hands. Once again, Aleks battled back an urge to go to her. He stood with rigid military discipline, reminding himself that this woman was the enemy. This woman had no scruples. This woman had tossed his child away like a stray dog.
When she lifted her tearstained face, his gut spasmed. She’d looked this way on the day he’d gotten news that his father was dying. She’d cried for him.
He’d been a fool then. He wouldn’t be again.
“Is he on a transplant list?” she asked. “I don’t know how things like that work here in your country. What can be done?”
“The best hope for Nico is a living donor. His body would then regenerate the donated segment into a full-sized body part while the donor’s body would also fully recover. But Carvainia is a country of genetically similar people. No one we can find shares his blood type.”
“AB negative,” she murmured.
“Yours, I assume.”
She nodded. “Yes.”
“Nor does anyone, including myself, my mother, nor any of the royal family share the specific blood markers that he requires.” Impatient, he chopped the air again. “I don’t pretend to understand the medical details. I only know that Nico is dying and his only hope is a living donor who matches him as exactly as possible.”
Perched on the edge of the chair, she bent forward, forearms against her thighs, hair falling over her shoulders as she looked up. “And that’s why I’m here, isn’t it? To be his donor.”
Aleks tensed. His heart galloped in his chest like one of his racehorses. If he was to gain Sara’s cooperation, he must proceed with extreme caution.
“You needn’t worry. I will pay you well.”
A soft gasp escaped her. “You’ll…pay me?”
Though she sounded less than eager, Aleks was confident she would agree once she understood the terms. Greed was a powerful incentive. A baby, a body part, it was all the same to a woman like Sara. “One million American dollars.”
Something hard shifted through her features. “No.”
Aleks blinked once, slowly, certain he had heard wrong. “No?”
Her lips tightened. “I said no.”
Sickness churned in his belly, and for the first time, he began to doubt his plan. What if he failed? What if Sara Presley was even more heartless than he’d expected?
The muscles in his neck tightened to the breaking point. “Then name your price. Whatever you want is yours.”
Sara stared back at him with eyes that had turned the color of a stormy sea. They were eyes that had beguiled him when he was young and foolish. Eyes that had promised so much and then had forgotten him. Eyes that now defied him.
With a near-regal grace, she rose, fists clenched at her side, her chin thrust upward. “Then here’s the deal, Prince Charming. I want to spend time with my son and get to know him. I want to be his mother.”
She wanted to be Nico’s mother? Cold fear sliced through Aleks. “You should have thought about that a long time ago, Sara. Nico is mine and mine alone. You will have no part in his life. None ever.”
“A little late for that, don’t you think? You’ve brought me here. I’m involved.”
“As a hired body part. Nothing else.”
She blanched and rocked back, biting down on her bottom lip.
Aleks refused to be moved by her wounded reaction. He would do anything to protect Nico, particularly from the woman who had abandoned them both.
In clipped tones with barely suppressed anger, he said, “Presenting a sick child with a long-lost mother is not in his best interest. Have you no compassion whatsoever? Think of the questions he’d ask! Do you want him to know that he was given away at birth? Do you want him asking why he’s never known about you? His health is far too fragile for that kind of revelation.”
Sara made a tiny noise of dismay and began to move around the room. She twisted her fingers together, worrying a small gold ring on her pinky. The hem of the yellow sundress swished softly against her thighs as curvy hips swayed below a slender waist.
Aleks didn’t want to notice her lush body or to remember the silk of her thighs against his palms. With firm resolve, he focused on the coldness of her heart and on his plan.
Now, while Sara was still in a state of shock, he had to press his advantage. “I’m prepared to pay you a million if you are a match and another million after the surgery.”
He was prepared to pay her far more than that should she balk. Everyone had a price.
Like a wounded tigress, Sara whirled on him. “Get this through your pig head, Aleks. I don’t want your money. I want my child.”
“He is not yours to want.”
On a sharp inhale, she drew up to her full height, shoulders high and tight as she contemplated him.
While Aleks held his own breath, she exhaled in a rush of words. “Then I won’t cooperate. You’ll have to search elsewhere for your donor.” She marched to the door and yanked it open. “You’ll also have to excuse me, Your Majesty, I must pack. I’m leaving in the morning.”
Aleks was stunned by the woman’s audacity. She was showing him out?
When he didn’t move, she said, “I never had the chance to know my son. I don’t want your money. I want to spend time with Nico. That’s the deal, Aleks. Take it, or I’m going home.”
Aleks could scarcely believe this was happening. She was bargaining with Nico’s life. But why? He didn’t believe for one second that she would turn down a million dollars in the end. Why the pretense of belated maternal feelings? Did she despise him enough to hurt him through Nico?
Whatever the reason, Sara was worse than he’d dreamed.
“Close the door.”
He had no wish for this conversation to be carried by the servants to his mother’s ears. She was upset enough. She would be livid to learn of the bargain he was about to strike.
The door snapped shut. Sara stood with one hand on the pull, facing him as calmly as if they were trading automobiles. Only the quiver of pulse above her collarbone indicated distress. “Do we have a deal?”
What choice did he have? He wanted Nico alive and well, and Sara was his only chance.
“You may visit his rooms, but either I or the queen must be present at all times.”
She cocked her head. A silver earring glinted against the pale skin of her neck. “You don’t trust me.”
About as much as he trusted the king of Perseidia. “Not in the least.”
A small skirmish went on behind sea-blue eyes but finally she said, “Okay, agreed, as long as I can see him as often as I like.”
“Done.” He reached for the door handle and paused. “One thing, though, Sara, is not negotiable.”
She regarded him warily. “And that is?”
Calling upon four years of festered anger and bitterness, he said, “Nico is never to know you are the bitch that whelped him.”
The color, which had drained from her face, now surged forth, setting her delicate skin aflame. She raised a hand as if to strike him. He caught her wrist. “I think not.”
Long after Aleks left her alone, Sara sat at the window staring out at the magical country of Carvainia. Aleks’s country. Her baby’s country.
Emotional exhaustion made her limbs heavy so she could hardly lift her hands to swipe at the tears flowing down her cheeks.
Her baby was here. After the