The Royal House of Niroli Collection. Кейт Хьюит

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СКАЧАТЬ as someone with very strong views. He is even older than my grandfather and tends to think of himself as the guardian of the island’s morals.’

      ‘You mean he disapproves of me being here with you,’ Emily guessed.

      Marco was negotiating a tight bend, and Emily had to wait for him to answer her.

      ‘What he thinks or feels is his business. What I choose to do is my own,’ he told her grimly.

      But the reality was that it wasn’t, and that whatever Marco chose to do was the business of the people of Niroli.

      In an attempt to change the subject, she asked him brightly,

      ‘I saw a basket of leather purses…’

      ‘Yes, the women of the villages make them. They sell them to tourists, if they can, although these days the visitors who come to Niroli would far rather have a designer piece than something fashioned out of home-made leather.’

      ‘Mmm…I was thinking that, with a bit of time and effort, the leather could be used to cover trinket boxes, the bead ornamentation was so pretty, and I know from my own experience there is a huge market for that kind of thing. If, as you say, the villagers are short of money, then…’

      ‘It’s worth thinking about, but there’s no way I want my people involved in any kind of exploitation.’

      ‘It was only a thought.’

      ‘And a good one. Leave it with me.’

      When the time came for him to marry, Marco reflected, he would need a wife who would take on the role of helping him to help his people. Emily could easily fulfil that role. Somehow, that thought had slipped under his guard and into his head where it had no right to be. Just as he had no right to allow Emily into his heart. Into his heart? Now, what was he thinking? Just because Rafael’s objection to her presence had made him feel so angry and protective of her, that didn’t mean that she had found her way into his heart. Did it?

      CHAPTER ELEVEN

      EMILY sighed to herself as she parked the car Marco had hired for her to use whilst she was staying on Niroli outside the island’s elegant spa. Although he had made love to her last night and it was at his suggestion that she was visiting the spa today, she knew that she would far rather have had his company. Marco, though, was too busy with royal affairs to spend time with her. His purchase and distribution of the generators had led to yet another row with his grandfather, which had resulted in Emily asking Marco if there wasn’t someone within his family who could mediate between the two of them.

      ‘Someone, you mean, like my sister Isabella?’ he had replied. ‘She claims that my grandfather doesn’t value her because she is female. No, Emily.’ He had shaken his head. ‘This is something I have to deal with myself.’

      To Emily’s relief, she had now gone three whole days without being sick, although she had noticed that, despite the fact that she wasn’t eating very much, the waistline of one of her favourite skirts was now uncomfortably tight, and even more uncomfortable were her breasts, which felt swollen and tender. It must be due to too-rapid a change of climate, she had told herself this morning as she’d dressed.

      Marco had told her that the spa was owned and run by Natalia Carini, daughter of Giovanni, the Royal Vine-keeper. Emily had been a bit hesitant about coming here and putting herself forward for ‘inspection’ when she was at her most vulnerable. But as she walked into the spa foyer she heard the pretty girl behind the reception desk saying to another client, ‘I’m sorry, but Miss Carini isn’t here today.’

      Emily hadn’t really been sure how she felt about meeting someone who might have known Marco when he was younger. Like any woman in love, she longed to know everything there was to know about him and yet, at the same time, the reality of her position in his life made her feel that she wanted to remain anonymous. In London, it might be acceptable for a couple to live together as lovers without any intention of making their relationship permanent, but she suspected that things were different here on Niroli—even if Marco weren’t who he was and destined to be King and, no doubt, to make a dynastic marriage.

      ‘May I help you?’

      Emily returned the receptionist’s smile. ‘I don’t have an appointment, but I was wondering if it was possible to have a treatment?’

      ‘Since it isn’t the height of the tourist season yet, we should be able to fit you in. What kind of treatment would you like? We specialise here in using natural substances, especially the island’s own volcanic mud. It’s very therapeutic, especially when we use it in conjunction with our specially designed massage treatments.

      ‘Here’s a list of the treatments we offer, and a medical questionnaire.’ The girl smiled again. ‘The owner of the spa takes her responsibility to our clients very seriously, and I should point out to you that some of the more vigorous massages are not suitable for women who are pregnant.’

      Pregnant! Emily almost laughed. Well, she certainly wasn’t. And then suddenly it hit her, her brain mentally registering the facts and assembling them: her sickness, her aching breasts, her growing waist. A wave of sickening shock and disbelief thundered through her, and she could hear the receptionist asking her anxiously if she was all right.

      ‘I’m…fine…’ she lied.

      But of course she wasn’t. She was anything but. How could she be ‘fine', when the reason for the sickness she’d been suffering these last few weeks, and the fact that, oddly, her waist seemed to have expanded making her clothes feel tight, had suddenly been made blindingly obvious to her?

      Was she right? Was she pregnant? She did some hasty mental calculations, whilst her heart banged anxiously against her ribs.

      She needed very badly to sit down, but not here. Not anywhere where the truth might out and there could be any hint of a threat to her unborn child. It had only been seconds, minutes at the most, since she had realised the reality, but already she knew that there was nothing she would not do to protect the new life growing inside her. She would allow nothing or no one to imperil her child’s safety and right to life!

      Emily stared at her own reflection in the bedroom mirror and tried not to panic. There was little to show that she was pregnant as yet, apart from that slight thickening of her waist, but how much longer would she have before Marco became suspicious? She couldn’t afford to be still here on Niroli by then. Her throat went dry. Inside her head she could hear Marco’s voice telling her, at the very beginning of their relationship, that there would be no accidents, and what he expected her to do if one occurred.

      Of course, what he had meant and not said was that he didn’t want any royal bastards.

      But there was no way she could destroy her child. She would rather destroy herself.

      However, logically, Emily knew that, even if Marco had not made it plain he did not want her to have his child, there would be no place here on Niroli for the future king’s pregnant mistress, or his illegitimate baby! What on earth was she going to do? She had never felt more alone.

      ‘And now the village elder says that his orders have been ignored, and that the generator-shed has been broken into and the generator itself stolen. You see what you have done, what trouble you have caused by your interference?’

      Marco forced himself to count slowly СКАЧАТЬ