took a deep breath. ‘That, Miss O’Shea, is an understatement. Can I interest you in some snails?’
‘You can interest me in anything that’s not turnip soup,’ she said, and received another startled look. ‘That’s what the Berics live on,’ she explained. She shook her head. ‘Every night, M’sieur Beric sits down to turnip soup, and every night he finishes it, looks up and tells his wife it was delicious. So she makes it the next night. And if she doesn’t, he gets all disappointed.’ She grinned. ‘So you see why I finally agreed to eat with you?’
‘Despite disapproving of me?’
Her smile widened. ‘Despite that.’
He paused, but he had to ask. ‘Why?’
‘Why what?
‘Why do you disapprove of me?’
‘Because you’re a prince and I’m a worker,’ she said frankly. ‘Cinderella was a fairy story. It doesn’t happen in real life.’
‘It might.’
‘Oh, yeah?’ It was a gentle jeer. ‘Even Cinderella’s prince didn’t propose marriage just for a year!’
Alastair thought that through and disagreed. ‘Her guy had his deadlines, too,’ he told her, semi-seriously. ‘Like midnight. Seeing carriages turn to pumpkins just as the going gets romantic might put a man right off his stride.’
‘I’d imagine it might,’ she said faintly.
‘So Cinderella’s beloved had to work fast.’ He paused again, and then his smile died. ‘As I do.’
‘If you want to be Prince.’
‘No.’ Alastair shook his head.
The champagne arrived. There was a moment’s silence while the bubbles were poured, and he waited until she’d taken her first gorgeous sip. He waited for her verdict, and he got it.
‘Yum!’ she said, and he smiled at her pleasure. Yum. It was a word Belle hadn’t used in her life!
But he couldn’t afford to be distracted by this strange Cinderella his mother had found for him. He had this one meal to persuade her, and he already knew persuasion would take some doing.
‘I really don’t want to be a prince,’ he said, and his eyes met hers over the glass. ‘Will you believe that?’
‘Um…’ She took another cautious sip and made her decision. ‘No.’
He had to make her believe. Otherwise nothing would make sense. ‘Fame,’ he said slowly, ‘isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. This principality is small, but as the eldest—indeed, only—male of the royal family, the spotlight is now on me. There’s a population of a tiny country waiting to see what I do.’
He motioned out the window to the tiny holdings scattered along the river. ‘There are so many families whose lives depend on my choice—and your choice, too.’
‘Don’t you dare try to blackmail me,’ she snapped, suddenly angry, and his expression softened.
‘No. I won’t. But according to my mother, our needs mesh.’
She glared some more. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘A year as my wife would set you up for life.’
‘I don’t need to be set up—’
‘You can barely afford to eat now,’ he pointed out. ‘Michael is still at secondary school and he wants to be an engineer. How are you going to afford three of them at university?’
She placed her champagne glass carefully down on the table. All of a sudden the bubbles tasted like vinegar.
‘You really have pried…’
‘My mother has on my behalf.’ His calm gaze met hers, and his hands reached out across the table and took hers. She didn’t pull back. He looked down at those work-worn hands, and his mouth twisted into the mocking smile she was starting to know well.
‘You want a résumé of all my mother found out about you?’
‘No, I—’
‘Because I intend to give it to you.’ He shook his head at her indignant protest, released her hands and sat back, assessing. His eyes rested on hers, like she was an enigma he was still trying to figure out.
‘Your mother was an invalid,’ he started, watching her face. ‘She had multiple sclerosis. She should never have had one child, let alone four, but your father was desperate for a son. After three daughters, she finally died giving birth to Michael. That was when you were ten.’
‘I don’t—’
‘I’m saying this no matter how much you interrupt,’ he continued. ‘So you may as well listen and make sure I have it right. We wouldn’t like to make any mistakes here.’
‘Of course not,’ she said bitterly, and Alastair smiled.
‘Very wise. So what did you have? A father who’s a farmer and an expert stone-waller, but who coped with his wife’s illness by turning to the bottle.’ He held his hand up as Penny-Rose made an involuntary protest and she subsided. Reluctantly. ‘And a mother who depended on her eldest daughter for everything.
‘And then your mother died.’ His voice softened still further. ‘Which left you at ten, caring for Heather, six, Elizabeth, four and Michael who was newborn. And a herd of dairy cows and a father who drank himself stupid every night, leaving everything else to you.’
‘I don’t—’
‘Welfare nearly stepped in,’ he went on. ‘The whole district was concerned. My mother’s investigators had no trouble finding people who remembered gossip about your family. I gather you came within an inch of being put into care. But for you.’
‘I didn’t—’
But he was brooking no interruptions. Like Cinderella’s prince, he was working to a deadline. ‘You worked your butt off,’ he told her. ‘You came home from school every night and you milked. You got up at dawn and did the same. The neighbours knew and were horrified but you wouldn’t have it any other way, and when Welfare tried to step in they were met by a little girl whose temper matched that of any adult. “Leave us alone,” you said. “We’ll survive.” And somehow you did, until you could leave school at fifteen and work full time on the farm.’
‘Yes, but—’
‘But it wasn’t much easier then, was it, Penny-Rose?’ he said gently. ‘Because your father drank any profits, and you had your work cut out keeping bread on the table. When your father got drunk one night and smashed his car into a tree, things might have been easier. If the younger children had left school. But you wouldn’t let them.’
‘Of course not. They’re so clever,’ she said desperately. ‘All of them. Heather wants so much to be a doctor. Like you, Elizabeth wants architecture.’ She flashed him a wintry smile. ‘And somehow you already know that Michael longs for engineering.’
‘You’re supporting two at university now and one at school. How are you going to do more?’
‘They have part-time jobs. They help.’
‘Not enough. It’s two more years until Heather finishes and Michael’s major expenses haven’t started. You’re up to your ears in debt already.’
‘I don’t need to listen to this!’
‘No, but you should,’ Alastair said ruthlessly. ‘You can’t do it. You’ve come to Europe because the pay’s better. With a great exchange rate you can send more money home, but there’s an end to it. You can’t stretch your debts any further.’
‘I must,’ she said in a small voice, and his hand came back across the table and