Stepping into the Prince's World (13 page)

That thought had lasted all of twenty seconds, which was the time Claire had needed to move in, feign an amateurish movement, change swiftly to a move that was anything but amateurish and have him flat on the mat.

She grinned down at him. ‘You'll have to do better than that, soldier.'

Soldier. For a moment she'd lost the Prince thing. She was having fun, smiling down at him, laughing at the ego that had had him misjudging her.

So then he got serious. He rose and circled and thought about everything his martial arts sergeant had told him.

As a soldier Raoul was trained to work with any number of different weapons. He could work on tactics, set up a battalion for attack, retreat, advance, camouflage, exist on meagre rations, survive with bush craft...

He could do this.

He moved in to attack, thinking how best to throw her without hurting her.

The next moment he was on his back again, and he didn't have a clue how he'd got there.
Whump!
He lay, winded, on the mat, and she was smiling down at him with the same patronising smile that said this throw had been no harder than the first.

‘What the...?'

‘I told you I was good,' she said, with not a hint of false modesty about her. ‘Believe me?'

‘Teach me that throw.'

‘Really?'

‘Please,' he said humbly, and she put down a hand to help him up.

He gazed at it with incredulity, and then grinned and put his hand in hers. She tugged him up, and he let her pull, and the feeling was amazing. He wanted to kiss her again—very, very badly—but she was in full martial arts mode. She was
sensei
to his pupil and she was serious.

They had an hour during which he learned almost more than in the entire time the military had devoted to teaching hand-to-hand combat. And at the end he still didn't know a fraction of what this woman could do.

* * *

Karate was fun.

Dressmakers were scary.

The appointment was for two. Showered in the lavish gymnasium bathrooms, dressed again and with make-up newly applied, she should be ready for anything.

She wasn't.

Henri had come to find them. Raoul had left her for his own fittings and Henri had escorted her to a massive bedchamber on the second floor.

He swung the door wide and four women were waiting for her, all in black, all with faces carefully impassive.

‘You'll take care of Miss Tremaine,' Henri said.

‘Of course,' the oldest woman said smoothly, and closed the door on Henri and turned to appraise Claire.

She was a woman whose age was impossible to guess—slim, elegant, timeless. She also seemed deeply intimidating. Her gaze was surely a dressmaker's appraisal—nothing more. Claire shouldn't take it personally. But it was hard not to as every inch of her body was assessed and while the other three women stood back, silent, probably doing the same thing.

‘Excellent,' the woman said at last. ‘I'm Louise Dupont. These women are Marie, Belle and Fleur. Our job is to provide you with whatever you need for the grand ball and for the preceding official engagements which we're informed you're invited to attend. Belle has a list of the requirements. Would you like to tell us your ideas first, so we have an idea where we're going?'

‘Simple.' It was as much as Claire could do to get the word out. ‘I'm not royal, and I'm not accustomed to such events. If I could, I'd wear a little black dress...'

‘A little black dress to a royal ball...?' Louise's expressionless face almost showed a flinch, and the women behind her gasped.

‘I know I can't do that, but I'd like something that won't make me stand out.'

Certainly,
mademoiselle
,' Louise said woodenly, and swathes of cloth produced, and sketches, and a part of Claire was thinking,
What a coward
.

Among the swathes of cloth were brocades, sequins, tulle, lace of every description. But sense was sense. She chose beige for one of the anniversary dinners and a soft green for the other. Matching accessories. Deeply conservative. Then the ball dress...

‘I really can't have black?'

‘Their Majesties would consider it an insult,' Louise told her, and so Claire fingered the silver tulle for just a moment and then chose a muted sensible navy in a simple sheath design.

It will look elegant
, she told herself, and the way the women set about fitting the cloth to her figure she knew it would.

And then Raoul arrived. One of the women answered the door to his tap. Whatever he'd tried on, he'd tried on fast. He was back in his casual trousers and open-necked shirt, but he stood in the doorway looking every inch a prince. He stared at the pinned sheath of navy cloth covering Claire and groaned.

‘I
knew
it. Get it off.'

‘I beg your pardon?' Louise turned and saw who it was, but her attitude hardly changed when she did. ‘I beg your pardon—Your Highness.'

‘Do you really think that's suitable for a royal ball?'

‘It's what Miss Tremaine wishes.'

‘Miss Tremaine wishes for the fairytale—don't you, Miss Tremaine?' He shook his head in exasperation. ‘Louise, Miss Tremaine is returning to Australia after the ball, to life as a country lawyer. This ball is a ball to be remembered all her life.'

He strode across to where the remaining bolts of fabric lay and lifted some white lace shot with silver.

‘This, I think. Something amazing, Louise. Something that makes the world look at Claire and know her for the beauty she is. She'll be wearing my mother's tiara...'

‘Raoul!' She should have used his formal title but she was too gobsmacked. ‘I don't want to stand out. Plain is good—and I'm not wearing a tiara.'

‘You saved my life. If that's not a reason to lend you my mother's tiara I don't know what is. She'd be proud to have you wear it. You need a dress to match. Something magnificent, Louise. Something fairytale.'

‘Would you like us to set up screens so you can supervise?'

‘No!' Claire retorted.

Raoul grinned. ‘What? No screens?'

‘Go away!'

The women stared at her in astonishment—a commoner giving orders to royalty?—but Raoul was still smiling.

‘Only if you promise to indulge in the fairytale. The full fantasy, Claire. Remember what Henri said? Have fun. Louise, can you do fairytale?'

‘Certainly, Your Highness,' Louise told him, sounding intrigued.

‘Then fairytale it is,' Raoul told her. ‘Get rid of that navy blue.'

‘Raoul...'

‘I'm leaving,' he said, still smiling at her, and his smile was enough to have every woman in the room trying to hide a gasp. ‘But you
will
have fun.'

‘I will have fun,' she said grimly.

‘That's my brave Claire. Go for it.'

* * *

And in the end she did have fun. Raoul left and she had two choices—she could try and incorporate a bit of bling into her image of plain or she could go for it.

With the women's blatant encouragement she went for it.

‘I
do
like a bit of fairytale,' Louise admitted, letting her dour exterior drop.

Raoul had suggested the white lace shot with silver, and after a little thought that was what Louise recommended. The design she suggested was a gown of true princess splendour, with a low-cut sweetheart neckline and tiny slivers of silver just off the shoulders to hold the bodice in place. A vast skirt billowed and shimmered from a cinched waist, and a soft satin underskirt of the palest blue made the whole dress seem to light up.

That was the vision. For now it was only draped fabric, held together with pins, but Claire gazed at herself in the mirror and thought,
What am I doing here?

She needed to ground herself. She needed to find Rocky and go home, she told herself as more and more of the shimmering silver was applied. To Australia. This fairytale was sucking her further and further in.

But she couldn't leave until after the ball.

At last the interminable measuring was done. ‘You'll do our Prince proud,' Louise told her, permitting herself a tiny smile, and Claire tugged on her jeans and blouse as fast as she could and wondered how her presence could possibly do anyone proud. She felt a fraud.

Raoul was in the hallway, calmly reading, clearly waiting for her. He had Rocky on his knee. Rocky bounced across to greet her with canine delight and Raoul smiled—and she was in so much trouble.

‘Hungry?' he asked. ‘Picnic in the grounds?'

‘Raoul, I should...'

‘There's a whole lot of
I shoulds
waiting for us in the wings,' he said gently. ‘For now, though, let's put them aside and focus on the
I wills
.'

CHAPTER TEN

R
AOUL
DIDN
'
T
RETURN
to her apartment that night, and neither did she stay in the palace. It had been a risk for one night; another night would be pushing things past reasonable limits if they were to keep the media treating their relationship as platonic. As they must.

Claire slept fitfully in her sparse apartment. She woke early, eager to throw herself back into work, which was far less confusing than being with Raoul. She was due to meet the head of Raoul's fledgling social services department. She drank coffee and read her notes from the previous week, trying to block out the fantasy of the weekend. Then, still with time before the car came to collect her, she retrieved the newspapers Raoul had organised to have delivered to her door.

She opened the first one and froze.

The page was entirely taken up with a photograph. Claire and Raoul, underneath the chandelier. The moment their waltz had ended. That kiss. The photograph had been blown up to the extent that the images were grainy, but there was no mistaking the passion.

This was no mere kiss. This was a kiss between two lovers. This was a man and a woman who were deeply in love.

She gasped and backed into the hallway, as if burned, dropping the paper on the floor. She stared down at it in horror.

The headline...

Roturière Australienne Pièges Notre Prince.

Commoner Australian Traps Our Prince.

Scarcely breathing, she picked it up again.

The first article she read had been hurriedly but deeply researched.

When she'd first arrived in Marétal the press had given their readers a brief background of the woman who'd rescued their Prince.

Lawyer taking time out from successful career to caretake an island...

It had sounded vaguely romantic, and the description had been superficial.

There was nothing superficial about
this
. Overnight someone had been in touch with an Australian journalist, who must have travelled fast to the tiny Outback town of Kunamungle. There was an exposé of her childhood poverty and scandal, even a nasty jibe from the publican—
‘She always thought she was better than us—she was dragged up in the gutter but ambition was her middle name...'

More coming!
the article promised, and Claire thought of the fraud allegations and what might come out—what
would
come out—and she felt ill.

This was sensationalist journalism and it cheapened everything. She felt smutty and used and infinitely weary.

She flicked to the next paper.

Prince Désire Paysanne...

Prince Desires Peasant.

The phone rang. It was Raoul. He spoke, but she couldn't make herself reply. She leant against the wall, feeling she needed its support. The papers were limp in her hands. She dropped them again and felt as if she wanted to drop herself.

‘Claire, talk to me.'

‘There's nothing to say,' she whispered. ‘I knew this would happen. So did you.'

‘I need to see you.' He groaned. ‘But I can't. The media have staked out the palace gates. I'll be followed if I come to you and it'll make things worse.' He paused. ‘Unless you want to face them down together?'

Together? With all that implied? ‘No!'

Somehow she hauled herself together. She was here to do a job and she would do it.

‘I have an appointment with the head of your social services department in half an hour,' she told him. ‘In this precinct. I imagine the media can't get in here?'

‘They can't. You'll still do that?'

‘I promised,' she whispered. ‘It's what I came here for.'

‘You came here for so much more.'

‘No,' she said, and anger came to her aid now—fury plain and simple. ‘I didn't. I agreed to take on a job. If I go home now then your papers will say that every single thing they've printed is true. That I came here to trap you...'

‘We both know that's a lie.'

‘I bet that's what they said about Cinderella.'

‘We're not basing our relationship on a fairytale.'

‘You said it,' she said wearily. ‘Raoul, it's impossible. This is real life. We had...we
could
have had...something amazing...but amazing doesn't solve real-life problems. You know I'm not good enough for you.'

And he swore—an expletive so strong she almost dropped the phone.

‘Um...' she said at last. ‘My translation isn't that good.'

‘Claire, I
will
see you.'

‘No,' she told him. ‘It does neither of us any good.'

‘You did promise you'd come to the ball.'

She fell silent then. The ball... She
had
promised. And there was the dress. And there was Raoul. And he'd be in his gorgeous regimental uniform.

Cinderella had
her
midnight, she thought ruefully. Maybe she, too, could have her ball and her midnight. There'd be no glass slipper afterwards, because happy-ever-after only happened in fairytales, but the ball would be something she could remember all her life.

She shouldn't. The sensible part of her brain was screaming at her:
Don't, don't, don't!

But there was still another part of her—the part that remembered Raoul holding her in the waltz, the part that remembered a dress of shimmering silver, the part that knew for the rest of her life she'd remember one night...

And she had to finish what she'd come here to do. She'd do her work, she'd have her ball and she'd go home.

‘Okay,' she whispered.

‘Okay, what? Claire...'

‘I will come to the ball,' she told him. ‘As long as...as long as you don't attempt to see me before then. I won't come to the receptions. Just the ball. And I'll finish the work I'm here to do this week so I can go home straight afterwards.'

‘It doesn't make any kind of sense'

‘It does,' she said sadly. ‘It makes all kinds of sense. It's anything else that's just plain lunacy.'

* * *

Raoul read the papers from cover to cover.

They were tearing Claire to pieces. No mercy... This woman wasn't good enough to be the future Queen. The papers said so.

A fury was building inside him—a rage so cold, so hard, that it was all he could do not to smash things. The palace was full of excellent things to smash. Priceless china, artwork that still had the power to take his breath away, precious carpets and furnishings...

Right now he wanted to put a match to the lot of it and watch it burn.

Instead he forced himself to keep reading as he knew that Claire, when her work for the day was done, would read.

Together they could face them all down, he thought. This wasn't insurmountable. In time they'd see...

But she wouldn't let that happen. He knew that with a dull, unrelenting certainty. Claire's self-image had been battered from birth, and the ghastly Felicity and her cronies had smashed it to nothing. He knew how wonderful she was, but she'd never let herself believe it. She'd be miserable here, knowing everyone was looking down at her. Her self-image wouldn't let her go past it.

The whole situation was impossible. He slammed his fist down on his desk, causing his coffee to jump and topple and spill onto the priceless Persian rug.

Excellent. A good start.

There was a faint knock on the door.

‘Come in,' he snapped, and Henri was at the door, looking grave.

‘I am so sorry, Your Highness,' he told him.

‘So am I.' He hesitated, and then thought,
Why not say it like it is?
‘The paper's right. I love her.'

Henri stilled. ‘Truly?'

‘What do
you
think?'

‘This criticism will pass.'

‘She doesn't think she's good enough, but she's better than all of us put together. What am I going to do? I can't demand she stay. I can't insist she subject herself to this sort of filth.' He picked up the top newspaper and tossed it down onto the pool of spilled coffee.

‘She'd like to learn to ride,' Henri said weakly. ‘Maybe you could ask her to come here for a lesson.'

‘You think that would be an enticement for her to stay?'

‘I...no.'

The two men stared at each other for a long moment. Raoul didn't even try to hide his pain. This man had known him since childhood. It was no use trying to hide.

‘She must be really special,' Henri said at last.

‘She saved my life,' Raoul said simply. He stared down at the spilled coffee and his mouth twisted. ‘She saved
me
.'

‘So how can you save her back?'

Raoul shrugged. ‘I know the answer to that. I need to let her go.'

‘There must be another way.'

‘If you can think of one...' He lifted the newspaper he'd tossed and screwed it up. ‘If you think the media will quit with this... It's relentless.'

‘I'm so sorry,' Henri said gently. ‘You know, the palace could put out a rebuttal...'

‘Everything they say is true. They're crucifying her for things she had no hand in. They're crucifying her for her birth.'

‘Are you thinking of marrying her?' Henri asked. ‘Are you really thinking she's worthy of the throne?'

The question made Raoul pause. He thought of the years of isolation, of the armour he'd built around himself. He thought of his relentless quest not to need people. Not to love.

He thought of Claire.

‘
Are you really thinking she's worthy of the throne?'

She surely was. Of course she was. And then he thought of the throne without Claire and he was suddenly face to face with what he must have known for weeks.

‘Of course I am,' he said bleakly. ‘She's the woman I need beside me for the rest of my life.'

‘Will she agree?'

‘No,' he said bleakly. ‘She won't, and I don't blame her.'

* * *

Claire spent the week working harder than she'd worked in her life. She'd been working to a plan and now she simply continued with the plan—except she worked faster.

She was interviewing as many of the country's movers and shakers in the justice system as she could. She was also talking to the police, prison officers, parole officers, small-time lawyers who worked at the fringe of the system—and to people who'd found themselves in court themselves. People who'd failed to find legal help when they'd needed it most. People whom legal assistance was designed to help.

As an outsider she could never have done this work alone, but Raoul had set it up for her. The people he and his staff had chosen for her to talk to were extraordinary, and to her relief almost none of them had backed out of the interviews because of the photograph and the lurid exposé of her past.

‘I thought you wouldn't be here,' a lawyer she'd talked to that first morning had said. ‘The papers say your legal work is just a smokescreen for you staying with the Prince.'

‘It's not. My legal work is the reason His Highness persuaded me to come.'

‘So you and the Prince...?' he'd probed, and she'd managed to smile.

‘Legal work is dull. A woman has a right to a little fun on the side,' she'd told him, somehow managing to smile.

He'd stared at her in astonishment and then he'd laughed, and they'd got on with their interview.

So that was how she was managing it—laughing it off as best she could as a bit of fun, pretending it had nothing to do with her work and ignoring Raoul.

He still rang every night, and she answered his calls. She talked determinedly about the work she was doing—there was so much that could be done for his country and her report would be comprehensive—but she refused to talk about anything personal.

‘Personal's a mistake,' she told him when he pressed her. ‘You know that. And who knows who's listening in on this conversation?'

‘No one is.'

‘You can't be sure.'

‘Claire...'

‘I'll come to the ball and then I'm out of here,' she told him. ‘My work will be done by then.'

‘You know I want you to stay.'

‘And it's totally unsuitable that I stay. Raoul, find yourself a princess. I'm just Claire.'

And each night she disconnected from his call with a firmness she didn't feel. She punched the pillows into the small hours and even made them a bit soggy, but there was no way she was relenting.

She had to do what she had to do and then leave.

* * *

Raoul also had to do what
he
had to do. As the week went on he became more and more sure that his decision was the right one. He needed her.

Need...

The knowledge made him feel exposed as he'd never been exposed before. It was terrifying and it was exhilarating and it was inarguable.

He'd lost his parents when he was so young he barely remembered them. His grandparents had been kind, but remote. He'd been raised by servants and then he'd found himself in the army—a place where teamwork was valued but individual emotional strength was everything.

He'd learned to be a loner. He'd thought he could be a loner all his life.

He'd been wrong, and the knowledge left him with no choice. Meeting Claire had made something inside him break and it couldn't be repaired.

A part of him said that was weak, but there was nothing he could do about it. Rejecting her felt like tearing himself apart.

He'd faced the worst of conflicts in the Middle East, but he'd joined the army for a reason. He'd spent a solitary childhood when life had seemed bleak to the point of misery. He thought of that solitude now. He had thought he'd trained himself to accept it.