Carrying The King's Pride. Jennifer Hayward
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“Pregnant?” He repeated the word as if he couldn’t possibly have heard it right.
“We had a detail on her as you requested, with so many photographers still trailing her. She purchased a pregnancy test earlier this week, then saw her doctor.”
Thee mou. His brain attempted to absorb what his aide was telling him. It was inconceivable. They had been so careful.
A buzzing sound filled his head. “And the doctor? We know for sure it was confirmed?”
“Yes.”
He got to his feet, his head spinning violently. It was impossible. Impossible.
He excused Abram. Paced the room and attempted to wrap his head around what he’d just been told. He was going to be a father. Sofía was carrying the heir to Akathinia. It was a disaster of incalculable proportions.
It occurred to him Sofía hadn’t told him because the baby wasn’t his. But as soon as the idea filled his head, he discarded it. Sofía hadn’t had a lover before him for a long while. They had been exclusive. That he knew.
So why not tell him? What was she waiting for? An image of that last time they’d been together filled his head. Woke up old demons. Sofía running a finger down his cheek. I wanted to end it like this. The emotion he’d read in her eyes that said she’d gotten too attached. How she’d stopped him when he’d reached for a condom... Can it be just us tonight?
Blood pounded his temples. Had she bedded him that night with the intention of getting pregnant? It seemed so at odds with Sofía’s independent personality. With her acceptance of the no commitment rules of their relationship. Yet didn’t he know from personal experience just how far a woman was willing to go to keep a prince? To preserve a relationship she knew was ending?
His head was in only a slightly better state when he found his father taking a mandated walk in the formal gardens. He curtly broke the news, without preamble. The king’s leathery old face turned thunderous.
“Pregnant? Thee mou, Nikandros. We have all turned a blind eye to your philandering, but to have her conceive your heir? Have you lost your mind?”
His jaw hardened. “It was not planned, obviously.”
“By you. What about by her?” He shook his head. “Has history taught you nothing?”
A red mist descended over his vision. “Sofía is not Charlotte.”
“You wouldn’t hear ill of your first American plaything either. Then she sold her story to the tabloids and seriously damaged the reputation of this family.”
And his father would never let him forget it. Never mind the fact that Gregorios had indulged in countless affairs during his marriage, had torn this family apart and was far from a saint.
His father waved a hand at him. “No use dwelling on your irresponsibility. We are on top of this. It gives us a chance to deal with it. Consider our options.”
His heart skipped a beat. “What options are you referring to?”
“We need this alliance with the Agieros.”
What his father didn’t say rendered him speechless. When he did recover his voice, his tone was as sharp as a blade. “This is the heir to the Akathinian throne we’re talking about. What exactly are you suggesting?”
“We can make this go away. There will be other heirs.”
Stars exploded in his head. He clenched his hands by his sides. “Do not utter that thought ever again.”
“Don’t be naive about her, Nikandros. Women are your downfall. They always have been.”
Nik gave him a dismissive look. “I’m flying to New York on Friday.”
His father gaped at him. “You can’t leave the country right now.”
“Idas is not going to start a war overnight. I’ll be there and back in twenty-four hours.”
“And if it gets out you’ve left Akathinia at this crucial time?”
“It won’t.”
“Send Abram.”
Nik pinned his gaze on his father. “As you’ve just said, the country is on tenterhooks right now. I am trusting no one to deal with this extremely sensitive issue but me. I know Sofía. I know how to reason with her. We’ll be back within twenty-four hours.”
His father clenched his jaw. “This is insanity.”
Nik shook his head. “Insanity was when Athamos decided to take Kostas on in a suicidal race neither of them should have survived. This is practicality. Sofía is carrying my heir. Marriage is the only answer.”
* * *
Sofía turned the sign on the boutique door to “closed,” kicked off her shoes and carried them to the register, where she started doing the nightly deposit. Working was preferable to facing up to the question of when she was going to tell Nik she was carrying the royal heir.
When she unleashed a ticking time bomb with the potential to rock a nation and its leader at a time when it needed it the least...
From the timing the doctor had given her, she had conceived her and Nik’s baby the night they’d ended it. When she’d questioned the effectiveness of her birth control pills, the doctor had informed her the migraine medication she was on could have interfered with the pill’s effectiveness, a fact she hadn’t been aware of. A fact she’d desperately wished she’d been in possession of.
That she’d gotten pregnant that night seemed to be the only thing she was certain of. That and the fact that she was keeping this baby. Treasuring it.
Her initial shock had faded into sheer, debilitating panic as her life shifted beneath her feet once again. How could this be happening now, when this was her time to shine? Her time to begin her design career with her business thriving. She’d even hired someone last week to make it happen.
She knew how difficult it was to bring up a child on your own. She’d watched her mother attempt to do it after her father’s death and fail under the unrelenting pressure of the responsibility. She had been the one to parent her mother when her mother had lapsed into a deep depression. And yet what choice did she have? Nik was marrying someone else, he hadn’t wanted her and it was up to her to figure this out, regardless that the life of an entrepreneur was completely unsuitable for what she was about to take on.
Overriding it all, however, had been the elemental, protective instinct that had risen up inside of her. That had always been in her DNA. The need to treasure what she’d been given. The need to protect the fragility of life. Although the sheer, debilitating panic still came in waves, something she had to keep a handle on, using the coping techniques the doctor had given her after her father’s death, lest it get out of hand. Not a place she wanted to be.
She counted the twenty-dollar bills for the third time, her concentration in tatters from all the possible scenarios running through her head. The door chimed. Katharine went to intercept the customer who’d ignored the closed sign. Sofía kept counting. Her gaze rose as a funny sound escaped her partner’s mouth.
The tall, dark male standing inside the door swept both of them with an enigmatic look. “You should lock the door if you’re closed. This is New York, ladies.”
The deposit bag slipped from her fingers. Eyes trained on Nik, she knelt and picked it up. He walked toward her, bent and scooped up two loose twenty-dollar bills, then straightened to tower over her. Their eyes locked. Her heart jumped into her mouth. Nik in full-on intensity mode was ridiculously intimidating.
She swallowed hard. “Nik— I— What are you doing here?”
“We need to talk, Sofía.”
Her mouth went dry. He couldn’t know. She had just seen her doctor. Then what was he doing here