The Royal Collection. Rebecca Winters

blue and a filmy long-sleeved shirt with a floral pattern of light and dark blues combined with pink. It draped beautifully against her body to the hips.

      The white suit went in the closet before she slipped into her casual clothes and put on bone-colored leather sandals. After removing the pearl tipped sticks from her hair, she exchanged the pearl studs for gold earrings mounted with star-shaped blue sapphire stones. As she was applying a fresh coat of lipstick, she heard a knock on the door.

      “Antonio?”

      He opened it but didn’t enter. “Come on over to the other bedroom when you’re ready.”

      Her heart started to thud. “I’ll be there in a minute.”

      * * *

      Antonio had changed into jeans and a sport shirt. Normally he would have put on the bottoms of a pair of sweats and nothing else for the twenty-one-hour flight. But out of consideration for Christina, he needed to make his way carefully for this journey into the unknown. Their honeymoon was in the process of becoming a fait accompli.

      He’d experienced two heart attacks already: one at the altar when his fiancée appeared in her white wedding dress and lace veil. The other attack happened this morning when he first saw her on the terrace ready for their trip to Paris wearing a stunning white outfit. When he heard her call out his name just now, he should have known to brace himself for the third attack.

      “Enter if you dare,” he teased. Antonio had stretched out on the bed with his head and back propped against the headboard using a pillow for a buffer.

      “Ready or not,” she countered, and came into the room. The incredibly beautiful woman dressed in blue appeared, and the sight almost caused him to drop the remote. With her shiny hair, she lit up any room she entered. How could he have ignored her for so long? The few phone calls and visits to her had been made out of duty. The busy life he’d been leading in California had included hard work and one certain woman when he had the time.

      Thoughts of his future marriage for the good of the country had only played on the edge of his consciousness, as did the woman who’d been thousands of miles away in Kenya. He couldn’t go back and fix things, but he could shower her with attention now. They didn’t know each other well yet, but had made a start last night when their passion ignited.

      Antonio recognized that he needed to treat her the way he would any beautiful woman he’d just met and wanted to get to know much better. He patted her side of the bed. “Come and join me. We have a choice of five films without my having to move from this spot.”

      She laughed and pulled a pillow out from under the quilt. The next thing he knew she’d thrown it at the foot of the bed and lain down on her stomach so she could watch the screen located on the other side of the bedroom. “Why don’t you start the one you’d like to see without telling me what it is?” she said over her shoulder.

      Christina made an amazing sight with those long legs lying enticingly close to him. “What if you don’t like it?”

      “I like all kinds of movies and will watch it because I want to know what makes my husband tick.”

      His heart skipped a beat. “You took the words out of my mouth.” He clicked to the disk featuring a Neapolitan Mafia gangster film. “I only saw part of this when it first came out.”

      “I’m sure I haven’t seen it. Italian films are hard to come by when you’re out in the bush. This is fun!”

      He found it more than fun to be watching it with the woman he’d just married. She made the usual moans and groans throughout. When it concluded she turned on her side and propped her head to look back at him. “I heard that the Camorra Mafia from Naples was the inspiration for that film. Were there really a hundred gangs, do you think?”

      “I do.”

      “Did any cross the water into our country?”

      “Three families that we know of.”

      “Do they still exist?”

      “Yes, but were given Halencian citizenship at a time when our borders were more porous. They’re no longer a problem. What I’m concerned about is creating high-tech jobs. Tourism and agriculture alone aren’t going to sustain our growing population. I have many plans and have been laying the groundwork to establish software companies and a robotics plant, all of which can operate here to build Halencian industry.”

      “So that’s what you’ve been doing in San Francisco all these years. No wonder you didn’t come home often.”

      “Are you accusing me of being a workaholic?”

      Her eyelids narrowed. “Are you?”

      “I make time to play.”

      “Since I won’t be able to go to sleep for a long time, what can I do for you, my husband?”

      “How about reading to me?”

      The question pleased her no end. “You’d like that?”

      “I saw a book in your suitcase. Have you read it already?”

      “I’m in the middle of it.”

      “What’s it called?”

      “Cry, the Beloved Country by Alan Paton. He wrote about South Africa and the breakdown of the tribal system. It’s not the part of Africa I know, but it’s so wonderful I’m compelled to finish the book.”

      “I never got around to reading it,” he said.

      “Tell you what. I’ll read you the blurb on the flyleaf. If it interests you, I’ll read from the beginning until you fall asleep.”

      “I’m surprised you don’t carry a Kindle with you. Aren’t physical books heavy to carry when traveling?”

      “They can be, but I really like to hold a book in my hands. They’re like an old friend I can see peeking at me from the bookshelf, teasing me to come and read again.”

      “I’ve decided you’re a Renaissance woman, Christina.”

      “That’s a curious word.”

      “It really describes you. You’re a very intelligent woman. I see in you a revival of vigor and an interest in life that escapes most people. You’re more intriguing than you know.”

      If she was intriguing, that was something. “When did you discover that?” she asked without looking at him.

      “It happened when you were just fifteen. I drove you and Elena to an old monastery in the woods above Lake Geneva. When we went inside, you were able to translate all the Latin inscriptions in those glass cases. I detested Latin and at eighteen I still needed a tutor for it. To hear you translating for us, I was so stunned at your expertise, it left me close to speechless. Do you remember that time?”

      He remembered that? It caused her pulse to pick up speed. “Yes. I was showing off to you so you wouldn’t think that your sister was spending time with a complete numbskull. My mother hated it that I was such a bookworm and would rather read than go to tea with a bunch of girls who only talked about boys and clothes.”

      “This conversation is getting interesting. When did you first become interested in boys?”

      “Actually I was crazy about them at a very early age.” Pictures of Prince Antonio and Princess Elena were constantly in the news. From the time she was about eight, she always liked to see photos of the famous brother and sister in the newspaper accompanying their family on a ski trip or some such thing.

      He was the country’s darling. By the time she met him in person, she’d already developed a crush on him that only grew after being with him. Of course all the silliness ended when she left Montreux and had new experiences in Africa. Once in a while she and Marusha would see him in the news, but until Elena’s brush with the law he’d been as distant to her as another galaxy.

      Antonio broke into laughter.