriate ways that certainly didn’t belong in a place of worship.
At the rehearsal her dad had trembled as he had escorted her down the aisle. In the hope of relaxing him she had said she and Edwin would join him and the rest of her relatives for dinner that night in the nearby hotel the palace had booked out in entirety to house the Irish Duffy contingent for dinner. She had also invited along her bridesmaids—Siza, her old rugby teammate, and Triona, who was the first employee to join her in Young Adults Together, and was now one of her closest friends—who were also staying in nearby hotels.
She had ended up going for dinner without Edwin. His weekly meeting with the cabinet had apparently become heated when he introduced his plans for designating land zoned for tourist accommodation into a financial centre and nature reserve.
During the dinner she had tried to hide her frustration with Edwin’s non-appearance, but when her dad had asked her for a chat after dinner she had expected yet another awkward conversation as to the wisdom of her deciding to agree to a marriage of convenience.
But instead, when they reached his room her dad had shyly plucked out the lightweight suits and crisp shirts he had bought for the wedding weekend. Her heart had melted to see how proud he was of his purchases, and how eagerly he had wanted her approval. He had asked for her advice as to what he should wear for today’s garden party and had proudly modelled the grey trousers and pale pink shirt she had picked out. He had self-consciously studied himself in the full-length mirror of the wardrobe and it had hit her once again what it was she was asking of this private man, whose confidence and identity had taken such a battering, to have to step into the glare of the world.
Now with a grimace her dad admitted, ‘I think you should know that your aunts gave an interview to one of the main Irish newspapers. I saw it online earlier in the special supplement they’ve published in advance of the wedding tomorrow.’
Kara groaned.
‘It’s all very complimentary...honestly, just photos of you growing up and how proud they are of you and how they knew you’d do great in life because you were such a headstrong child.’
Oh, please, someone tell me they didn’t use the photos of me on the beach close to Aunt Nina’s house with a battalion of cousins.
The photos where her hair was twisted into tight curls and stood on end like hundreds of startled question marks, thanks to a day spent in the sea.
So much for asking that family members wouldn’t speak to the media. She didn’t want her family or friends to be invested in this marriage. Unfortunately she had forgotten just how much her dad’s side of the family liked a wedding, not to mention a royal one featuring their very own niece.
She couldn’t even bear to think about just how crushed they’d all be when her divorce was announced. ‘Am I right in guessing it was my aunts who eventually persuaded you to come to the wedding?’ It was only last week that her dad had finally said he would attend, a fortnight after the rest of their Irish family’s acceptances had started rolling in.
Her dad gave a resigned sigh. ‘Five badgering sisters would be hard for any man to fight.’
She twisted Edwin’s engagement ring, its weight still feeling alien on her finger, regret punching her stomach that her dad was only here because of family persuasion and not to support her in her decision, even if it was not one he approved of. But at least he was here...which was more than could be said for her mum.
‘I blame myself,’ he said.
‘Blame yourself for what?’
He looked her in the eye, the intimacy of it swiping like a blade to her heart. How she missed his easy nature and love of teasing that had used to have her giggling endlessly as a child. ‘If we were closer...’ He paused, shrugged. ‘We’ve drifted apart, haven’t we?’ He nodded unhappily towards their opulent surroundings, and then in the direction of Edwin’s father and brothers and the various other members of the royal court standing to their side. ‘If I knew what was going on in your life then maybe I could have persuaded you not to do this before it all got so out of hand.’
Kara rolled her shoulders and placed her bunched hands in the pockets of her summer cocktail dress.
This morning she had hopped out of bed, thrilled that she had finally persuaded Edwin last night, when he had eventually turned up at her dad’s hotel, two hours late, to take an early morning trek with her into the mountains. She had hoped some time alone together would restore the equilibrium that had used to exist between them, that some teasing and banter would fix Edwin back into her world order of regarding him as a friend. But her hope and excitement had soon disappeared when she had gone in search for him. Unable to locate him, she had been forced to interrupt Victor, who had been in a meeting with many of the senior members of the household, to enquire as to Edwin’s whereabouts. Curious eyes had studied her, everyone present clearly wondering why she did not know that her fiancé had left Monrosa earlier that morning. She had tried not to let her embarrassment, her disappointment, her confusion show but had backed out of the room, her cheeks stinging with hurt.
And after her make-up and hair had been completed by her team and she had pulled on the strapless dress she had fallen in love with the moment Ettie, a recent design-school graduate and native Monrosian had shown it to her, and stared at her reflection in the mirror, taking in the material printed in layers of pinks and purples and yellows, designed to resemble the colours and pattern of a butterfly’s wings, she had stared at t
he stranger in the mirror and wondered if she could go through with the wedding. But what choice did she have? How could she back out now with most of their guests already here? And on what basis—that Edwin was never around, and even when he was he was constantly distracted by work? With a sigh she faintly said, ‘Let’s not go over all this again, Dad. You know the reasons why I want to marry Edwin.’
‘A marriage without love destroys people.’
She did not want to hear this right now. She had enough on her plate without her dad prophesying doom and gloom for their marriage. She had enough of those niggling doubts herself. ‘We might not have romantic love, but there’s no one in the world I trust more than Edwin. He has always had my back.’ Shifting her head even closer to her dad, she whispered with a fury that rose suddenly and fiercely from somewhere deep inside of her, ‘He has never let me down. I owe him this.’
Her dad blinked. And just as quickly as it had risen within her, Kara’s fury was quenched, to be replaced with those nagging doubts that had been germinating like a deadly virus inside of her following weeks of Edwin’s distraction and distance.
Her dad reddened. ‘I wish your mother were here to speak to you. She might be able to get you to see sense.’
Kara shrugged. It hurt like hell that her mum was refusing to take the short plane trip from the south of Spain to Monrosa to attend her wedding, but she was not going to admit that to anyone. ‘Maybe it’s for the best—the last time you two were in the same room it wasn’t exactly a pleasant experience for anyone.’
Her dad cleared his throat, stuffed his hands into his trouser pockets, his gaze on the closed double doors out to the gardens. ‘You can’t spend your days and nights with someone and remain detached. Edwin is a good-looking man... I don’t want you getting hurt.’
Her mouth dropped open. Was her dad actually warning her not to sleep with Edwin? Heat ignited in her belly as she remembered their kiss. A few weeks ago she would have been able to laugh off her father’s warning, but now she became a physical wreck of hormones whenever she saw him. She fancied him. She really, really fancied him. He was that good a kisser. ‘I wouldn’t worry if I were you—if the past few weeks are anything to go by, we’ll rarely see one another.’
‘Victor, where is Edwin? Our guests are waiting for us.’
Both she and her dad jumped at Edwin’s father’s barked question that echoed around the cavernous double-height hall ceiling like a helter-skelter in motion.
Victor stepped away from the marble pillar beside which he had been standing and calmly answered, ‘His plane landed ten minutes ago, Your Highness. He should be arriving very soon.’
Eyeing Kara as though it was her fault Edwin was late for his own pre-wedding garden party, Edwin’s father asked, ‘Just how urgent was the business that took him out of Monrosa? Doesn’t he realise he’s getting married tomorrow and is needed here?’
For a moment Kara was tempted to fire back, Don’t look to me for answers. I’ve no clue as to what’s going on in your son’s head. All we’ve talked about in recent weeks is wedding logistics and succession planning. Heaven knows he’s never been good at talking about anything of even a slightly personal nature, but since our engagement he’s taken it to a whole different level.
But instead she gave him a polite smile and answered, ‘I’m sure it must be of great importance, as he would not have wanted to keep our guests waiting.’
His Highness muttered something before turning his attention on Luis, who was leaning against the wall, his shoulder touching the gilt frame of a no doubt priceless still-life, flicking through his phone, and snapped, ‘Please focus on our important guests this afternoon.’
A grin formed on Luis’s mouth. He got the poorly disguised insinuation of his father’s words—not to get sidetracked by pretty female faces, as was his wont. ‘Don’t take your bad mood out on me.’ His grin dropping, Luis eyed his father, the roguish prince with a reputation for short-lived affairs with some of the most beautiful women in the world now replaced with the astute professional sportsman who had come close to winning the World Powerboat Series on several occasions. ‘This whole mess is of your own making—no wonder Edwin doesn’t want to play ball.’
Every eye in the room swung in Luis’s direction, everyone clearly trying to understand the meaning of his words.
Tight-lipped, His Highness stared at his middle son furiously. ‘Your constant absence from palace life has caused you to forget the importance of decorum.’
Luis held his father’s gaze for long seconds, the heat in his cheekbones in stark contrast to the coldness of his expression. He shot his gaze in her direction. Kara gave him a supportive smile, all the while hoping he wouldn’t start an argument that would add even more tension to the day. With a reluctant shrug Luis lowered his head and once again flicked a finger over the screen of his phone.
His Highness let out an irritated breath before turning his attention towards Ivo. ‘I’ve scheduled time in my diary on Monday morning for us to meet.’
Ivo, with his tall, muscular physique, short-cropped hair and sharp features, on the surface appeared confidently aloof, but his low voice told the truth of his gentle nature. ‘I’m flying out on Sunday morning.’
‘Well, change your plans,’ His Highness countered.
With zero emotion showing, Ivo studied his father for a moment. Kara expected him to refuse to change his plans. Ivo might be gentle but he had a stubborn and single-minded streak, which had served him well, no doubt, in his journey to becoming an Olympic rower. After a quick glance in her direction, rather surprisingly, he shrugged in agreement.
Walking towards a window overlooking the gardens, Kara studied their waiting guests down at the waterfront, her eyes brimming with tears. Edwin’s distance stung even harder in the face of his brothers’ understated support.
There were over five hundred guests mingling at the waterfront awaiting their arrival. Along with heads of state and prime ministers, local people and Young Adults Together staff were among the invited guests. She had had to fight hard the resistance of the wedding logistics team to have them invited ahead of corporate presidents and European politicians.
She had had to fight too for her idea to hold this garden party in the afternoon before the wedding. The logistics team had argued that many of the guests, especially those designated as dignitaries, would not arrive until the morning of the wedding and therefore the garden party was unnecessary and would only complicate preparations for the following day. Time and time again, Kara had had to remind them as to why she wanted to host the garden party in the first place—it was Kara’s way of including as many Monrosians in the wedding celebrations as possible and her way of thanking those who had taken the time and expense to travel from all over the globe for the long weekend of celebrations.
As it had turned out, many of the dignitaries had opted to travel to the wedding early, and who could blame them for starting their weekend early on a sun-kissed Mediterranean island ablaze with colour, thanks to the springtime blooming of its native wild plants and flowers?
A number of guests had been unable to accept their invitation due to work commitments or personal issues. Only one had not sent an apology, however: her mum.
Kara had spoken to her only once since their engagement photos had been splashed across the front page of every newspaper worldwide. The pain in her mum’s voice when she had begged Kara not to ask her again to attend the wedding had torn through her like a sharp blade. Kara knew just how private her mum was but had hoped she would have put that aside for her sake. In the reporting of their engagement, the media had referenced Michael’s death, more often than not as a small aside paragraph at the end of an article, as though his death had been nothing but a blip in their lives.
She had gasped when she had seen the photos herself, grown all hot and bothered at the ones showing Edwin passionately kissing her. But
it had been one photo—a fluke, a misinterpretation due to the angle at which it had been taken, but unfortunately the photo used by most of the media outlets—that still cut her to the quick. The photo had been taken in the seconds after Edwin had drawn back from their kiss, and the media had chosen to deduce from the intensity of his expression that it portrayed a man deeply in love.
When in truth it was nothing more than the portrayal of a man deeply irritated with himself. He regretted that kiss. He hadn’t even been able to look her in the eye since. Which was mortifying, considering the lust it had unleashed in her. And any fears she had had about them sharing an apartment were a joke. Edwin had been away on business most nights since she had moved to Monrosa a fortnight ago. She had tried to shrug off his constant work and royal commitments abroad, burying herself in wedding preparations and in managing the transition of the day-to-day operations management of Young Adults Together in the UK to Marion Parry, her Head of Charity Services, so that she could focus instead on forming an international branch of the charity.
But despite her busyness, and how excited she was at the prospect of helping even more young adults, deep down she was lonely.
Was this how the next two years were going to pan out? Edwin consumed by work, their relationship nothing more than work colleagues who saw each other occasionally? Her spending her nights alone, rattling around their enormous apartment trying not to have sexual fantasies about her indifferent husband? Their friendship lost to the careful dance they needed to perform every time they stepped out to fulfil a public duty, lost to the exhausting toll of keeping up the pretence of being a couple in love, lost to Edwin’s ceaseless drive to prove wrong all of the commentators who proclaimed that his succession was happening a decade too early?
His father’s abdication announcement had been received with shock and disquiet, the media and public unsettled by what the change in leadership would mean to the country. Ever since, Edwin had been waging a campaign, both at home and abroad, to bring people on board with his succession.
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