Crown Prince's Bought Bride

And anxiety—‘You will find out in due course.’

Did he mean the agreement she’d made with Jules? If so, how?

It was clear he held a great deal of sway over his younger half-brother, despite Jules’s defiant attitude. Would he stoop to denying her what Jules had promised her?

That last thought kept her awake for the rest of the night until, giving up on sleep, she dragged herself out of bed just before her alarm went off at six.

Her father was already up, although not dressed, when she reached the kitchen. Maddie paused in the doorway, breath held, and examined him. His gauntness was even more pronounced than it had been a month ago—the result of his failing kidneys on top of the strong painkillers he’d become addicted to when his thriving property business had failed in the crash a decade ago.

He’d hidden his addiction for years, in a misguided attempt to keep up appearances and hang on to a wife who had made no bones about the fact that she expected to live a certain lifestyle and demanded her husband provide it.

A near overdose had brought everything to light three years ago, showing the shocking damage Henry Myers had done to his body. It had also been the start of many promises to get clean that had resulted time and again in relapse, and the raiding of their meagre finances to seek help for him that had pulled them deeper into destitution.

Eventually the fall from affluent lifestyle to nursing an addict in a tiny flat in one of the poorest neighbourhoods in London had become too much for her mother.

Once upon a time her father had been healthy, outgoing, a pillar of a man his peers had looked up to. Maddie’s childhood had been pampered and carefree, if a little emotionally unrewarding. She’d learned not to complain early on, when she’d realised her father loved her but was always busy and her mother was more preoccupied with retail therapy than her daughter’s emotional well-being. Even when the distance between her and her mother had widened, Maddie had been secure in her father’s abstract affection.

All of that had ended with Priscilla Myers’s three-minute phone call to Maddie at university. She’d had enough. Maddie needed to come home and take care of her father because she wasn’t prepared to live in poverty and disgrace. Any guilt about abandoning the husband she’d promised to stand by in sickness and in health hadn’t been reflected in her voice. She’d walked away without a backward glance or a forwarding address.

Maddie bottled up the still ravaging anguish now as she fully entered the kitchen. ‘You’re up early.’ She kept her voice light and airy.

Her father shrugged half-heartedly. ‘Couldn’t sleep,’ he muttered.

‘Do you want breakfast? Toast and tea?’ she asked hopefully.

He shook his head. ‘I’m not hungry. Maybe later.’

He was avoiding her gaze—a sure sign that the demons of addiction were snapping at his heels again. Her heart dropped. Had she owned more than the couple of hundred pounds she kept for emergencies in her bank account she would have taken the day off and stayed home to offer the support he baulked at but clearly needed.

Pushing back the despair, she pinned a smile on her face. ‘Mrs Jennings will look in on you later. She’ll fix you lunch if you’re hungry. There’s food in the fridge.’

His mouth compressed but he didn’t reply. Maddie pushed past the bite of guilt. Although her father suspected it, she hadn’t confirmed that desperation had driven her to pay their next-door neighbour a small sum to look in on him a few times a day.

After he had been bumped from the transplant list twice after relapsing, she’d resorted to desperate ways of keeping an eye on him. The last barrage of tests had revealed he was weeks away from full renal failure.

The doctors had advised that they wouldn’t sanction her father’s operation unless he remained clean for at least six months. He’d waved away her worries when she’d talked to him about it but so far he’d stayed clean.

All she needed to do was come through with the funds required for his operation. Funds entirely dependent on whether she finished her stint with Jules Montagne. Correction: Jules Montegova. Half-brother to Crown Prince Remirez Alexander Montegova.

The latter’s image rose up, large and imposing, dragging a small shiver down her spine as she finished her breakfast.

By the time she was done with the morning rush hour customers at the café where she worked near Oxford Street, the seed of worry that had taken root in the small hours had grown into a bramble bush.

Jules normally sent her a text in the early hours before he went to bed, telling her where and when to meet for their next ‘date’. When midday came and went without a word from him, her worry escalated to full-blown anxiety.

She didn’t want to waste her precious phone minutes calling him, but the inkling that something was wrong wouldn’t ease. Too much hinged on finishing what she’d started with Jules for her to prevaricate about this. She decided she would call him during her break.

The café was quieter, but still half full. Besides her, two other waitresses were busy delivering dishes to customers, with a third, Di, cleaning the table next to where Maddie was sorting cutlery.

‘Holy cow, it’s Prince Remirez!’ Di screeched.

Maddie almost jumped out of her skin, nearly dropping the two dozen forks in her hands. ‘What?’

Di pointed, wide-eyed, at the window.

Heart slamming against her ribs, Maddie turned and watched the man she’d spent far too many precious hours thinking about examining the café sign and the pavement with the same dripping disdain he’d shown for her neighbourhood last night.

The late March sun burst through the clouds in that moment, outlining his upturned haughty face in jaw-dropping relief.

Last night, in the dark nightclub and darker limo, she’d thought his breathtaking male beauty too good to be true. Now, with the sun caressing every spectacular feature, Maddie was left in no doubt that from head to toe the man next in line to the throne of Montegova was a magnificent male specimen.

She managed to drag her gaze from that rugged jaw and captivating face long enough to glance at her colleague. ‘You know who he is?’

Di rolled her eyes. ‘Duh! Every female with a pulse over the age of fourteen knows who he is. His brother Zak is equally hot. I wonder what the Crown Prince is doing here, though. I would’ve thought Bond Street was more his speed if he’s shopping. Hey, don’t royals have minions to do that sort of—? Oh, my God, he’s coming in here!’

Maddie turned away, praying Di was wrong. He wasn’t here for her. He couldn’t be. In the dark of a nightclub, in the midst of minor celebrities and royalty, it was easy to explain away a crown prince’s fleeting interest in her—even to herself.

Here, among the cheap plastic furniture and even cheaper food of a street corner café, it was difficult to rationalise why the hottest man alive would seek her out.

But what were the chances that he was here on some other mission?

Di continued to chatter away. Maddie kept her back to the door, despite the mocking voice that said she was burying her head in the sand.

Moments later she heard the hush in the café, heard the firm, confident footfalls of a man who believed he owned the very ground he walked on—right before she felt the mildly earth-shaking vibrations of his presence behind her.

‘Miss Myers.’

Dear God, she hadn’t imagined the impact of that voice. Nor had she imagined its pulse-destroying effect on her.

She tried fruitlessly to fight the shivers coursing through her as she turned around. And promptly lost her grip on the forks in her hand.

The clatter was astounding.

Face flaming, Maddie dropped to her knees, furiously scrambling for the forks. Before her, a pair of polished hand-stitched shoes remained planted. Unmoving. She refused to look up, refused to acknowledge the existence of the man clad in an expensive, dark navy pinstriped suit that probably cost more than her year’s salary. She crawled around him, snatching up the utensils as her face grew hotter. When she had them all she sat back on her heels, prepared to rise.

‘Miss Myers?’

Maddie bit her lip, knowing she couldn’t avoid looking at him. She tilted her head, her breath strangling all over again when her eyes clashed with his silver-grey ones. They were ferociously intense, even as one eyebrow slowly lifted mockingly and he examined her flushed face.

‘Um...yes?’ She was sure embarrassment was what had rendered her voice a husky mess, not the charged volts shooting through her pelvis and the stinging awareness that she was at eye level with his crotch.

She blinked, her brain emptying of everything but one single, breath-stealing erotic image.

‘You missed one.’

A throat cleared. Hastily she glanced down, saw one cheap scratched fork held between his long, neatly tapered fingers.

She snatched it from him. ‘Thank you.’

Still on her knees, she placed the forks on the nearest table, then froze when Prince Remirez extended one elegant hand towards her.

Her heart leapt into her throat as she considered the many ways she could refuse his assistance without causing offence.

There were none.

So she placed her hand in his, felt his fingers glide across her palm on their way to gripping hers. She’d once read a novel in which the heroine described feeling pure electricity when she touched the man of her dreams. Maddie had rolled her eyes then.

Now she sent a silent apology to the maligned character.

Crown Prince Remirez would never be the man of her dreams, and she wasn’t going to waste her time counting the many ways why, but the reality that singed and branded and claimed that small portion of her body promised that she would never shake another hand without remembering this captivating moment.

Her insides liquefied as he tightened his grip and tugged her to her feet. The slight tautening of his face and the flare in his eyes told her he wasn’t completely unaffected by what was happening. Nor did he miss her wince as her arm twinged in pain.

The moment she felt steady on her feet she tried to snatch her hand from his. He kept hold of her for a moment longer before he released her.

When she could breathe again Maddie threw a furtive glance around her. As suspected, every single gaze in the café was fixed on her, including her boss’s—although his curiosity was beginning to dissolve into annoyance.

‘Would...would you like a table, um... Your Highness?’ Was that the correct form of address? Or was it Your Grace? ‘You can pick any one you like. I’ll be with you as soon as I finish putting—’

‘I’m not here to dine, Miss Myers.’ He cut across her, not bothering to keep his voice down. Or the disdain out of it.

She reminded herself that she needed this job and therefore couldn’t afford to be rude to patrons or non-patrons. ‘In that case I can’t really help you, since I’m working. Maybe we can—’

‘It’s in your interest to make time. Now.’

About to refuse, because her heart rate didn’t seem interested in slowing down, and because he really was a little too potent to her senses, she paused. Something in his voice warned her against it.

Belatedly she remembered that he’d summoned Jules to breakfast this morning. Had Jules divulged their connection? Was that why he was here?

She searched his face and came away with nothing but further evidence of his heart-stopping gorgeousness.

A quick glance at the clock showed it was a quarter past eleven. The lunchtime rush hour wouldn’t start for another half hour. ‘Jim, can I take my break now? I’ll make it up later.’

The head chef, who also happened to be the café’s owner, glanced from her to Prince Remirez and then, barely hiding his irritation, nodded. ‘I s’pose so.’

She flashed him a grateful smile, then dived into the small cubicle that doubled up as a changing and break room to get her bag. Slinging it crossways over her shoulder, she hurried through the café and out onto the pavement.

Where a small crowd had gathered, their camera phones ready to capture the image of the most captivating man on earth.

‘We’ll have more privacy in the car,’ Prince Remirez pronounced smoothly, a second before his hand arrived at her waist and nudged her firmly in the direction of the open back door of a limo.

Maddie entered, immediately noting the different configuration of the seats from last night’s car. There was no bench seat on the far side behind the driver. Which left her no choice but shuffle along the seat as Prince Remirez slid in after her.

The door shut behind him and instantly the atmosphere closed in around them. The push of air wrapped his scent around her, triggering that insane urge to bury her face in his neck and drown herself in his scent.

Whether it came from a bottle or it was a specially branded scent, it was lethal enough to be seriously addictive to women.

Addictive.

The word brought her up short, flinging her foolish ruminations into harsh reality. ‘Okay, Your Highness. You have fifteen minutes.’

He adjusted his cuffs, rested his elegant hands on his thighs before fixing his ferocious eyes on her. ‘Your business with Jules is over,’ he stated bluntly.

Maddie tried not to panic, but fear raced up her spine and threatened to paralyse her all the same.

After forcing herself to take a few slow, rib-bruising breaths, she pulled her phone from her pocket. ‘With all due respect, I want to hear it from him.’

Prince Remirez glanced at her phone. ‘He’s already on a plane to Montegova. You won’t see him or talk to him again. Your number has been blocked from his phone permanently so save yourself the trouble.’

A cold shiver ploughed through her. ‘Why are you doing this?’

He reached into his breast pocket and extracted a dark burgundy card with sleek gold numbers embossed on the front and back. ‘I came here to tell you that if you wish to salvage anything from this I am prepared to hear you out.’ He nodded at the card. ‘My address and private number are on the back. You have twenty-four hours to use it. Then I too will be out of your reach.’

CHAPTER THREE

LAST NIGHT, SEEING her in real life for the first time, Remi had thought her beauty exceptional.

Right now, watching the muted light from the sun-roof bathe her in a soft glow, she was even more exquisite.

Maddie Myers’s beauty was like nothing he’d ever seen. For starters, he couldn’t put his finger on why she would look so magnificent in a cheap, drab waitress’s uniform when last night she’d been dressed in finer, albeit more risqué, attire.

The other puzzling thing was that Remi had dated women who were equally beautiful. And yet something about this woman, whose beauty oozed from her very pores, triggered a stark, cloying hunger within him that he hadn’t quite been able to get a handle on.

That hunger had roared to life the moment he’d walked into that dismal café, and intensified when she’d dropped to her knees before him. Even now base images reeled through his mind. Images he had no business accommodating in public.

Years spent perfecting the art of schooling his expression had saved him from blatantly telegraphing his reaction. But those images were etched clearly in his brain, gaining lurid purchase as her plump lips part in shock.

‘Jules is really gone?’ she demanded huskily.

Remi gritted his teeth, finding the chore of discussing his half-brother with this woman intensely unsatisfactory. ‘Yes.’

Brows two shades darker than her honey-gold hair bunched together in confusion. ‘But... I don’t understand.’

‘What’s there to understand? He’s finally decided to grow up and make a meaningful contribution to the kingdom.’

‘Just like that?’ she asked sceptically.

‘Of course not. It’s taken a considerable amount of time to make him accept his responsibilities.’

‘And you came here to get him to do that?’

Remi shrugged. ‘It was past time someone did.’ He watched her carefully for signs that whatever had been going on between her and Jules was more than a light dalliance.

Her eyelashes swept down, shielding her expression from him. He fisted his hand on his thigh to curb the urge to cup her chin and expose her gaze to him.

After a moment, she swiped the tip of her tongue over her bottom lip. ‘Did he...did he say anything about me?’ she enquired gruffly.

His irritation grew. ‘Should he have?’

Her long lashes flew up, jade-green eyes flashing at him before she turned to stare blindly out of the window.

Remi continued to study her. Although her fingers twisted the handle of her bag in agitation, her expression didn’t reflect the forlorn anguish of a discarded lover. No, Maddie Myers’s demeanour betrayed a different sort of torment. One of panicked frustration.

Jules had been an important cog in the wheel of her plans. A thwarted plan she was now furiously reassessing.

Still, he needed to be sure. ‘You didn’t kiss him back.’

Her head whipped towards him, her eyes widening. ‘What?’

‘Last night your supposed lover kissed you goodnight. You didn’t kiss him back. In fact you seemed disturbingly apathetic.’

Remi was certain that had been one of the reasons he hadn’t acted on his visceral need to separate them. The other had been because he hadn’t wanted to attract even more attention than his presence in that seedy nightclub had already garnered.

Maddie Myers schooled her features in a way that would have made his childhood deportment instructors proud. ‘Didn’t I? You must be mistaken.’

‘I was not. Why were you with Jules?’ The question was beginning to grate, like a tiny stone in his shoe.

‘According to you, he’s several thousand miles away. Therefore why we were together no longer matters, does it?’

Her gaze dropped to her phone, and there was a contemplative look in her eyes.

‘It matters if you’re planning to contact him the moment you’re out of my sight. If you are, I seriously advise against it.’

Defiant eyes met his. ‘I fail to see how you’re going to stop me, since the minute I step out of this vehicle I intend never to see you again.’

‘You delude yourself if you think you’ll be free of me that easily.’

‘And you delude yourself with...with whatever you think this interrogation is. I owe you nothing. Getting into this car with you was a courtesy. One you’ve outworn. So, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going back to work now before I annoy my boss.’

She reached for the handle to the door that would open onto the street.

He darted forward and seized her wrist, quiet fury laced with something that felt alarmingly close to dread fizzing through his bloodstream. ‘Are you always this careless with your safety?’ he demanded, aware his voice was harsh and gruff.

He told himself it had nothing to do with the guilt fused into his being. Or the breathtaking smoothness of the skin stretched over her racing pulse.

For some reason she found his question amusing, although her thousand-watt smile barely made an appearance before it was extinguished again. ‘Did you not ask your brother how we met?’

All he’d wanted from Jules this morning was his agreement to board the royal plane back to Montegova, and a promise that he would cease contact with Maddie Myers immediately. Discussions of duty and responsibility had been shelved when he’d realised his brother was severely hungover.

‘The subject didn’t come up.’

‘Well, he nearly ran me over with his supercar. And, no, I wasn’t being reckless. The signal to cross was still green when he hit me.’

Remi’s blood went deathly cold. Over the last two years he’d lived with an unending torrent of might-have-beens. All the things he might have done to alter events. The image of Maddie Myers lying lifeless on a filthy pavement awoke demons he’d fought hard and failed to conquer.

‘Jules hit you with his car?’ He was aware his voice was a thin, icy blade. But it was only when she flinched that his gaze dropped to the hold he had on her.

He loosened his grip as other things began to fall into place. The wincing she tried to hide. The flash of pain across her face last night in the car and when he’d touched her in the café.

Rage rose to mingle with the guilt. ‘How badly were you hurt?’ The gravel-rough demand seared his throat.

Her head dipped and her gaze fell to her lap. ‘Besides my pride and a few bruises and scratches, I’d say the groceries that met their end on Camberwell New Road came off worse.’

Ice-cold fingers gripped his nape. ‘Don’t be flippant about it.’

His harsh rebuttal made her flinch. When her eyes darted to his fists, Remi realised he’d clenched them so hard the knuckles were bloodless.

‘I... It wasn’t a big deal,’ she whispered.

He slowly unfurled his hands. Sucked in one long breath. ‘Was that when you struck this secret bargain between the two of you?’

A flash of alarm crossed her face, then evaporated to leave faint pink spots on her cheeks. Without answering she turned resolutely to the door. ‘This conversation is over. Goodbye, Your Highness.’

Remi had no intention of letting her get away. Not until he’d delved into these new revelations. Revelations that had him secretly reeling.

‘I’ve changed my mind. You no longer have twenty-four hours.’

He picked up the card she’d dropped on the seat between them and slid it back into his pocket.

He nodded abruptly. And a moment later his car had left the kerb and the café behind.

Her shocked gaze swung to the window, then back to him. ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’

‘We’re going to talk. In one hour you’ll either have decided you don’t work at that café any more or your boss will be adequately compensated for your absence and you can return to work tomorrow morning. Either way, neither of you will lose. Put your seatbelt on.’

‘No! I don’t know how things work in your country, but here what you’re doing is called kidnapping!’

Remi caught her arm just beneath the short sleeve of her cheap shirt, again noting the satin-smoothness of her skin and the sizzle of miniature fireworks that transmitted from her skin to his.

Back in the café, when he’d first touched her, he mocked himself for over-exaggerating the sensation. Now he knew for sure as the blood heated in his veins.

Her breath hitched and her alluring eyes dropped to where he held her before she jerked away from him. ‘Please don’t touch me.’

Reluctantly, he released her. She gave a tiny shake of her head, as if she found the sizzling, unwanted chemistry as confounding as he did. That knowledge only intensified the urgency rampaging through him.

‘You will tell me why you’re anxious to get in touch with Jules. After you tell me in detail about your first meeting.’ He frowned as his memory came up blank on that part of Maddie Myers’s recent history. ‘Why isn’t there a record of the accident or a hospital visit?’

Sparks flared in her eyes. ‘Because there wasn’t one. And in case I didn’t get around to mentioning it last night, it’s loathsome of you to pry into my life the way you blithely believe you have a right to.’

‘Why wasn’t there one?’ he demanded.

‘Because your brother didn’t take me to hospital, that’s why.’

This time he couldn’t contain his curse, the fury that tripled his heartbeat or the churning alarm that underpinned all his emotions. ‘He nearly ran you over and you didn’t demand to be taken to a hospital?’

Her expression closed and she avoided his gaze. ‘I told you—’

‘You’re trying to hide the fact that you’re favouring your right arm and yet you flinch and grow pale with every contact. Either you’re truly intent on deluding yourself that your injury is no big deal...’ he paused as a deeper bolt of emotion, a protectiveness he didn’t welcome, kicked him in the gut ‘...or there’s another reason you’re burying your head in the sand.’