The Prince's Love-Child (The Royal House of Cacciatore 2)

‘Sure that I’m pregnant, you mean? Or sure that it’s yours? Yes, on both counts.’

Guido’s words were like bitter stones spitting from his mouth. ‘What is your address?’

He didn’t even know where she lived! With a feeling of hysteria she told him, aware of the almost laughable contrast between his penthouse apartment or his Rainbow Palace. ‘Number five Western Road, Brentwood.’

‘I’ll be there tomorrow,’ he said tightly, and terminated the connection.

Unable to concentrate, and fired up by the need to fill her waking moments with any kind of activity which might temporarily give her the comfort of allowing her to forget her precarious situation, Lucy cleaned the house from top to bottom.

Gary stood in the doorway, watching her scrub the floor on her hands and knees. ‘What’s this?’ he questioned. ‘Penance?’

‘I want the place to look clean,’ she said stubbornly. ‘It might be an ordinary little suburban house, but it will gleam as brightly as any damned Rainbow Palace!’

‘We do have a

mop, you know,’ he said mildly.

Lucy’s mouth wobbled into a smile. ‘I’m treating it as a mini-workout!’

Gary breathed a sigh of relief. ‘Thank God you’re smiling again!’

‘Being miserable isn’t going to change anything.’

‘That’s my gal! What time is he arriving?’

‘He didn’t say. This afternoon, probably.’

‘Just my luck to be flying off to Singapore in a minute!’ Gary put his hand on his hip in an overtly camp gesture which made her smile again. ‘You know I’d always wanted to meet a real-live prince!’

By mid-afternoon the house was gleaming—and there were fresh flowers in vases and the smell of furniture polish wafting in the air. Why didn’t she go the whole hog and bake a cake while she was at it? Because you aren’t selling your house, that’s why. And neither are you selling yourself.

She didn’t know what she was going to say to him, but she knew that she was not going to allow him to talk her into anything she didn’t want. And—

The doorbell rang and Lucy froze. She shut her eyes briefly. How many times in your life did you wish that something was just a bad dream?

Guido glanced down the road as he waited for her to answer. He had never been anywhere like this in his life—it was like a parallel universe. Neat little semi-detached houses, with sparkling windows and tidy gardens. He could hear the sound of birds, and walking down the road towards him was a woman with a pushchair, and a chubby toddler by her side, who kept stopping to peer at the pavement. He stared hard at them in a way he would never normally have done, and his mouth tightened as the door opened and there stood Lucy.

For a moment he was taken aback to see that she looked just the same—slim and strong and curvy. Had he somehow expected her to be already swollen? Perhaps wearing some floaty smock thing to disguise a growing bump? His eyes narrowed. No, not the same at all—there were faint shadows beneath her honey-coloured eyes and her face was pale. The world seemed suddenly silent—an immense, important silence—and yet his words, when they came, were ordinary words.

‘Hello, Lucy.’

Just the sight of him made her heart turn over, as she had suspected it would anyway. But her feelings for Guido were deeper and more complex now—for this was the man who had sired the child which grew inside her. A strong and powerful man. How she yearned to just let him take over and protect her—an instinct which perhaps went hand-in-hand with pregnancy itself. But he was offering to do neither, and she did not have the right to ask—she had relinquished all such rights the day she had walked out on him…

Her heart was racing—could that be good for the baby?—and she nodded in acknowledgement. ‘You’d better come in.’

It was a bit like stepping into a larger version of a dolls’ house he had once seen as a child in a museum, when he had been staying with his aunt. He’d had no idea that proportions could be so scaled-down—that rooms could be so small!

She led the way into a yellow and white sitting room, and he was surprised by the sudden understanding of a word which was not usually in his vocabulary. Cosy.

‘Would you like some coffee?’

He shook his head. ‘No, I do not want coffee.’ And then, because they both seemed in danger of ignoring something in the hope that it might just go away, he said, ‘How many weeks?’

‘I’m not sure—’

‘How can you not be sure?’ he demanded.

‘We can work it out,’ she said desperately.