flattened his lips and arched an eyebrow, going for an evil leer. “Wonderful. You’ve convinced me. I’ll be taking complete advantage of you after all.”
* * *
They returned to the palace a short time later. By then it was a little after six. There was a light buffet laid out on a sideboard in the main dining room. They filled plates and sat together to eat.
After that he walked her to her room. He kissed her, a kiss he let go on a little too long. A kiss that tempted him to push the door open behind her, to carry her in there and finish what they’d started the night before.
But no. Once he had her naked in his arms, he wasn’t going to want to let her go until the morning, when they would say goodbye. And tonight was the annual Prince’s Thanksgiving Ball. She couldn’t miss that. It was a memorable part of a Montedoran Thanksgiving.
Reluctantly, he broke the kiss and promised to return for her at nine.
In his apartment, Damien got out his phone, turned on the ringer again and checked his messages and calls. He discovered that V had called only those two times. And left one voice mail.
He sat for a while actually considering calling her, trying one more time to speak reasonably with her, to convince her that she had to leave it alone, move on. And then he went ahead and played back her message even though he never played her messages anymore, because he’d grown weary of listening to her call him bad names in Italian.
Surprisingly, her voice was calm. She spoke English, which surprised him almost as much as her even tone. V was fluent in English, but she considered it a barbaric language, unmusical and crass.
“Dami. I can guess where you are. With that skinny, plain little American nobody, the one with hardly any hair.” A laugh, soft, knowing. The bitch. “You’re all over the internet with her, the two of you at the bazaar on Thursday and the museum last night. Really, Dami, what am I going to do with you?” A long sigh. “I know, I know. You have to follow every cheap flirtation to its logical conclusion and I’m going to have to leave you alone to pursue this new and incomprehensible infatuation. And guess what—I believe I will do just that. Enjoy yourself. I’ve had enough. When you finally see what a fool you’ve been, you’ll be sorry. But of course, there won’t be anything you can do about it. Because I am finished. You hear me? It’s over, finito. Ciao.”
Damien got up from the sofa and paced to the window. He wasn’t angry, exactly, just annoyed at her spiteful remarks about Lucy, who never hurt anyone, who only brought joy.
And there was a bright side to this. Or there could be. V had sounded as though she’d finally accepted the inevitable.
He put the phone to his ear again and played the message through a second time.
Yes. Very possibly a real goodbye.
He went back to the sofa, kicked off his shoes and stretched out. A certain buoyancy had come over him. He felt distinctly optimistic.
It didn’t hurt his new, improved mood that for now, anyway, there was no need to consider calling V after all. If she’d meant what she’d said, he wouldn’t be talking to her again.
And if she hadn’t meant it...
Well, he’d walk that plank when he came to it.
* * *
“I work as a nanny,” said Lani Vasquez, leaning closer to Lucy in order to be heard over the din in the crowded ballroom. The musicians had taken a break and now everyone seemed to be talking at once. Lani went on, “I came from Texas with Sydney when she married Rule.” Rule, Lucy reminded herself. Second-born after Maximilian. “And now I take care of their kids, Trevor and Ellie. It’s such a great job. I love the kids and Sydney is very hands-on, so I get a lot of time to myself. Tonight she and Rule are at their villa with the children, so here I am enjoying the Thanksgiving Ball.” Lani flashed a bright smile. “I love it here in Montedoro. I never want to leave.”
Prince Maximilian, the heir apparent, who’d been standing a few feet away chatting with a beefy older guy, stepped closer. He and the black-haired nanny from Texas shared a warm glance. “Lani’s a writer,” he said. “She’s writing a series of historical novels set in Montedoro.”
“Someday I intend to be a published writer,” Lani added. “Someday soon, I keep hoping.”
“Lani has an agent in America,” said the prince. The man was clearly a booster of the pretty nanny. “She’s right on the brink of that first big sale.”
“The brink.” Lani gave a small uncomfortable chuckle. “As I said, we can hope.”
“It can’t be long now.” Max seemed to have no doubts about Lani’s inevitable success.
“His Highness has two children, Nicholas and Constance,” Lani told Lucy.
“I remember seeing them at Thanksgiving dinner.” Lucy pictured them: a dark-eyed boy of seven or eight, a little blonde girl a year or two younger.
Lani went on, “Their nanny, Gerta, and I have become good friends.”
Max said, “Gerta’s like a second mother to them. They’re very attached to her.”
“Gerta. I’ve heard that name before— Wait, I know. Dami told me that he had a nanny named Gerta.”
“That’s right,” Max replied. “Gerta was our nanny, too. She looked after all nine of us when we were small. Gerta’s part of the family, really.”
Lani said, “We all hang out together. The four children, Gerta and I. That’s how Max and I have gotten to know each other a little. His Highness is the world’s foremost expert on the history of Montedoro.” She said it proudly, with real admiration, apparently as much a booster of the prince as he was of her. “And he’s arranged it so that I have unlimited access to the amazing original materials in the palace library.”
“Wow.” Lucy was impressed. “Talk about an invaluable research resource....”
Lani and the prince shared another lingering glance. “Exactly,” Lani said. “The library contains the correspondence of the Calabretti princes over hundreds of years. There are historical documents going back to the Middle Ages. I could never find such a treasure trove anywhere else.”
Right then Dami, who’d gone off to chat up some business associate, appeared at Lucy’s side. He greeted his brother and Lani. The music began to play again. Max offered Lani his hand. She took it and they went out on the floor to dance.
Lucy watched them go. “The prince and the nanny. I’m lovin’ it.”
“What are you talking about?” Dami sounded surprised.
Lucy chuckled. “Oh, come on.” She watched the two dancing. They had eyes only for each other. “It’s obvious those two have a thing going on.”
“No. Never.” His tone was flat, unequivocal. She glanced at him. He was frowning. And then he said grudgingly, “Yes, all right. It’s a little odd.”
“Excuse me? Odd?”
“Max only dances with his sisters and our mother.”
“Well, yeah. That is kind of odd.”
“That’s not what I meant. You don’t understand.” He watched Max and Lani until they danced out of sight. Then he shook his head. “Never mind.”
She moved in a fraction closer to him and brushed her bare arm against the superfine wool of his sleeve, loving the heat in her belly, the shiver of anticipation for the night to come, when it would be just the two of them at last and they would finally finish what they’d started the night before. “Don’t blow me off, Dami. There’s something going on between the two of them. They’re a mutual admiration society, I kid you not. And when they look at each other... Bam.” She lifted her fisted hands and then popped all her fingers wide to illustrate.
Dami