Since the story hit had world news four days ago, Toby had found he couldn’t even attend a fire without being crowded and asked for his opinion on questions he couldn’t answer. How the hell did stars handle this on a daily basis?
How had Charlie managed not to punch someone without his restraining influence? How was Giulia coping with the pressure? Was she eating? And, God help him, did she like that handsome Grand Duke? Had she fallen in love at a glance?
A disembodied voice filled the room via the loudspeaker. “Grizz, report to Leopard’s office, stat.”
Toby sighed and dropped down from the chin-up bar. Though they used the irreverent nicknames for each other—Toby’s being “Grizzly Bear” because of his height and build—when you were called to the captain’s office you didn’t prevaricate.
He took the back stairs three at a time, hoping to God Leopard didn’t have more questions about Charlie and Giulia, and ridiculous assertions that a fireman and a ballet teacher could be the lost heirs to a kingdom he’d only heard about on quiz shows. When he reached the office, two black-suited, unsmiling men turned to him, and he knew he was about to get answers at last. One said, “We need you to come with us now, sir, no questions asked.”
It wasn’t a request.
An hour later he landed in Canberra, at a quiet airfield reserved for VIPs.
For the next three hours he endured intense questioning, and instructions on what complete discretion really meant. Then, only then, was he introduced to Lady Eleni, a pretty, dark-haired woman who was personal assistant to Princess Jazmine—Charlie’s fiancée. Then he was taken to a dressing room at the Hellenican Consulate in Canberra, where he changed from gym clothes to jeans and shirt from the suitcase packed for him by the Australian Security Intelligence Office. They’d thought of everything.
Including Lia’s puppy, the excitable, scruffy Puck, who barked a series of excited yaps as they boarded the Hellenican royal jet.
She was shaking.
Standing in bright, late-summer sunshine outside the Summer Palace, wearing designer jeans and a lemon linen-shift and shoes that would have cost the same as her ballet school, Lia Costa waited for Toby to arrive.
But I’m not Lia Costa. I’m Giulia Maria Helena Marandis, Princess Royal-to-be, she reminded herself yet again, after a month of living in the Summer Palace in the small Mediterranean nation of Hellenia.
She reminded herself of it every day, almost every hour—and still she kept expecting the alarm to go off and to wake up back in her bedroom in Ryde…
Despite the day’s warmth, her hands and feet were cold. She chewed on her lip as the black Rolls turned smoothly and came through the gates. She winced as the press took hundreds of shots of the car’s occupants.
He was here. Toby was here.
The butterflies in her stomach turned to woodpeckers.
“It’ll be fine, Lia, you’ll see,” Charlie muttered as he waited beside her. “Don’t worry so much.”
She smiled and pressed her brother’s hand, knowing Charlie didn’t believe it any more than she did. Though he’d insisted on the King bringing Toby here, to talk everything out with their best friend, there was nothing anyone could say or do to fix the crisis she and Charlie found themselves in, unless they could find a way to turn back time. Charlie would be the next king of Hellenia, and Lia would be Princess Royal, with all its luxury—and its duty. Including creating much-needed royal heirs.
Charlie might be between a rock and a hard place, but at least he and Jazmine were deeply attracted. They had a chance at happiness.
She, Lia, had the choice of the devil and the stormy, blue sea.
The Rolls pulled up in front of them. The chauffeur opened the door for him and Toby, big, strong and dependable, emerged from the car. Joy surged through her at the sight of him.
Then she saw his face, let go of Charlie’s hand and gasped. Something awful ran through her body, like she’d stuck her finger in an electrical socket.
Toby was her gentle giant, her quiet tower of strength, who knew and loved her just as she was despite her inadequacies. For more than a decade she’d counted on seeing the tenderness in his summer-sky eyes, the sweet curve of his slow, sunlit smile, and the flash of his deep-grooved dimples when he looked at her.
Now, as he took in the changes to her hair, the obvious designer touches to her clothes, the look on his face—cold and unemotional—hurt her. It had been so stupid to indulge in the small, pitiful hope that in these clothes, with her hair cut and some subtle make-up applied, he’d find her pretty at last…
Until this moment she’d never seen the blackness Charlie claimed was inside him. She had only one single memory where Toby had looked at her without a smile—the day she’d discovered his family was exploding, and she’d brought him home to live with the family. Even when she’d woken up in the clinic after her collapse four years later, he’d smiled, held her tight and thanked God she was still with him.
But today there was no smile. She saw his soul from the mirror of his eyes, turning the bright summer day to night. Until now she hadn’t thought of his reaction to crossing the world for her, losing career, home and freedom of choice.
Lia fiddled with her hands. Her toes did the squirmy thing she hated. “T-Toby?”
His eyes met hers, in a searching that felt like a winter’s night…and then, like a miracle unfolding before her, they softened and lightened.
“Toby,” she whispered, and took a hesitant step. Her arms, of their own accord, reached for him. When his opened in return, and he smiled that slow, sunlit smile so uniquely his, she couldn’t hold in the sob of relief.
“Toby, oh, Toby, I’ve missed you!” she choked, and ran slam into his arms.
“Giulia, beloved,” he murmured into her hair as he held on fast.
And after a month of weathering storms of right royal proportions, the world felt right at last. Toby was here, her one-of-a-kind, wonderful friend who knew her, good and bad, weak or strong—and just loved her. She loved the endearments he used for her alone. Most women loved the way he spoke—or maybe they just loved his striking looks. But he’d never called the girls he’d dated “beloved,” only her. She loved it—so different from “babe” or “doll” or “sweetheart”, or the other normal nicknames guys called their women.
But she wasn’t his woman—she never had been—and that made the difference. Friendly love took away demands, emotional confrontations and expectation.
She ought to know. After enduring the world’s most stupid crush on her best friend all through her teen years, she’d finally given up hoping he’d look her way. Only then had the world shifted onto its right axis, and the best-friend love they were always meant to share had been theirs. They could hold each other without any silliness.
Only, the funny thing now was… Was he—aroused? No, that was ridiculous; he’d never wanted her that way. She tried to dismiss it from her mind as a guy thing, an involuntary reaction of some kind, and held tight to him anyway—best friends could do that. She whispered, “Toby, Toby,” as if he was a phantom that might disappear at any moment.
He smiled down at her, tender and loving. “Miss me, beautiful girl?”
“Like half of me was gone,” she choked. Like the sunshine had disappeared.
“So I gather I need not bow and say Your Highness, as instructed?”
The tone of his deep, rumbling voice, rich with teasing, made her gasp with relief. “You do and I’ll hit you.”
As he chuckled and caressed her hair, she kissed his cheek—and felt the old urge to taste his skin with her tongue.
Okay,