Читать книгу: «The Secret Prince»

“You’re Out Of Here!”

Dan’s wide hand shot out. He seized Elly by the arm and marched her firmly toward the door.

Elly had only enough time to swipe her purse from the coffee table and grab her coat from the back of her chair before he ushered her out of the room.

“I don’t know what kind of game you’re playing, and I don’t care. You’re leaving, lady.”

“But don’t you want to—”

Before she could get out the rest of her sentence, she found herself standing alone in the cold ocean mist on Madge’s lemon-bright porch. After the door slammed behind her, she could still feel the pressure of Dan’s strong fingers on her arm and his palm on her backside. The nerve of the man. He’d thrown her out!

Then the implication of what had just happened hit her. A triumphant grin spread slowly across her lips.

She had found her missing prince!

Dear Reader,

Celebrate the rites of spring with six new passionate, powerful and provocative love stories from Silhouette Desire!

Reader favorite Anne Marie Winston’s Billionaire Bachelors: Stone, our March MAN OF THE MONTH, is a classic marriage-of-convenience story, in which an overpowering attraction threatens a platonic arrangement. And don’t miss the third title in Desire’s glamorous in-line continuity DYNASTIES: THE CONNELLYS, The Sheikh Takes a Bride by Caroline Cross, as sparks fly between a sexy-as-sin sheikh and a feisty princess.

In Wild About a Texan by Jan Hudson, the heroine falls for a playboy millionaire with a dark secret. Her Lone Star Protector by Peggy Moreland continues the TEXAS CATTLEMAN’S CLUB: THE LAST BACHELOR series, as an unlikely love blossoms between a florist and a jaded private eye.

A night of passion produces major complications for a doctor and the social worker now carrying his child in Dr. Destiny, the final title in Kristi Gold’s miniseries MARRYING AN M.D. And an ex-marine who discovers he’s heir to a royal throne must choose between his kingdom and the woman he loves in Kathryn Jensen’s The Secret Prince.

Kick back, relax and treat yourself to all six of these sexy new Desire romances!

Enjoy!

Joan Marlow Golan

Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire

The Secret Prince
Kathryn Jensen

www.millsandboon.co.uk

KATHRYN JENSEN

has written many novels for young readers as well as for adults. She speed walks, works out with weights and enjoys ballroom dancing for exercise, stress reduction and pleasure. Her children are now grown. She lives in Maryland with her writing companion—Sunny, a lovable terrier-mix adopted from a shelter.

Having worked as a hospital switchboard operator, department store sales associate, bank clerk and elementary school teacher, Kathryn now splits her days between writing her own books and teaching fiction writing at two local colleges and through a correspondence course. She enjoys helping new writers get a start and speaks “at the drop of a hat” at writers’ conferences, libraries and schools across the country.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

One

“You’re mine, lady.” Daniel Eastwood tossed his jeans on top of the sweatshirt already in the sand and fixed his dark eyes on her. “Giving me the cold shoulder won’t keep me away.”

She was even more beautiful this morning than she’d been the day before…or the one before that. The muscles angling across his taut stomach and lean thighs tensed, primed for action. He rolled his wide shoulders in anticipation.

Three long running strides, and he dove into the chill waves of the Atlantic. She yielded, as always, to his fierce strokes. Her cool fingers supported him, beckoned him to deeper waters, challenged him. He could feel her strength in each liquid gray-green surge. He swam exactly half a mile along the deserted beach before flip-kicking around to slice back through the icy foam, back toward where he had started, directly below the pastel bungalows of the Haven.

Dan had sustained an intimate relationship with the sea since the first day he had seen her. The school field trip to Ocean City had carried him a good three hours by bus from the grim streets of south Baltimore, a world away. Never had he forgotten the sense of awe, respect, and fascination he felt that day—a city kid, standing on that endless stretch of pale sand, so much water all in one place. Water that seemed to breathe with its own movement and the motions of living things hidden beneath it. And all that clean air hitting him in the face, filling his lungs, it made him feel strong and new inside. Although he had to return to the city with his classmates that day, he had never forgotten the ocean’s beauty or wanted to live anywhere but beside her.

As soon as he was old enough, he had returned to take a summer job as a lifeguard. And each June after that, with the exception of those four he had spent with the marines, he had been drawn back to her as surely as the tide is pulled by the moon. He never lost sight of her capricious temperament, though. The unpredictable squalls. Sudden drops just off shore that hadn’t been there days before. Riptides that could seize a strong swimmer, drag him out to frigid depths, and rob him of his will to ever breathe again. He loved her beauty and power, despite her faults.

As he turned his head to draw a final breath that would carry him the last four strokes of his morning regime, he glimpsed a woman standing beside his clothes, her hand held delicately above her eyes to shade them from the early-morning sun. She gave the impression of having come for him, not just someone idly watching a lone swimmer brave fifty-degree water.

“What the devil,” he muttered, swallowing a mouthful of salt water in his distraction. His people knew not to disturb him at this time of day. That is, if any of them were in the office this early. Setting his feet down, he stood in chest-deep water, the sand sucking and scraping beneath the pads of his feet as he studied her.

Not a local. He would have recognized her this time of year with all the tourists gone. She was tall for a woman, maybe up to his chin, which would make her about five-nine. Her hair was russet streaked with pink-gold highlights from the dawn sky, pulled back in a prim knot at the nape of her neck. Her dark-green business suit seemed absurd beachwear. Tan leather pumps dangled from one crooked finger. Her mouth was pulled into an annoyed pout. The tiny grains of sand sifting between the threads of her pantyhose probably weren’t helping her mood.

But as soon as he started up the slope out of the water, her expression changed. The water line crept teasingly down his chest, not yet revealing the presence or lack of a bathing suit. Her eyes widened with alarm. He smiled, kept on coming, and soon the upper edge of his flesh-molding Speedo showed above the white spume.

Immediately, her lips lifted in a weak smile of relief.

Dan chuckled to himself. What he would have given to have been swimming in the buff that morning, just to watch the shock in her pretty eyes.

A nippy breeze off the water hit him, and the sudden cold took his breath away. “Throw me that towel!” he called to her.

She scowled as if she hadn’t at first heard him over the grating, gurgling rush of the waves against the sand. Looking around, she focused on a generous pile of terrycloth near his clothing and scooped it up. “Isn’t November a little extreme for swimming in Maryland?”

“Not for me.” He couldn’t resist. “I’m naturally hot-blooded.”

She rolled her eyes and tossed the towel at him. “Oh please—”

“Seriously. My body temperature runs two degrees above normal. Always has. I draw the line, though, at breaking through ice for my morning constitutional.”

“Limits are good.” Her eyes sparkled with humor.

Elly forced herself to look past the near-naked man toward the softly glowing horizon. She tried to remember the reason she was standing on a beach in the middle of winter in her stocking feet. But Dan Eastwood was very difficult to stop looking at. No male she’d ever personally met possessed a body like that. Wide, muscled swimmer’s shoulders, a rock-hard stomach, and hips that slimmed to strong, efficient kicking levers. But she hadn’t come to flirt with the owner of the Haven. Her mission was much more important than that and, she reminded herself, time was of the essence.

“You’re Daniel Robert Eastwood?” she asked, risking another glance his way. God, he was gorgeous!

“I’m Eastwood. And you?”

He was drying off his beautifully muscled chest, his long, strong arms—the towel dropped lower—his everywhere. She looked away, tiny beads of sweat springing up beneath her hairline despite the frigid air. “I’m Elizabeth Anderson. I need to ask you a few questions, if you can spare me ten minutes.”

He frowned. “If you’re selling hotel supplies, you’ll need to see my business partner, Kevin Hunter. He takes care of all the ordering. His office is in the main building.”

“I’ve already spoken with Mr. Hunter. He told me where you’d be.”

“He did, did he?” She liked the way his dark eyes flashed at her, suggesting he wasn’t at all displeased with his partner’s decision.

With a sudden jolt, Elly realized that she had been running the tip of her tongue across her upper lip and she stopped herself. He might read the gesture as an appreciation of his near-nakedness, which of course it was. But it was crucial that she keep her mind on the business at hand. A lot of people, very important people—not the least of which was her father—were depending on her.

As Dan tugged his sweatshirt down over his head, he snuck a good peek. She looked slim and healthy, though a little on the pale side, as if her work rarely took her out into the sunshine and she didn’t take much time off for outdoor recreation. Her pleated skirt was short, revealing elegant, long legs. Her breasts…hard to tell. All he could make out was a promising swell beneath the ultra-conservative suit jacket. Pity it wasn’t August. She’d have been hard put not to strip down under Ocean City’s blazing sun.

“Suppose we walk up to my house,” he suggested. “You can tell me what this is all about.”

“Why don’t you get yourself dressed, Mr. Eastwood? I’ll meet you back at your office.”

“That’s not convenient.” He started walking away from her, up the sloping beach. A moment later, he heard her scurrying behind him in the sand, and he smiled to himself.

“Why isn’t it convenient?” she called out.

“I have a nine o’clock. No telling how long the meeting might last. Ever heard of making appointments, Miss Anderson?”

“There isn’t time. I need to speak with you right away.”

Dan stopped and turned to face her. The urgency in her tone signaled trouble. “Maybe we’d better settle this right here. What’s the big crisis?”

She sighed and gazed thoughtfully along the wind-swept beach then turned back to study his face with an odd intensity.

“Talk fast,” he prompted. Pretty soon his fingers were going to fall off from the cold. After that, who knew what would be next.

“All right then,” she snapped, giving him an irritated look. “I am a professional genealogist. I work for my father’s company, and we’ve been hired to verify the ancestors and descendants of a gentleman, now deceased. There’s a possibility you might be related to his family.”

He laughed. “That’s it?”

“That’s it,” she said. “All I need to do is ask you a few simple questions, then I’ll be out of your hair.” She tipped her head to observe him. “Your lips are turning blue. I suppose it’s all right if we talk at your place, since it’s so cold outside.”

“Thank you.” He stepped up onto the boardwalk that ran over a mile along the shore. Most of the structures at the far end of the driftwood-gray planks were high-rise condominiums and hotels. But here, in the older part of town, along with the arcades, snack shacks and amusement park rides, were a few of the older-style beach bungalows that had survived the ocean’s violent mood swings. Four years ago when Hurricane Evelyn had swept away entire blocks of the low wooden structures, Dan had seen the opportunity he’d been waiting for. He was out of the Corps, had earned his degree in business on the GI Bill and saved up a nest egg. He was looking for an investment that would keep him close to his beloved beach.

He and his best friend Kevin put together a proposal to buy the ruined property. They raised the level of the land by bringing in tons of fill, built protective man-made dunes, then erected sturdy, smaller versions of the original bungalows—twenty-five of them in a cluster. The Haven evolved into a far more successful business than either of them had expected. Dan couldn’t help feeling proud of what they’d accomplished.

But now that most of the hard work had been done, the days often ran together. The off-season was particularly lonely. After Labor Day, the tourists disappeared, including most of the dateable women. But here was pert, intriguing Elizabeth Anderson with her burnished locks, long legs, and baffling need to interrogate him. He toyed with the tempting idea of canceling his nine o’clock to spend the morning with her…if he could find a way to stretch her promised ten minutes to a few hours.

“So tell me about my mystery family.” He opened the door to the first house they came to and waved her inside.

“We don’t know that they are your family,” she cautioned. “Not yet. That’s why I need to talk to you.”

“So shoot.” He tossed the damp towel on the arm of the tan leather sofa and she followed it with a look of female disapproval for his casual housekeeping.

“What are your mother’s and father’s full names?”

“My mother is Margaret Jennings Eastwood. She goes by Madge. My father, I never knew. His name was Carl Eastwood. He died shortly after I was born.”

She nodded, sliding a small pad of paper and pen from her purse. Elizabeth wrote a few notes. “And the date of your birth?”

He told her.

“That makes you, let’s see…thirty-two?” He nodded. “Your mother’s current address and phone number?” she asked smoothly.

He stopped halfway into the bedroom and turned to face her, suddenly suspicious. “Why do you need to know that?”

“I’m sure she’ll be as interested as you are in your shared heritage,” she said with a brilliant smile. But her eyes shifted away from his before she’d finished speaking. He wondered if she might be concealing something he should know before giving her more information.

“If you need to speak with my mother, I’ll take you to her. What else do you need from me?”

She looked vaguely disappointed, but glanced down at her pad. Her tongue did its little lip-flick thing again. “Well…where were you born, Mr. Eastwood?”

“It’s Dan. In Baltimore, Mercy Hospital.”

She blinked, checked something she’d written a few pages back, then nodded. He sensed she was holding her breath as she asked the next question. “And have you always lived in Baltimore?”

“Until I graduated from high school. Then I enlisted in the Marine Corps. After that I took up permanent residence in Ocean City. We’ve been here ever since.”

A subtle blink of her eyes told him he must have given her a piece of information she thought valuable. That troubled him. He didn’t like being kept in the dark.

“Do you have any siblings?” she continued.

“No.”

“Not even half brothers or sisters by another father?”

Dan scowled, even more uneasy at the intimate turn of her questions. “What are you implying, Miss Anderson?”

“My friends call me Elly.” She beamed at him—all hazel-eyed innocence. Something tightened pleasantly in his stomach, and he couldn’t help smiling back despite his growing suspicion that she was setting some kind of trap for him. “It’s a simple question, really,” she continued. “These days, many families include step-kids, half siblings…yours, mine, and ours…. Women are allowed to marry more than once, you know.”

“My mother never remarried,” he stated quickly.

“I see.”

Dan wished he could get a look at what she was writing. Her pen was in constant motion now, scratching out far more than the few words of each of his responses. The sense that his privacy was being invaded in some mystifying way that he couldn’t yet understand became almost overwhelming.

“I have to change and get to that meeting,” he grumbled. “Unless you’re willing to be straight with me about what you’re really up to, Miss Anderson, this is the end of our discussion.”

Looking disheartened, she flipped the little book shut then shoved it and the pen into her shoulder bag. “I’m afraid, for the time being, anything more than what I’ve already told you is confidential.”

“Then you’d better leave,” he said gruffly. He told himself he was being an idiot, shaking off the prettiest thing that had crossed his beach in months. She looked as good indoors as she had outside in the salty air. If anything, her eyes seemed brighter, more alive than before—as if she was excited by something she had just learned.

But the meeting with his contractor really was important. And even as his libido urged him to get her phone number, his brain was warning him to distance himself from her. She was pure trouble, although what variety he hadn’t as yet figured out.

“I’ll let you know if I can tell you anything more,” she promised coolly then stuck out her hand to shake as if determined to conclude their conversation with a professional gesture, even if it had begun under less than businesslike conditions.

“Next time, maybe you’ll join me for a swim,” he suggested as he opened the door for her.

She laughed. “In November? Don’t hold your breath.”

Too bad, he thought as he stood alone in his living room a moment later, the knob still in his hand. I’d love to be the one to warm you up after a winter dip.

Elly sat in her car gripping the steering wheel, trying to compose herself. Her father would be furious with her for not getting everything out of Daniel Eastwood they so desperately needed. But things had started out badly. She’d nearly keeled over when he came up out of the water—all gleaming muscles and smooth, bronzed skin. A classic vision of Neptune in his younger years, sans trident. That skimpy red Speedo hadn’t left much to the imagination. Not much at all!

She felt a hot flush across her cheeks and brow and let out a yip of frustration. She wasn’t usually flustered by men. In fact, she’d become pretty much immune to these feelings from choice. It was her defense against getting involved. Involvement meant intimacy, and intimacy meant…

A flash of dark memory rocked her without warning. Suddenly, she could hear and see everything as it had been that night. The high-pitched cry in the night…her father’s frantic shouts into the telephone…the wretched look of helplessness on his face. And finally, her mother’s unmoving body glimpsed through the half-open bedroom doorway seconds before sirens shattered the silence in the little house.

Just as quickly as the horrible vision had struck, it passed, leaving Elly trembling, her body moist with sweat, her heart pounding erratically in her chest. She covered her eyes with her palms and drew in deep, calming breaths. “It’s over. It’s over,” she whispered until the fear slowly subsided and the pressure in her chest lessened and her brain cleared so that she could think again. Where had she been? What had she been thinking when…

Yes, she reminded herself, Dan Eastwood.

She opened her eyes and focused on the long line of gray-green surf on the other side of the sand from where she was parked. She could do this. She could do this!

Eastwood. Even if he hadn’t refused to answer any more questions, it would be torture to go back and attempt to grill him further. As long as those dark eyes rested on her, Elly knew her mind would wander to that scene on the beach and she’d be incapable of focusing on her job, and—Lord, help her—she might even fall apart as she had just now, only right in front of him. And she couldn’t bear that.

The real problem was, although she’d verified several basic points of their investigation she still didn’t have enough information to prove he was the one they were looking for.

She looked at her watch. Within a few hours, she’d have to call her father in Elbia with an update. They both knew that if she failed to find the person they were looking for within twenty-four hours, all hell was going to break loose in the international press. The London tabloid that somehow had been leaked information from the palace would reveal a scandal that might threaten the Elbian crown. And Anderson Genealogical Research would earn a very big, very black mark for breaching their own right-to-privacy rule, even if it hadn’t been their fault.

Now what was she going to do?

Worrying her bottom lip between her teeth, Elly slid her notebook computer off the passenger seat and into her lap. She flipped open the screen, booted up and summoned the correct file. From memory, she added the information Eastwood had just given her. She had found his name and address through an Internet search, but his mother’s phone number and address hadn’t come up, probably because she didn’t have an e-mail address and her phone number was unlisted.

However, Eastwood had let slip that his mother lived somewhere in the area. “We’ve been here ever since…” We, not I. And he’d offered to take Elly to her, so the woman couldn’t be far away.

Elly finished typing her notes then grabbed her purse and locked the car behind her. Neighbors were always a great help in instances such as this, she thought with renewed hope. That was where she’d start.

Elly stood on the top step of the tidy yellow bungalow, straightened her suit jacket, put on a friendly smile, and knocked. It was only a moment before the door opened.

“Yes?” A short, middle-aged woman with blond hair stepped into the opening and gave her a curious smile.

“Margaret Eastwood?” Elly asked.

“Yes, hon.” Her accent was pure Bal’morese.

“I was just speaking with your son and—”

The woman’s face lit up. “You’re a friend of Dan’s?”

“Well, not exactly a friend. You see, I was looking for you, but I found Dan’s name first and—”

“Come in and tell me why he sent you over.” Margaret beamed at her. “This is one of the nicest things about the Haven. A gated community, they call it. You can feel safe chatting with folks, not like in the old neighborhood where we had to be so very careful who we let into the house.”

“Well, yes, of course,” Elly agreed, feeling just a little guilty, for she was about to become a most unwelcome intruder in this woman’s life.

As Elly stepped into the cozy colonial-furnished living room, she focused on a collection of antique glass bottles arranged on shelves in a bay window, then on a display of photographs on top of an upright piano. There were several of a little boy at different ages, babyhood through toddler, then at various school ages. Elly sniffed the air, distracted by a delicious aroma. “Something smells wonderful.”

“Gingerbread,” Margaret said. “I always make old-fashioned New England gingerbread in the fall. It reminds me of home, and Danny loves it.”

“Then you’re not from around here?”

“Oh my goodness, no. But Maryland is my home now. I’ve been here all of my adult life. Sit down, I’ll bring you a cup of coffee and a warm slice.”

Elly turned around to protest but Margaret was gone.

“You said you’ve lived here all of your adult life?” she shouted toward the kitchen door.

“In Maryland, not Ocean City. We lived in Baltimore while Dan was young. But he turned into such a beach bum after a few summers of lifeguarding down here. After he was discharged from the service, he wanted me to move down here with him while he attended the community college. Later, he and his friend bought this land and built these cute little cottages.” She was beaming proudly as she walked back into the room, holding a tray laden with coffee mugs and plates of fresh gingerbread topped with mountains of whipped cream. “Danny also runs a summer camp for city boys and girls.”

“I didn’t know that,” Elly admitted.

“Oh yes. He feels very strongly about giving inner-city children a few weeks off the streets, to let them see a different world from their troubled neighborhoods.”

Elly accepted a steaming mug of coffee and a dessert plate with a second twinge of guilt. She didn’t want to deceive this woman who was being so hospitable to her. “Mrs. Eastwood, I have to confess that Dan didn’t actually send me over to talk with you.”

“Oh?” She looked disappointed.

“I’ve been hired by a European family to fill in a missing branch on their family tree. The von Austerands. Do you recognize the name?”

Elly watched as the woman’s face grayed and her fingers pinched nervously at the napkin in her lap. “No.”

“They’re like the Windsors of England. They are the royal family of a small country that borders on Austria. Elbia.”

“I think you’d better leave,” Madge said tightly.

But Elly was determined. She continued choosing her words carefully. “We have reason to believe that a young American woman had a brief romantic liaison with the young king of that country thirty-three years ago, before he married. There is a chance that she was carrying his child when they parted, but if so, she disappeared before the baby was born. Would you know anything about this, Mrs. Eastwood?”

Dan’s mother firmly set her plate on the coffee table and turned her face toward the rainbow of glass in the window. “My husband was an American. His name was Carl Eastwood, and he died before Dan was a year old,” she pronounced tightly.

Carl Eastwood. There it was again, the name Dan had used. Carl with a C according to the documents she’d already dug up. Could it be a coincidence that the young king’s name had been Karl? His Royal Highness Karl von Austerand had died just a few years ago, and now his son Jacob wore his crown. Jacob had always been thought to be the king’s sole heir, until evidence of a secret love affair turned up in a routine cataloguing of the family’s papers only days ago. Days which now felt to Elly like weeks and months of frantic searching.

“I wouldn’t know about affairs or kings or illegitimate royal babies,” Madge said sharply.

Elly’s heart beat faster despite the woman’s denial. Something in her pale eyes told Elly this was a woman unaccustomed to lying, who was desperately trying to do just that.

“I understand how difficult this must be for you,” Elly said softly, setting aside her own coffee and fragrant gingerbread to reach across the space between the two chairs and pat the other woman’s arm. “But if you can just give me a little more information, please.”

Madge’s chest rose and fell with labored breaths. She stiffened and leaned back into her chair, her hands gripping the arms. Her features contorted into sharp folds, as if she was trying to work out a difficult puzzle. “Go,” she whispered hoarsely. “Get out of my house.”

Elly sighed inwardly. She respected the woman’s right to privacy, but if she didn’t get to the truth soon, both Madge and her son would find themselves in a terrible fix. This was no time for cat-and-mouse games. A simple statement from the woman would save days they didn’t have for a full public records’ investigation. She’d already picked up and lost two reporters on her way from Connecticut to Baltimore. They might show up at any moment—then it would be out of her hands, if her theory about Dan Eastwood was right. She decided to try a different angle.

“Mrs. Eastwood, I’m not trying to upset you. But in cases where relationships have broken up, the children often want to know about their lost family members. Don’t you think Dan would like to learn who his real father is?” She was bluffing, just a little, for she wasn’t one-hundred-percent certain of all the facts. But if it worked she would know for sure.

Madge’s mouth flew wide on a horrified gasp. “My son doesn’t need to know—”

Her words stilled in the air as the front door clicked shut and footsteps approached the sitting room from the hall. Both women turned to face the doorway.

Dan Eastwood looked around the corner, his dark eyes glittering dangerously. Even at a distance, Elly could see the thin blue vein throbbing at his temple and the tense cut of his mouth. “I don’t need to know what, Mother?”

Elly’s heart felt as if it were being squeezed by a cold, hard hand. She crossed her fingertips over her chest and swallowed. The warning rumble of Dan’s voice sent icy prickles down her spine.

She glanced quickly at Madge, whose expression had altered with amazing speed from a stubborn glare to a helpless pucker. “Oh, dear. I guess I shouldn’t have let this young woman in. She told me she was your girlfriend, Danny.”

Elly gasped in outrage and shot to her feet. The woman wasn’t as guileless as she appeared. “I never said that! Mrs. Eastwood, you know that I never implied my visit was—” She let out a frustrated wail. Between his mother and a stranger, who was the man likely to believe? “Never mind. I came alone because I felt your mom might feel less self-conscious speaking to me without your being here.”

Dan quirked one skeptical, dark brow at her.

“Honest. I didn’t mean any harm.”

“I told you I would bring you around if necessary!” Dan snapped, then turned to his distraught-looking mother. “I don’t know how she found you. I’m sorry. Now, ladies, what is it I don’t need to know?”