CHAPTER ONE
‘S HE was only seventeen?’
‘We’re talking ten years ago. I was barely out of my teens myself.’
‘Does that make a difference?’ The uncrowned king of Aristo stared across his massive desk at his brother, his aquiline face dark with fury. ‘Have we not had enough scandal?’
‘Not of my making.’ Prince Andreas Christos Karedes, third in line to the Crown of Aristo, stood his ground against his older brother with the disdain he always used in this family of testosterone-driven males. His brothers might be acknowledged womanizers, but Andreas made sure his affairs were discreet.
‘Until now,’ Sebastian said. ‘Not counting your singularly spectacular divorce, which had a massive impact. But this is worse. You need to sort it before it explodes over all of us.’
‘How the hell can I sort it?’
‘Get rid of her.’
‘You’re not saying…’
Sebastian shook his head, obviously rejecting the idea-though a tinge of regret in his voice said the option wasn’t altogether unattractive.
And Andreas even sympathized. Since their father’s death, all three brothers had been dragged through the mire of the media spotlight, and the political unrest was threatening to destroy them. In their thirties, impossibly handsome, wealthy beyond belief, indulged and fêted, the brothers were now facing realities they had no idea what to do with.
‘Though if I was our father…’ Sebastian added and Andreas shuddered. Who knew what the old king would have done if he’d discovered Holly’s secret? Thank God he’d never found out. Not that King Aegeus could have taken the moral high ground. His father’s past actions had got them into this mess.
‘You’ll make a better king than our father ever was,’ Andreas said softly. ‘What filthy dealing made him dispose of the royal diamond?’
‘That’s my concern,’ Sebastian said. There could be no royal coronation until the diamond was found-they all knew that-but the way the media was baying for blood there might not be a coronation even then. Without the diamond the rules had changed. If any more scandals broke…‘This girl…’
‘Holly.’
‘You remember her?’
‘Of course I remember her.’
‘Then she’ll be easy to find. We’ll buy her off-do whatever it takes, but she mustn’t talk to anyone.’
‘If she wanted to make a scandal she could have done it years ago.’
‘So it’s been simmering in the wings for years. To have it surface now…’ Sebastian rose and fixed Andreas with a look that was almost as deadly as the one used by the old king. ‘It can’t happen, brother. We have to make sure she’s not in a position to bring us down.’
‘I’ll contact her.’
‘You’ll go nowhere near her until we’re sure of her reaction. Not even a phone call. For all we know her phones are already tapped. I’ll have her brought here.’
‘I can arrange…’
‘You stay right out of it until she’s on our soil. You’re heading the corruption inquiry. With Alex still on his honeymoon-of all the times for our brother to demand to marry, this must surely be the worst-I need you more than ever. If you leave now and this leaks, we can almost guarantee losing the crown.’
‘So how do you propose to persuade her to come?’
‘Oh, I’ll persuade her,’ Sebastian said grimly. ‘She’s only a slip of a girl. She might be your past, but there’s no way she’s messing with our future.’
It was time to leave, but of all the places Holly had to farewell, this was the hardest.
The grave was tiny-a simple stone plaque nestled under the shade of the vast river-red-gum that gave this Australian cattle station its name. The tree was ancient. The native Australians who’d lived here for generations called it Munwannay-resting place-and when Holly’s tiny son had died it had seemed the only place to let him lie.
How could she walk away?
How could she walk away from any of this? Holly sank to her knees before her son’s grave and turned to gaze back over the homestead-the rambling, old house with its wide verandas, its French windows opening the house to every breeze, the neglected garden she’d loved so much since she was a little girl.
Andreas had loved this garden.
Andreas had loved everything about this place. And she’d loved Andreas.
Well, that was another thing she needed to walk away from. The memory of Prince Andreas Karedes. He’d been twenty when he’d come here to spend six months experiencing life in Australia’s remote outback. She’d been seventeen.
She was twenty-seven now. It was more than time that she move on-from this place, as well as a love that had been doomed from the start.
She’d been stalling for as long as possible, trying to keep the property presentable in case new owners could be found, but it had been on the market since her father’s death six months ago. Financially it was impossible to keep going, and it was becoming bleaker every day as she watched it deteriorate. Finally she’d transferred her job-teaching on the School of the Air-to the educational base at Alice Springs. This was the end.
She touched her baby’s gravestone one last time, aching with regret and loss. And then she paused, looking upward as the stillness of the hot April morning was shattered.
A helicopter was arrowing in fast from the east. It was big and powerful, a much larger machine than those owned by the larger local landowners. All black, almost menacing, it swept in low across the bare paddocks, heading straight for the homestead.
Holly winced. There’d been a trickle of potential buyers looking at the place since it had gone on the market. No one had been interested. Munwannay needed a massive injection of cash and enthusiasm to build it up to the magnificent property it had once been. If these were more potential buyers sent by the rural land agents, they’d react the same as the others. They’d walk through the faded splendour of the old homestead; they’d look at the weathered outbuildings and the dilapidated infrastructure and they’d walk away. If these buyers were coming in such a helicopter they’d have more money than most, but then they could afford to buy a more prestigious place.
And she didn’t want them here now. Not on her last day.
But they were landing. She watched them as the chopper settled in a cloud of dust; as the doors opened. Four men in dark jeans and black T-shirts jumped out. Big men. Powerfully built, all of them.