“You’ll be compensated.”
He correctly interpreted her silence as admission that there wasn’t anyone. But the offer of remuneration was insulting. “I wouldn’t want that. You wouldn’t have to pay me.”
“So you’ll do it?”
“But you think finding the right woman is about lists and boxes you can check off, and it’s not.”
“That’s why I need you. Lists and tickable boxes are part of it and you’ll have to accept that, but I know there’s more. I want more.” He paused. “I want what Rafe has.”
Danni stifled a gasp. “You want Lexie?”
“No.” The word was vehement and a look of disbelief and disappointment crossed his face. “I just meant he found someone to marry. Someone he could be happy with.”
“She was supposed to be yours,” Danni said quietly, daring to voice the suspicion she’d harbored.
“Only according to my father. We, Lexie and I, never had anything.” As far as Danni could tell, Adam seemed to be telling the truth and she wanted to believe him. But it was common knowledge that Crown Prince Henri had at one point intended that the American heiress with a distant claim to the throne herself would be the perfect partner, politically, for Adam. “And to be honest,” Adam continued, “I’m inclined to believe my father’s later assertion that he’d always intended for Lexie and Rafe to be together. He wanted Rafe to settle down and rein in his ways, but he knew Rafe would rebel against any overt matchmaking.”
Rafe had been charged with escorting Lexie to San Philippe to meet Adam. By all accounts the two had fought falling in love almost from the time they laid eyes on one another. When Rafe and Lexie finally gave in to their feelings, they utterly derailed the Crown Prince’s perceived plans and Rafe’s carefree bachelor existence. They’d since married and now had a beautiful baby girl. Rafe had never looked happier. And while to all outward appearances Adam had also seemed more than happy with the arrangement, Danni had always wondered. A little.
He shook his head as he watched her. “You don’t believe it?”
She shrugged.
“I like Lexie.” He sighed heavily as though this wasn’t the first time he’d had to explain himself. “In fact, I love her. But as a sister. It was obvious from the start that it was never going to work for us. We just didn’t connect.”
“She’s beautiful. And vivacious.”
“She’s both those things. But she wasn’t for me. And I wasn’t for her.”
Danni nodded, almost, but not quite, buying it.
He must have read that shred of doubt in her eyes. “I’ll tell you something on pain of death and only because it will help you believe me.”
“You don’t have to.”
“I think I do.” Adam glanced away looking almost embarrassed. “On our first date …”
A log shifted and settled in the fire as she waited for him to continue.
“I fell asleep.”
She covered her mouth. “No.”
“I’d been working hard, putting in some long hours. The timing was off. Dad never should have had her brought out then.” He reeled off his excuses. “But anyway, we went to dinner at the same place I went with Clara, we had a lovely meal and on the drive home …” He shrugged. “It was inexcusable. But it happened.”
“Was my father driving?”
Adam nodded.
“That explains why he’s always been adamant that you were okay with Rafe and Lexie.”
“I’m more than okay with it. But I’ve seen how happy they are, and Rebecca and Logan, as well.”
Hard on the heels of his brother finding love his sister, Rebecca, had, as well. Her wedding to Logan, a self-made millionaire from Chicago, would be in two months. “And I wonder …”
“If you can have it, too?” Probably every single person in country had wondered the same thing, the fairy tale come true. Danni certainly had.
He sighed. “It’s not realistic though. Not with the life I lead. The constraints on it, constraints that whoever marries me will have to put up with.”
He’d deny himself love? Deny himself even the chance at it? And for someone as smart as he was, his reasoning was screwy. “Don’t you see? That’s why it’s more important than ever that there’s love. That she knows, whatever the constraints, that you, the real you—” She touched her fingertips just above his heart and the room seemed to shrink. She snatched her hand away. “—are worth it.”
Adam’s gaze followed her hand. “So, you’ll help me?”
Danni hesitated.
A fatal mistake.
“I have a date on Friday.” He spoke into the silence of her hesitation. “If you could drive for me then you’ll be doing me and my father and the country a favor.”
“So it’s my patriotic duty?”
“I wouldn’t quite put it like that but …” He shrugged. “I don’t know if you’ve heard, but the doctors have told Dad to ease up on work and watch his stress levels. This is one way I can help. So, I need to expedite this process. I want a date for Rebecca and Logan’s wedding, and I can’t take just anyone. It has to be someone I’m seeing seriously. So that means I need to be working on it now. We’ve only got two months.”
Danni sighed heavily. “See? Your whole approach is wrong. It’s not a transaction that you can expedite. You can’t put time limits on things like this.”
“This is why I need your help. As a friend.”
“You might think you want my help, but I remember you well enough to know that you don’t take advice or criticism well. Especially not from me.”
“No,” he agreed. “But I’m not looking for criticism as such, just pointers.”
“You might see my pointers as criticism.”
“I’ll try not to.” Sincere, with the merest hint of a smile.
There was a time when she practically hero-worshipped Adam and would have done anything he asked of her. So she had to fight the unquestioning instinct to agree to his request. Just because it wasn’t a big job and she had a little time on her hands didn’t mean it was a good idea. She hadn’t been this hesitant about anything since her skydiving course last year. She needed to know what she’d be getting into and she needed Adam to know she wasn’t that blindly devoted girl anymore. “Normal rules would have to not apply. Because if I agree to do this, there could well be things I want to say to you that usually I absolutely wouldn’t.”
“This is sounding ominous.”
“It won’t work if I don’t have the freedom to speak my mind.”
He hesitated. “If you do this for me, then I’ll accept that much.” His dark eyes were earnest. “I’d appreciate it, Danni.” When she was younger he’d called her Danni. But somewhere along the way as they’d both gotten older, and he’d gone away to school and become even more serious, formality had crept into their relationship and he’d switched to calling her Danielle with rare exceptions. Calling her Danni now brought back recollections of those easier times. He touched a finger to the small bump on his nose. Just briefly. The gesture looked almost unconscious, and she’d seen him make it before. But it never failed to make her feel guilty. Did he know that? Was it part of persuading her that she owed him?
Whether he knew it or not, it worked. “I don’t know how much help I can be.”
He recognized