Читать книгу Marrying Her Royal Enemy - Jennifer Hayward - Страница 8
ОглавлениеSO THIS WAS what freedom tasted like.
Princess Styliani Constantinides, or Stella, as she had been known since birth, lifted an exotic rum-based cocktail to her lips and took a sip, the contrasting bitter and sweet flavors of the spirits lingering on her tongue before blazing a fiery path down to her stomach, where they imbued an intense feeling of well-being.
The perfect combination for this particular moment as she sat in her friend Jessie’s tiny, local bar on the west coast of Barbados, halfway around the world from her home in Akathinia, contemplating her future.
Sweet, given the burnout she’d been suffering from after the hundred-plus public appearances she’d done last year, in addition to her work chairing the boards of two international youth agencies. Bitter because her brother Nik had accused her of running away from the issue at hand.
As if it had been just yesterday she’d ditched her Swiss finishing school to spend a month in Paris when she’d thought the stifling formality of her studies might suck the very life out of her. As if every sacrifice she’d made since then had meant nothing...
“How’s that?”
The testosterone-laden, dreadlocked bartender rested his forearms on the gray-veined marble bar and cocked a thick, dark brow at her.
“On the nose.” The smile she gave him was the first real one she’d managed in months. He offered a thumbs-up in return, then moved on to serve another customer.
Relaxing back in her stool, she cradled the tulip-shaped glass in her hands and studied the fiery jewel tones of the cocktail glowing in the fairy lights of the beachside bar. She deigned to disagree with her brother, the king. She was not, in fact, running, so much as drawing a line in the sand. She may have given up her childhood dream for her country and sacrificed the freedom that was like oxygen to her, but her brother’s latest request was over the line. Untenable. Out of the question.
She wouldn’t do it.
Her breath left her in a long, cathartic exhale. Pulling in another lungful of the salty ocean air, she felt her limbs loosen, the band of tension encircling her skull ease, the tightness in her chest unwind. The release of pressure unshackled something inside of her that had been knotted and twisted for weeks.
When was the last time she’d felt she could breathe? As if the forces conspiring to turn her life upside down were not in control, but she was. As if the insanity that had driven her to this Caribbean paradise had simply been a vexing nightmare that an airplane ticket purchased under an assumed name and a lifetime of skill in eluding her bodyguards could fix.
A smile curved her lips. It had been a compelling game. Almost as fun as the ones she and Nik had used to play on the palace staff. Convincing Darius, her ex–special ops bodyguard, to let her leave the palace alone and dropping an arch hint she was headed for a secret tryst, when, in fact, a man was the last thing she wanted in her life, had summoned a blush to the hardened serviceman’s cheeks and an agreement to “overlook” her departure from the palace. Boarding a commercial flight in a Harvard T-shirt and sunglasses and making the getaway from the pink-sanded Mediterranean island paradise she called home had been even easier.
The only rain on her very slick parade had been the text from Nik. She’d sent him one to say she was fine, that she needed time to think. His blunt, admonishing reply had made her turn off her phone.
Her brother could, of course, find her if he wanted to. But she knew he wouldn’t. Once her twin royal rebel, Nik knew the price it had cost her to clip her wings. He himself had made the ultimate sacrifice in taking their brother Athamos’s place as king, giving up the life he’d loved in New York when Athamos had been killed in a tragic car accident that had rocked Akathinia. He would allow her this time to find her head, herself. If she even knew who she was anymore.
“Need a menu?” The bartender waved one at her.
“Please.” There were no paparazzi lying in wait to chase her from the bar, no Darius watching her with eagle-eyed precision from ten feet away, nor did anyone have a clue who she was in jeans, a T-shirt and sunglasses. Since Jessie wouldn’t be free until the dinner rush was over, she might as well eat and enjoy the superb sunset from one of the patio tables.
“I hear the calamari is spectacular.”
The low, textured voice came from her right, delivered by the male who slid onto the stool beside her. She froze, breath jamming in her throat. The hairs on the back of her neck rose to attention, a sense of unreality washing over her. It couldn’t be. Except that voice carrying a Carnelian accent, infused with a Western inflection, that richly flavored, deeply masculine tone, could belong to only one man.
Noooo. Every muscle in her body tensed in rejection, her heart shutting down in coordination with her breathing as the earthy, sensual scent of him slammed into her senses. Her toes curled in her shoes, ordering—begging—her to run. But she had never been, nor would she ever be, a coward, so she looked up at the king of Carnelia instead.
Tall and muscular, he dwarfed the stool he sat on, as if he went on forever, the sheer brawn of him riveting; intimidating. But what was perhaps more hazardous to a woman’s health was how all that sheer masculine power was cloaked with a civilized veneer that had always set him apart from his savage of a father. That had once made her believe he was different.
Kostas Laskos lifted a hand to capture the bartender’s attention, an unnecessary action when everyone in the bar was staring at him. The women because his hawkish, striking face, set off by his short-cropped black hair, was just that arresting. The men because anyone that dangerous was to be inspected and sized up immediately.
“The oldest Mount Gay you have,” the king requested.
Diavole. Her stomach retracted in a visceral reaction only this man had ever been able to elicit. Stunning, as he had been the last time she’d seen him, in ceremonial uniform at the Independence Day ball in Akathinia, tonight in jeans and a shirt rolled up at the elbows, he was compelling in a way the sunset staining the sky outside was—an utterly unavoidable, spectacularly beautiful product of nature.
His long, powerful fingers claimed her attention as he lowered them to his side. He had lethal hands—ones that could snap a man’s neck as easily as they had crushed her eighteen-year-old heart. Hands that purportedly seduced so skillfully that women lined up for him to do it, but she wouldn’t know because he had saved his cruelest rejection for her.
Her teeth sank into her lower lip, the effects of him reverberating through her. He had kissed her with that beautiful, sensual mouth of his, the only soft part of Kostas that existed, to comfort her after her dreams had come crashing down around her. He had stripped her of her innocent defenses, shown her what true fire could look like, then walked away, making a mockery of her teenage idolization.
She hated him.
He was watching her, analyzing her every reaction to him in that deadly way of his. She forced herself to speak past the blood pounding in her ears. “Shouldn’t you be home ruling over that band of ruffians you inherited, or did your jet run out of fuel?”
A corner of his mouth lifted. “You know why I’m here.”
She set down her glass with a jerky movement, liquid sloshing precariously close to the sides. “Well, you can refuel and be on your way. I gave Nik my answer. I wouldn’t marry you if you came with a dowry of a hundred billion euros.”
“I think you have that the wrong way around.”
“I think I don’t. I’m the prize in this scenario, am I not? Or you wouldn’t have flown halfway around the world to harass me.”
“I wouldn’t have had to if you’d given me the time I’d requested.”
“I refused what was on offer.”
His whiskey-soaked gaze glittered. “How can you know what you don’t want when you don’t even know what’s on offer?”
She pressed her fingers against her mouth. “Let’s see... Hmm. A barbarian for a husband, living in the enemy’s lair, a union with a man who didn’t even have the guts to try to stop his father when he tried to take Akathinia? No, thank you.”
His jaw tightened. “Watch yourself, Stella. You don’t have all the facts.”
“It’s a year and a half too late. I no longer care.” She pushed away from the bar and slid off the stool. “Go home, Kostas.”
“Sit down.” The words left his mouth with the fine edge of a scythe. “Do me the courtesy of hearing me out. The time for tantrums is long past.”
Customers turned to stare. Jessie, who was seating a table, looked over, eyes widening as she took in the man beside her. Stella waved her off and sat down because she didn’t want to cause a scene and blow her cover. Not because of the inherent command in the king’s voice.
Kostas pinned his gaze on her. “Have dinner with me. Listen to what I have to say. I promise if you do, I will leave and accept whatever decision you make.”
Accept whatever decision she made? Had he always been this arrogant? How could she once have thought herself so blindingly in love with him she’d willingly made a complete fool of herself over him?
Heat smoked through her, singeing her skin. “Kala,” she drawled in her most agreeable voice. “You’re right. This conversation is long overdue. Why don’t you order us a good bottle of Bordeaux, find a table, and we’ll discuss it over dinner like two civilized adults?”
She slid off the stool and sashayed toward the washrooms.
* * *
Kostas knew the moment Stella turned on her heel that she wasn’t coming back. He knew her. Had known her since childhood, when the royal families of Akathinia and Carnelia had crossed paths at official celebrations, at the dozens of royal occasions that marked the season in the Mediterranean. His family had had a measure of respectability then, as his father’s tendency toward a dictatorial rule had been less pronounced.
He had watched Stella grow from an undeniably attractive teenager into a spirited, often recalcitrant young woman who spent so much of her time flaunting the rules he wasn’t sure she could see past her insurgency. Except of late. The past few years had seen the Akathinian princess turn herself into a respected global philanthropist, her rebellious edge muted if not entirely eliminated.
And for that, he was glad. It was her will he had always respected, found himself irresistibly drawn to. Her strength of character. It was a quality he required in a wife, a woman who could accomplish extraordinary things with him—change the very fabric of a nation that had suffered greatly. Few would have the courage to take on the challenge he was about to offer her. Stella had been born with it.
He caught the proprietor’s attention, secured a private table outside on the edge of the patio, then returned inside to lean against the wall opposite the washrooms, arms crossed over his chest. When Stella emerged and headed directly for the exit, he cleared his throat.
“I thought you might need help finding the table,” he offered in as benign a tone as she had drawn him in with. “Château Margaux okay?”
Her eyes widened, then narrowed, a series of emotions flashing across her arresting face as she formulated an alternate game plan. “Lovely,” she announced, swishing past him into the restaurant.
He followed, a surge of amusement filling him as he contemplated her better-than-average backside, set off to perfection in formfitting blue jeans. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt alive, awake to the zest of a life he’d lost his taste for. It figured Stella would be the one to snap him out of it.
Guiding her to the table on the patio with his fingertips at her elbow, he held her chair out for her. She sat down, allowing him to push in the chair. He deliberately let his fingers brush her shoulders as he lifted his hands away, eliciting a visible flinch from the princess. A test. He recorded it with satisfaction. She wished it to be hate, but he knew it was anything but.
He fixed his attention on the woman sitting across from him while he waited for their server to uncork the impressive bottle of Bordeaux. Devoid of makeup, with her hair pulled back into a tight ponytail, the bold, strong lines of her face were a challenge in themselves. Not classically beautiful, but unforgettable when paired with her ice-blue eyes and blond hair.
Where every other woman had eventually faded to a blurry replication of the last, Stella had remained unique. The one he couldn’t group with all the rest. The one his twenty-three-year-old self had somehow resisted with an impressive display of self-control. Just.
The waiter left the wine to breathe. Kostas laced his fingers together on the table and addressed the land mine that lay between them. “I’m sorry about Athamos. I know how much you loved him. I understand the grief you and your family must be going through.”
“Do you?” She lifted her chin, fixing those spectacular blue eyes on him. “I don’t think you could possibly understand the grief we feel because you are alive, Kostas, and Athamos is dead.”
He drew in a breath at the direct hit. He had expected it. Deserved it. Had spent every waking moment since the night Athamos had died wishing he could turn back time. Wishing he could bring Stella’s brother, the former crown prince of Akathinia, back to his family. But he couldn’t. The events of that night would always be a waking nightmare for him. A reminder of his flaws. All he could do was forgive himself for his mistakes and attempt to move on before he destroyed himself, too. With a country resting its hopes on him, that wasn’t an option.
He held her cold, bitter gaze. “He was a friend as much as a rival, you know that. Our relationship was complex. I need to take responsibility for what happened that night, but both Athamos and I agreed to that race. We both made bad decisions.”
Fire disintegrated the ice in her eyes. “Yes, but you were the ringleader. I’ve heard the stories about you two in flight school—they’re legendary. You egged him on until neither of you could see straight past your obsession to win. But you weren’t collecting points to be top dog that night, you were gambling with your lives. How can I forgive you for that knowing Athamos was following in your trail? In your suicidal jet wash?”
“Because you need to,” he growled. “Because bitterness won’t solve anything. I can’t bring him back, Stella. I would if I could. You need to forgive me so we can move on.”
“It’s too late for forgiveness.”
He closed his hand over hers on the table. She yanked it away, glaring at him.
“What was so important you couldn’t have come to us and explained what happened? What was so imperative you needed to walk away without putting us out of our misery?”
“I should have.” He closed his eyes, searching for the right words. “What happened that night rocked me...shattered me. I needed time to process what had happened. To pick up the pieces...”
“And that was more important than the precious peace and democracy you preach?” She fired the words at him, her hand slicing through the air. “While you were finding yourself, we were living in fear, terrified your father would annex Akathinia back into the Catharian Islands. How could you not have intervened?”
His fingers curled around the edge of the table. “My father was the king. Short of overthrowing him, spearheading a mutiny against my own flesh and blood, the only thing I could do was try to reason with him. It wasn’t working near the end. He was losing his mental faculties, suffering from dementia. I had to bide my time until I took control.”
“So you put yourself into a self-imposed exile?”
“I went to Tibet.”
“Tibet?” Her eyes widened. “You went to live with the monks?”
“Something like that.”
She stared at him as if searching for some sign he was joking. When he said nothing, she sat back in her chair, eyes bleak. “Did your sojourn afford you the forgiveness you craved? The absolution? Or perhaps it was peace you were looking for. Lord knows we’ve all been searching for that. We didn’t even have a body to bury.”
He brought his back teeth together. “Enough, Stella.”
“Or what?” She tossed her hair over her shoulder. “I am not your subject, Kostas. You can’t fly in here, interrupt the first vacation I’ve had in years and order me around like your dictator of a father loved to do. You’re the one walking on very thin ground right about now.”
He was. He knew it. “Tell me how I can make this right,” he growled. “You know we need to.”
The waiter arrived to pour their wine. Dispensing the dark red Bordeaux into their glasses, he took one look at their faces and melted away. Stella took a sip, then cradled the glass between her palms, eyes on his. “What happened that night? Why did you race?”
His heart began a slow thud in his chest. Every detail, every minute fragment of that night was imprinted on his brain. He had promised himself he wasn’t ever going there again, and yet if he didn’t, Stella would walk out on him, he knew that with certainty.
“Athamos and I met a Carnelian woman named Cassandra Liatos. We both had feelings for her. She was torn, liked us both. We decided to settle it with a car race through the mountains—the winner got the girl.”
Her jaw dropped. “You had a pink-slip race, except the prize was a woman?”
His mouth flattened. “I’m not sure that’s a fair comparison. One of us had to back off. Cassandra couldn’t make the call, so we did.”
“So she was merely a pawn in the game between two future kings?” A dazed look settled over her face. She rubbed her fingertips against her temples and shook her head. “That wasn’t my brother. He didn’t treat women as objects. What was wrong with him?”
His gaze fell away from hers. “It was not a rational night.”
“No, it was a deadly one.” The rasp in her voice brought his eyes back up to hers. “Where is Cassandra now? Were you with her after Athamos died?”
“No. It was...impossible to move on from there.”
Stella looked out at the sunset darkening the horizon to a deep burnt orange. The convulsing of her throat, the slow deliberate breaths she took, told him how hard she was fighting for control. When she eventually returned her gaze to his, she was all hard-as-ice composed.
“Are you done? Have you said all you need to say? Because if you think I’m going to marry you after hearing that, Kostas—sign on to be another one of your pawns—you are out of your mind.”
He leaned forward, resting his forearms on the table. “It was a mistake. I made a mistake, one I will pay for the rest of my life. What I am proposing between us is a partnership, not a chance for me to lord it over you. An opportunity to restore peace and democracy in the Ionian Sea. To heal the wounds we have all suffered.”
Her mouth curled. “So I should save you after everything you’ve done? Allow myself to be used as a symbol you can flaunt to the world in some PR exercise you are undertaking to restore Carnelia’s credibility?”
The animosity emanating from her shocked him. “When did you become so cynical? So unforgiving? Where is the woman who would have done anything to fight for a better world?”
“I am fighting for a better world. Every day I do that with my work. It’s you who seems to have lost your compass. You are not the man I once knew. That man would have stayed and fought your father tooth and nail. He would not have jumped ship.”
“You’re right,” he said harshly, bitter regret staining his heart. “I’m not the man I was. I am a realist, not an idealist. It’s the only thing that’s going to save my country from the mess it’s in.”
She regarded him over the rim of her glass. “And how do you intend to do that? Save Carnelia?”
“My father has driven the approval ratings for the monarchy to historic lows. I plan to hold elections to turn Carnelia into a constitutional monarchy in the fall, which will include a confirmation by the people they wish the monarchy to stay in place. There is a very real possibility, however, before I can do that, the military junta who backed my father will seize control. You marrying me, joining Akathinia and Carnelia together in a symbolic alliance, would be a powerful demonstration of the future I can give to my people if they afford me the opportunity. A vision of peace and freedom.”
An air of incredulity surrounded her. “You’re asking me to marry you, to walk into the enemy’s lair, where a powerful military faction might take control at any moment, and transform a country, a government, with you?”
“Yes. You have the courage, the strength and the compassion to help me take Carnelia forward into the future it deserves.”
Her eyes flashed. “And what about me? Am I supposed to lay my happiness down on the altar as I’ve done everything else? Marry a man I can’t stand for the sake of duty?”
He shook his head. “You don’t hate me, Stella. You know that’s a lie. And it wouldn’t be like that. You told me once your dream was to become a human rights lawyer, to effect widespread change. Becoming my queen would allow you to do that. You would be altering the course of history, bringing happiness to a people who have suffered enough. Can you really tell me that’s not worth it?”
Her lips pursed. “Pulling out your trump card, Kostas? Now I know you’re desperate.”
“We both know that isn’t my trump card. We’ve proved we could be very good together. More than good.”
A deep red flush stained her chest, rising up to claim her cheeks. “That was ten years ago and it was just a kiss.”
“One hell of a kiss. Enough you jumped into my bed in flimsy lingerie and waited for me until one o’clock in the morning, while the entire party thought you were ill.”
A choked sound left her throat. “You are such a gentleman for bringing that up.”
“No,” he countered softly, “I was that when I tossed you out. You were Athamos’s little sister, Stella. Eighteen. I was the son of the dictator. Kissing you was the height of stupidity when I knew the pedestal you put me on. I tried to end it there, but you wouldn’t take no for an answer. Sometimes cruelty is kindness in its most rudimentary form.”
Her sapphire eyes blazed a brilliant blue beam at him. “You should have spared me the pity kiss, then.”
“It was far more complicated than that between us and you know it.” She had been wrecked by her parents’ refusal to allow her to accept the Harvard Law School admission she’d been granted, where Nik had studied. Devastated, as her dream had evaporated. He had not been prepared for the chemistry that had exploded between them.
“Would you have preferred I’d taken you?” He held her stormy gaze. “Walked away with a precious piece of you and broken your heart?”
“No,” she huffed, fingernails digging into the armrests of her chair. “You did me a favor. And now that we’ve confirmed you’re a heartless piece of work I’d never consider marrying, I think we’ve said all there is to say.”
He studied the emotion cascading through her beautiful eyes, regret sinking through him. He had hurt her. Perhaps more than he’d thought.
She stood up in a whirlwind of motion, snatching up her purse, pushing back her chair, as if a hurricane was sweeping down the Atlantic headed straight for them.
“Breaking our deal?” he drawled.
“The deal was to hear you out. Suddenly, I find myself without an appetite.”
He stood, then reached into his pocket, pulled out his wallet and extracted a card from the marina where he was staying. She flinched as he tucked it into the front pocket of her jeans. “Don’t make this decision because you hate me, Stella. Make it for what you believe in. Make it for Akathinia. If the military isn’t handcuffed, they will seek to finish the job they started when they took that Akathinian ship last year. Lives will be lost.”
Her chin dropped, her lithe body tense, caught in the middle of a storm. “I know you,” he murmured. “You’ll do the right thing.”
“No, you don’t.” She shook her head slowly, a wealth of emotion throbbing in those blue eyes. “You don’t know anything about me.”
