Page 7 of Crowned For The King's Secret

Now Vic realised the wisdom of Lance’s words.

‘Victoria.’

That voice. Soft, deep, a low rasp. A voice that had haunted her dreams. After all this time she hadn’t expected to see him again and yet here he was, dressed unlike a king in casual trousers and an open-necked shirt. Although the trousers were obviously tailored to his powerful form, and the shirt was bespoke. She’d lived around fine tailoring enough to be able to tell.

Today he wore sunglasses. She was thankful for that. On their night together she’d believed he could peer right into her soul and she’d enjoyed the sensation of being...known, far too much. But what if he took off his sunglasses right now? Vic gripped onto the doorjamb lest she fall, or flee into the house, locking the door behind her, because this man was a risk to her equilibrium...

No.

She wasn’t that person any more. She’d hidden before, smothering her sorrows and her physical and emotional pain in prescription medication and an uncaring façade that had hurt herself, and the people she’d loved. She wasn’t doing that now. Fight, not flight.

‘What are you doing here?’

The corner of his perfect mouth kicked up in the barest of movements at her less than welcoming greeting, though what did he expect? Still, a traitorous whisper of warmth slid through her. That mouth of his had been a revelation, exploring her body in every way. Soft, coaxing. Hard and relentless. He’d given it all to her and she’d craved more. She’d never wanted it to end.

Enough.

‘I came to see my... Nicolai. For his birthday.’

She loathed the hesitation in Sandro’s voice. The chill. The complete lack of acknowledgement of Nic’s place as Sandro’s son, whilst accepting it all the same.

In the months after the custody arrangements had been finalised, she’d welcomed the lack of that formal acknowledgement from Sandro. All she’d wanted for Nic from the moment of his birth was a happy, normal life not weighed down by expectation that she knew the aristocracy, and most certainly royalty, carried with them. Her brother had suffered enough and by extension her, and he’d been a duke. She could only imagine the pressures on a king and his heir. And selfishly, she didn’t want anything taking Nic away from her. She also didn’t want him dragged back to a country once torn apart by a civil war in which Sandro had lost his parents and a country he had been exiled from for years.

Even now that knowledge had made her heart break a little, for the boy this man had once been. Who’d lost everything. As a mother she simply couldn’t imagine it. Learning about her son’s father and the man with whom she’d spent one blissful night had been a shock and a revelation. What he’d survived, what he’d achieved. But even with the catastrophic loss of his parents, he hadn’t wanted to know his own son, share his heritage with his little boy. She’d been responsible for all of that, for trying to ensure that even as an infant Nic knew who his father was, and what his country looked like. She’d never understood Sandro’s reluctance, but then, she accepted after her disastrous marriage that she’d never much understood men at all.

‘Nic’s sleeping right now, but thank you for the gift.’

‘The gift...’

He probably had no idea what had been purchased. He’d have staff to buy presents for his illegitimate child. She should be thankful that he’d arranged for anything to be purchased at all, though she knew gifts didn’t mean that people cared.

Two people seemed to melt from behind Sandro, a man and a woman, casually dressed although wearing jackets even on this warm summer’s day. There was nothing casual about their demeanour, the way they scanned the street. They murmured something in what sounded like Italian, Santa Fiorina’s official language. She tried to peer around Sandro’s impressive form to get a better look at them.

‘Please excuse my personal protection,’ he said, his voice a little more accented than when she had first met him. ‘May I come in?’

An uncomfortable sensation pricked at the back of her neck. The male security operative smiled at her as the female continued monitoring the street. They loomed rather than seemed intimidating, yet why did she feel the electric sensation of a threat? Of course. She had akingon her doorstep. Nothing about this situation was normal. She gripped the door harder. Sandro smiled at her too, with not the warm, seductive smile of a night that seemed so long ago, but something sharper, more brittle.

She supposed you didn’t keep royalty standing on the doorstep, even if they had arrived unexpectedly.

‘Of course.’

Vic stepped aside as Sandro came through. The whole entrance hall seemed to shrink in his presence. His height, his breadth. Once, his size had made her feel small and safe. Now, it was as if the air had been sucked from the space. His security detail followed, and she shut the door behind them. Why did she feel trapped all of a sudden?

The man spoke this time. More Italian. She’d been trying to learn for Nicci, in case one day he wanted to travel to Santa Fiorina. Mr Falconi, the palace representative who seemed to be a constant and unnecessary visitor, had offered to teach her, but that man’s presence made her skin prickle uncomfortably. The way he looked at her. The personal disclosures, like telling her he hadn’t been able to have children of his own, as if that was somehow meant to bring them closer, when he was an intermediary and could never be the man she still wanted in a visceral kind of way. So she’d politely declined his assistance and stuck with phone apps instead.

‘My apologies,’ Sandro said, bringing her back to the reality pressing down on her. ‘My security would like to look through your house. They’re zealous about my safety.’

Sandro removed his sunglasses, her breath hitching at the way his vivid blue gaze caught her. How many times had she recollected his heated looks, his eyes the colour of balmy summer days? Their shared passion? Now there was no heat. Only something like the open ocean. Cold, remote, unfathomable.

She could say no. This washerhome, somewhere warm and welcoming she’d set up, away from the inner city. A place to quell the vicious memories that still plagued her at times. Where she could make a simple life for her and Nic, do her charity work. Try to make a small difference.

But she understood, Sandro wasn’t a normal man as much as she’d liked to pretend that he had been. She’d wanted to ask why—why that one night, why her? But she supposed the answer didn’t really matter when there were so many other questions that were more important.

Such as why he wanted nothing to do with his son when he’d lost so much himself.

Vic turned to the woman. ‘You can look through the house and garden, just don’t go into the room upstairs with the closed door. That’s Nic’s and he’s sleeping.’

She nodded, and disappeared into the house with her colleague, leaving Vic and Sandro awkwardly alone with the hallstand, umbrellas and coats. He raised one strong, dark eyebrow in an imperious kind of way.

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