Marion Lennox - Cinderella: Hired by the Prince

‘But…’

‘I will not argue,’ Ramón said. ‘I’ve a mind to wash my hands of the whole business and take Marquita straight back out to sea.’ Then, at the wash of undisguised distress on the lawyer’s face, he sighed and relented. ‘But, of course, I won’t,’ he said. ‘You know I won’t. I will return with you to Cepheus. I’ll do what I must to resolve this mess, I’ll face Carlos down, but you will give me one more night.’

SHE walked for four long hours, and then she found an Internet café and did some research. By the time she returned to the boat she was tired and hungry and her anger hadn’t abated one bit.

Ramón was the Crown Prince of Cepheus. What sort of dangerous mess had she walked into?

She’d slept with a prince?

Logically, it shouldn’t make one whit of difference that he was royal, but it did, and she felt used and stupid and very much like a star-struck teenager. All that was needed was the paparazzi. Images of headlines flashed through her head-Crown Prince of Cepheus Takes Stupid, Naive Australian Lover-and as she neared the boat she couldn’t help casting a furtive glance over her shoulder to check the thought had no foundation.

It didn’t-of course it didn’t. There was only Ramón, kneeling on the deck, calmly sealing the ends of new ropes.

He glanced up and saw her coming. He smiled a welcome, but she was too sick at heart to smile back.

For a few wonderful days she’d let herself believe this smile could be for her.

She felt besmirched.

‘I’ve just come back to get my things,’ she said flatly before he had a chance to speak.

‘You’re leaving?’ His eyes were calmly appraising.

‘Of course I’m leaving.’

‘To go where?’

‘I’ll see if I can get a temporary job here. As soon as I can get back to Australia I’ll organize some way of repaying the loan.’

‘There’s no need for you to repay…’

‘There’s every need,’ she flashed, wanting to stamp her foot; wanting, quite badly, to cry. ‘You think I want to be in your debt for one minute more than I must? I’ve read about you on the Internet now. It doesn’t matter whether anyone died or not. You were a prince already.’

‘Does that make a difference?’ he asked, still watchful, and his very calmness added to her distress.

‘Of course it does. I’ve been going to bed with a prince,’ she wailed, and the couple on board their cruiser in the next berth choked on their lunch time Martinis.

But Ramón didn’t notice. He had eyes only for her. ‘You went to bed with me,’ he said softly. ‘Not with a prince.’

‘You are a prince.’

‘I’m just Ramón, Gianetta.’

‘Don’t Gianetta me,’ she snapped. ‘That’s your bedroom we slept in. Not the owner’s. Here I was thinking we were doing something illicit…’

‘Weren’t we?’ he demanded and a glint of humour returned to his dark eyes.

‘It was your bed all along,’ she wailed and then, finally, she made a grab at composure. The couple on the next boat were likely to lose their eyes; they were out on stalks. Dignity, she told herself desperately. Please.

‘So I own the boat,’ he said. ‘Yes, I’m a prince. What more do you know of me?’

‘Apparently very little,’ she said bitterly. ‘I seem to have told you my whole life story. It appears you’ve only told me about two minutes of yours. Apparently you’re wealthy, fabulously wealthy, and you’re royal. The Internet bio was sketchy, but you spend your time either on this boat or fronting some charity organisation.’

‘I do more than that.’

But she was past hearing. She was past wanting to hear. She felt humiliated to her socks, and one fact stood out above all the rest. She’d never really known him.

‘So when you saw me you thought here’s a little more charity,’ she threw at him, anger making her almost incoherent. ‘I’ll take this poverty-stricken, flour-streaked muffin-maker and show her a nice time.’

‘A flour-streaked muffin-maker?’ he said and, infuriatingly, the laughter was back. ‘I guess if you want to describe yourself as that… Okay, fine, I rescued the muffin-maker. And we did have a nice time. No?’

But she wasn’t going there. She was not being sucked into that smile ever again. ‘I’m leaving,’ she said, and she swung herself down onto the deck. She was heading below, but Ramón was before her, blocking her path.

‘Jenny, you’re still contracted to take my boat to Cepheus.’

‘You don’t need me…’

‘You signed a contract. Yesterday, as I remember-and it was you who wanted it signed before we came into port.’ His hands were on her shoulders, forcing her to meet his gaze, and her anger was suddenly matched with his. ‘So you’ve been on the Internet. Do you understand why I have to return?’

And she did understand. Sort of. She’d read and read and read. ‘It seems your uncle and cousin are dead,’ she said flatly. ‘There’s a huge scandal because it seems your cousin wasn’t married after all, so his little son can’t inherit. So you get to be Crown Prince.’ Even now, she couldn’t believe she was saying it. Crown Prince. It was like some appalling twisted fairy tale. Kiss a frog, have him turn into a prince.

She wanted her frog back.

‘I don’t have a choice in this,’ he said harshly. ‘You need to believe that.’ Before she could stop him, he put the back of his hand against her cheek and ran it down to her lips, a touch so sensuous that it made a shiver run right down to her toes. But there was anger behind the touch-and there was also…Regret? ‘Gianetta, for you to go…’

‘Of course I’m going,’ she managed.

‘And I need to let you go,’ he said, and there was a depth of sadness behind his words that she couldn’t begin to understand. ‘But still I want you to take my boat home. Selfish or not, I want to see you again.’

Where was dignity when she needed it? His touch had sucked all the anger out of her. She wanted to hold on to this man and cling.

What was she thinking? No. This man was royalty, and he’d lied to her.

She had to find sense.

‘I’m grabbing my things,’ she said shortly, fighting for some semblance of calm. ‘I’ll be in touch about the money. I swear I won’t owe you for any longer than absolutely necessary.’

‘There’s no need to repay…’

‘There is,’ she snapped. ‘I pay my debts, even if they’re to princes.’

‘Can you stop calling me…’

‘A prince? It’s what you are and it’s not new. It’s not like this title’s a shock to you. Yes, you seem to have inherited the Crown, and that’s surprised you, but you were born a prince and you didn’t tell me.’

‘You didn’t ask.’

‘Right,’ she said, fury building again. She shoved his hands away and headed below, whether he liked it or not. Ramón followed her and stood watching as she flung her gear into her carry-all.

Dignity was nowhere. The only thing she could cling to was her anger.

‘So, Jenny, you think I should have introduced myself as Prince Ramón?’ he asked at last, and the anger was still there. He was angry? What did that make her? Nothing, she thought bleakly. How could he be angry at her? She felt like shrivelling into a small ball and sobbing, but she had to get away from here first.

‘You know what matters most?’ she demanded, trying desperately to sort her thoughts into some sort of sense. ‘That you didn’t tell me you owned the boat. Maybe you didn’t lie outright, but you had plenty of opportunities to tell me and you didn’t. That’s a lie in my books.’

‘Would you have got on my boat if you thought I was the owner?’

There was only one answer to that. If he’d asked her and she’d known he was wealthy enough to afford such a boat-his wealth would have terrified her. ‘No,’ she admitted.

‘So I wanted you to come with me.’

‘Bully for you. And I did.’ Cling to the anger, she told herself. It was all there was. If he was angry, she should be more so. She headed into the bathroom to grab her toiletries. ‘I came on board and we made love and it was all very nice,’ she threw over her shoulder. ‘Now you’ve had your fun and you can go back to your life.’

‘Being a prince isn’t my life.’

‘No?’

‘Gianetta…’

‘Jenny!’

‘Jenny, then,’ he conceded and the underlying anger in his voice intensified. ‘I want you to listen.’

‘I’m listening,’ she said, shoving toiletries together with venom.

‘Jenny, my grandfather was the Crown Prince of Cepheus.’

‘I know that.’

‘What you don’t know,’ he snapped, ‘is that he was an arrogant, cruel womanizer. Jenny, I need you to understand this. My grandfather’s marriage to my grandmother was an arranged one and he treated her dreadfully. When my father was ten my grandmother fell in love with a servant, and who can blame her? But my grandfather banished her and the younger children to a tiny island off the coast of Cepheus. He kept his oldest son, my uncle, at the palace, but my grandmother, my father and my aunt were never allowed back. My grandmother was royal in her own right. She had money of her own and all her life she ached to undo some of the appalling things my grandfather did, but when she tried…well, that’s when my father died. And now, to be forced to go back…’

‘I’m sorry you don’t like it,’ she said stiffly. What was he explaining this for? It had nothing to do with her. ‘But your country needs you. At least now you’ll be doing something useful.’

‘Is that what you think?’ he demanded, sounding stunned. ‘That I spend my life doing nothing?’

‘Isn’t that the best job in the world?’ She could feel the vibrations of his anger and it fed hers. He’d known he was a prince. ‘The Internet bio says you’re aligned to some sort of charity in Bangladesh,’ she said shortly. ‘I guess you can’t be all bad.’