‘We haven’t hurt her,’ Georgiou said, defensive. ‘We have our orders. Though she fights like a wildcat’
‘I don’t care how she fights,’ Andreas snapped, appalled at the results of Sebastian’s curt orders. ‘You will not retaliate. She’s just a girl.’
‘She’s a woman,’ Georgiou corrected him. ‘She’s every bit a woman. Mixed with tigress.’
Andreas thought back to the Holly he’d left ten years ago. Even at seventeen Holly had had spirit.
Years ago he’d spent a glorious six months on Holly’s parents’ property, experiencing life in the Australian outback before taking up his royal duties. It had been a dispensation granted reluctantly to a younger son by his father, the king. His relationship with Holly had flared from nowhere and turned to wildfire. The young Andreas had been desperate for it to continue, but Holly had been strong enough for both of them.
‘You don’t belong in my world and I don’t belong in yours,’ she’d said firmly as he’d held her close one last time and declared he couldn’t leave her. ‘You’re needed at home. Your life is on Aristo. You’re promised in marriage to a princess. Andreas, don’t make it harder than it needs to be for both of us. Just go.’
So he’d gone, trying hard to block the stricken expression he’d glimpsed on his beloved’s face as Holly had turned away that one last time. Yes, there had been tears-he’d been close to them himself-but she was right. He was a royal prince, already promised in marriage. Holly had aging parents to care for and a budding career as a teacher on School of the Air. Holly and Andreas belonged on separate sides of the world.
So that had been it. He’d tried not to think of her for ten long years, through a tumultuous royal marriage that ended in acrimonious divorce, through his career as a royal prince with princely duties, through a life in the goldfish bowl of royalty. His was a life of service to the crown, a crown that must be protected at all costs.
A crown that Holly herself was now threatening to undermine, whether she knew it or not.
‘Just bring her here fast,’ he said, his tone becoming harsher as he recalled all that was at stake. ‘Bring her straight to the palace.’
‘There might be problems,’ Georgiou said cautiously.
‘What sort of problems?’
‘I told you. She’s not…quiet,’ he said. ‘There’s no saying she won’t scream her head off.’
‘Why would she do that?’
Another silence. Georgiou obviously thought that was a stupid question.
Okay, maybe it was. If they’d dragged her here against her will…If she was still even slightly the Holly he knew…
‘I’ll meet you at the airport,’ he said.
‘Not the main landing strip,’ Georgiou said urgently. ‘You need to talk to the lady privately. If she’ll talk to you.’
‘She’ll talk to me,’ Andreas said grimly.
‘Maybe,’ Georgiou said. ‘How long is it since you’ve seen her?’
‘Ten years.’
‘Then maybe she’s changed,’ Georgiou said and there was suddenly a note of admiration in his tone. ‘Maybe this woman has learned to fight.’
‘She could fight ten years ago.’
‘Could you win then?’ Georgiou asked diffidently. ‘With respect, Your Majesty…It takes four strong men to hold her now. Will you be able to do it?’
They were landing.
Holly had long since stopped struggling. Once she’d been bundled ignominiously onto the jet and the jet was in the air she’d accepted that fighting was useless. She’d withdrawn into what she hoped was dignified silence.
Not that she felt the least bit dignified. She’d been wearing ancient jeans and a dust-stained shirt when she’d been grabbed. She’d just completed a last inspection of the bores and water troughs-for the sake of the kangaroos and emus on the place, for the cattle had been sold long ago-and her blonde curls were thick with dust. Twenty-four hours later that dust was still with her. She’d scrubbed her face in the airplane washroom but there was no make-up to disguise the shadows under her eyes. She looked grubby and exhausted and fearful.
Not fearful, she thought savagely. She was damned if she’d show these louts fear.
Maybe it wasn’t these men she had to fear. Andreas wanted her. Andreas had taken her, whether she agreed or not.
Ten years ago she would have agreed. Ten years ago if Andreas had said come she’d have followed him to the ends of the earth. She’d fallen so deeply in love that she’d given everything she had. She would have given more.
Then she’d been wild, passionate, desperate to find a life outside the confines of her parents’ farm. Andreas had blasted into her dreary life, tall, dark and mysterious, a royal prince, twenty to her seventeen, laughing, imperious, seemingly as eager to be a part of her world as she’d been to be part of his. Of course they’d fallen in love.
She’d thought later, in the bleak aftermath of loss, that maybe that was why her parents had arranged to host Andreas. They’d known two young things might be drawn together as they had been. Her parents had had illusions of grandeur, and offering to host a young prince on a farm-stay when they had such a young, impressionable daughter was surely dangerous.
Maybe they’d had a royal marriage in mind. Who knew? All she knew was that her parents had achieved more than they’d bargained for.
A daughter desolate.
A tiny grandson, unacknowledged by his father. Now dead.
Don’t think of Adam, she told herself fiercely as the plane started to descend. Don’t you dare cry.
She blinked and stared fixedly out the plane window. They were circling the Adamas kingdom now. Home of Andreas.
Adamas consisted of two vast islands, the glamorous Aristo and the desert lands of Calista. Andreas had told her so much of these islands that she felt she knew them already. They were once one kingdom, ruled by the Royal House of Karedes, but now split acrimoniously into two by a warring brother and sister.
Andreas’s father ruled Aristo, and Andreas helped rule, as one of three royal sons. Andreas was married. She knew that much. The wedding had taken place soon after he’d returned from Australia. The story of the ceremony’s magnificence had even reached the women’s magazines in the Munwannay General Store. She’d read of it and wept. After that she’d studiously avoided any mention of him, but he was probably saddled with a tribe of royal children by now.