She nodded and stood up, backed away a step, unsteady on her feet. “I understand,” she said, horribly close to tears. She liked Zale so much. Wanted him even more.
Zale stood and brushed the sand off, his expression equally grim. “Shall we see what Chef packed us for lunch?”
“Yes,” she answered, going to retrieve her towel to wrap around her waist.
They sat in the middle of the blanket and Zale opened the hamper. Hannah watched, her head thick, senses drugged. If his kisses were this potent, Hannah couldn’t even imagine how she’d feel if they had sex.
Zale unpacked the lunch hamper in silence and Hannah was good with that. She didn’t think she could make small talk, not when her emotions felt so wild. How could she be falling for Zale this hard? How could she want him this much, even when she knew he belonged to Emmeline?
Her conscience felt stricken and yet there was something else primal fighting with her guilt.
Need.
Desire.
And the desire was so foreign to her. She never wanted a man like this. Hadn’t needed a man in years.
“I’ll let you help yourself,” Zale said, handing her a plate.
Hannah looked at all the food Zale’s chef had sent—roast chicken, baguettes, cheeses, potato salad, beet salad, fruit and more—but her appetite was nonexistent.
“Would you have regretted making love?” she asked abruptly, looking across at him.
Zale sighed. “You have an amazing body and I’d have no problem taking you, exploring you. But … considering there are still serious decisions to be made, I don’t think we can just jump into bed.”
“So you’re still trying to make up your mind about me.”
He hesitated, then nodded.
Hannah clenched her hands together. “Forgetting the past, what worries you most about me?”
He looked off into the distance, his narrowed gaze fixed on a distant point out at sea and then his shoulders shifted. “You’re just so different, Emmeline. You’re not the woman I thought I was marrying. And I don’t understand what’s changed.”
Hannah’s heart sank. “You don’t like … me?”
“No, I do like you. I very much like the woman that is here on the beach right now. You’re smart, playful, confident and sexy. But that wasn’t the woman I proposed to a year ago. And that concerns me. People don’t change this much. Not at our age.”
“Would you feel better if I was more like the old me?”
“Maybe. Probably. I’d at least be on familiar ground.”
Hannah mustered a smile even though she felt like crying. “Then I’ll work on getting the old me back. Hopefully it won’t take long.”
They returned to the palace midafternoon after more swimming and sunbathing but there was tension between them and Hannah felt the strain. She was glad when the helicopter arrived to take them back to the palace and told herself she was glad when Zale let her walk away from him and return to her suite of rooms.
She wasn’t glad, though.
She didn’t want to be alone in her rooms. She wanted to be with him. Wanted what they’d had for a moment on the beach—tenderness, closeness, passion.
Hannah paced her living room absolutely desperate. She’d agreed to play pretend and it was killing her. She wanted to tell Zale who she was, wanted him to know the truth about her, but she knew once she told him, she’d lose him altogether.
It wasn’t fair that the one man she wanted most in the world was the one man she couldn’t have.
If only she really was Emmeline d’Arcy. If only she could be the princess he needed.
A soft, muffled sound reached her and Hannah paused in the middle of her suite to listen.
There it was again, a low cry—part whimper, part moan—and it sounded as though it were coming from her adjoining bedroom.
Hannah stiffened, her skin prickling. She was about to call for the palace guard when she heard the word Mari, Raguvian for Mama.
And then again.
Someone was crying for his mother.
Timidly she went to her bedroom door and pushed it slightly open. Light spilled into the dark bedroom. She could hear the sound of crying more clearly.
Mama, Mama.
Hannah pushed the door all the way open and the light from the living room illuminated the bedroom. She could see all the way across the large room. And although the far corners remained shadowy, she saw a figure in one sitting on the floor, hunched over.
The figure rocked in the corner. “Mama?” he said, slowly lifting his head.
It was a child’s voice coming from an adult body, and Hannah knew immediately who was it was. Dark brown hair, sloped shoulders, knees bent and held tightly against his body.
Prince Constantine.