To Marry a Prince (9 page)

She sniffed a bit. ‘Ceramic. With forget-me-nots on.’ Her voice wobbled.

He looked up at her then. It was the heart-stopping smile she remembered. How could he be such a lying toe-rag and have a smile like that? It wasn’t fair.

‘OK. Forget-me-not ceramic. It still needs to be fished out. Hot water? First-aid box?’

Bella was starting to feel faint. She directed him to the bathroom but denied all knowledge of any first-aid supplies. He went and she fell back among the lumpy cushions, nursing her foot. She didn’t want to look at it again. There was a purply-white flap of flesh that made her feel quite sick.

Fortunately, he was not so squeamish. He came back with a soap dish full of warm water, a fistful of Lottie’s eye make-up remover pads and a tube of antiseptic cream.

‘Let’s see if gangrene has set in,’ he said cheerfully, brushing her hand away.

Bella leaned forward, peering in spite of herself.

‘It looks gross.’

‘Then don’t look.’

She sat back hastily and averted her eyes while he mopped in a brisk, no-nonsense fashion that somehow didn’t hurt as much as it ought to. When he’d finished, he pressed an eye make-up pad to the side of her foot and said, ‘Hold it there. You don’t have to look. Just keep pressing hard so it doesn’t start bleeding again.’

He disappeared into the bathroom and returned with a handful of serious-looking packets and a roll of bandage. Bella stared.

‘I’d say that either your flat-mate is a hypochondriac or she dates rugby players. Hold this.’

She took the roll of bandage while he ripped open one of the smaller packets.

‘Here we are. Sterilised pad. Brilliant. You can take your hand away now.’

She did and braced herself for a fountain of blood. But the gash only oozed a bit.

He slapped the pad on to it, wound the crepe bandage around her foot like a professional, and stood back with a flourish.

‘I should stay there for a bit, if I were you. Keep the pressure off. If you stand up it will start to bleed again.’

‘Thank you,’ said Bella.

She could see he was pleased with himself and she was genuinely grateful. On the other hand, he was still a lying toe-rag who’d had no compunction about making a fool of her. He had no
right
to tell her what to do, even if it was for her own good.

He cocked an eyebrow. ‘Still annoyed with me?’

She sat up, furious all over again. ‘Annoyed?
Annoyed?
Annoyed doesn’t begin to cover it. What you did was unforgivable.’

He backed away, blinking.

‘Would you really call it unforgivable?’ he demurred.

‘I just did. What’s more, I mean it.’

‘I can see that. But – look, give me a chance to explain?’

But she swept on. Anger was better than weeping. His duplicity still hurt more than she wanted to think about.

‘I thought I knew every lousy trick in the book that you guys play on women. But this is a new one, even for me and my friends.’

He looked serious. ‘You’ve told your friends?’

That made her even madder. ‘Oh, yes, that gets you, doesn’t it? What if one of my friends goes and tells the
Daily Shag?
You – you – you
wart poultice
.’

He blinked. Just for a moment, Bella thought she saw his mouth start to lift at the corner. She reared up against the battered corner of the sofa.

‘Don’t you dare laugh at me! Don’t you dare.’

At once he was serious again. ‘Not laughing. Not laughing. If your friends have told the
Daily Shag
—’ his voice shook for a moment but he got control of it with
admirable speed ‘—it’s no more than I deserve. I’ll tell my office to admit everything and issue an abject apology.’

She relaxed. ‘Well, they haven’t. Though it would serve you right if they did.’

‘They haven’t? How do you know?’

‘Because I haven’t told anyone,’ she snapped. ‘I didn’t find out myself until this afternoon. Then I saw your photo in a paper in the dentist’s waiting room and realised you were a sodding prince as well as a total …’ Words failed her.

‘Wart poultice?’ he offered, straight-faced.

‘Con man,’ she said coldly.

‘I know.’ He sat down in the shabby old armchair on the other side of the fireplace and clasped his hands between his knees. ‘I’m truly sorry. I don’t know what came over me. I’ve never done anything like that before.’

‘Huh!’

‘No, I mean it. Ask anyone. Not me at all. My brother George now, it’s exactly the sort of thing he loves. Does all the time. He’s been known to dress up in a gorilla suit and sell kisses at a hen night. But me – no. I’m the boring, well-behaved one.’

‘Not,’ said Bella between her teeth, ‘from where I’m sitting.’

He sighed. ‘No. I can see that. I really am sorry.’

‘So you’ve said.’

‘Look – can I explain?’

‘I don’t know. Can you?’

‘I don’t know. But I can try.’ He looked into yester-
day’s ashes. ‘When you didn’t know who I was – really didn’t know, I mean, weren’t just playing some game you thought was cute – I felt as if I’d been given a present. Everyone always knows who I am. So they’re polite and a bit careful. Or challenging, sometimes. Or flirtatious. I know how to put them at their ease. Or deflect hostility. Or blank the predatory vamp. Oh, boy do I know how to do
that
.’ For a moment he sounded bitter.

Bella was aware of a sneaking sympathy for him. She repressed it. He deserved to suffer a lot more yet before she forgave him.
If
she forgave him.

‘I never tried to vamp you,’ she said hotly.

He looked up then. ‘No. Exactly. You were just sweet and all tied up with your own problems.’

She stiffened. ‘Are you saying I’m self-obsessed?’

He smiled. ‘No, you just had your own priorities. And I wasn’t one of them. You have no idea what that was like. I felt like a horse galloping into a field after spending its life walking round and round a paddock.’

‘Really?’ She was sceptical.

He ran his hands through his hair. ‘Look, everyone around me thinks I’m so important, and it’s not good to be the person for whom everything is done, around whom everything is planned. They treat me like a national monument. And then, on Saturday, as far as you were concerned I was just a guy who happened by. It was a new experience for me.’

‘I – see.’ It made sense in a weird way.

‘I didn’t want to give that up. Can you understand that?’

‘I suppose so. But it still doesn’t explain why you
went on playing Mr Nobody this morning. That was horrid.’

He flushed. ‘I know.’

‘I even asked who you were, for God’s sake.’

‘I know,’ he said miserably. ‘But I don’t usually have to tell people who I am. I couldn’t find the words somehow. And while I was floundering, you ran off.’

‘Hmm.’ That made sense, she thought, softening.

‘I knew I’d done it wrong as soon as you did. You looked so – hurt.’

Bella flinched and hardened herself again. ‘So why didn’t you come after me and put it right? Tell me who you were, at least?’

‘I wanted to. But, well, there was my security man watching. And God knows who else. You might not have recognised me but there are plenty of people who do, all the time.’

‘Recognise you?’ She gave a hoot of derision. ‘How the hell would they recognise you under a hoodie and shades? You looked like a CIA assassin.’

‘Really?’ He sounded flattered.

‘Not a very good assassin.’

‘Oh, well, that’s me in my place,’ he said resignedly.

In spite of herself, she gave a faint giggle.

He looked up hopefully. ‘Bella, please. I know I’ve been all sorts of an idiot and you have every right to kick me out and never see me again. But – can we start again? Please?’

She thought about it. ‘Start again?’

‘As if we’d just met.’

‘Saturday never happened?’

His eyes lit with that secret laughter. ‘I don’t want to go that far. You looked very fetching among the flowerpots. Say this morning never happened.’

‘Ah.’ She thought about it. ‘Proper introductions?’

‘If you want. The Hamiltons could ask us both to dinner …’

She waved that aside. ‘I don’t mean references and people you know setting it up with people I know. I mean you telling me who you are, what you do and what you want. And then giving me a phone number, like people do. If you want to.’

He looked dazed. ‘I want to,’ he said in a sort of strangled croak.

‘OK then. Let’s see how it goes. Hello. I’m Bella Greenwood.’ She held out her hand.

He took it. But instead of shaking it politely, he stood up and went down on one knee in front of the sofa, holding her hand between both of his.

Oh, my Lord
, she thought, startled.

‘I’m Richard. I’m heir to the British throne. I saw you across a moonlit courtyard and I couldn’t wait to meet you.’

WOW!
she thought.

Aloud she said, ‘You are nuts. You know that?’

‘You can’t say things like that to the heir to the throne,’ he said calmly.

And kissed her hand. Very gently, but it was a real kiss all the same. She felt it through her skin and down to her bones, and it damn nearly stopped her heart.

‘You are going seriously OTT,’ she said in a breathless, scolding voice.

‘You told me to tell you what I want,’ he said in an injured voice.

‘I said proper introductions,’ she hissed, seriously flustered.

‘Well, all right, if you insist. But if you want to curtsey, you’ll have to stand up.’

‘Curtsey? No way.’

‘You are quite right. You shouldn’t put any weight on that foot yet. Not for hours. In fact, I think—’

Abruptly he stopped kneeling beside her and plonked himself down on the sofa. ‘Budge up.’

She did, eyeing him warily. He put one arm along the saggy old back and leaned forward, looking down into her eyes. His, she saw, were brown and very, very amused.

‘I think you should lie back and—’

‘If you tell me to lie back and think of England, I shall deck you,’ snarled Bella, finding herself a lot deeper among the cushions than she had expected.

He smiled. ‘No, you won’t.’

And kissed her.

And there was a yell as the front door opened and Lottie skidded on spilled tea and the ruins of her forget-me-not-mug.

Richard let Bella go rather slowly. ‘There.’

She swallowed. ‘You took advantage of me.’

‘Yup.’

‘Oh, God. And now Lottie’s home.’

‘Charlotte thing? Good.’ He stood up.

‘Good?
Good?
Have you no sense of timing?’

But he was already in the small hall. Bella heard him
say, ‘Charlotte Hendred? You won’t remember me, but we met at the Hamiltons’ several months ago. I wonder if you would do me the immense kindness of introducing me to your friend, Miss Greenwood.’

There were glugging sounds from the hallway. Bella sympathised. The man was a swine, with a very nasty sense of humour.

She struggled off the sofa and limped over to the door of the sitting room. She was very much afraid that her hair was a mess and her cheeks were pink. Lottie would recognise the signs of a woman who had just been comprehensively kissed. But there wasn’t a thing Bella could do about it.

‘Um … hi, Lottie. Richard –’ she glared at him ‘– is teasing you. We met on Saturday.’

‘But we weren’t properly introduced,’ he said imperturbably. ‘Miss Hendred?’

Lottie looked from one to the other of them, and shrugged.

‘Your Royal Highness, may I present Miss Isabella Greenwood, a childhood friend and currently my flat-mate.’

Bella’s chin rose. ‘I told you. No curtseying.’

His eyes laughed. ‘OK. What about a date? A proper date, where I pick you up, take you to dinner and bring you home again?’

Bella was so taken aback she could only mouth, like a goldfish, but no words came out.

He stood there, all courteous attention, waiting for an answer.

Eventually she managed a wordless ‘squee’ noise,
like a demented dentist’s drill, and he inclined his head.

‘Thank you. Tomorrow? Eight o’clock?’

She squeaked again.

He clicked his fingers. ‘Phone number. You wanted me to give it to you. But I think you have it on your phone already. Lots and lots of times, in fact. Call me if you want to change the plans. Otherwise I’ll see you here tomorrow at eight.’

He came over and looked down at her, half laughing and wholly purposeful. Bella swallowed. But he didn’t kiss her. Instead he touched one hand to her scarlet cheek. Which was worse, somehow; wonderful but worse.

‘Take care of that foot,’ he said softly. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow.’