In the absence of a job description, maybe she ought to list her own.

‘Ground rules?’ he asked, quirking one eyebrow. Again he seemed to be on the verge of laughter, and the sensation made her feel crazy.

‘No washing, no ironing and definitely no scrubbing the stairs on hands and knees,’ she said wildly, while he and Zoe looked on with astonishment. ‘No attending royal banquets and sitting at the bottom of the table where I don’t know anyone. Neither will I wear a calf-length uniform with a starched collar and Nanny embroidered on the front. Nor will I curtsey or walk out of Zoe’s presence backwards. No shoe shining, no…’

‘But we do still need to go,’ Zoe said, cutting into a tirade that was getting…well, more than a bit irrational.

Elsa paused. She looked at Stefanos’s hiked eyebrows-both of them were hiked now. His lips were twitching.

Maybe she was being just ever so slightly over the top.

She struggled for calm. Hysteria wasn’t what was needed, she told herself severely. Nor was treating this as a crazy joke. She needed to stay practical and focus on Zoe-regardless of whether or not Stefanos was laughing at her.

In her short life Zoe had faced her parents’ deaths, and then more hospitals and doctors and paramedics and social workers than Elsa wanted to think about. Almost all of them talked over her head. It made Zoe mad, but usually she became quiet and passive.

Not now. She’d been listening to Elsa in astonishment, but with an attention more suitable to one twice her age. Now she turned to Stefanos and frowned.

‘Elsa doesn’t have to do all that stuff, does she?’

‘No,’ Stefanos said definitely. ‘I think Elsa’s been reading too many fairy tales.’

‘But there really is a palace?’

‘There really is a palace,’ he said and smiled at her. ‘And you really are a princess.’

He’d hooked Zoe, Elsa thought frantically. Just because he had a smile to die for.

Just because he was logical, thoughtful and he sounded as if he cared. Just because he was smiling at Zoe now with kindness and also the trace of a challenge, convincing her that this could be some sort of magical adventure.

He was glancing at her with a quizzical look that was kind as well as knowing.

How could he be kind? What did she know of the man?

What did she know about the island?

‘What…what medical facilities are on the island?’ she managed, trying valiantly to sound grown-up, sensible and in control. Or at least as grown-up, sensible and in control as Zoe.

‘Zoe will have me to care for her,’ he told her, matching her tone. ‘And there’s specialist backup in Athens.’

‘There are no paediatricians on Khryseis?’

He hesitated. ‘Education has hardly been King Giorgos’s concern,’ he admitted at last. ‘In fact he’s actively discouraged it. Even I haven’t been able to work there. Giorgos wouldn’t permit me to practice medicine on Khryseis, so I’ve built my career elsewhere.’

‘There are no medical facilities at all?’ she asked incredulously.

‘There’s one elderly doctor and a midwife. Up until now the fishermen have taken really ill islanders to Athens.’

‘You’re kidding me.’

‘Sadly, no.’

‘And…and now?’

‘And now we go back to the island and think about the future from there.’

‘You’ll get more medical staff?’

‘That’s one of my first priorities. The island’s not big enough to support a huge range of specialties but there will be good basic medicine with fast transfers to Athens at need.’

He hesitated. ‘Elsa, you will be looked after,’ he said, gently but strongly. ‘You both will. So no, Elsa, you will not be asked to scrub stairs or polish silver. You’ll be on the island as Zoe’s friend and as her nanny, for as long as you wish to stay. I’ll ask nothing more of you. This isn’t a trap, Elsa. I promise you. No strings.’ His face broke into another of his magical smiles. ‘Our island’s lovely, Elsa. Zoe. We can work things out. The three of us. Please?’

His smile caught her and held. Demanding a response. How could she resist an appeal like this?

And, despite her fears, a tiny trickle of excitement crept in.

She had no idea where this man was coming from-or where he was going-but his smile was mesmerising. And as well as that…

She and Zoe had eaten sandwiches for lunch almost every day for four years. She’d had to chop wood to cook and to heat their water. Wood-chopping jarred her hip so much that sometimes it was hard not to just give in. But there was never the choice of giving in.

But now…Stefanos was offering them a home in a palace on an island in the Mediterranean. He was offering her a well-paid job. She’d have no more money worries. No wood-chopping. Did he realise how enticing it sounded? This man might appear seriously sexy but right now it was the lack of wood-chopping that was more seductive.

‘I do need to keep my research skills up,’ she muttered, fighting to sound practical and reserved and wary.

‘Of course. I see you doing the same things you’re doing now. With Zoe.’

‘Home-schooling?’

‘We can get a tutor. Zoe, you’ll need to learn Greek.’

‘I already know Greek,’ Zoe said proudly.

‘You already know…’

‘Christos spoke Greek to her as a baby,’ Elsa told him, feeling a bit smug herself as she noted his astonishment. ‘We figured it was part of who she was, so we’ve kept it up.’

‘Elsa speaks it now too,’ Zoe added, ‘and we both read it. There are two old Greek ladies in Waratah Cove. We visit them once a week and talk with them, and Elsa does their shopping and says it’s payment for our lessons. If we went away I’d miss them.’ Her face clouded. ‘And the cats. How can we go away without our cats?’

‘Yeah, the cats,’ Elsa said, as if it was a challenge.

He grinned at that. ‘That’s one more thing fixed. Zoe, open the blue suitcase.’

She opened it. Fascinated. To display cat food. Bulk cat food. A suitcase of cat food.

‘So we’re supposed to open the suitcase and come home when they need a refill?’ Elsa said and she couldn’t help sounding waspish.

‘That’s fixed too,’ he said, his grin teasing her to smile with him. ‘There’s a guy who works round here tending gardens, doing odd jobs. I’ve arranged for him to visit every night at dusk, feed the cats, lock them up, then let them out at dawn. In perpetuity. And if any other stray comes along then he’s to do exactly what you’d do. Take it in, get it neutered, tell it the house rules. He can even do your two Greek ladies’ shopping if you want. Now…Any more objections?’

‘My…my house?’ Elsa stammered.

‘I told you, he does gardens and odd jobs. He’ll maintain this place as long as we want.’

‘You found this guy when?’

‘The concierge at the hotel earned his keep last night,’ he said, and grinned again. ‘He brought his wife in to help. His wife knows you and knows what you need. So there you go. Local knowledge and my cash.’

‘Yeah, your cash,’ she said, breathless. ‘We can’t take it.’

‘See, what you don’t understand is that you can,’ he said. ‘Zoe’s a princess. You’re nanny to a princess. Are there any other problems?’

‘The medical facilities…’

‘I’ll be there and, as I said, there are fast flights to Athens. Until we get other medical facilities organised we can cope.’ He took her hand again and held, and with his other hand he took Zoe’s. ‘Khryseis needs a team,’ he said. ‘A royal team. Prince Regent, Princess Zoe and Nanny Elsa. Do we have it?’

‘Yes,’ Zoe said.

There were no arguments left. The only one that was still swirling round and round in her mind was, I don’t want to be a nanny to your prince.

But that was dumb. She glanced at the mantel where Matt still smiled.

Definitely it was dumb.

He glanced to where she’d looked. Saw what she’d been looking at.

Didn’t ask a question.

‘It’ll be fine,’ he said softly, and the pressure on her hand strengthened. Then, before she knew what he was about, he put his hand under her chin and tilted it-and kissed her. It was a feather-light kiss, quickly over, and why it had the capacity to make her feel…make her feel…

No. She had to stop thinking about how it made her feel, because that was nonsense. But his hand was still under her chin, forcing her to meet his gaze.

‘I will keep you safe,’ he said, strongly and surely. ‘And Zoe too. You’ve worked too hard for too long, Elsa Murdoch. Now it’s up to Zoe and me to see you have some fun. Just say yes.’

And what else was she to do?

‘I guess…yes,’ she managed, but she didn’t add, Yes, Your Royal Highness. Because that would be agreeing to all of it. The whole royal fairy tale.

Ridiculous.

CHAPTER SIX

TWO weeks later they left Australia, luxuriating in first class seats on a direct flight to Athens, to be followed by a smaller plane to Khryseis.

‘I’ll be on Khryseis to meet you,’ Stefanos had said in one of the scores of calls he’d made since then. ‘But our people will take care of you all the way.’

They hadn’t seen him since that fateful lunch. He’d had to leave. ‘Things are chaotic,’ he’d said. ‘I need to get back to the island straight away but I promise I won’t let that disorder touch you.’

It wasn’t touching them now. They were in first class airline seats. They had a cocoon each, with every conceivable gadget, including one that turned the seats into beds at the flick of a switch. A hostess had already made Zoe’s bed for her, with crisp linen and fluffy duvet, and she was fast asleep.

Elsa was staring out of the window and seeing what was probably Hawaii.

She was trying not to gibber.

She’d been on one overseas flight in her life. To Tasmania. She didn’t remember all that many gadgets and duvets and cocoons on that flight. She remembered being served a packet of nuts and a warm beer.