Читать книгу Virgin Princess's Marriage Debt - Pippa Roscoe - Страница 13

Widow Princess Caught in Clinch with Wine Playboy!

From Widow Princess to Scandalous Princess in One Kiss!

Widow Princess Tames Bad Boy of the Wine Industry!

THE HEADLINES SCREAMED in Sofia’s mind, punctuated by exclamation marks that struck almost physical blows as she threw down the collection of newspapers unceremoniously handed to her by the royal council earlier that day. She peered through the window of the car and cast a glance up and down one of Monaco’s most famous streets. The light illuminating the Plaza del Casino de Mónaco caused the water feature in the centre to sparkle in the night like a thousand diamonds.

And each and every glint scratched against her already frayed nerves and temper.

It wasn’t the fact that she had been captured in a kiss with one of Europe’s most notorious playboys, and splashed across the front pages for the world to see. It wasn’t even the fact that the morning after the party, Joachim—her third and last hope for a fiancé—had regrettably informed Angelique that he could no longer consider matrimony with Sofia.

It was the fact that Theo Tersi—notorious womaniser—had refused to comment. And he always commented. By neither confirming nor denying their speculative questions, he had served only to inflame the rabid press. The Iondorran privy council had further tied her hands and refused to allow a statement to be issued by the royal communications office in a desperate act of blind ignorance, wilfully hoping that it would all ‘blow over’.

But she knew better. Because the sneaking suspicion that had begun the first moment she’d seen the awful photographs had grown into a living, breathing belief that Theo Tersi had somehow managed to orchestrate this whole disaster. The birthday party in Paris had been under a strict press embargo, the girl’s family having sold the rights for images to Paris Match. Furthermore, the only photos surfacing from that night were of them—no other guests—despite the fact that Sofia was aware of at least three front-page headline-worthy incidents. In the last three weeks she had stopped wondering how and instead focused on the why.

She bit back a distinctly unladylike growl as she exited the dark diplomatic-plated sedan, remembering how she had held herself that night as her body trembled after their conversation, after their kiss, as it shook at how he had weakened her. For the hours following, her body left overly sensitised, she had found herself pressing her fingers to her mouth as if in denial or longing, she couldn’t tell, and no matter how much she wished it the low, aching throb between her legs and in her chest had both shocked and terrified her. She had allowed herself that night to feel, to ache, to want. But in the morning when she had seen the headlines, something within her had turned to steel. Sofia dismissed the guards she usually travelled with. She did not want an audience for what was about to happen.