Secret Heirs: Royal Appointment. Carol Marinelli

she’d found out. It wouldn’t have taken her long. Settling back into her normal life, she could hardly avoid seeing his face in the press after his enthronement. In shock, she would be trying to process every piece of information, amongst which had to be what the hell was he doing here?

      He followed her gaze as she glanced around to see if anyone else was hurt. He saw the tyre marks on the pavement left by the car as it had mounted the kerb, and realised how kind fate had been. Pockets of survivors were checking each other out. Numbers were being exchanged and arms thrown around complete strangers. This was human nature at its best. From what he could see, everyone was shaken up, but thankfully unharmed. Quite a crowd had gathered. People were calling on their phones. The emergency services would arrive soon. The police were already on the scene. The youth behind the wheel of the speeding car had been captured. Patrol cars had his vehicle boxed in.

      ‘Luca,’ Callie gritted out, managing to fill that single word with all the bitterness and uncertainty prompted by his supposed deception. When she was calm, she might realise they’d both been escaping their normal lives during their time in the lemon groves. Both had seized the chance to escape and explore a different, looser version of themselves. But none of that mattered now. All that mattered was that Callie was safe. However, she, understandably, took a rather different view. ‘I can’t believe this,’ she said, staring at him. ‘What are you doing here?’

      Ignoring her understandable surprise, he concentrated on essentials. ‘Take it easy. Slowly,’ he advised as she struggled to sit up. ‘You might feel dizzy for a while. You’ve had a shock.’

      ‘To put it mildly,’ she agreed. ‘Are you all right?’ she asked tensely.

      ‘Don’t worry about me.’

      ‘You came down with quite a bang.’

      He wasn’t interested in discussing anything but Callie, and was only relieved that he’d reached her in time.

      ‘Sorry.’ She started to giggle. Hysteria, he guessed. ‘But we must stop meeting like this.’

      He couldn’t agree more. They were lying in the road on a bed of grime and oil patches. Hoping that laughter signified her body’s resilience to the blow it had just received, he huffed wryly, and for a moment they weren’t at loggerheads, but just two people caught up in an unexpected incident on a cold and wintry street.

      ‘Oh, no!’ Callie was staring at the stolen vehicle, which was planted in what appeared to be a dress shop window. ‘My landlady,’ she exclaimed, starting to get up.

      ‘Let me help you.’

      She pushed him away in panic. ‘I have to make sure she’s all right.’

      ‘You have to get checked out first,’ he argued.

      ‘What are you doing here?’ she demanded as he shrugged off his jacket and draped it around her shoulders.

      ‘You’re in shock, Callie. You need to go to hospital for a check-up now.’

      ‘I’m fine,’ she insisted, starting to pull his jacket off.

      He closed it around her. ‘You’re shivering. You’re in shock,’ he repeated, ‘and until the paramedics get here and check you out, I’m not taking any chances.’

      ‘So you freeze to death instead?’

      ‘I don’t think it will come to that,’ he soothed, ‘do you? I’m just glad I got here when I did. I couldn’t get here any sooner.’

      ‘I heard you’d been busy,’ she admitted.

      A paramedic interrupted them. ‘You all right, love?’ he asked, proffering a foil blanket. ‘Let the gentleman have his jacket back, or he’ll catch his death of cold.’

      ‘I’ve been trying to give it back to him,’ Callie explained, ‘but he won’t take it.’

      ‘Well, if he’s happy for you to keep it.’ The paramedic shrugged as he arranged the foil blanket over the jacket for extra warmth. ‘Not too many gallant gentlemen left, love,’ he commented. ‘Better hang onto this one.’

      Callie hummed and smiled, though Luca wondered if her smile was for the paramedic’s benefit. ‘Was anyone else hurt?’ she asked. ‘The lady in the dress shop?’

      ‘Had just gone to make herself a cup of tea,’ the paramedic reassured her. ‘She was working in the shop window, she told me, only minutes before the car struck.’

      ‘What a relief,’ Callie gasped. ‘I was with her. I live over the shop,’ she explained.

      ‘It’s thanks to the quick thinking of your knight in shining armour that a young mother and her baby were also shoved to safety and saved from injury. He’s a real hero. Aren’t you, sir?’

      ‘I wouldn’t say that.’ Luca had acted on instinct. There had been no planning involved. There’d been no time to think. He’d done what was necessary to avert disaster, in his view, and that was all.

      ‘Accept praise when it’s due, sir. You’re a genuine hero, sir,’ the paramedic assured him. ‘Now, excuse me, miss, but we’d better get you to hospital for a check-up. If the gentleman wants to come too—’

      ‘He doesn’t want to come,’ Callie said with a glance his way. ‘You obviously know where I live,’ she added, narrowing her eyes, ‘so we’ll speak later.’

      Shepherding her to one of the two waiting ambulances, the paramedic steadied her as she climbed inside. ‘What are you doing?’ Callie demanded when he swung in behind her.

      ‘Collecting my jacket?’ Luca suggested dryly.

      The paramedic gave him a broad wink, but had the good sense to appear busy with paperwork when the doors closed and the ambulance set off. Callie disapproved of him accompanying her to the hospital. Too bad. As she had been a member of his staff, he had a duty of care towards her, and with a baby on the horizon that duty had doubled.

      ‘You saved her, mate,’ the paramedic put in as he settled down.

      This wasn’t how he’d pictured his reunion with Callie. He just wanted her to be safe.

      ‘Have you been spying on me?’ Callie asked, careful not to let their companion hear her conversation.

      He shrugged. He wasn’t going to lie. It was a fine line between his security team’s protection service and overstepping the mark. ‘Your welfare and that of our child is my only concern.’

      She blenched. He didn’t think he’d ever seen anyone so pale. ‘Are you all right? Pain? You’re not—’

      ‘No. At least, I don’t think so.’ Her eyes were wide with fear as she stared at him. She reached for his hand. For the first time, she looked vulnerable. This was a very different woman from the Callie he’d met in Italy. This was a woman afraid for her unborn child, and discovering she cared for that child far more than she cared for herself. ‘Don’t,’ she said. ‘Don’t look at me like that.’

      ‘Like what?’

      ‘As if I’m special and you’re glad you’re here.’

      ‘You are special. You’re about to become a mother, the mother of my child. And if I am looking at you, it’s only because you’re covered in grit and filth and need a good wash.’

      ‘Charming, mate,’ the paramedic piped up, proving that he wasn’t lost in his work after all. ‘Which charm school did you attend?’

      ‘I didn’t go to school until I was ten,’ Luca admitted wryly. ‘And then it was the school of hard knocks.’

      ‘Hey, wait a minute,’ the paramedic exclaimed, turning to stare at Luca intently. ‘Aren’t you that billionaire bloke who started life in the gutters of Rome and became a prince?’ And when Luca didn’t reply, he added, ‘What are you doing in Blackpool?’

      He