The Price of Royal Duty. PENNY JORDAN

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      As they had reached the king and queen, champagne was being handed round in anticipation of a toast. Sophia’s intense focus on how to get around her father’s insistence on this ridiculous arranged marriage had momentarily made her forget that this was her oldest brother’s engagement party. His fiancée Allegra’s father, Bobby Jackson, got to his feet, albeit rather unsteadily, and made a rambling speech of congratulation to the newly engaged couple. When it finally came to an end, they all dutifully toasted the happy couple, but an uneasy rumble of chatter spread around the ballroom in reaction to Bobby’s graceless public display.

      ‘Ash, how lovely to see you,’ Queen Zoe welcomed him, the diamonds in the tiara she was wearing sparkling in the light from one of the room’s many chandeliers. Sophia’s mother was clearly covering her embarrassment with polite small talk.

      Deprived of Ash’s presence at her side as her mother engaged him in conversation, Sophia had to fight hard not to feel alone and abandoned, emotions that were all too familiar to her growing up, despite the fact that then, as now, she had been surrounded by her siblings. The trouble was that she had never felt truly accepted or loved by them. Because she had never felt accepted or loved by her father? That was why it was so important to her to marry someone whom she loved and who loved her, someone who would share her determination to raise the children they would have in a loving home in which those children would know how much they were loved. That was her secret and deepest desire.

      As her father began his toast to the happy couple, Sophia turned to look longingly towards Ash. Only a metre or so separated them but it might as well have been a mile. Listening to her father’s speech he had his back to Sophia, and she rubbed her arms in a small sad gesture of self-comfort.

      Her father was still talking, and looking straight at her, Sophia realised, as he announced, ‘And Alessandro’s engagement is only the first Santina engagement we are to celebrate. I am delighted to be able to tell you all that my youngest daughter Sophia’s fiancé is shortly to arrive in the kingdom.’

      The shock of what her father had said descended on Sophia like an icy wall, numbing her, reducing her to dumb, frozen shock, unable to speak or move as she was jostled by the throng of press photographers who had all been focusing on her brother and Allegra but who were now all around her, instead, their cameras flashing.

      As swiftly as it had engulfed her, the numbness receded, leaving her with the reality of the full horror of her situation. Inside she felt as though she was shaking from head to foot, as she was gripped by a rising tide of nausea and furious helpless despair. This couldn’t be happening. Her father couldn’t have trapped her into an engagement without giving her any warning. But he had, and now she had no way of arguing him out of his plans. She felt so weak and helpless, so lost and alone. Instinctively she looked towards Ash but there were too many photographers in the way. Her father, on the other hand, she could see, and the cold warning look in his eyes told her what he expected of her.

      Reporters and photographers surrounded her, pushing mikes and lenses in her face as they demanded a response to her father’s announcement.

      ‘I …’

      ‘My daughter is delighted to be engaged,’

      the king answered for her. ‘Aren’t you, Sophia?’

      Shock and a lifetime of always giving in to her father’s will couldn’t be ignored or overcome no matter how much she wanted to do so. As though someone else was speaking the words Sophia bowed her head submissively and responded, ‘Yes.’

      From the queen’s side Ash watched and listened to what was happening with a mixture of feelings, the least wanted of which was the sudden savage stab of antagonism he had felt towards the unknown prince to whom Sophia was now officially engaged.

      ‘Such a relief that Sophia has finally seen sense and realised that her father knows what’s best,’ Queen Zoe murmured to Ash. ‘All this gossip about her in the press has made the king very angry. Marriage will do her good. The king believes that the prince shares his traditional values and beliefs on the role of a royal consort and royal children, and will soon have Sophia realising where her duty lies.’

      ‘Sophia …’ Sophia felt a small tug on her arm, and she turned from the throng of reporters to see the concerned face of her sister Carlotta.

      ‘I can’t believe what Father has done. He knows I don’t want to be engaged. I can’t stay here, Carlotta,’ she told her sister. ‘Not now. I’m going to my room.’

      By the time she reached the relative sanctuary of her room Sophia’s thoughts were in such turmoil that she was trembling from head to foot as though the force of them couldn’t be contained within her body. How foolish and naive she had been to think that her father would allow her the freedom of trying to change his mind. That had obviously never been an option. Her father must have known all along that he intended to announce her engagement without her real consent. Now her plan to parade Ash in front of her father, in the hope that the king could be deceived into thinking that there could be a match between her and Ash, seemed so juvenile and ridiculous—the pointless hope of someone who didn’t recognise or understand reality. Angry, helpless, frustrated tears blurred her vision. All the things she had done to avoid marriage until she found the right man had been a complete waste of time. She might as well have remained here in her room at the palace as a good and dutiful daughter who never did anything to challenge the status quo.

      How was she going to endure what would now be her future? She couldn’t, she wouldn’t, Sophia decided on the wave of panic and pain that welled up inside her, and she certainly wasn’t going to stay here and let her father marry her off. She’d run away and leave the island, cut herself off from her family, before she’d allow herself to be forced into this marriage. Her heart was hammering even faster at the enormity of what she was thinking.

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