The Wedding Party And Holiday Escapes Ultimate Collection. Кейт Хьюит

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СКАЧАТЬ yet still her words cut deep, carved themselves into his soul. They held up a mirror to the selfishness of his heart, the inadequacy he felt now, and he couldn’t stand it. Couldn’t stand the guilt that rushed through him, along with the resentment. He didn’t want to be here, didn’t want to be king, didn’t want any of this, and yet it was his by right. By duty. Even if he didn’t deserve it. Even if he felt afraid—terrified—that he could not bear the weight of the crown his father hadn’t even wanted to give him.

      He yanked open the door to the study that had once been his father’s and still smelled of his Havana cigars. Sandro opened a window and breathed in the cold night air, tinged even here in the city with the resin of the pines that fringed the capital city. He willed his heart to slow, the remnants of his desire, making his body ache with unfulfilment, to fade.

      Briefly he considered whether he should break off his engagement. Find another bride, someone with a little more warmth, a little more heart. Someone who might actually respect him.

      And just who would that be, when the truth is and always will be that you walked away from your duty? That you don’t deserve your crown or the respect it commands?

      He closed his eyes briefly, pictured his father’s face twisted in derision moments before he’d died.

      You think I wanted this? You?

      And deluded fool that he insisted on being, he actually had. Had hoped, finally, that his father accepted him. Loved him.

      Idiot.

      Sandro let out a shuddering breath and turned away from the window. He wouldn’t call off the wedding, wouldn’t try to find a better bride. He was getting about as good a deal as he could hope for.

      What kind of woman, after all, agreed to a marriage of convenience? A woman like Liana, like his mother, intent on everything but emotion. And that was fine, really, because he didn’t have the energy for emotion either. He didn’t even think he believed in love anymore, so why bother searching for it? Wanting it?

      Except that need seemed hardwired into his system, and had been ever since he’d been a little boy, desperate for his father’s attention, approval, and most of all, love, when all he’d wanted was to use him as a pawn for publicity, so he could pursue his own selfish desires. Desires Sandro had been blinded to until his naive beliefs had been ripped away.

      ‘Sandro?’

      Sandro turned around to see his brother, Leo, standing in the doorway of his study. Six months ago Leo had been first in line to the throne, as he had been ever since their father had disinherited Sandro and put Leo forward. Fifteen years of bracing himself for the crown, and then Sandro had unexpectedly returned and set him free. At least that was how Sandro had always viewed it; Leo hadn’t protested, and Sandro knew his brother hated the pretence of royal life as much as he had.

      Yet he’d made a damn good heir to the throne in his absence, so much so that Sandro had wondered if Leo regretted his return.

      He’d chosen not to ask.

      Leo was a cabinet minister now, lived in a town house in Averne with his bride Alyse, and was working on passing a bill to provide broadband to the entire country, drag Maldinia into the twenty-first century.

      ‘What is it?’ Sandro heard the terse snap of his voice and sighed, rubbing a hand over his face. ‘Sorry. It’s been a long day.’

      ‘You met with Lady Liana?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘Is she suitable?’

      Sandro laughed, the sound humourless and harsh. ‘Definitely.’

      Leo stepped into the room and closed the door. ‘You don’t sound pleased.’

      ‘Did either of us really wish to marry for duty?’

      ‘Sometimes it can work out,’ Leo answered, a hint of a smile in his voice, on his face.

      ‘Sometimes,’ Sandro agreed. Things had certainly worked out for his brother. He was in love with his wife and free to pursue his own interests and ambitions as he chose.

      ‘I always thought Liana was nice enough,’ Leo offered carefully. ‘Although she seemed...sad to me, sometimes.’

      ‘Sad?’ Sandro shook his head even as he recalled the shadows in her eyes, the secrets he felt she’d been hiding. Yes, she had seemed sad. She’d also seemed determined, resolute, and as cold and hard as the diamond she’d worn around her neck. The diamond he’d lifted when he’d licked the skin underneath....

      Remembering made lust beat along with his fury, and hell if that wasn’t an unwholesome mix. Sighing, he pushed away from the window. ‘I didn’t realise you knew her.’

      Leo’s smile was wry. ‘Father considered an alliance between us, briefly.’

      ‘An alliance? You mean marriage?’ Sandro turned around to stare at his brother in surprise. Yet how could he really be shocked? Leo had been the future king. And hadn’t Liana already shown him just how much she wanted to be queen? For fifteen years—over half her life—he’d been essentially out of the picture. Of course she’d looked at other options.

      As had his own brother, his own father.

      ‘So what happened?’ he asked Leo, and his brother’s smile was crooked and yet clearly full of happiness. Of joy.

      ‘Alyse happened.’

      Of course. Sandro had seen the iconic photo himself, when it had been taken over six years ago. Leo had been twenty-four, Alyse eighteen. A single, simple kiss that had rocked the world and changed their lives for ever. And for the better now, thank God.

      ‘Although to be honest,’ Leo continued, ‘I don’t think Liana was ever really interested. It seemed as if she was humouring me, or maybe her parents, who wanted the match.’

      Or hedging her bets, perhaps, Sandro thought, just in case the black-sheep heir made a reappearance. ‘I’m happy for you, you know,’ he said abruptly. ‘For you and Alyse.’

      ‘I know you are.’

      Yet he heard a coolness in his brother’s voice, and he could guess at its source. For fifteen years they hadn’t spoken, seen each other, or been in touch in even the paltriest of ways. And this after their childhood, when they’d banded together, two young boys who had had only each other for companionship.

      Sandro knew he needed to say something of all that had gone before—and all that hadn’t. The silence and separation that had endured for so long was, he knew, his fault. He was the older brother, and the one who had left. Yet the words he knew he should say burned in his chest and tangled in his throat. He couldn’t get them out. He didn’t know how.

      This was what happened when you grew up in a family that had never shown love or emotion or anything real at all. You didn’t know how to be real yourself, as much as you craved it—and you feared that which you craved.

      And yet Leo had found love. He was real with Alyse. Why, Sandro wondered in frustration, couldn’t he be the same?

      And in the leaden СКАЧАТЬ