The Viscount and The Virgin. Valerie Parv

spent with us, but we mustn’t monopolize him any longer. Some of you have transportation waiting for you at the east gate, so please join me in showing your appreciation before you leave.”

      Thanks to the splendid acoustics in the hall, the applause she initiated echoed for some minutes. With a smile and a salute, the viscount swung around and started to walk away. As he passed Kirsten, he said in lowered tones close to her ear, “Report to me in the curator’s office as soon as you’re finished here.”

      The summons was hardly a surprise after what she’d done, but she found it hard to keep her composure as she saw the group off. Rowe was a member of the board of the Merrisand Trust. Although he didn’t attend board meetings, technically he was her superior.

      He probably intended to reprimand her for drawing attention to his presence in the group, and she knew it was no more than she deserved. She had her own issues with the viscount, but they were personal, and in no way excused her unprofessional behavior.

      As she returned her portable microphone and the notes she rarely needed to her office, her mind spun back to the first time she’d heard of Rowe Sevrin. She’d been an intern at the castle, struggling to master her chosen profession while trying to keep her wayward teenage sister on the straight and narrow.

      Neither had been easy, but she had no notion of how badly she was failing until Natalie came home and announced that she was pregnant.

      Kirsten knew Nat had been frequenting the car races at nearby Angel Falls, where a leg of the international Grand Prix was being held. Kirsten had decided her sister’s interest was harmless and would wear off more quickly if she ignored it than if she made a fuss. Nat had never suggested that she was involved with anyone connected with the race.

      “You’d better tell me what happened,” she’d said weakly, struggling to hold back the condemnation that hovered on her lips. Since their parents’ deaths two years before when Kirsten was twenty, she had feared alienating Natalie by being too bossy. Maybe if she’d laid firmer ground rules, this wouldn’t have happened.

      It was too late by then. Natalie had confessed that the father of her child was the racing driver Rowe Sevrin. Kirsten had been fairly sure this was nonsense. What would a sophisticated man like Sevrin, a member of the royal family, to boot, see in a teenager like Natalie?

      Only by making herself see her sister objectively had Kirsten realized how oblivious she’d been. Natalie might have been young in age, but she had grown up quickly since losing their parents. She’d dressed, spoken and acted much older than her years, and had had a coquettish way that was bound to attract men.

      Even Rowe Sevrin? Kirsten had finally conceded that Natalie had no reason to lie to her and so had developed a powerful anger toward the viscount for his role in the affair. Even though he couldn’t have been more than twenty-two himself at the time, he should have taken more care. For although Natalie looked womanly and was legally an adult, she was still a vulnerable innocent, grieving for her parents.

      Natalie had thrown a tantrum worthy of baby Jeffrey when Kirsten suggested she telephone the viscount. “Most women would be eager to be involved with a member of the royal family,” Kirsten had said by way of encouragement.

      Natalie’s response had been totally unexpected. “Most women wouldn’t have given him a false name and told him they were on the pill.”

      Under Kirsten’s gentle probing, Natalie had admitted that she had crashed a party to celebrate the viscount’s team winning the championship. When the viscount’s security people had demanded her name, she’d given them a false last name.

      According to Natalie, Rowe himself had been watching the party from a shadowed terrace and had said she could stay. Intending to thank him for intervening on her behalf, she’d noticed how distressed he seemed, and they’d started talking, during which she shared with him some of her own deep unhappiness. He’d suggested she join him for dinner after the party and she had never gotten around to telling him her real name. One thing had led to another, and then she was expecting his child. He might well think, Natalie had protested, that she had pretended to be on the pill to trap him into fathering her baby.

      He didn’t have to like it, he only had to take his share of the responsibility, Kirsten had insisted. She felt sorry for Natalie for getting herself into such a predicament, but Rowe was entitled to be told.

      Natalie sister needn’t have worried. Rowe had already moved on to the next stage of the Formula One circuit and she was told he wasn’t available. He probably had no wish to be bothered by a girl he had used and abandoned on the previous leg, Kirsten assumed. Her sister’s calls were never returned.

      Through her contacts at the castle, Kirsten had obtained a postal address for him and insisted Natalie write and tell Rowe she was expecting his child. Natalie hadn’t wanted to send the letter, but Kirsten vowed that she would if Natalie didn’t. So the letter was sent, but no reply came.

      Then they’d heard that Rowe had given up racing and had established an event-management organization. With his connections, Kirsten wasn’t surprised that the business was now reputed to be worth a fortune, quite apart from his royal inheritance.

      She had debated whether to try to contact him again, but Natalie had stood firm this time, declaring that she wanted nothing to do with a man who ignored the birth of his own child. This time, Kirsten didn’t argue.

      As a parent, Natalie hadn’t done much better, Kirsten thought with a wry twist of her lips. When the baby, an adorable little boy, was born, Natalie had been eager to have Kirsten take over most of his care. Natalie returned to the racing scene, making Kirsten glad that Rowe was no longer part of it, and couldn’t hurt her sister with his indifference more than he already had.

      Kirsten knew she should have tried to make Natalie more accountable, for Jeffrey’s sake if not her own, but she hadn’t had the heart. Nat had lost so much, with her parents and then being abandoned by her baby’s father. Her sister had had so little time to be young that Kirsten willingly juggled her commitments so she could look after Jeffrey, telling herself that Natalie would settle down and resume her responsibilities if given enough time.

      As things turned out, time was something neither of them were granted. Watching a qualifying race before a major event, Natalie had been killed when a tire flew off a car, bounced over a protective barrier and slammed into her.

      Jeffrey had been six months old at the time. He was six years old now. Without him, Kirsten didn’t know how she would have survived the grief of losing her sister after her parents. Having the baby to care for meant Kirsten couldn’t afford to indulge her own feelings.

      For Jeffrey’s sake she had battled through the dark aftermath of Nat’s death and had doggedly completed her studies by correspondence in time for Jeffrey’s first birthday. Although he was too young to appreciate her efforts, she had baked him a cake with a huge single candle, and they had celebrated together, her pleasure shadowed by memories of loved ones who were no longer with them.

      Jeffrey had become her only family, as she had become his. She was the only mother he knew. By his silence, Rowe had forfeited any right to be involved in the child’s life. If he had answered Nat’s letter or shown any interest in Jeffrey at all, Kirsten would have felt duty bound to share the child’s upbringing with him, but he hadn’t called or written. Did he even know that Natalie had a sister who was now a mother to his child in every way that mattered?

      He had been retired from racing by then, but he must have read about Natalie’s death, although she probably meant nothing more to him than a one-night stand, Kirsten thought, feeling choked. Her sister had written to him telling him her real name. Would he even remember her, given the number of women he was reputed to have been involved with? He hadn’t shown any interest in whether the child had ever been born, much less whether he had a son or daughter.

      Kirsten felt her body begin to heat with remorse. She had actually allowed herself to feel aroused by his blatant appraisal, when he was the last man she should want to have anything to do with. It couldn’t be helped that he was a member of the Merrisand board, and as such, was