A Bride For The Playboy Prince. Sandra Marton

one.’ Lisa sucked in a deep breath as she patted her expanding stomach. ‘Think about it. There aren’t many really fashionable maternity dresses on the market right now—especially ones in natural fabrics, which “breathe”. I can work in more fabrics than just my trademark silk. Cotton and linen and wool. There’s an opportunity here staring me right in the face, and it seems I’m the perfect person to model my new collection.’

      ‘But...won’t that get publicity?’

      Lisa smiled and it felt like the first genuine smile she’d given in a long time. ‘I sincerely hope so.’

      ‘You aren’t afraid that the father will hear about it and come to find you?’

      Lisa shook her head. No. That was one thing she wasn’t worried about. Luc certainly wouldn’t be trawling the pages of fashion magazines now that he’d turned his back on his playboy life and locked himself away on his Mediterranean principality. Luc had made his position very clear.

      ‘No,’ she said quietly. ‘He won’t find out.’

      She sat back on her heels and as a rush of something like hope flooded through her, so did a new resolve. She needed to be strong for her baby and that wasn’t going to happen if she sat around wailing at the unfairness of it all. She was young, fit and hard-working and she had more than enough love to give this innocent new life which was growing inside her.

      Her baby would be happy and well cared for, she vowed fiercely. No matter what it took.

      * * *

      Luc sat at his desk feeling as if he had just opened Pandora’s box. The blood pounded inside his head and his skin grew clammy. There must be some kind of mistake. There must be. He had been bored. Why else would he have tapped Lisa’s name into the search engine of his computer? Yet wasn’t the truth something a little more unpalatable? That he couldn’t get her out of his head, no matter how hard he tried.

      Nearly six months had passed since he’d seen her and he had been eaten up with guilt about what had happened just before he’d left London. He had broken his self-imposed celibacy with his ex-lover, instead of the woman he was due to marry. But he was over that now and the date for his wedding to Sophie was due to be announced next week. It was the end of an era and the beginning of a new one, and he intended to embrace it wholeheartedly. And that was why he had typed Lisa’s name into the search engine—as a kind of careless test to see whether he could now look on her with indifference.

      A muscle at his temple flickered as once again he stared with disbelief at the screen. He was no stranger to shock. He had lost his mother in the most shocking of circumstances—and in some ways he had lost his father at the same time. He had thought nothing would ever rock him like that again, but a faint echo of that disbelief reverberated through him now. He stared at the image in front of him and his mouth dried. A picture of Lisa at a fashion show. Her lustrous caramel curls were pulled away from her face and her eyes and skin seemed to glow with a new vitality—but it hadn’t been that which had made his blood run cold.

      He stared at her swollen belly. At the hand which lay across her curving shape in that gently protective way which pregnant women always seemed to adopt. Features hardening into a frown, he read the accompanying text.

      DESIGNER LAUNCHES SWELL NEW LINE!

      Lisa Bailey, famous for the understated dresses which captivated a generation of ‘Ladies Who Lunch’, last night launched her new range of maternity wear. And stunning Lisa just happened to be modelling one of her own designs!

      Coyly refusing to name the baby’s father, the six-months-pregnant St Martin’s graduate would say only that, ‘Women have successfully been bringing up children on their own for centuries. It’s hardly ground-breaking stuff.’

      Ms Bailey’s collection is available to buy from her Belgravia shop.

      Luc sat back in his chair.

      Lisa, pregnant? He felt the ice move from his veins to his heart. It couldn’t be his. Definitely not his. He shook his head as if his denial would make it true, but memories had started to crowd into his mind which would not be silenced. Her heated claim that there had been no other lover than him since they’d been apart—and he had believed her, because he knew Lisa well enough to realise she wouldn’t lie about something like that. Six months pregnant. He sat back in his chair, his heart pounding as he raked a strand of hair away from his heated face. Of course it was his.

      Lisa Bailey was carrying his baby.

      His baby.

      Disbelief gave way to anger as he shut down the computer. Why the hell hadn’t she told him? Why had she left him to find out in such a way—and, just as importantly, who else knew?

      He reached out for the phone, but withdrew his hand again. He needed to think carefully and not act on impulse, for this was as delicate a negotiation as any he had ever handled. Using the phone would be unsatisfactory and there was no guarantee the call wouldn’t be overheard by someone at her end. Or his. It occurred to him that she might refuse to speak to him—in fact, the more he thought about it, the more likely a scenario that seemed, for she could be as stubborn as hell.

      Leaning forward, he pressed the buzzer on his desk and Eleonora appeared almost immediately.

      ‘Come in and close the door.’ Luc paused for a moment before he spoke. ‘I want you to cancel everything in my diary for the next few days.’

      Her darkly beautiful face remained impassive. ‘That might present some difficulties, Your Royal Highness.’

      Luc regarded her sternly. ‘And? Is that not what I pay you for—to handle the tricky stuff and smooth over any difficulties?’

      ‘Indeed.’ Eleonora inclined her dark head. ‘And does Your Royal Highness wish me to make any alternative arrangements to fill the unexpected spaces in your diary?’

      Luc’s mouth flattened as he nodded. ‘I need to fly to Isolaverde and afterwards I want the plane on standby, ready to take me to London.’

      ‘And am I allowed to ask why, Your Royal Highness?’

      ‘Not yet, you’re not.’

      Eleonora bit her lip but said nothing more and Luc waited until she had left the office before slowly turning to stare out of the window at the palace gardens. Already the days hinted at the warm weather ahead, yet his heart felt as wintry as if it had been covered with layers of ice. He couldn’t bear to sit here and think about the unthinkable. He wanted to go to England now. To go to Lisa Bailey and...and...

      And what? His default mechanism had always been one of action, but it was vital he did nothing impulsive. He must think this through carefully and consider every possibility which lay open to him.

      The following morning he flew to Isolaverde for the meeting he was dreading and from there his jet took him straight to London—but by the time he was sitting in his limousine outside Lisa’s shop, his feelings of disbelief and anger had turned into a clear focus of determination.

      The evening was cold and a persistent drizzle had left the pavements shining wet, with a sickly orange hue which glowed down from the streetlights. In the window of Lisa’s shop was a pregnant mannequin wearing a silk dress, her hand on her belly and a prettily arranged heap of wooden toys at her feet. Luc had sat and watched a procession of well-heeled women being dropped off by car or by taxi, sheltered from the rain by their chauffeurs’ umbrellas as they walked into the shop. Business must be booming, he thought grimly.

      He forced himself to wait until the shop closed and a couple of women who were clearly staff had left the building. As Luc waited, a passing police officer tapped on the window of the limousine, discreetly overlooking the fact that it was parked on double yellow lines once he was made aware of the owner’s identity.

      He waited until the lights in the shop had been dimmed and he could see only the gleaming curls of the woman sitting behind a small desk—and then he walked across the street and opened the door to the sound of a tinkly bell.

      Lisa