European Billionaire Beaus: The Complete Series

by North, Leslie

  It took Amy a moment to catch up. “I live in New York City.” She wouldn’t be living there for much longer if she got to head up Holliday’s European office. If she did that, she’d be closer to Artur, if he wanted to see her and the baby. Would he? She wasn’t sure. It hadn’t been as easy to see him as she thought it would be. Her mind needed movement to unravel why it had been so hard, and what she was going to do next.

  “Do you have any plans for sightseeing while you’re here?”

  “I—” Amy was usually prepared with a list. She didn’t go into any situation without a plan, but now that Sasha had asked, she found herself with nothing to offer. “I was hoping to see the palace,” she said with a laugh. Hopefully that would cover the fact that she hadn’t researched anything about sightseeing landmarks in the capital city. She’d been so swept up in the pregnancy...

  “Have you been sick?” Sasha asked on her next trip out.

  At first, Amy didn’t know what she was talking about, but then she looked down to where her hand was already resting on her bump. “Oh, no. I was a little tired in the beginning, but otherwise it hasn’t been too bad.”

  “That’s good,” said Sasha. “Some women can’t get out of bed. My sister—” She shook her head. “So sick. Are you here until the birth?”

  It seemed like a personal question, but Amy had an answer. The Stolvenian National Medical service had a hospital close to the palace. She would go there. It was on her agenda to meet with a few possible OB-GYNs as soon as possible. But giving birth was a whole different story from getting pregnant, as well she knew, and it was...not something she wanted to face. Not right now. So she sidestepped the discussion.

  “I’m just here to help Prince Artur with some PR things,” she said with a big smile. “Maybe I’ll combine some sightseeing with a countrywide tour and finish my plans for the birth at a later date.”

  Sasha laughed. “A countrywide tour won’t take you long. Stolvenia isn’t all that large.”

  Still, the thought had set Amy’s mind to work on something she could figure out—PR. Stolvenia was at least large enough that a tour would mean spending a few weeks on the road. Maybe that would be a good plan for Artur. Part of the problem with the original firm’s strategy was that it had focused entirely too much on international events and connecting Artur with members of the elite class, both within Stolvenia and without. That wouldn’t do much to improve the popularity numbers from the citizens of Stolvenia who weren’t the type to attend fancy galas. In order to help him connect with the majority of the voting public of Stolvenia, they needed to do something else.

  They needed to start on a local level.

  Amy liked that idea. A few weeks out on the road, engagements with the citizens of Stolvenia—that would be a good starting point. It was something she could bring to him at the next meeting—a neutral topic of conversation, and a suggestion that had the added benefit of getting them away from the palace for a bit. Amy had the sense that being at the political ground zero of the kingdom wouldn’t make it any easier to discuss...personal matters.

  Now that she had the bones of a plan figured out, Amy felt better. So much better, in fact, that the itch to run right out of the suite had settled. Her feet hurt a bit. She took in the suite with new eyes. The living area featured a loveseat and two chairs around a little table, along with a little round dining table with two chairs. There were plenty of places to sit and relax. Amy chose the loveseat.

  “That’s better,” Sasha said, coming out of the closet. “I’ll finish up in here, and then you’ll be on your own for a bit. If you need anything—”

  “I’ll let you know.” Amy smiled at Sasha, then sank back into the seat. It was time to flesh out her battle plan.

  * * *

  “...the perception of the royal family needs to change in a groundswell, starting with the citizens who live and work in Stolvenia. Connecting with them will be the key to rebranding Artur’s image, and along with it, the image of the monarchy as a whole.” Amy finished her speech, then turned to the group of people seated around the table.

  There was a pause, and then King Rafael brought his hands together in a slow clap. The rest of them joined in.

  That felt good. Amy had to admit it. She raised her hands. “Thank you, thank you. But not necessary. I’m just doing my job.”

  It was a relief to know she had their approval—that they knew she was genuinely qualified for this task, not just a fling of Artur’s who he’d hired as a cover for an ongoing affair. Not that she had any intention of picking up where they’d left off in New York…but she couldn’t exactly hide the fact that they had gotten together then. Everyone there—Artur’s two brothers, Rafael and Armin; Armin’s wife, Katie; Kostya’s second-in-command, Zia—knew everything.

  Artur had pulled her aside before the meeting to tell her that he had informed them so as to avoid any uncomfortable moments in the future. Amy hadn’t been wild about that announcement from Artur, but she knew immediately that it had been a good idea. If she ended up staying in Stolvenia, questions would arise. It was the nature of working so closely with members of the royal family. Better those in his inner circle knew now. “I’ve also informed them that we’ve not decided on any official announcement,” Artur had told her, with a look in his eyes that she couldn’t quite read.

  “Good,” Amy had said. “Let’s do this.”

  Now she stood in front of those same people, telling them how she hoped to change Artur’s reputation for the better. It was more than a little ironic.

  “Those are my ideas.” She took the only empty seat at the table. “Do you have other suggestions?”

  “Do you plan for the tour to include any gala events?” Zia asked.

  “I don’t think so,” Amy said. “Those events have become too stale for Artur, and they only reinforce public opinion that the royal family is out of touch with the common people.”

  “Perhaps a few events with schoolchildren,” Rafael suggested. “We’ve always seen positive feedback when Artur visits with kids. Isn’t that right, Zia?”

  Zia looked over her own papers. “Yes, that’s right. His work with the children in both hospital and school settings has been well-received.”

  Amy tried to keep her expression neutral. Were they guiding this discussion toward kids because of what Artur had told them?

  “Perhaps becoming a father will soften his image as well,” Armin chimed in.

  “I’m not sure about the timeline of letting the country know about the baby,” Zia answered. “There are still several months before that will come into play. We can’t bank any part of this strategy on something so far in the future. Not if we want to change things now.”

  “It should be part of the consideration,” said Rafael.

  So this was what Artur’s life had been like.

  “I wonder what you think about that, Artur.” Katie, Armin’s wife, had raised her eyebrows at the first mention of fatherhood. “After all, you will be the father.” Amy liked her.

  Artur, Amy saw now, was frowning. “Ah, yes. Thank you for reminding us all of that fact.” The prince shifted in his seat. “No, I won’t be using my child as a solution to boosting my popularity. If and when we go public with this pregnancy, it will be on terms that Amy and I are comfortable with.”

  Amy appreciated his support…and what’s more, she liked the sound of her name in his mouth, which made it a little harder to present the next part of her plan. “I appreciate that, Artur,” she said. “I have a different solution to the idea of presenting you as more of a family man. I think it’s time to find Artur a wife.”

  There was dead silence around the table.

  “Technically, a girlfriend,” Amy said into that silence. “I was thinking we could add a fun dating element to the tour.”

  “A...dating element?” Katie was the first to speak up, which was a surprise. Amy had thought Zia would leap right into a discussion on her idea. But Katie’s eyes were quizzical, c
urious. Zia was still staring at Amy as if she was from another planet. “Like a contest?”

  “No, not like a contest.” Amy laughed. “Maybe a date with a local woman from each of the stops on the tour. Women from well-regarded families, on casual dates, to create some photo opportunities. It would allow Prince Artur to make connections with citizens and give them a platform to discuss the changes they want to see in Stolvenia. We could talk about their suggestions at our meeting next month. But adding in a bit of a romantic element will make it more fun for the public, waiting to see if Artur will click with any of the women.”

  “That does sound like something Artur would do,” Rafael said, still watching Amy.

  “It would be entertaining, but with a side of commitment,” Amy said, the word heavy on her tongue. “To both the citizens of Stolvenia and the monarchy itself. It would show the country that not only is Artur serious about national issues, but he’s getting serious about dating as well. He’s ready to settle down.”

  “That would be quite the change,” Armin said.

  For the first time, Amy looked across at Artur. He was not smiling.

  “I find that I’m warming to the idea,” said Rafael. “It could result in a marriage. Marriages do seem to have a...stabilizing influence.” He grinned at Armin and Katie. “Wouldn’t you agree?”

  “I would,” said Katie, putting a hand on Armin’s arm.

  “A royal wedding with the right touches could put us in the public’s good graces,” commented Zia. “It would need to be rather restrained.”

  “I disagree,” said Armin. “The people might think we’re out of touch, but they love a good spectacle. We wouldn’t want to let them down on that.”

  The conversation shifted to royal weddings, but Amy was still watching Artur. Without another word, he got up from the table and slipped away. No one seemed to notice him leaving.

  5

  It was afternoon before Artur had sufficiently arranged his thoughts about the meeting, at least to the point where he could speak to others without yelling. At first, he took a walk in the gardens, moving so briskly through the trails that he could hear his security detail hustling to keep up. Perhaps he should have chosen the gym. Come to think of it—yes. He should have chosen the gym. He ran a hand through his hair, changed directions, and headed back in.

  After an hour in the palace’s private gym, his muscles burned and his workout gear was soaked through, but his head was clear. This plan of Amy’s—to parade him around with various women of Stolvenia—was never going to happen. But he had another idea.

  He showered, dressed, and styled his hair in his signature look, then headed down the hall to Amy’s suite. He’d made sure she got one of the larger apartments in the wing. He knocked at the door. It opened immediately to reveal one of the maids.

  “Prince Artur.” She stepped back to let him in, dipping her head.

  “Thanks much. What’s your name?”

  She looked up at him with a little smile. “Sasha, Your Highness.”

  “Sasha. You may go—we’ll be all right for a bit.”

  “All right.” She went out behind him, leaving him to Amy’s rooms.

  There was a large main room, but Amy wasn’t in here, so he went left, toward the smaller sitting room.

  Amy sat at a cabriole facing a table, with papers spread out in front of her and a pen in her hand. She was writing notes on a legal pad and didn’t look up at first. “Sasha, do you think we could—”

  “Not quite Sasha.”

  Her eyes flew up to meet his. “What are you doing here?”

  Deliberately misunderstanding her, he replied. “I live here, of course. Did you not realize you’re being housed in the royal wing?”

  Amy’s mouth dropped open, and a pleasantly pink color came to her cheeks. “Well. I didn’t realize I’d been given such...exclusive accommodations.”

  He gestured around him. “These rooms are technically part of my apartments. I won’t bore you with the details of the passageways between the different suites. I promise you, they haven’t been used in decades and all of the doors are probably boarded up.”

  Amy raised her eyebrows, and he saw a flash of the woman she had been when she came back to the hotel with him from the gala that night. “Secret passageways? So the royals of old could sneak around and get themselves into trouble behind closed doors?”

  “Yes. The royals of old,” he emphasized, giving her a wink.

  She laughed out loud.

  “In all seriousness, the team thought it best that you be placed closer to me for the duration. Especially since you’ll be staying until the referendum.” Secretly, Artur wasn’t sure she would stay that long, but he wished that was the firm plan. Despite the train wreck of the meeting earlier, when his inner circle had blithely agreed with her ridiculous plan to turn his life into their own version of a dating show, the thought of having her nearby made him feel...at home. Yes, that was it. Though, on second thought, that didn’t make much sense.

  Amy wore a thoughtful expression. “It’s a good plan. In terms of logistics, this will make planning the tour much easier. And Kostya said the anti-royalist media might harass me if I was staying at a hotel but coming and going from the palace every day.”

  Artur didn’t much care what Kostya had said, and in fact, the rooms weren’t the reason he’d come here to talk to her at all. “I had an amendment to your proposal from earlier.”

  Amy raised her eyebrows. “Do tell. I’m open to all input, especially from the man at the center of it all.” The smile she gave him was a genuine one. “That might have sounded a little sarcastic, but I meant it.”

  He came to sit across the table from her in a chair that turned out to be more comfortable than it looked. “It came to me during my workout that there’s an easier solution than planning dates for me with half the women in the country.”

  Amy leaned back, resting her hands atop the curve of her bump. She ran her fingers down over the fabric of her dress, and the movement was somehow completely casual and completely intimate at once. It almost made him want to look away, but looking away from her was harder than seeing that little gesture. And why was it so difficult?

  “What’s that?”

  “If you want to make me more respectable by settling me with a woman, why not you? Marrying you would make abundant sense in the context of your plan,” he added. Why was his heart beating so hard? It wasn’t as if he was pledging his undying love. This was a business arrangement. A solution to an irritating problem she had presented.

  Amy was still watching him, her brow furrowed as if he’d started speaking in his native Stolvenia.

  “You’re respectable, attractive, and the mother of my child.” It seemed best to fill the silence. “Wouldn’t marrying you play well in the press? We could even take our honeymoon on the tour and combine the two events for maximum press coverage and goodwill.”

  Amy sat up straighter. “So you’re not opposed to the idea of the tour.”

  “Not at all. I’m glad you suggested it. I’d never have thought to take a tour of the country otherwise.” He relaxed into the chair, resting one arm on an armrest. Now was the point in the conversation where Amy would reject him—he was sure of that. But all of the thoughts he’d had in the garden and the gym had been focused on getting him out of all those dates. The tour—that was a hell of an idea, and he wanted to travel the country with Amy. It was the small talk and the empty flirtation with a series of strangers, all while news cameras tracked their every word, that Artur simply couldn’t bear.

  “It’s not the worst proposal I’ve ever had,” Amy said, after what seemed like an eternity. She smiled ruefully. “There was one D-list celebrity who got down on one knee after a New Year’s event. He was so drunk he could hardly balance himself.”

  The thought of anyone making light of a proposal like that made his skin crawl, though Artur couldn’t put his finger on why. He shouldn’t care this much about some stranger
drunkenly stumbling through a half-hearted proposal. Still, he managed one of his most winning smiles. “This should be the best proposal you’ve ever had.” Amy laughed, a low sound that sent pleasure humming through his veins. “I’m offering you the full benefits of becoming part of the royal family. Connections, wealth...the best of everything for our child. Why not marry me, honestly?”

  Amy shrugged one shoulder, still grinning. “Love?”

  He sat up, shaking his head. “Oh no, that’s not part of it at all. I don’t love you. But why should that stop us?”

  Amy snorted. “You think that little of love?”

  He resisted the urge to get up and pace around the room. “It’s not that I...discount the idea of love entirely, but I have other obligations that come first. I wasn’t certain that love was the point of this anyway. Surely you didn’t expect me to fall in love with some random woman on your matchmaking tour, did you?”

  Was her face a little redder, or was he imagining it? She looked beautiful with a little blush in her cheeks and a grin on her face, even if it was meant to cover up some deeper feeling.

  “No, I guess not.” Amy ran her hands over her bump again, then folded them neatly in her lap. “I don’t love you either,” she said, as if she were running down an agenda at yet another meeting. “But someday I might love someone.” There was a hope in her voice that broke his heart. Artur shifted in his seat under the weight of that feeling.

  As much as he wanted to go around to the cabriole and sit next to her and fold her in his arms, he settled for a casual shrug. “Marry me in the meantime, then. When you find the love of your life, we can get a divorce. By then, my image will be turned around, the monarchy will be secure. And until then, you and our child will have everything you could desire. It’s not such a terrible option, is it?”

  She sat up straight, her hand now seeming protective on her belly. “I have a better option, Artur. Myself.” Amy lifted her chin. “I have a great job. I could give this child of ours an amazing life. I don’t need to marry into the royal family for the benefits package, I promise.”