His Temporary Cinderella. Jessica Hart
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remained obstinately silent. Caro kept checking it to see if the battery had run out, or the signal disappeared for some reason. When it did ring, she would leap out of her skin and fumble frantically with it in her hands before she could even check who was calling. Invariably it was Stella, calling to discover if Philippe had rung yet, and Caro got quite snappy with her.
Then she was even crosser with herself for being so twitchy. It was only Philippe, for heaven’s sake. Yes, he was a prince, but what had he ever done other than go to parties and look cool? She wasn’t impressed by him, Caro told herself, and was mortified whenever she caught herself inspecting her reflection or putting on lipstick, as if he would be able to see what she looked like when he called.
Or as if he would care.
In any case, all the jitteriness was quite wasted because Philippe didn’t ring at all. By Saturday night, Caro had decided that there must have been a mistake. Lotty had misunderstood, or, more likely, Philippe couldn’t be bothered to do what Lotty had asked him to do. Fine, thought Caro grouchily. See if she cared. Lotty would call when she could and in meantime she would get on with her life.
Or, rather, her lack of life.
A summer Saturday, and she had no money to go out and no one to go out with. Caro sighed. She couldn’t even have a glass of wine as she and Stella were both on a diet and had banned alcohol from the house. It was all right for Stella, who had gone to see a film, but Caro was badly in need of distraction.
For want of anything better to do, she opened up her laptop and logged on to right4u.com. Her carefully worded profile, together with the most flattering photo she could find—taken before George had dumped her and she was two sizes thinner—had gone live the day before. Perhaps someone had left her a message, she thought hopefully. Prince Philippe might not be prepared to get in touch, but Mr Right might have fallen madly in love with her picture and be out there, longing for her to reply.
Or not.
Caro had two messages. The first turned out to be from a fifty-six-year-old who claimed to be ‘young at heart’ and boasted of having his own teeth and hair although, after one look at his photo, Caro didn’t think either were much to be proud of.
Quickly, she moved onto the next message, which was from a man who hadn’t provided a picture but who had chosen Mr Sexy as his code name. Call her cynical, but she had a feeling that might be something of a misnomer. According to the website, the likelihood of a potential match between them was a mere seven per cent. I want you to be my soulmate, Mr Sexy had written. Ring me and let’s begin the rest of our lives right now.
Caro thought not.
Depressed, she got up and went into the kitchen. She was starving. That was the trouble with diets. You were bored and hungry the whole time. How was a girl supposed to move on with her life when she only had salad for lunch?
In no time at all she found the biscuits Stella had hidden in with the cake tins, and she was on her third and wondering whether she should hope Stella wouldn’t notice or eat them all and buy a new packet when the doorbell rang. Biscuit in hand, Caro looked at the clock on wall. Nearly eight o’clock. An odd time for someone to call, at least in Ellerby. Still, whoever it was, they surely had to be more interesting than trawling through her potential matches on right4u.com.
Stuffing the rest of the biscuit into her mouth, Caro opened the door.
There, on the doorstep, stood Prince Philippe Xavier Charles de Montvivennes, looking as darkly, dangerously handsome and as coolly arrogant as he had in the pages of Glitz and so bizarrely out of place in the quiet Ellerby backstreet that Caro choked, coughed and sprayed biscuit all over his immaculate dark blue shirt.
Philippe didn’t bat an eyelid. Perhaps his smile slipped a little, but he put it quickly back in place as he picked a crumb off his shirt. ‘Caroline Cartwright?’ With those dark good looks, he should have had an accent oozing Mediterranean warmth but, like Lotty, he had been sent to school in England and, when he opened that mouth, the voice that came out was instead cool and impeccably English. As cool as the strange silver eyes that were so disconcerting against the olive skin and black hair.
Still spluttering, Caro patted her throat and blinked at him through watering eyes. ‘I’m—’ It came out as a croak, and she coughed and tried again. ‘I’m Caro,’ she managed at last.
Dear God, thought Philippe, keeping his smile in place with an effort. Caro’s lovely, Lotty had said. She’ll be perfect.
What had Lotty been thinking? There was no way this Caro could carry off what they had in mind. He’d pictured someone coolly elegant, like Lotty, but there was nothing cool and certainly nothing elegant about this girl. Built on Junoesque lines, she’d opened the door like a slap in the face, and then spat biscuit all over him. He’d had an impression of lushness, of untidy warmth. Of dark blue eyes and fierce brows and a lot of messy brown hair falling out of its clips.
And of a perfectly appalling top made of purple cheesecloth. It might possibly have been fashionable forty years earlier, although it was hard to imagine anyone ever picking it up and thinking it would look nice on. Caro Cartwright must get dressed in the dark.
Philippe was tempted to turn on his heel and get Yan to drive him back to London, but Lotty’s face swam into his mind. She had looked so desperate that day she had come to see him. She hadn’t cried, but something about the set of her mouth, about the strained look around her eyes had touched the heart Philippe had spent years hardening.
Caro will help, I know she will, she had said. This is my only chance, Philippe. Please say you’ll do it.
So he’d promised, and now he couldn’t go back on his word.
Dammit.
Well, he was here, and now he’d better make the best of it. Philippe forced warmth into his smile, the one that more than one woman had told him was irresistible. ‘I’m Lotty’s cousin, Ph—’ he began, but Caro waved him to silence, still patting her throat.
‘I know who you are,’ she said squeakily, apparently resisting the smile without any trouble at all. ‘What are you doing here?’
Philippe was momentarily nonplussed, which annoyed him. He wasn’t used to being taken aback, and he certainly wasn’t used to having his presence questioned quite so abruptly. ‘Didn’t Lotty tell you?’
‘She said you would ring.’
That was definitely an accusing note in her voice. Philippe looked down his chiselled nose. ‘I thought it would be easier to explain face to face,’ he said haughtily.
Easier for him, maybe, thought Caro. He hadn’t been caught unawares with no make-up on and a mouthful of biscuit.
There was something surreal about seeing him standing there, framed against the austere terrace of houses across the road. Ellerby was a quiet northern town on the edge of the moors, while Philippe in his immaculately tailored trousers and the dark blue shirt open at the neck appeared to have stepped straight out of the pages of Glitz. He was tall and tanned with that indefinable aura of wealth and glamour, the assurance that took red carpets as its due.
A pampered playboy prince … Caro longed to dismiss him as no more than that, but there was nothing soft about the line of his mouth, or the hard angles of cheek and jaw. Nothing self-indulgent about the lean, hard-muscled body, nothing yielding in those unnervingly light eyes.
Still, no reason for her to go all breathless and silly.
‘You should have rung,’ she said severely. ‘I might have been going out.’
‘Are you going out?’ asked Philippe, and his expression as his gaze swept over her spoke louder than words. Who in God’s name, it seemed to say, would even consider going out in a purple cheesecloth shirt?
Caro lifted her chin. ‘As it happens, no.’
‘Then perhaps I could come in and tell you what Lotty wants,’ he said smoothly. ‘Unless