Bound by the Prince's Baby Read online

  The door at the back led to a narrow kitchen and a sunny conservatory extension they used as a sitting-cum-dining room and they each had a bedroom on the first or second floor, two to a floor, sharing a bathroom. Only Emilia now lived in Armaria, Alex spent most of her time in the country at Finn’s and Harriet would move out when she and Deangelo married later in the year. Their time together had been all too brief.

  Harriet directed Amber to sit on the sofa while she made tea and peered into a cupboard. ‘No biscuits or cakes?’ She glanced over at Amber, her forehead crinkled. ‘You haven’t baked this week?’

  ‘I haven’t felt like it.’

  ‘That’s it. Something is definitely up. For you not to bake? That’s like, well, there’s no metaphor serious enough. Amber, what’s wrong? Is it to do with the wedding? With the Prince?’

  Amber took the cup of tea gratefully, her eyes hot and heavy, chest tight with unexpected pain. ‘Oh, Hatty, I messed up.’

  Harriet curled up in the opposite corner of the huge sofa and sipped her tea. ‘You don’t have to tell me, but it might help. Did you and Tristano spend the night together?’

  Amber stared down at her cup. ‘Yes.’

  ‘And how did you leave it?’

  ‘We didn’t. By the time I woke up he was gone.’

  ‘And he hasn’t contacted you?’

  ‘No. But I didn’t expect him to. You see, he left a note.’

  ‘A note?’ Harriet’s tone made it very clear what she thought of that and Amber rushed to explain.

  ‘No, no, it’s fine. It was actually really lovely.’ She still had it, in her bedside drawer. It was a beautifully composed note: an apology, a love letter and a farewell, all in one. He thanked her for giving him an evening where he didn’t have to pretend to be someone he wasn’t. He thanked her for her kindness. He apologised for leaving her with nothing but a note, but explained that he had no choice, that he couldn’t offer her any more than the one night and he asked for her understanding. The part where he told her that she was the most beautiful woman he had ever met, that the memory of that night would stay with him for many, many years to come, were harder to read. For, whether she had meant to or not, Amber knew that she had deceived him...

  ‘Hatty, do you know anything about his situation?’

  Harriet frowned. ‘Laurent’s mother did say something. Doesn’t he have to marry and have a son by the time he’s thirty-five or the throne goes to his cousin? Have you ever heard anything more absurd?’

  ‘Yes. I didn’t know about it during the wedding but Laurent’s mother mentioned it the next day. Apparently the cousin is a bit of a playboy and would be a disastrous king.’

  ‘So that’s why Tris snuck off, leaving you with a note? Because he needs a queen? That’s even worse, no wonder you’re upset. You would make a wonderful queen!’

  ‘Harriet, I can’t think of anything worse. I would hate to be a queen. But no, that’s not why. There’s more.’ She took a deep breath. ‘Eight years ago he entered into a formal betrothal with someone, but she ran away and he hasn’t seen her since. But apparently the betrothal is binding in his country and he can’t marry anyone else, unless she formally breaks it.’

  Harriet’s eyes widened. ‘That’s absolutely crazy! His country—Elsornia, isn’t it?—sounds positively medieval. So that’s why he hasn’t been in touch, because he’s engaged to a missing woman.’

  ‘That’s about it.’ Amber could hear the blood roaring in her ears, every part of her aching with worry. How had this happened? She’d had no idea that Tris would consider the betrothal binding, that eight years after she’d left his whole life would have come to a halt because of her actions. It simply hadn’t occurred to her when she had left her grandmother’s house, that the freedom she had claimed came with a price. A price that Tris had to pay. Was paying.

  She had to tell Tristano who she really was, now she knew the impact her actions had had on him. She could still summon up the memory of her righteous anger at his arrogance for betrothing himself to a girl who wasn’t even in the same room, let alone consenting, but the bitter dislike that had fuelled that anger had dissolved, replaced with a reluctant admiration, and an even more reluctant liking. Every day she started to write to him to tell him who she was and to tell him that he was free. Every day the letter remained unwritten. Amber knew that as soon as Tris realised who she really was, his desire and admiration for her would be replaced by anger. Her friends loved her, but she was also so alone in this world that to have been seen as someone worthy of desire, to have been wanted was so intoxicating it was hard to let go. But let go she must.

  ‘Harriet...’ But she couldn’t quite bring herself to say the next words. To admit that she was the missing Princess and for her world to change. She took a deep breath but before she could speak Harriet put her tea down and took Amber’s hand.

  ‘Amber,’ Harriet said slowly. ‘Do you think that maybe there’s a reason you’ve been feeling so ill? I mean, you were careful, weren’t you?’

  ‘Careful?’

  Harriet flushed, her cheeks staining a deep, dark red. ‘Could you possibly be pregnant?’

  ‘Of course not!’ Amber’s cheeks were on fire. ‘That is...technically, I guess, it’s possible.’

  Most groups of girls in their twenties who were as close as Amber, Emilia, Alex and Harriet probably spoke about their love lives in great detail. But that kind of gossip had never been part of their friendship. Partly because of the unspoken rule not to pry, but mostly because none of them, Amber aside, had really dated before meeting their partners and as a result contraception was not something they often discussed. Especially in the practical rather than the theoretical sense.

  ‘Possible, but really unlikely. I’m not an idiot; we used protection, obviously we did.’

  ‘Protection?’ Harriet looked steadily at her friend.

  ‘Yes, protection.’ Amber really wanted this conversation to go away now.

  ‘Condoms?’

  ‘Harriet! I can’t believe you’re asking me this. Yes, condoms. Happy?’

  ‘You do know that those things aren’t one hundred per cent, don’t you? It’s easy for mistakes to be made in the heat of the moment.’

  Amber swallowed. ‘I know that but I’m pretty sure...’ She was pretty sure they had been careful. No, she knew they had. But they had also been a little intoxicated. Not just on the champagne, but on the night itself. With each other. And it hadn’t been just once...

  ‘Amber...’ Harriet put a careful hand on her shoulder. ‘Before we book that doctor’s appointment, maybe we should take a pregnancy test.’

  Amber managed a smile at that supportive we. ‘I appreciate your help, but I think this is something I will definitely have to do alone.’

  But Harriet was shaking her head. ‘No, you are never alone. Remember that, whatever that test does or doesn’t say, you are not alone.’

  Amber squeezed her friend’s hand gratefully, fear tumbling around inside her. Were Harriet’s suspicions correct? They made perfect sense. The lethargy, the melancholy, the strangeness in her body. She’d put it down to guilt and something less definable. Not heartbreak exactly—how could she be heartbroken about a man she didn’t know? More sadness for a life that wasn’t hers, for the wish that she could be simply Amber Blakeley, meeting a man she liked, seeing where that liking might take her, without centuries of tradition and expectation and lies lying between them.

  But if Harriet was right then Amber knew that she would be alone. Her friends couldn’t support her in this. If she was pregnant with Tris’s baby, then she couldn’t avoid telling him who she was any longer, and not with a letter setting him free but in person. And all her work to build a life free of Belravia and her grandmother’s plans would be for nothing.

  But she had no choice. Honour demanded it, and she had this much honour left
at least.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  NORMALLY AMBER WOULD be thrilled to visit Paris. The city had been her first stopping point after she had left her grandmother’s apartment, when she had spent a couple of months as a chambermaid in the beautiful French capital before interrailing her way around the continent, finally ending up in London. Her initial plans to go to university had been derailed by her lack of funds and formal qualifications, but instead she had used her hotel experience to get a job as first a receptionist and then a concierge in a London hotel before Deangelo had headhunted her.

  She had always meant to return to Paris; the city held such warm and happy memories—memories of freedom, of finding out who she was and what she wanted, memories of evening walks and calorie-filled dinners, of not having to watch what she ate, how she walked, what she wore, what she said and who she spoke to. She would always love the city for those precious few weeks of happiness.

  But today she was sitting in the waiting room of the kind of discreet, expensive lawyers who served the royal houses of Europe, knowing that in ten minutes’ time she would see Tris again. Amber pressed her hands tightly together and allowed herself a moment of weakness, a moment of wishing she had taken up her friends’ offers of companionship and support. Finn, Laurent and Deangelo had all been more than willing to appoint themselves her knight in shining armour, but she had turned down both their money and attempts to accompany her here today. This was something she had to do by herself. This was an appointment only the Princess of Belravia could attend.

  ‘Mademoiselle Blakeley?’ The perfectly chic receptionist looked up unsmilingly. ‘Please go in.’

  Stepping through the open door, Amber looked around nervously. The lawyer’s office felt more like a sumptuous library than a place of business. The glossy wooden desk was clearly antique, and the shelves were laden with leather-bound books of all types, not just dry texts. Huge windows let the sunlight bounce in, bathing the room with golden light. It reminded her of her grandmother’s study, and for a moment she felt like the sullen schoolgirl she had once been, trying to wrestle her outer self into compliance, even as she raged with rebellion inside.

  ‘Please, mademoiselle, sit.’

  The receptionist gestured towards a brocade-covered chair by the coffee table at the far end of the room and Amber gratefully sank into it, her legs shaking with nerves and memories. This polite, ruthless, moneyed world was no longer hers, not any more. But she needed the best to guide her through the next few minutes, hours and days and, from all she had heard, Monsieur Clément was the best of the best.

  ‘So, Mademoiselle Blakeley,’ Monsieur Clément said in perfect if heavily accented English, ‘it is good to finally meet you in person.’ If he was at all curious about Amber and the case he was presenting on her behalf, he hid it well. She supposed that was what she was paying for. The lawyer had been suggested by Laurent, who had also offered to pay for him, but Amber had her pride; right now it seemed that was all she had.

  She managed a smile. ‘Will the Prince be much longer?’ She hoped she hadn’t betrayed her nervousness through the quiver of her voice.

  ‘He should be here on the hour,’ Monsieur Clément said reassuringly. ‘I thought it best if we met first, to give you the advantage of the home ground.’

  ‘Of course.’ She stilled her trembling legs and tilted her chin. She did have an advantage here; she was the only person in the room who knew the full story. All that Tris knew was that his missing fiancée had shown up at last. He was coming here to verify her identity, and to nullify their betrothal.

  And then she’d be free. If she didn’t tell him, she would be free.

  But how could she keep her pregnancy a secret? They had close friends in common—and she didn’t doubt that his people would keep a close eye on her for some months to come. Even if telling him the truth wasn’t the right thing to do, it was the only thing to do. If she was going to keep the baby...

  Despite herself, her hand slipped to her stomach. As if there was really any doubt. How could a girl who had spent her life longing for someone of her own to love not jump at the opportunity of that, no matter what strings—or chains—came along with it?

  She looked up at the silent clock on the wall—only five minutes until the hour. Each second lasted an eternity and yet no time at all had passed when she heard the sound of the outer door opening and the rumble of voices in the reception area. For one dizzying moment she wished she had taken up her friends’ offers to accompany her, wished she had the moral support she so desperately needed. But she squared her shoulders and sat back in her chair, every single one of her grandmother’s lessons echoing through her head. She was, whether she liked it or not, the Princess of Belravia. And she held all the bargaining chips. ‘If you’d like to come this way, Your Royal Highness.’

  This was it. There was no going back. Amber clutched the sides of her chair, her knuckles white, and waited.

  She didn’t recognise the first man who stalked into the room. She guessed he was in his late fifties, greying hair slicked back, dark eyes cold and keen. But the moment he greeted the lawyer she knew his voice, a chill shivering through her. This was the unknown man who had been in her grandmother’s study eight years ago. The man who had bargained with her grandmother for her virginity, her hand in marriage and her substantial dowry. Her eyes narrowed even as her breath quickened. This man could be no friend of hers; she was as sure of it as she was her own name. What kind of hold or influence did he have over Tris? But the stranger was forgotten as Tris followed him into the office.

  Amber had a couple of seconds to notice the shadows under his grey eyes, the faint stubble coating his sharply cut cheeks and the slight disarray of his usually meticulously combed hair. He looked as if he had barely slept for days, if not weeks. She knew the feeling. She pressed her lips together, not knowing what to say, but knowing that whatever she did say would be the wrong thing.

  Tris looked around, his gaze alighting on Amber, surprise and confusion warring on his granite-like face. ‘Amber?’

  ‘Hi, Tris.’ She winced. Hi? It was completely the most inane thing she could have said, but she had no other words.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I—’

  But the lawyer interjected, ‘Please, Your Highness and Your Grace, be seated.’

  Nothing more was said for several torturous moments as Tris and the strange man her lawyer had addressed as ‘Your Grace’ sat in chairs opposite Amber. The unsmiling receptionist carried in a tray stacked with cups, a jug of rich-smelling coffee that made Amber’s stomach recoil in horror and tiny little dry biscuits. She set the tray on the coffee table before them and busied herself pouring drinks and handing around biscuits as if they were at a tea party. All the time Tris stared at Amber as if he could not quite believe that she was here.

  It wasn’t until the receptionist had left the room that Monsieur Clément spoke again. ‘Your Highness, Your Grace—Her Royal Highness Princess Vasilisa of Belravia has asked me to speak on her behalf.’

  But Tris was on his feet interrupting the lawyer. ‘I don’t understand,’ he said, looking intently at Amber. ‘Amber, what are you doing here? Do you know the Princess? Why didn’t you say so at the wedding?’

  Amber swallowed. She couldn’t hide behind a lawyer, no matter how experienced he was, not when Tris was looking at her with such confusion. ‘Tris, I’m not Amber... At least I was christened Amber and it’s a name I’ve always gone by.’ She shook her head impatiently. Why was she making such a mess of this? ‘But my grandmother called me a different name, ignored the name my parents gave me and the surname my father took when he became a British citizen. She could never accept that he had given up any claim to the long-gone throne of a country that no longer existed, that he wanted nothing to do with her dreams of Belravia.’

  The confusion in Tris’s eyes had disappeared as if it
had never been, replaced with a clear, bright anger that hurt her to look at it. ‘I am really, really sorry,’ she said, aware of how futile the words were. ‘I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. I just wanted to be free.’

  * * *

  She just wanted to be free. Free? Tris could have laughed—if he wasn’t quite so angry, that was. Angry with himself for his shock and the stab of hurt that pierced him as her words sunk in and he realised just who she was. Angry with her for knowing all this time and never saying a word, even as he had bared as much of his soul to her as he had ever bared to any other person. Angry at the whole universe for this quirk of fate, a joke played squarely on him.

  ‘Free?’ he repeated, voice chilly with numbness. Who did this woman think she was? No matter what she called herself, no matter who she thought she was, she was a princess born and bred, and with that title came responsibilities not freedom. He had accepted that long ago; it was time she did too. ‘So to achieve that freedom you did what? You ran away?’ Scorn replaced the numbness, biting through the sunlit air.

  Amber had been sitting stock-still, eyes fixed on him, a plea in them he had no intention of heeding, but at his words, his tone, her green eyes flashed. Good. She was angry too; anger he could cope with. Anger he understood. Matched.

  ‘I’m not here to go over what happened that day. All I will say is that I don’t accept any betrothal entered into on my behalf without my consent and without my knowledge was, or is, valid.’

  During their brief conversation, Tris had been aware of his uncle statue-like beside him, frozen with disbelief. But as Amber finished speaking, her last hurt syllable fading away, his uncle’s reserve broke at last and he jumped to his feet. ‘Your grandmother had every right...’