The Princess is Pregnant! (3 page)

“Is there a best one?” Selywyn interrupted.

The two men locked gazes, then the admiral shrugged ruefully. “I suppose not. I think we shall have to proceed to Plan B, as we discussed last night.”

“You were serious?” Logan questioned while Preston looked even grimmer.

“Dead serious. I don’t see another choice, and it would be the king’s wishes. Look at the situation. We’re in critical negotiations with the United States on a trade agreement, in talks with Majorco on a
military alliance and still have to convince the Ministers of the Exchequer of the wisdom of ratifying the international trade accord reached two months ago in Monaco. We must at least give the appearance of making progress on those fronts.”

Preston spoke up. “The law says if the king becomes incapacitated, the queen takes over as regent until a royal son is crowned. What of her?”

“The queen has never shown much interest in political affairs. The King of Majorco’s contempt for women entering a man’s world is well-known. I suggest we stall, at least until we know what is to become of the king,” Selywyn told them. “Or until one of the royal princes returns to the country and is made king.”

Selywyn was aware of his own fatigue as Monteque rubbed a hand over his face in an unconscious gesture of weariness. None of them had slept for more than a couple of hours at a time since the king’s mysterious ailment had befallen him last Sunday. It was now Thursday, and the military alliance treaty was to be signed in a public ceremony next month.

“It’s a hell of a time for both Owen and Dylan to be out of the country and unavailable,” Monteque continued. “I don’t think we should allow that in the future.”

“They’re young men with minds of their own,” Logan reminded the RET leader. He yawned and stretched. “They won’t be shackled.”

“Aye, the royals are different today than when the king and I were growing up,” Monteque said, referring to the five royal children of King Morgan and Queen Marissa.

“But not, I think, in their hearts,” Selywyn murmured. “I suppose we must get on with the business at hand. When should we put the emergency plan into effect, Admiral?”

Monteque rose. “At once.”

The admiral, along with Preston, left the private chamber. Selywyn turned to his friend, Logan, who was as close to the king as he was. “I wonder if we are about to admit the Trojan horse into the kingdom.”

But Logan’s eyes were closed and his head nodded to one side. Selywyn touched the man’s shoulder.

“Go to your bed, my friend,” he told the king’s bodyguard, who awoke with a start. “We’ll all need our wits about us to see this through to the end.”

Jean-Paul stood on the cliff that overlooked the private lagoon adjoining the grounds of the palace. His request for Megan to meet him had gone unanswered the previous day. Now he was taking matters into his own hands.

He felt certain she would slip down to her favorite place as soon as she had a spare moment, so he’d taken the liberty of going the long way to the
shore, approaching the hidden cove along the strand from the northwest and staying well out of sight of the palace walls where he might be spotted by the ever-present surveillance cameras.

Glancing at his watch, he saw it was nearly noon. An early morning fog lingered over the bay. He’d been on the beach since seven, and his disposition was not improving as each minute ticked by.

A lone figure appeared out of the mist.

Ah. A smile tipped the corners of his mouth as he recognized the graceful form of Megan, Royal Princess of Penwyck, making her way down the rocky path along the cliffs. Patience was at last rewarded.

She walked with surefooted skill, a slight woman, no more than five feet, four inches, weighing hardly more than a hundred pounds. Her dark hair curled damply around her shoulders in the mist, its auburn highlights dimmed by the fog. She held a long shawl snugly around her to ward off the chill breeze from the ocean.

He decided not to call out to her until she was on the beach so as not to startle her. A thrum of anticipation beat through him like jungle drums from a distant place. He remembered vividly how she had whispered his name in wonder as he’d caressed her.

During those moments, while the storm surged around them, the wildness of the selky had returned
to her eyes. She’d been incredibly passionate, responsive to his every touch, until he, too, had felt the call of the sea in his blood, until his heart had pounded with the fierceness of the storm surge, until he’d thought it would burst from his chest…

The next moment he exclaimed in annoyance as the princess skipped lightly over the rocks in the opposite direction from him rather than walking around the cove as he’d thought she would do. Some instinct cautioned him to silence as she approached the water’s edge.

To his astonishment, she tossed off the long shawl and her sandals. Clad only in a swimsuit, she raced into the chill sea and proceeded to swim out into the bay on the morning tide.

Surprise was replaced by a surge of fear so strong he was rendered motionless for a split second. Then he was on his feet, tossing shoes and clothing aside, and diving into an oncoming wave, determined to haul her back to shore.

She was a surprisingly strong swimmer and she knew how to ride the outgoing tide to her advantage. She was almost abreast of a small rocky island centered in the bay when he caught up with her.

Her eyes opened wide in obvious shock upon discovering him when she glanced over her left shoulder. “Wha—” she began. “Who is it?” she demanded in true regal style.

He raised his head and looked at her.

Her eyes, as green as the sea could sometimes
be, stared at him as if he were a strange creature she’d never seen before. Anger joined the hunger and fear and all other emotions that filled him.

“Jean-Paul Augustuve,” he informed her sardonically. “Good morning, Your Highness.” He executed a bow.

But Megan had already discerned who he was, had known it instinctively upon spying the dark hair and long, lean figure closing in on her as she neared the island.

“Hello,” she said in confusion.

Being that she was a virgin prior to her encounter with Jean-Paul, she’d never met an ex-lover face-to-face after the crime, so to speak. It was doubly awkward treading water while they spoke, like a couple of merfolk meeting accidentally. She had neither a mermaid’s nor a worldly woman’s wit and nonchalance.

“Hello, indeed.” He stretched out and in two strokes had arraigned himself beside her.

She swam to the rocky shore of the island, Jean-Paul beside her all the way.

“You didn’t answer my note yesterday,” he said when they stood side by side, water sluicing from their bodies.

A bolt like lightning hit her when she realized he wore only underclothes that clung, almost transparent, to him like a second skin. She hurriedly turned and selected a boulder to perch on so she could watch the restless ocean.

“I was busy,” she told him, groaning silently at how haughty she sounded.

“Which is why I waited for you here.”

She shot him an assessing look, not sure of his mood. His manner was calm, but she sensed the danger he could be if he chose.

“How nice to see you,” she said formally.

“Weren’t you expecting me?”

She shook her head.

His laughter was brief. “Did you think I was a callow youth who would flee in the face of fatherhood?”

A gasp tore from her throat, which suddenly seemed too hoarse to speak. She hadn’t had near enough time to prepare herself for this meeting, to find the words to ask what his intent might be, what his wishes were. “I…why do you say that?”

“A cryptic note that you needed to see me, written eight weeks and a day from our night on the sea? I would think it’s fairly obvious what conclusion should be drawn.”

“Oh.”

His hands clenched at his sides. His eyes raked her in anger. She felt like cringing but managed not to.

“Are you expecting a child?”

His voice lashed at her, shocking her as much as the question. “If I am?” she asked to gain time.

“There is no need for panic.” He gestured to
ward her and the sea. “I will do my duty toward you and the babe.”

The words should have soothed her troubled heart, but she was only more confused. It came to her that he perhaps thought she was considering taking her life and that of the child. Resentment, anger and other emotions whirled through her. She lifted her chin as pride asserted itself. “I am hardly in a panic. I often come out to the island when I wish to be alone and think…about things.”

Her hesitation must have given her away. “Then there is a child,” he concluded.

“No,” she denied.

He was silent while his eyes swept over her figure. “No?”

Her two-piece swimsuit suddenly seemed much too revealing. She opened her mouth, but no lie flowed from her lips. “I haven’t seen a doctor yet,” she confessed.

With a quick move, he caught her shoulders. “You said you didn’t play games. Don’t start with me,” he warned.

She took a deep breath. “Then yes, I think I am…that there is…”

“I’ll go to your father at once.”

She stared into his clear blue eyes. He seemed to have no problem accepting this possibility at all. “Why?”

“To ask for your hand. We must follow protocol. After all, you are a royal princess.”

“Wait,” she said, laying a hand on his chest as if he might dash up the knoll and confront her father on the spot. “I must think.”

Heat pulsed from where she touched him, running up her arm in waves that reminded her of the passion she’d found in his embrace. She pressed a hand to her temple, the world spinning completely out of control.

“We have some time,” he conceded, “but it isn’t infinite. Royal weddings take preparation. Or were you planning to elope?”

Now there was open amusement in his manner, as if he laughed at her expense.

“I wasn’t planning anything,” she informed him sharply, stepping away from his touch.

“I’ve heard pregnant women are often unreasonable,” he remarked, his smile widening.

“I’m not unreasonable! You can’t just waltz in here and start planning a wedding as if…as if…”

“As if we were lovers who’d been unable to wait for official blessings on our union?”

She stared at him aghast. He was twisting everything she said. And confusing her. Drawing courage around her like a cloak, she said, “I must go back. I have an appointment.”

His smile said he knew she was lying, but he spoke quite gently. “We’ll have dinner tonight and talk then. In the palace, or shall we go out?”

Everyone would notice if they went to a restaurant. Desperation seized her, and she said the first
thing that came to mind. “In my chambers. I’ll arrange it.”

“Good.” He guided them into the sea, staying by her side until they reached the mainland.

She kept her gaze carefully averted from the enticing flex of his muscles as they donned their garments. He escorted her to the palace gate, then lifted her chin with a finger and gazed into her eyes.

“Marriage to me may not be so bad as you obviously think,” he suggested with a touch of bitterness.

She avoided his gaze. “We’ll talk tonight. At eight.” She unlocked the gate and fled, rushing to her chambers in a welter of undefined emotion. “Hurry,” she said to her maid. “We have things to do.”

Then she sank into a chair and sat there in a daze, doing nothing at all.

M
egan paced from her desk to the window, then started back. She paused in front of the hearth and considered ordering a fire. But that might be construed as too intimate. God forbid she appear eager for intimacy with the handsome Earl of Silvershire.

She would have laughed at the irony but she wasn’t sure she’d be able to stop.
Poor princess,
everyone would say as they carried her away.
She just couldn’t handle the affairs of state.

It was affairs in general that she couldn’t handle, she admitted with gallows humor.

An authoritative knock sounded at the door. Candy, her personal maid, hovering over the table set for two, glanced her way in question. Megan nodded and stayed at the hearth.

Jean-Paul entered, thanked the maid, then looked directly into Megan’s eyes, trapping her with his commanding presence when she really wanted to bolt to her bedroom and hide in the closet. He bowed with careless grace.

Tonight he wore all black—slacks, shirt, sans tie, and velvet jacket. He looked like a storybook prince.

“You’re beautiful,” he said, as if this were such a simple truth it should be obvious to anyone who saw her.

Although the night often grew cool due to the sea breeze, she’d chosen a long summer dress of golden silk with satin leaves of deep green around the neckline and elbow-length sleeves and hem. He handed her a golden rose wrapped with ribbons of variegated green.

“Thank you. That was thoughtful.” She slipped the wrist corsage over her left hand, staring at it in confused wonder.

“I called and asked Candy about your outfit,” he explained.

An odd resentment flowed through her at the casual use of her maid’s name. Then it was gone as she recalled the whisper of her own name on his lips.
Megan,
he’d said in a husky murmur that magic night.
Sweet selky.

At that moment, had she been such a creature, she would never have traded her human form for
that of the sea mammal, although selkies supposedly yearned to return to their watery home.

She was brought back to the present when Jean-Paul crossed the carpet and lifted her hand to his lips. His kiss was brief and formal. But only for a moment, then he turned her hand and kissed her wrist. She gasped.

The maid gave a surprised exclamation, then quickly coughed to cover it. When Megan frowned her way, the girl smoothed an imaginary wrinkle in the tablecloth.

“You may serve the first course,” Megan said, sweeping past the earl and hearing the whisper of the silk against her thighs at the same instant she inhaled his scent, which was that of balsam cologne, shampoo and talc…and one she was thoroughly acquainted with.

She had to stop thinking like that!

“Please join me,” she invited, stopping at the table, which, set for two, seemed much too confining. However, they could hardly discuss their problems at the family table.

Besides, her mother was filling in at some royal function for the king this evening and the twins were out of the country, so only the princesses were at home. Megan didn’t want to share Jean-Paul with her sisters at present.

Thinking of the king, Megan wondered what important project had come up. Her father hadn’t been seen the past five days. Neither Megan nor her sis
ters knew what was up, which was not unusual; their father had left the raising of the children to his queen while he attended royal affairs.

On second thought, Meredith, who worked with the Royal Intelligence Institute, might know, but she hadn’t said.

Growing up in a palace, one learned to discern the faintest nuances of intrigue. Megan had discovered long ago that things were seldom as they seemed in a royal household and that personal matters always were last in priority. Her gaze went to her handsome guest.

“Deep thoughts?” Jean-Paul’s smile was mocking but not sarcastic or cruel. She’d never seen him act in a mean-spirited manner, a good trait in a father.

Quickly, before her unruly mind went off on another tangent, she sat and arranged her skirts while he took the chair opposite her. Candy served a chilled plum soup from fruit grown on the royal farm. Megan saw Jean-Paul’s eyes linger on the girl, a frown in the blue depths.

“That will be all for the evening, Candy,” Megan told the maid. “We’ll serve ourselves.”

With a confused bow, the young woman, recently turned eighteen, left the sitting room.

“Alone at last,” her guest murmured, his face relaxing into a pleased expression.

Startled at the laughter in his eyes, she managed a smile and picked up her spoon. The meal was
consumed in near silence. She was glad she’d chosen only four courses, for she couldn’t come up with a topic of small talk, and he didn’t try.

After they finished the white chocolate mousse, they returned to the sitting area. He chose the sofa after she took a chair at right angles to it.

She poured him a cup of coffee, black with no sugar as she remembered from their week in Monte Carlo, then prepared her own with half milk and one spoon of sugar.

“What is your position on marriage?” he asked as soon as the formalities were complete.

The question shook her composure like a broadside hitting a sailing ship. “I don’t approve of arranged ones.”

A frown snapped a groove between his eyes. “Has one been proposed for you?”

The fury startled her. “No. Of course not. Meredith would be wed first.”

He leaned forward and rested his forearms on his thighs. “Life as a royal is damned difficult. I suppose we would need to spend most of the year here. That wouldn’t be a problem while my father is alive. When I inherit, we’ll have to spend at least half the time at Silvershire.”

“This is absurd,” she began. He was planning where they would live while she hadn’t yet come to terms with a possible marriage.

His eyes met hers in a brilliant glance of blue fire. “You’ll like it there. We have the sea and the
mountains just as you do here. I’ll show you my secret places.”

“Wait!” she cried softly. “You’re…this is going too fast. I haven’t told my parents yet.”

“I said I’d speak to your father. Do you think I’d let you take the heat alone?”

“That’s noble of you, but as you noted, there’s no need to rush into anything.”

“Yet,” he added, his gaze sweeping over her. “You’re small. A child will show soon. Have you been ill in the mornings?”

She nodded, shy about admitting it. The fact seemed more intimate than the night they’d shared.

“And there is this,” he murmured, continuing his train of thought.

His move took her off guard as he gathered her into his arms, then easily lifted her to his lap. His lips touched her cheek, then followed a line down to her mouth when she dared look at him.

“I should reprimand you,” she told him sternly, but the scolding was for herself, for wanting his kiss.

“Are you going to?” he asked, not pausing in the light skimming touches of his lips on hers.

“No. I’m as wicked as you.”

He stopped, then laughed. “I’ll have to get used to your honesty.”

She laid a hand on his chest inside his jacket. “Do you deal only with dishonest women?”

“Perhaps. Or only with those who are very practiced at dissembling.”

The cynical admission reminded her that his life had been spent in the public eye much as hers had. Another bond, she thought and wondered how many more might be formed between them…and if that was good or bad for the heart.

He stroked her arms through the thin silk. “I’ve missed the taste of you. One night wasn’t enough.”

“How many would be?”

Raising his head, he studied her with a certain tinge of hostility in his gaze. “Where did that come from?”

She met his eyes levelly. “You. You’ve lived a liberal existence. Would one woman please you?”

He deftly rose and set her on her feet. “Perhaps. If she is the right woman.” His eyes pierced the thin ice that surrounded her heart. “And if I so choose.”

Megan managed not to flinch in the face of his cool statement of truth. She even smiled, because that magic night she’d let herself dream of their falling in love and sharing a true fairy-tale romance. But that was fantasy. Reality was having lunch and hearing her sisters speculate on the handsome Earl of Silvershire.

“Perhaps he seeks a bride,” Anastasia had suggested with irrepressible humor. “Which shall he choose—the brain, the nun or the jock?”

They had mocked the news media by choosing
nicknames among themselves, a secret bit of foolishness for their own amusement. Owen was referred to as the cowboy and Dylan was the captain due to his fascination with the sea and pirates. Only among the royal five did they use these names.

Megan sighed. At lunch, a desire to confide all to her sisters had nearly overwhelmed her. However, first she must speak with her father. No. First she would speak to her mother. The queen would know what to do.

Jean-Paul’s expression softened fractionally. “It has always been my intention to be true to my wife. Is that your only worry?” he demanded imperiously.

She ignored the question. “My sisters wondered if you came seeking a bride.”

“Did you tell them that choice was made?”

“Forced, you mean.” Her shoulders slumped. “How could we have been so foolish?”

She meant it as a rhetorical question, but he answered anyway. “What mortal can resist a selky?”

He hooked a finger under her chin and lifted her face to his. For a long second those icy blue eyes delved into hers, making her hot instead of cold.

“An alliance between us would work out well.” He paused as if in deep thought. “If you don’t want the baby, I will take it. My mother would love to have a grandchild to spoil.”

“I would never give up my child!”

His manner became frigid. “Neither would I. We
may have behaved foolishly, but the little one had no part in that. We must do what is best for his or her future.” He released her and walked toward the door. “Think upon that.”

She was speechless as he left her apartment. He wanted the child and thought she didn’t?

Wrapping her arms across herself, she contemplated the future. A child, she mused in wonder. A child that came from a magical night. And she knew who the selky had been in that wonderful coming together…

Queen Marissa turned her head at the sound of approaching footsteps. “Oh,” she said softly, surprised.

Her husband of thirty years, King Morgan, stopped, picked a red rose, removed the thorns and came to her.

Heart suddenly thudding, she watched him with a wary stance. She hadn’t seen him in over a week. Which wasn’t unusual. It was the way of a royal marriage.

She’d been twenty-three to his twenty-eight when they’d wed. An arranged marriage, of course, conducted through officials and ambassadors. Courtship had taken place after the wedding.

A blush lightly warmed her cheeks as she recalled that wondrous honeymoon.

As if he, too, were swept back into a distant time, Morgan bowed before her. With a slight smile on
his handsome face, he reached out with the long-stemmed rose and lightly drew it along her cheek, its cool petals like damp satin against her skin. He then continued down her throat until finally he paused at the vee of her morning gown.

With a deft movement, he tucked the flower between her breasts. Heat spread to a point deep inside her. She searched his face, not sure of the meaning of the rose. She saw passion in his eyes and felt an answer in herself. It had been such a long time…

Finally he sighed and retreated a step. “I must be going,” he said, “but I saw you in your garden and knew I couldn’t ignore such beauty.”

She studied the paleness of his skin. No matter how busy he was, he usually took time for brisk walks during the day. “You’ve been working very hard of late,” she began, then stopped, not wanting him to think she was complaining.

“And will be doing so in the future,” he added with a grimace. “Matters of state demand long hours.”

He lifted one finger to his mouth, then touched her lips, implanting a kiss there. A thrill went through her as if she were a young bride just getting to know her husband.

“I will see you…soon,” he murmured, his eyes hot, almost feverish, as he bid her farewell.

It took her a moment to get her breath after he
disappeared inside the palace. A knock on the outside garden door caused her to start and gasp.

“Mother?” called the voice of her middle daughter. “May I come in?”

“Please do,” she answered, composing herself.

Megan entered and closed the door carefully behind her. She executed a perfect curtsy, then came forward. Marissa noted her second child’s hesitant air and immediately put her own worries aside.

“How lovely you look,” she said, patting the bench beside her under the old rose arbor. “It seems ages since I’ve seen you.”

Megan settled herself, paying much attention to arranging the skirts of her morning gown. “We’ve all been busy of late.”

Contrition ate at Marissa’s conscience. She and the king had so little time for their children anymore. The girls had their own interests and the twins loved adventuring around the world.

“You seem worried,” she said, giving the girl an opening gambit.

Megan nodded, not sure how to begin. “When you and father were married, did he love you?”

She watched her mother anxiously and held in all the words that ached to tumble from her tongue in a surfeit of confession, guilt and uncertainty.

“I…” The queen stared at her in confusion, then an understanding smile curved the corners of her mouth. “Are you in love, my darling?”

Megan blinked back the sting of tears. She shrugged.

“Might I ask with whom?”

“It wasn’t love,” Megan said after a long silence. “I mean…I don’t think…I’m not sure…”

Her mother touched her hand lightly, comfortingly. “Tell me what I can do to help?”

Megan stared at the rose tucked into her mother’s gown. “You and Father love each other, but your marriage was arranged. Did you fall in love before the marriage? Or afterward?”

Megan saw she’d totally stunned her mother, who reddened then went pale. She swallowed and tried to think of words to explain to her parent the welter of feelings that darted around inside her without rhyme or reason.