Royal Christmas: Royal Love-Child, Forbidden Marriage. Кейт Хьюит

roiled within him, as bitter as bile. He was using Phoebe, using her with cold-hearted calculation. And if she discovered it …

      He couldn’t think that way. Couldn’t afford to. The king’s nefarious plans justified his own. This was the way it had to be; the only way it could be.

      Numbly, Phoebe followed one of the royal servants to the top floor of the palace, where the nursery suite was located. She was met at the door by a pink-cheeked matron in a staid blue uniform.

      ‘We’ve been waiting for you,’ the nurse said, smiling with easy good humour.

      ‘Where’s my son?’ Phoebe asked tersely, and Frances stepped aside to let her enter.

      ‘He’s right here, never you worry.’

      ‘Mommy!’ Christian stood up from his place on a colourful rug on the floor, bits of Lego scattered around him. ‘Where have you been?’

      Phoebe let out a shaky laugh of relief as she bent to scoop him into her arms. Christian squirmed, but she couldn’t resist pressing a kiss to his head. ‘I was talking to Leo,’ she murmured, kissing him again. ‘Are you all right?’

      ‘Of course I am.’ Christian wriggled away, returning to his Lego. ‘I met the king.’

      Phoebe sat back on her heels, her heart beating fast once more. ‘Did you?’ she asked lightly. ‘Was he nice?’

      ‘He was OK,’ Christian said with a shrug, then glanced up. ‘Why didn’t you come with me?’ His eyes widened, and Phoebe saw the fear lurking behind his boyish bravado.

      ‘I wanted to,’ she said carefully, ‘but the king wanted some special time with you.’

      Christian considered this as he placed another piece of Lego on the tower he was building. ‘Oh,’ he said, and just when Phoebe was about to let her breath out in relief of a confrontation avoided, he looked up with his clear, candid gaze. ‘Why?’

      ‘Time for elevenses!’ Frances swept in with a tray of jam and bread as well as glasses of milk. ‘You must be hungry, young man. Come and have a bite to eat.’ Dutifully Christian sat at the table for his snack, and Phoebe rose, turning to Frances, who busied herself tidying up the toys.

      ‘Thank you for taking care of him.’

      ‘He’s a lovely young man,’ Frances replied. ‘It was no trouble.’

      ‘You’ve worked for the royal family for a long time,’ Phoebe said slowly.

      Frances nodded. ‘Thirty-five years, since Leo was born. I took care of him as well as Anders.’ Her expression sobered. ‘Such a waste, that one. A loss.’

      It was, sadly, a succinct and accurate summary of Anders’s life. ‘Yes,’ Phoebe agreed quietly.

      ‘You know, of course,’ Frances continued with a nod and Phoebe started at her plain speaking. ‘He couldn’t keep his hand to anything.’

      ‘No, I don’t suppose he could.’ Phoebe reached down to place a dog-eared book in the toy basket. ‘You must have known them quite well, then? Anders … and Leo?’

      Frances glanced up quickly, her expression shrewd before she shrugged and nodded. ‘Yes, of course.’

      Curiosity bit at Phoebe, made her want to ask questions. To know more, and even to understand. ‘What were they like … together? Were they friends?’

      Frances gave a short, derisive laugh. ‘Friends? Those two? Not even for a moment.’

      The abruptness and certainty of her answer made Phoebe ask, ‘Why do you say that?’

      ‘Because Anders was frightfully spoiled from the moment he was born. I did the best I could, but his parents doted on him dreadfully. He could do no wrong, and if he did …’ she shrugged ‘ … Leo was blamed.’

      ‘Leo …?’ Phoebe glanced quickly at Christian, but he was absorbed in a game he was playing quietly with himself at the table, his face smeared with jam. ‘What do you mean?’

      Frances sighed. ‘It’s not my place to say, but I can only imagine how difficult your position here must be, and the more information you have …’ She stopped and shrugged again. ‘Nicholas and Havard were brothers. It starts with them, you see. Nicholas hated Havard … he was jealous of him, of course. Everyone loved Havard. He was the younger brother, but I’m sure everyone wished he were the heir instead of Nicholas. He was handsome, charming, kind to everyone, while Nicholas was sour and spiteful. He couldn’t help it, really. He was sickly as a child, pale and thin, while Havard was bursting with health. Or so I’ve been told … he was a husband and father by the time I met him. But it seemed that Nicholas had reason to be jealous, and that jealousy poisoned him.’ Frances put the basket back on the shelf and brushed off her hands. ‘Nicholas married first, a Danish woman, Johanna. She retired to Monaco when Anders abdicated, and died two years ago. But back then it seemed as if they might make a good match, until no children came. For ten years.’ She shook her head. ‘Ten long years. Meanwhile Havard married Ana, an Italian heiress, and had Leo practically nine months later. Nicholas was even more eaten up with jealousy. Everyone could see it, even me. I had been hired by then, to take care of Leo.’

      ‘But Leo had no chance to be king,’ Phoebe said. ‘As the son of the younger son.’

      ‘Well, that would be the case, if Nicholas didn’t have any heirs. And Havard probably began to think his son might be king—he actually might be king—if Nicholas remained childless. There were rumours and whispers, as there always are, and no doubt they enraged Nicholas.’

      Phoebe couldn’t even imagine the tensions and rivalries that must have poisoned the royal household, the home Leo had grown up in. How had it affected him? Changed him? ‘What happened then?’ she asked in a whisper.

      ‘Anders was born and Havard died,’ Frances said simply, ‘and everything changed.’

      ‘How …?’

      ‘Nicholas had an heir and Leo had nothing. His mother was sent back to Italy post-haste and Leo was treated like the poor relation. It’s no wonder—’ Frances stopped, shaking her head. ‘But I shouldn’t gossip like this, even if you deserve to know.’

      Phoebe laid her hand on Frances’s arm. ‘Please,’ she said, ‘tell me.’ She needed to know this history, needed to understand Leo.

       Why …?

      She couldn’t even say, couldn’t untangle the kaleidoscope of feelings tumbling through her. Fear, of course, was prevalent, but there was also compassion, wonder, hope.

       Hope …?

      That made no sense.

      Phoebe turned back to Frances, who pursed her lips then gave a little shrug. ‘It’s no wonder he went off the rails a bit, that’s all,’ she finally said.

      ‘The Playboy Prince,’ Phoebe murmured, and Frances nodded.

      ‘Exactly.’ Christian rose from the table, gleefully holding out his jam-covered hands. ‘Come here, love,’ Frances said, bustling over to him, clearly glad to have a reason to end the conversation with Phoebe. ‘Let’s get you washed off.’

      Christian went for a wash off with Frances, and Phoebe was left alone in the nursery with its high sashed windows and pale oak floor. She sank onto a sofa, her mind spinning. She felt she understood Leo so much more now … why he’d been such a playboy, so cynical, and why he’d changed. For he had changed, she thought. The unneeded spare had become the heir, the prince who would be king, and duty rather than desire—a lust for pleasure—drove him now.

      Yet could she really think she knew—understood—Leo? She wanted to know him, to trust him, even to like him. She touched her finger to her lips, and knew she wanted more than to like him. Desire, consuming, endless, flooded her.

      Yet