Conquering His Virgin Queen

And now, despite all this spectacle, all this civility, the future of Farrehed was hanging by a thread. And the only person who could help him hold on to it was the woman he’d let into his palace to wear his ring.

Behind him Odir felt rather than heard a lull in the conversation and the hairs lifted on his arms. She should never have been able to elicit such a reaction in him. He’d once thought the barriers around his heart strong enough to prevent such a thing. But she had. And she still did.

Eloise—his wife, his future Queen—had arrived.

Odir watched her reflection in the glass as she made her way through the throng of people between them. The closer she got, the more eagerly he ate up the defiance that shone from the angle of her shoulders, her determined footsteps. Good. He wanted the promise of the fight she was offering him. He needed it.

He let her get almost within touching distance and then he struck.

Odir wheeled round and imprisoned her within his arms, proceeding to kiss her in a way that he had allowed himself on only a few occasions during their courtship. He took full advantage of her lips, opened partially in shock, and plunged his tongue into...

Into a heaven he’d refused to let himself remember.

As his lips carved out his domination over her he cursed inwardly. The taste of her tongue was shocking in its sweetness, her soft lips taking in every sweep of his firm command. He had meant the kiss to be retribution. He had not for one minute thought that it would be his own punishment. His entire body was on fire, and he jerked back away from her before he could get burnt.

For just a second the shock that lit her features was echoed in his eyes. Only once had he ever felt this way. On their wedding night... It had been a glimpse into the madness that might consume him whole, might tempt him to turn his back on his country’s needs.

And then he remembered what had happened two months after their wedding night...the lies and the betrayal... It was enough to return his presence of mind to what had to be done.

‘Eloise, habibti, I’m sorry. I couldn’t help myself,’ he said, with a smile so sickly sweet he wondered that anyone could believe it. ‘Even two days apart feels like...months,’ he said, through lips that still held the taste of her.

For a moment he almost hoped that she might slip up, that the hesitation he saw in her eyes would reveal her to be the fraud she truly was, but her instant reply was flawless.

‘I’m sorry that I couldn’t be on the same flight as you, darling.’

The lie slipped seamlessly from her lips, and yet again he wondered how he’d failed to notice such great skill in her throughout the months of their engagement and their brief marriage. Never mind. He would use it to his advantage and remember not to underestimate her. After all, she had managed to coerce his most loyal personal guard into doing her bidding.

No, it would not pay to underestimate his wife.

* * *

That kiss might have stolen her breath, and taunted her with memories of their wedding night—and it certainly was not the welcome that she’d expected from her husband—but that didn’t change a thing.

Eloise pushed down the betraying grip of desire that had dusted her body and forced it away before it could take hold. If her will hadn’t been enough, then the barely concealed warning in Odir’s eyes certainly was.

She had been here before. She had played many roles in her life and played them well. The perfect daughter, the doting wife... Just for one more night she could do it.

Eloise was skilled at recognising illusions and half-truths, but she could almost believe there had been a time when there was more to her husband’s glance than cold acceptance.

The French Ambassador claimed her attention with a bow.

‘Ma chère Eloise—I can’t tell you how sorry we were not to see you at the Hanley Cup in May. Matilde and I were just saying so, weren’t we?’ he asked of his wife.

Glancing at Matilde’s avaricious gaze, Eloise knew exactly what kind of speculation they had been involved in, and clearly they were greedily about to eat up the first juicy bit of gossip on Farrehed’s errant Princess.

Eloise was prepared to launch into the carefully constructed cover story of her actions over the last months when Odir cut in with an impossibly gentle chuckle. Chuckle? She didn’t think she’d ever heard such a sound from his lips in all the time she had known him.

‘You must forgive my wife. She’s been so preoccupied with her charitable works—’ the heavily laden words for her benefit alone ‘—that it feels as if I have hardly seen her once in the last six months.’

Matilde’s hungry gaze turned into one of reproach, and that only angered Eloise even more. The last words Odir had hurled at her across a room had been so full of fury they had driven her from Farrehed. He had forced her out of her country, her home, and he had the gall to blame her?

‘Odir, don’t exaggerate,’ she said playfully, putting a bit more weight than necessary behind a not-so-playful tap on his arm. ‘You know exactly where I have been.’ She turned to Matilde with the most ingratiating smile she had ever given and continued, ‘I have been overseeing a project to bring sovereign-funded, mental and medical health care to women of the tribes at the outer reaches of Farrehed.’

It was as close to the truth of what she had been helping to do in Zurich as it could be. As she well knew, the best lies were born from threads of truth. She had learnt that from her mother and father.

‘It’s no wonder you’re here, then,’ replied the smiling ambassador’s wife, and for a moment, Eloise was confused.

She had been so preoccupied with her husband’s summons she hadn’t even noticed which of Odir’s causes this event was for.

‘Eloise would never miss a charitable event that reaffirms the links between the World Health Organisation and the betterment of women in our country. But I hope that you will excuse us,’ he said, placing a reassuring hand on the ambassador’s shoulder. ‘It’s a little-known secret that it’s my wife’s birthday tomorrow, and I have a special present for her.’

Odir wrapped his strong arm around her waist like a steel clamp and started manoeuvring her from the room.

‘There’s only one birthday present I want from you, darling, and that’s a divorce.’

CHAPTER TWO

August 1st, 21.00-22.00, Heron Tower

‘KEEP YOUR VOICE DOWN,’ he commanded, pulling her tighter into his side as if he feared that she would try to escape.

Perhaps it wasn’t such a silly fear, as from the moment he had put his lips to hers, brushed the inside of her mouth with his tongue, all she’d wanted to do was run.

How galling it was to realise that within seconds of his kiss all she had wanted to do was give herself over to the feelings that she’d been wrong to think had died. Everything in her had surged up, almost bringing her arms to hang on to the lapels of his tux jacket.

People parted before them like the sea, and she knew that they would still have done the same even had he not been a prince, such was the power and authority he wore around him like a protective cloak.

From halfway across the room she could see Odir’s personal guard beginning to gather around a small doorway that led off to the side of the room.

‘Where are you taking me, Odir?’

‘What? No darling for me this time?’

She tried to pull her arm free, but he only tightened his hold.

‘Stop it or you’ll make a scene. And, as bad a job as you’ve already been doing as my wife for the last six months, believe me, you don’t want to make it worse.’

His response confused her momentarily. What did he care if she wasn’t being the perfect wife? He certainly hadn’t in the two months following their wedding day, having disappeared for weeks on end, leaving her to haunt the halls of the palace alone and lost. Surely the only reason he’d called her to London this evening was because he wanted to sever all ties with her?

Eloise couldn’t imagine for one moment that it would be anything else after the last words he’d said to her in Farrehed. After what he believed her to have done.

‘I’m not the one causing the scene, Odir. You are. I’ll ask again. Where are you taking me?’

He seemed to flinch as her voice had become almost loud enough for those closest to them to hear.

‘Somewhere we can talk. That is what you want, no? To talk?’

‘What I want is a—’

He wheeled her around so that she stood in front of him, impossibly close. He leaned in with what would look to the world like the satisfied smile of a loving husband. His lips were just beneath her ear, tantalisingly close.

‘Do. Not. Say. That. Again.’

Each whispered word pressed a puff of air against her heated skin, causing her pulse to jump erratically in response—her body seemingly ignorant of the threat his words implied.

He brought her back round to his side and pushed her through the crowd towards a private elevator. The doors slid open without a sound and Eloise stepped into a mirror-lined lift. If he wanted to talk, so be it—as long as it brought about her freedom.

It took her a moment to realise that she was alone with her husband for the first time since their wedding night. Since he had left her by herself, unable to get out of that ridiculous white dress. Standing by his side now, she looked at their reflection, multiplied over and over again until it was all she could see.

She took in the changes that six months had brought to his handsome features. The fine dusting of grey at his temples, shining bright against his thick dark hair. The lines that framed his eyes—closed now—and the hollows beneath his cheekbones, serving only to make him seem even more powerful and commanding. His cologne infused the air about them until it was all she could smell, overwhelming her completely.

She had expected anger from him. Fury, even. Not this cold carelessness that seemed to vibrate from his being. But she was astute enough to recognise the anticipation of anger as a learning from her childhood. From the powerful men she had encountered. Like her father. Like his.

‘Odir—’

‘Not yet,’ he said, without even bothering to open his eyes.

And all the anger she’d held at bay since the moment his lips had touched hers raised its ugly head and forced its way out.

‘No, you’ll listen to—’

But before she could finish her sentence the lift arrived at its destination and Odir stalked out into a corridor and through a door being held open by the guard already stationed there.

Eloise followed, feelings of uncertainty and a hatred of being ignored filling her, propelling her forward as she stepped over the threshold of a room she hadn’t expected.

Floor-to-ceiling windows launched her gaze out to the London she had glimpsed earlier from the lift. Spread out before them like a blanket made of black silk and sequins, its tiny lights shifted and flashed, outlining the London Eye and the Houses of Parliament. And strangely she felt an ache of homesickness pulse within her, even though she had not lived in London since she’d left university and made her way to Farrehed.

Not even three years later here she was, surveying it as if she were its lord and master.

And then she realised how foolish that thought was. She had never been lord and master of anything. That had been the role of her father and then her husband. The women in her family had never had the privilege of holding such power. Not until she had left her husband’s side.

Odir was standing two feet in front of her, but the reflection in the glass distorted the distance between them, showing them as almost side by side. He made no move to turn on the lights in the apartment and shadows swept around them as the clouds sped their way across the light of the moon, casting her husband’s face into half-light and shade as he turned to face her.

They might not have shared a bed, and they might not have spoken in half a year, but Eloise knew her husband. Knew that she should not push him. But she couldn’t back down now. It had taken everything she had to come here tonight. To face him one last time.

‘I want a divorce.’

‘What? No small-talk?’

‘You want small-talk? Fine. Hello, Husband, how was your day?’ she replied, mock sweetness dripping from her voice.

‘Pretty bad, actually. How was yours?’

‘Equally so, having been summoned halfway across Europe for God knows what reason.’

‘I’ve seen quite a number of sides to you, Eloise. Sweet and innocent, cold and indifferent. But I think this—righteous indignation—suits you the best.’

Yet he’d never seen the truth of her, she realised. Perhaps he hadn’t wanted or needed to once he’d had his ring on her finger. She sighed heavily. This was getting them nowhere.

‘Odir. Please. I want a divorce.’

‘As you keep saying,’ he replied. ‘But I’m afraid that doesn’t fit with my plans.’

‘And I’m afraid your plans no longer matter to me. I have built a life for myself in Switzerland. A life that doesn’t involve you. I’ve...changed, Odir. I am not the same woman you married.’

His eyes narrowed at that. Justifiably so. Six months ago she wouldn’t even have thought to fight back. But she was now.

‘Mmm...’ he murmured. ‘Perhaps you have changed.’

* * *

Odir took in the defiance that filled her slim frame. She had lost weight in the last six months, and he wasn’t sure that he liked it. He let arrogance fuel his gaze as it dropped to her feet and leisurely made its way back up, over her hips to her breasts, to her face. A gaze that heated her cheeks and stoked a fire within him.

He ate up the subtle changes in her—the way that anger brightened her eyes and flushed her cheeks—and for a second he thought he might possibly be forgiven for mistaking it as arousal. He cursed the way his body reacted, but knew it served as a reminder to be on his guard.

‘If you had liked what you saw when we were married, Odir, we might not be in this situation now.’

The barb hit home. It struck at the weakness he’d had for his wife—the one thing he’d promised himself he would not indulge in. Hadn’t his father’s obsessional love for his wife nearly destroyed his country? Hadn’t the impossible attraction between Odir and Eloise nearly made him do the same?

‘Don’t you dare turn this around on me.’ His low, dark tone buzzed in the air between them. ‘I may not have graced your bed, but someone else—’

‘Stop!’

She issued the command with such force her hand came up between them. And, bastard that he was, he relished her anger. Relished the fact that her feelings matched his own.

‘You never did like hearing the truth, did you, Eloise? Always running...always hiding.’

As the words fell from his lips he briefly wondered if they should instead be aimed at himself.

‘And you were never interested in the truth, Odir. Only in what suited you and Farrehed.’

‘What version of the truth would that be, Eloise? I’m curious. Because I’d like to know what I would find on the divorce papers. Would you place the blame at my feet, or would you own the fact that it was you who betrayed me? Tell me, Eloise, would you be ready to see, splashed all over the pages of the international press, the fact that you committed adultery with my brother?’

* * *

Eloise wanted to scream. Her hands were clenched into fists and she knew that her nails would leave crescent-moon-shaped indentations in her palms, but still she couldn’t release them. Because if she did they would be hurled against her husband, and she didn’t know if she would be able to stop.

Never had he asked her for the truth of that night. Not once.

‘Get out! Get out of my sight and don’t you dare come back!’

The words rang through her mind and she felt her heart break twice over—once for the past and once for the present. Odir had made an assumption. The wrong one. And he had never looked back, using it instead as an excuse to avoid his bought bride.

The night Odir had found his brother trying to kiss her had been one of the worst of her life. He hadn’t given either her or his brother the chance to explain. And clearly Jarhan had never put him right. Then again, she hadn’t really expected him to.

She tried to shake off the memory of Jarhan’s drunken attempts to kiss her but its hold was too great and it dragged her under.

She was in a different room...in a different country. She had been keeping Jarhan company ever since Sheikh Abbas had unveiled his plans for his younger son to wed the Princess of a nearby principality—Kalaran. She had been trying to comfort him, trying to convince him to explain, to tell the truth. But the fear in Jarhan’s eyes had been very real.

Stains from the red wine he’d been drinking all night had scored red grooves into the corners of his mouth, and the second his thin lips had crashed painfully against hers the young Prince had gone from being someone she had considered a friend and confidant to becoming the weapon of her undoing.

It was a kiss that had broken a marriage, a brotherhood, and the tentative future she had hoped one day to have.

‘So you still won’t believe me.’

‘Believe what? More lies from that delicious mouth of yours?’

The scorn in his words was completely at odds with the compliment he had given away so easily. He turned away and she let out a breath so heavy with grief it surprised even herself.

There had been a time, she acknowledged, when she’d cherished the idea of marrying Odir. Back then, barely two years ago, she had thought even the sun couldn’t shine brighter than Odir. He’d charmed her with a self-deprecation and a quick, warm wit she hadn’t expected. For a year during their engagement she had watched him, studied the care with which he spoke to palace attendants, seen his love of his people enter every decision he made, every act he chose.

He had been her childhood fantasy come to life. What had started out as their fathers’ business agreement had been moulded—so she had thought—by them. Together they had made something of their advantageous union. A friendship, she had once thought. A relationship, she had once hoped.

Here was the Prince who would whisk her away from the pains of her childhood—the Prince who would break the hold her father had over her. She had thought that perhaps he might even be her confidant—that finally she would have someone on her side.

But that had been before the reality of her marriage had struck, and all of Odir’s words and promises had disappeared into lonely nights as he’d found excuse after excuse to avoid her at every turn, leaving her cold and alone.

Now Eloise sought Odir amongst the shadows and could see determination painted across those features she had once longed to see soften and show something close to the love that they were reported to feel for each other. Looking at him now, she realised that she had been a child, with childish dreams.

She knew then that there was nothing she could say—no defence she could make of that night or any of the nights from then to now. Nothing would make any difference.

‘The past isn’t going to change. But the future can.’

His grim smile infuriated her.

‘You can say it as many times as you like, Eloise. It’s not going to happen.’

‘Odir, please. See reason. There was once a time when we could talk openly...’ She hated the longing that had crept into her voice. ‘Don’t you want to move on? Don’t you want to find a suitable princess? One who will be the right person to rule by your side one day and provide you with...with the heirs you need?’

She hoped that he would be swayed by the practicality of her argument—the same kind of practicality that had always defined their relationship.

Until she met his eyes. And then she knew that she was just as foolish as that girl who had once hoped this man would rescue her like one of the knights of old and whisk her away to a magical kingdom...

* * *

‘So, with your birthday tomorrow, on the brink of inheriting what I have been told is your grandfather’s considerable trust fund, you’re finally ready to ask for a divorce?’

The accusation heavy in his words was bad enough, but the fact that he knew about her grandfather’s trust fund was a shock.

‘How do you know about that?’

‘It’s amazing what investigators can find out in only the briefest of hours.’

How she wished she could make him understand about her trust fund—wished she could tell him what she wanted to do with the money. How she wanted to use it to help Natalia get the treatment she so desperately needed—the only way to treat the painful medical condition that would one day end her life before it had really ever begun.

But before she could create a response his furious words continued.

‘Tell me honestly, were you only waiting until your trust fund was released before you came to me asking for a divorce?’

She couldn’t deny it. Couldn’t deny that she’d had no other option. Her father’s machinations meant that until she had access to her trust fund she couldn’t leave this marriage. And she couldn’t explain to her husband why.

‘Were you always such a gold-digger? Or did a taste of royal life—even as brief as it was—ignite such an obscene fire for wealth in you?’

* * *

He hated the words that had exploded into the room, called forth from his deeply held anger. They burnt his tongue and scoured his throat, as if punishing him for the cruel taunt.

‘If that’s what you think of me then we really need a divorce, Odir. It’s impossible to have two people bound together with such...hatred.’

‘You made vows before God—before my country’s King and before its people. We don’t have a choice.’

‘There’s always a choice. I’ve seen the changes you’ve made in your country in the last six months. You’ve done incredible things. Things that have done so much to restore global respect for Farrehed.’

Could he hear admiration in her voice? It surprised him that she had kept up with the changes he’d had to make in the last months. The gruelling hours he’d spent undoing the destruction his father had caused. Or was it just carefully designed research in order to bolster her argument and get what she wanted?

He wondered what it would take for her to realise that what she wanted didn’t matter. That what he wanted didn’t matter. Not now. Not after...

He shut down the direction of his thoughts before they could take hold. He couldn’t afford to think about it. Not now. After he had her agreement, maybe. And maybe, even then, not until after the press conference.

He forced his mind back to their conversation.

‘And what would come of those changes—all that hard work—if I were to allow my wife to divorce me? Now that I have dragged Farrehed kicking and screaming into the twenty-first century? Now that I have ploughed money, time and energy into investments that will make Farrehed a global economy? One that survives—no, flourishes—in spite of the current climate? I’ll tell you what would come of those changes, Eloise,’ he said, just for once allowing free rein to his seething mass of emotions. ‘All of them would turn to dust should their King divorce his Queen.’

‘You are not King yet, Odir. Although it would be difficult, you can still obtain a divorce before you take the throne.’

Her words were little daggers, finding their way into his heart, and Odir cursed the slip of his tongue that might have revealed the extent of the power she held at this very moment.

He fought with the feelings in his chest...all the anger, grief and exhaustion from the last twelve hours. He wielded them like weapons and went on the attack. If her trust fund was the only thing that Eloise was holding out for, he could match that easily.

‘Let me go, Odir. Just let me go and you will never have to hear from me again.’

From a dark corner of the room a bitter laugh emerged, and he stepped from the shadows into a shaft of moonlight.