Her gaze locked on the dirty, tattered scarf, Queen Gwendolyn gasped softly. Tears flooded her eyes, and when she reached out for the scarf with trembling fingers, it was almost as if she was afraid to touch it. “Oh, Marcus, look!”
The king didn’t say a word. His expression as hard as granite, he shot Eliza a look that would have had a lesser woman shaking in her shoes. “We gave this to our son for Christmas last year. Where did you get it?”
“From a man named Willy Cranshaw,” she replied. “He found it in the woods in Colorado…near an abandoned campsite about five miles from the crash site.”
“You think Lucas dropped it there?” the queen asked, brushing away the tears that spilled from her eyes. “That he somehow survived the crash? All this time when we thought he was dead, you think he’s been wandering around the mountains? Is that what you’re saying?”
Eliza would have bet everything she owned that that was exactly what happened, but she couldn’t prove it. And until she could, she wouldn’t give the queen false hope. “I don’t know, Your Highness. I just know that the scarf didn’t walk away from the crash site on its own.”
She was trying to be cautious, but she might as well have saved her breath. The king and queen exchanged a long look, and suddenly they were in each other’s arms, laughing and crying and dancing with joy.
“He must be alive, Gwen!” the king laughed joyfully. “Can you believe it? After all this time, he’s really alive!”
Ecstatic, he whirled her around, then kissed her soundly, not caring who saw. “I have to tell Lorenzo,” he exclaimed, “so he can reopen the investigation. And the girls! They’re going to be thrilled. Rudy?” he yelled, all dignity gone as he glanced around for his personal servant. “I need you, man. Where are you?”
“Here, Your Highness,” the older man said quietly as he stepped into the room.
Surprising the older man, the king embraced him like a brother. “Lucas is alive, Rudy!”
To his credit, Rudy admitted that he’d already heard the news. “Ms. Windmere said that he was, Your Highness, but I thought she was another fortune hunter. Forgive me, Miss,” he told her solemnly. “But I couldn’t take any chances.”
“It’s okay,” she replied with an easy smile. “I know you were only doing your job.”
Pleased by both his old friend’s honesty and Eliza’s response, the king patted him on the shoulder. “Go get Lorenzo for me. He needs to know about this so we can reopen the investigation.”
At the mention of the duke’s name, Eliza stiffened. No! she wanted to cry. Don’T Bring Him In On This! But even as she bit back the words, she knew she was going to have to deal with the duke whether she liked it or not. He was, after all, the head of Royal Intelligence and had been in charge of the search for the prince from the moment his plane had gone down. Of course the king would want him to know about the scarf.
“Please sit down, Eliza and tell us everything,” the queen said, motioning her over to the pretty cream-colored couch and wing chairs that flanked the marble fireplace, which was the focal point of the room. “I know you said Mr. Cranshaw found Lucas’s scarf near a campsite in the mountains, but can you give us all the details you know?”
“Did he find anything else?” the king asked as he joined his wife on the couch and Eliza sank into one of the comfortable chairs. “Was there any way to tell if Lucas was hurt? Where has he been all this time? Why hasn’t he called? Doesn’t he know we’re worried about him?”
Hesitating, Eliza didn’t quite know how to answer that. As far as she was concerned, the very fact that Prince Lucas hadn’t notified his family that he was alive said a lot about his mental state, but that was strictly her opinion. She wasn’t a doctor and wasn’t about to comment on the prince’s mental or physical condition to his worried parents. So she avoided the issue and turned the conversation back to what she did know.
“Willy found the scarf at an abandoned campsite in a remote area up in the mountains. He couldn’t tell how long the prince stayed there—if it was just overnight or possibly longer, but someone had stayed long enough to build a campfire. As for the scarf, we don’t know if the prince dropped it or just forgot it, but it was on a log near the campfire.”
“Do you trust this Cranshaw fellow?” the king asked with a frown. “What do you know about him? Could he have found the scarf at the crash site and just made this all up so we would think Lucas is still alive? There are sick people out there who get their kicks doing that kind of thing, you know,” he told her grimly. “Gwendolyn and I found that out after Lucas turned up missing. Unfortunately, we live in a twisted world.”
“Willy has his moments,” she said honestly, “but I trust him. He’s not lying about where he found the scarf. He wouldn’t do that.”
She would have said more, but Duke Lorenzo arrived then, and the second he saw her sitting with the king and queen, he stiffened, his sharp green eyes dark with irritation as they locked with hers. Ignoring his aunt and uncle, he growled, “I don’t know what the devil you think you’re doing, but you’re not getting away with it.” Striding over to the chair where she sat, he grabbed her arm. “C’mon, you’re leaving. And this time, I’ll make sure you don’t sneak back in.”
Shocked, Queen Gwendolyn cried, “Lorenzo! What in heaven’s name has gotten into you? Eliza has brought us news of Lucas. Stop that!” she cried when he hauled Eliza to her feet. “Have you lost your mind? You know better than to treat a guest that way!”
“She’s just a reporter looking for headlines,” he retorted with a scowl. “Don’t believe anything she says. I caught her wandering the halls earlier and had Rudy escort her out of the building, but I guess she found a way to break back in.”
“She didn’t break in,” his uncle said, frowning. “We invited her in. She has news of Lucas. He’s alive. Look.” Holding out the scarf to him, he made no attempt to blink back the tears that pooled in his eyes. “This was found five miles from the crash site, Lorenzo. At an abandoned campsite,” he added huskily. “Can you believe it? He must be alive!”
Seeing the hope in his uncle’s and aunt’s eyes, Lorenzo wanted more than anything to believe that his cousin had somehow survived the plane crash. But how could he? It had been a year. If Lucas had walked away from the crash, where had he been for the past year? Where was he now? And even though he knew in a glance that the scarf Marcus held was Lucas’s, how much stock could he put in the word of an American reporter who no doubt lived and died by the outrageous headlines she wrote?
“I think it’s a little too early to jump to that conclusion,” he told Marcus stiffly. “This woman is a reporter. She’s just looking for a sensational story.”
“I am not!”
“She writes a gossip column about royalty,” he continued, ignoring her indignant cry. “I thought her name sounded familiar when I ran into her in the hall, so I did a little investigating. She writes for the Denver Sentinel, and she prides herself on beating the competition to a story. She’ll go to any lengths to get material for her column.”
“I don’t lie!”
“No? So you’re going to stand there and say Count Baldwin really had a child with his governess?” he taunted, referring to a twenty-five-year-old English count who had a reputation for being as pious as a monk. “That’s the most ridiculous thing I ever heard. The woman’s fifteen years his senior!”
“And a paternity test proved the child was his,” she retorted. “If you don’t believe me, I have a copy of the test results back in my office in Denver. I’ll send it to you when I get back home.”
Her blue eyes sparking fire at him, she dared him to top that, and with nothing more than that little act of defiance, she set his