A shadow crossed his face, lines forming on his forehead. ‘He was going to take a back seat for my grandmother.’
‘She was a violinist?’
‘Yes. When they married she was already world-famous. My grandfather’s coronation limited the scope of when and where she could perform, so she concentrated on composing music rather than performing, which was her first love.’
‘So that was their plan? For her to start performing again?’
‘She still performed, but only a couple of times a year at carefully arranged events. His abdication would have freed her and enabled her to tour the world—something my grandfather was fully behind. He was looking forward to travelling with her.’
‘He’d travelled much of the world as a monarch,’ she pointed out.
‘Travelling as monarch is different. He was an ambassador for our island.’ He smiled grimly. ‘When a member of my family travels on royal business he has a retinue of staff and an itinerary that leaves no room for spontaneity. Every minute is accounted for.’
Jo tried to imagine the Theo she’d met five years ago, the carefree adrenaline addict with the infectious smile and an impulsive zest for life, living under such restrictions.
An image flashed into her mind of a fully mature lion trapped in a small cage.
‘Is that why your grandfather agreed you could take a sabbatical from your duties at the palace and travel the world?’
‘It wasn’t a question of agreement,’ he replied shortly.
When Theseus had decided to leave he’d discussed it with his grandfather as a matter of courtesy. He’d wanted his blessing but it hadn’t been imperative. He would have gone anyway. He’d graduated from Sandhurst and, loving military life, had stayed on in the army for a few more years. But then he’d turned twenty-eight and his family’s eyes had turned to him. He’d been expected to take his place in the palace, as a good prince was supposed to do...
It had felt as if a hook had been placed around his neck, tightening as the day had loomed ever closer.
He’d known that once he was in the palace permanently, any hope of freedom would be gone for ever. His childhood dream of becoming an astronaut had long been buried, but that yearning for freedom, the wish to see new horizons and control his own destiny without thinking of the impact on the palace, had still been so vivid he’d been able to taste it on his tongue.
He’d thought of his parents, dead at an age not much older than he was now, their lives snuffed out in the blink of an eye. Would they have lived that final day in the same way if they’d known it would be their last?
And so he’d made up his mind to leave before protocol engulfed him and to live his life as if each day really was his last.
He’d become Theo Patakis: the man he might have been if fate hadn’t made him a prince.
A STRANGE DISQUIET slipped through him. Theseus shrugged it off, and was thankful when a maid came into the office with their refreshments, placing a tray down on the table where Jo had put her Dictaphone.
He saw her gaze flitter to the karidopita, a walnut and spice cake.
‘Have a slice.’ He lifted the plate for her.
‘No, thank you.’ While she poured the coffee her gaze lingered on the cake.
‘Are you sure?’
She pulled a face. ‘I put on weight just looking at it.’
‘One slice won’t hurt.’
‘If I have one slice I’ll want the rest of it, and before we know it I’ll be running to the kitchen and holding the chef to ransom until he’s made me a fresh one.’ She said it with laughter in her voice, but there was no disguising the longing on her face.
He was about to encourage her again—to his mind a little bit of everything never hurt anyone—when he remembered her as she’d been on Illya. She still had her luscious curves now, but there was no denying that she’d lost weight—perhaps a couple of stone if he were any judge. It seemed her weight loss was an ongoing battle.
Moving the plate to his desk and out of her eyeline, he settled back in his chair, cradling his coffee cup in his hands.
He didn’t miss the quick smile of gratitude she threw his way. It was a smile that made his stomach pull and a wave of something he couldn’t distinguish race through him.
‘We were discussing my grandfather’s plans for abdication,’ he prompted her, keen to steer them back to their conversation and focus his mind on the job at hand rather than on her.
She threw him another grateful smile and leaned forward to press ‘record’ on her Dictaphone again. The movement pulled her sweater down enough to give him the tiniest glimpse of her milky cleavage.
A stab of lust pierced him. Thoughts he’d done his damnedest to keep at bay pushed through.
She had skin like satin. Breasts that...
With resolve like steel he pushed the unbidden memory away.
He was not that man who put his own pleasure above everything else any more.
Holding on to his steely resolve and keeping his head together, he answered her many questions, one leading directly to another, all the while stopping his thoughts from straying any further into forbidden territory.
It was a hard thing to do when the mouth posing the questions was so sinfully kissable.
* * *
By the time she’d asked her last question Jo’s lower back ached from sitting in the same position for so long—three hours, according to her watch. She got up to stretch her legs and went to stand at the window.
Discussing his grandfather’s life had felt strangely intimate and she was relieved that it was over. The way Theseus had stared at her throughout...
His dark eyes had never left her face. And she hadn’t been able to wrench her gaze from his.
‘There’s a load of schoolchildren in your garden,’ she said, saying the first thing that popped into her mind as she tried desperately to break through the weird atmosphere that had shrunk the spacious office into a tight, claustrophobic room.
‘They’ll be here for the tour,’ he murmured, coming to stand by her side. ‘The palace museum and grounds only open at weekends in the off season, but we arrange private midweek tours for schools and other groups. From the first of May until the first of September the grounds, museum and some parts of the palace are open every day. You can’t walk anywhere without tripping over a tourist.’
‘Is it hard, opening your home to strangers?’
He gave a tight smile. ‘This is a palace—not a home.’
‘It’s your home.’
‘Our private quarters are off-limits to visitors, but look around you. Where can I go if I want to enjoy the sun in privacy? As soon as I step out of my apartment there are courtiers by my side—’ He broke off and muttered what sounded like an oath.
Jo would have pressed him further, but her throat had closed up. Theseus’s nearness, his heat and the warm, oaky scent she remembered so well were all there, igniting her senses... She clenched her fists, fighting her body and its yearning to press closer, to actually touch him.
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