Claiming The Royal Innocent. Jennifer Hayward
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who stood poised like a flock of vultures behind the stanchioned-off red carpet waiting for a money shot.
Her palms went sweaty. A shot of her in handcuffs, a royal intruder caught red-handed during a time of high security for the country, would be great fodder for them. She could just see the residents of her small, sleepy coastal village waking up to her face splashed across the front page of the daily newspaper. Picture them doing a double take, their bemusement quickly turning to horror...
Her heart pounded madly against her ribs. There was no way she was going to pull this off. She should turn around and go back to Stygos and forget she’d ever had this stupid, foolish need to know a piece of herself. To right a wrong that had long since been undoable.
But it was too late to back out now. The palace official was reaching for her blue and gold-embossed invitation, an expectant smile on his face. She handed it to him with frozen fingers. He checked his list. Frowned. Ran his finger over the names again, then looked up at her. “Lypamai, despoinis, but your name doesn’t seem to be on the list.”
Alex swallowed hard. Summoned composure from a place deep inside her she hadn’t even known existed. “I originally had to decline the invitation,” she said smoothly. “When I found out I would be in the country, I sent another note accepting.”
He procured another list, scanned it, consulted someone by radio, then nodded. “Kala. It’s fine. You’re on the original list.” He passed the invitation to the soldier with the booming voice and nodded for her to proceed. “Enjoy your evening.”
She pinned a smile on her lips, picked up the hem of her gown and moved toward the entrance to the ballroom.
“Kara Nicholson,” the soldier announced, his deep baritone seeming to hang on the air forever. Alex’s step faltered, a thin layer of perspiration breaking out on her brow as she waited for someone to point out that she was not Kara Nicholson. That she was a fraud.
The din of the crowd remained unchanged. The soldier gave her a curious look. Exhaling the breath she’d been holding, she propelled herself forward on legs that shook so badly it was hard to put one foot in front of the other. The powder room was her first priority. There, she restored her outward composure with her makeup compact. Inner composure, however, was somewhat more elusive.
That she and Kara, the American heiress who’d stayed in her family’s tourist hotel a few weeks ago, were both slim with dark hair and blue eyes had just saved her from certain disaster. It was Kara’s discarded invitation she’d picked out of the trash can to gain admittance to the party. Kara’s identity she’d assumed. But resembling the beautiful socialite and being in any way prepared to do what she’d come here to do, to mingle with the exclusive crowd Kara frequented, were two entirely different things.
You just have to fake it long enough to get this done. Jaw set, shoulders back, she made her way into the elegantly clad crowd that filled the magnificent sweeping ballroom, champagne flutes in their hands. The upper echelons of Akathinian society were in attendance to celebrate the princess’s birthday—assorted celebrities and a smattering of royalty from across Europe. The kind of people she checked into her hotel for a quiet, idyllic week where they wouldn’t be bothered, the best view in all of Akathinia offered from their seaside window. Not those she socialized with.
She plucked a glass of champagne off a waiter’s tray and moved deeper into the thick crowd, searching for a spot to locate her target. Taking a long sip of the delicious, clearly outrageously expensive bubbly, she swallowed, the champagne fizzling its way down to her stomach, where it spread a slow warmth through her. Exactly what she needed.
Securing a quiet corner from which she could survey the room, she tucked herself against a pillar and drank in her spectacular surroundings. Lit in the same blue and gold tones as the invitation, the richly appointed ballroom was a feast for the eye. The Akathinian royal crest was projected onto black marble floors, which looked as if they were threaded through with real gold vein. Massive antique chandeliers glittered from the ceiling, serving as a brilliant counterpoint for the dark accents in the room, while precious, larger-than-life paintings adorned walls that soared to impressive thirty-foot heights.
Her head spun at the opulence of it all. None of it seemed real. But then again, nothing had seemed real since her mother, a former lady-in-waiting to the elder Queen Amara, had broken a twenty-five-year silence with a bombshell that had blown her life apart.
Her father had not been an Akathinian businessman who had died before her birth. He was King Gregorios, the former monarch of this country, with whom her mother had carried out an extended affair before the queen discovered her betrayal and fired her.
Her hand trembled as she downed another swallow of champagne. That her mother, whom she’d considered above reproach, whose strength and courage symbolized everything that was good in the world, had indulged in a dangerous, illicit affair with the king, a married man, then manufactured a series of elaborate stories to paint a rosy view of her childhood, for whatever altruistic reasons she cared to offer, seemed inconceivable. Unimaginable.
And yet it was the truth. She had a father she’d never known. The siblings she’d longed for as a child, all of whom would have been lost to her if her mother hadn’t broken down and told her the truth.
A bright burst of laughter drew her gaze. Princess Stella, her half sister, clad in a dazzling silver gown, held court in the center of the room, a handful of handsome men arranged around her, vying for her attention. She looked every inch the Grecian goddess with her slim figure and sleek blond hair caught up in an elaborate twist. Every inch a princess.
How different would her life have been had her mother told her the truth? Would she have become a princess, glittering alongside her sophisticated elder sister? Would she never have known her quiet, idyllic life in Stygos?
A fist tightened in her chest. How her half siblings would receive her was yet to be determined. Her priority, however, was her father’s ill health, which had made tonight’s subterfuge necessary. A heart attack had sent King Gregorios back to the hospital, his absence tonight marked. She needed to meet him before he died. It was the only thing that had been clear in the confusion of the past few months.
She scanned the room, locating the young, strikingly handsome King Nikandros mingling with a group of guests, his wife, Sofía, by his side. Her brother.
Nikandros had ascended to the throne after his father’s initial heart attack during a difficult time for Akathinia, with its aggressive sister island Carnelia threatening to annex Akathinia back into the Catharian island group to which it had once belonged. Many feared the seventy-year-old Carnelian King Idas might finally have lost his mind, his recent mobilization of the Carnelian military suggesting a war might be on its way.
Thus the reason she had chosen tonight as her avenue to speak to the king. Securing an audience with him under any other circumstances would have been nearly impossible given the security that surrounded him and the demands on his time.
So tonight it was. She set her flute down on a waiter’s tray with a determined clink of crystal. Took another. The expensive vintage was boosting her confidence by the minute, easing the tightness in her chest as it filled her with its insidious warmth. After this glass, she’d work up the courage to do what she needed to do. To rock the royal family with a scandal at a time when it needed it the least.
* * *
Aristos Nicolades leaned against a column in the packed ballroom, watching the stunning brunette in the sexy blue gown toss back her second glass of champagne with a speed that suggested she needed courage of some sort.
For what? he wondered idly, studying the play of shimmering light as it highlighted every dip and curve of her petite, shapely figure. Considering she’d lied about who she was to gain admittance to the party, he’d thought it best to keep an eye on her.
He’d been behind her in the lineup to the ballroom, his flight from the United States delayed, making him almost an hour late for the party. His every desire had been to skip the event, go home, take a long, hot shower and sleep after a grueling week abroad. But considering the king had finally granted