He smiles. “And that’s why I have you. That is precisely why I want you to handle this, Victoria.” He tents his hands in his lap. “And this will not be a phony news story like my brother’s. This story…” His voice trails off and he looks down at his lap for a moment before lifting his gaze back to mine. “This story—these stories—will help to shape the future of Montovia.”

  I can only shake my head at him. He seems so sure of this plan—so certain. I can see now that the wildness in his eyes is more like desperation. If what he’s been saying is true—if the press really is accusing him of attempting suicide—I can’t even imagine the anguish he must be feeling. It’s true that I barely know him—even though I’ve covered hundreds of stories about his brother, I hardly know anything about Andrew himself. He’s always been the mysterious prince—the world’s most eligible bachelor, for sure, but he’s rarely made public appearances outside Montovia.

  I look over at him again. He’s staring at his hands, obviously lost in thought about this half-baked plan of his. I know he thinks it’s a great scheme, trying to pull the wool over the world’s eyes with these carefully crafted stories of his, but he has no idea how much it’s going to hurt him in the long run if it fails. If the slightest thing goes wrong, it isn’t going to just damage him. It’s going to ruin him.

  If I were really one of the paparazzi that he despises so much, I might let him do it. I might even help him to do it, knowing what the outcome will be. But after everything that’s happened in the past few days, I know I can’t. Even if we hadn’t had this weird bonding experience, I’m not sure I could allow him to hang himself like this.

  I turn in the bed to face him and clear my throat to break him out of his thoughts.

  He looks up at me and smiles.

  I’m sure the smile I return is pretty weak—I don’t know how to do this. How to tell him that he’s a fool if he wants to pursue this ridiculous scheme. “Andrew, if this fails—”

  “It won’t.”

  “It might. You have no guarantee—”

  He nods. “I can guarantee that the women I choose to participate are ready to rule Montovia with me. They’ll be of noble blood, born into the same sort of role I was. They’ll have grown up knowing they could be chosen for something like this—that there is at least the possibility—”

  “I get it.” I nod. “I get that you want some princess-y girl—”

  “Woman.”

  I lift a brow. “Woman. You want someone appropriate—”

  He grins, nodding. “Exactly.”

  I shake my head. “If someone had come to you a week ago—two weeks ago—with the same plan, you would have told them they were crazy. That there was too much at risk.”

  He reaches out and takes my hand into his. “That was before. Two weeks ago, I didn’t believe that anyone would ever have found out about certain events that happened several months ago. I didn’t believe that Leopold would be trying to usurp my rightful place as heir to the throne—”

  “I seriously cannot believe that you actually think that, Andrew. I’ve known your brother for years—”

  He shakes his head. “You think you know him. You know what he’s wanted you to know. And he’s changed. He may not have wanted to rule before, but he does now.” He sucks in a breath and drops my hand before he stands, almost kicking the chair he’s been sitting in out of the way.

  Andrew starts pacing the length of the room again, his hands clasped behind his back. He’s muttering under his breath and I can’t understand what he’s saying. He freezes, turning to me, his eyes wide. “Victoria, I will not discuss this with you outside of Montovia.”

  I struggle not to roll my eyes. “I didn’t ask you to, Andrew.” I motion to the chair with my hand. “Why don’t you sit back down? You can outline this awesome plan of yours.”

  He nods and walks back over to the chair, pulling it up to the side of my bed again. There’s something clouding his eyes—it’s desperation, for sure, but there’s almost a little hope there, too. He lowers his voice. “I’ve given this quite a lot of thought and consideration over the past day, and I think having five women in contention will be suitable for this plan.”

  “Okay.” I motion at the pen and pad of paper on the table next to my bed. Andrew reaches over and grabs it, handing it to me. I almost write IDIOTIC PLAN across the top, but I stop myself before I do. I scribble a few notes instead before I look back up at Andrew. “Do you have any candidates in mind?”

  He nods. “As I said, Princess Maria is out of the question.”

  “Obviously.” I blink at him a few times, waiting for him to give me any other names, but he doesn’t. “And were there any other women you were thinking of?”

  He frowns and rubs his jaw. “Lady Karina is also out of the question.”

  I roll my eyes this time. “Yes, Andrew, obviously. She just had a child two weeks ago, so, yeah, probably not the best choice.” I pause for a second. “Unless her baby is actually yours and not Leo’s…?”

  His eyes widen with horror and he shakes his head. “Of course not!” He slows his breathing before speaking again. “And as long as this is off the record, the child is not Leopold’s, either. And this is off the record, at least until we reach Montovia. That is clear, is it not, Victoria?”

  I roll my eyes again. “Yes, Your Highness. Clear as day.” I tap my pen on the paper. “So… Are you going to give me any names? Potential candidates? This is going to have to be handled…delicately. And you may want to let the women in on it. I mean, any woman would probably be honored to be chosen for something like this, but… You still need to be careful.”

  He presses his lips together and nods. “Yes, of course.” He pauses for a moment, lowering his voice as though someone might be listening. “I had thought that perhaps Lady Evelyn, Karina’s younger sister, might be a suitable candidate.”

  I lift a brow and tap my pen a few times. I shake my head. “Andrew, I’m just speculating here—so let me know if I’m wrong. But…” I clear my throat and stare down at my paper. I lower my voice to match his. “You do want women your brother hasn’t been with, right?” I lift my gaze to meet his, frowning.

  His jaw drops for a second before he snaps his mouth closed. “Leopold…and Evelyn? Are you certain?”

  I give him a slow nod.

  “How…? When? And you’re certain?”

  I nod again. “Two years ago, I think? Maybe a little longer than that. They were fairly public about it—it lasted a week or so. He took her to a movie opening in Los Angeles, which is why I remember. And—”

  “Fine, not Lady Evelyn.” He rubs his chin for another long moment. “There must be dozens of eligible noblewomen. My mother will have a list.” He forces a smile. “Leopold won’t have been with all of them. And if I must, I can ask him. I believe he’ll at least be honest with me about his prior affairs, now that he’s with Elle.”

  “Okay.” I pause for a moment. “Have you thought about how you’re going to pull this off? Is it all going to happen in the palace? How are you going to keep the women separated—or is that part of the plot? You said you wanted it like a reality television show—and those women are all kept together in the same place, off-camera until they’re supposed to be on-camera. And part of the drama is the fighting that goes on between them—”

  “I would want nothing that crass, I assure you. We’ll need to have public dates—dinners, galas, events of that nature. My mother adores planning parties, so perhaps we can have some of those, as well. I’ll need to see how my date behaves when I’m going about my official duties—how she interacts with our subjects. If she can’t earn the respect of the Montovian people, she couldn’t be queen. She wouldn’t be an appropriate choice.”

  I nod, trying to cover up the way it feels like a knife being driven into my chest every time he says the word appropriate. There’s something so strange about how different Leo and Andrew are—Leo has never seemed to care whether or not the woman he’s with is appropriate—whatever the hell that means, anyway.

  “Can I ask you something, Andrew? Something personal?”

  He gives me the smallest of smiles and nods. “Of course. Though, I’ll remind you that this conversation is off the record.”

  I roll my eyes again. “Yes, you’ve made that perfectly clear.” I let out a long breath and stare down at my paper. “Did your parents tell you that you had to marry someone from a royal family?” I look back up at him. “I mean, did they say that it was expected of you? Because I’m not entirely sure—”

  He shakes his head. “Of course it is not required, Victoria. We should make that clear in your news stories, as well. It’s just easier. Less complicated. I’m certain that if my father could go back in time and choose a wife that was noble born, he might—”

  “I can’t believe that. I absolutely cannot believe that you believe that, Andrew. I’ve seen your parents together. They married for love—”

  “Marrying for love is fine in theory, Victoria. But when you are royal—”

  “Your brother and Elle are in love. She’s not noble born. You really want me to name other examples? You really—”

  He pulls my hand into his and smiles. “I think I understand what is going on here.”

  “You…you do?” My voice is cracking—I know I’m probably being pretty transparent at the moment, but I thought I had hidden what I was feeling pretty well. I had been almost positive that Andrew hadn’t noticed that I had originally thought he was talking about marrying me for a second after I first woke up. And that I’d pretty much buried and covered in cement what I thought might actually be my feelings for him.

  And if he’d stop touching me, I might be able to keep all that shit buried forever.

  “I do.” He nods, smiling again. “You want me to consider choosing a commoner among the candidates for my wife.” He chuckles. “Of course, that is a brilliant idea. Brilliant. It will heighten the drama all the more, increasing the interest in the story.” He shakes his head, his eyes widening with his grin. “You really are very talented at this, Victoria. And I will. I’ll have my mother identify someone trustworthy, of course. Someone who might perhaps not be in on the game itself, but who would remain loyal to our family all the same. Perhaps one of the servants…” His voice trails off for a second and he turns his gaze away from mine. “And as I narrow my choices, I’ll be certain to keep her in the running, though she would never be my final choice.” His gaze snaps back to mine. “The public will likely root for her, of course, but they’ll understand why I make my choice in the end. We can make it part of the story—why choosing someone of noble heritage over loving a commoner is in the best interest for our country. It will help them to understand why I’ve had to make so many difficult decisions in my life. Why being royal is not as romantic as it seems.”

  He squeezes my hand. “Thank you, Victoria. Thank you—”

  I yank my hand away from his, not bothering to cover up anything this time. My jaw clenches and I glare at him, even as I blink back the hot tears that sting at my eyes again. “You have to stop that.”

  “Stop what?” He looks genuinely hurt that I’ve pulled away from him.

  “Stop…touching me.” I press my lips together—I know I can’t say more than that. I can’t unleash on him—tell him he’s being an idiot. Tell him that there are billions of women out there who are just as worthy as any noblewoman of his attention. And I definitely can’t tell him that if he’d just open his damned eyes…

  No. I definitely can’t tell him that.

  I set my jaw, pushing away whatever the hell it is that’s bubbling inside of me. I straighten, jutting my chin out the slightest bit to cover the aching I can feel with every beat of my heart. “I’ll do your story, Andrew. I’ll write whatever it is you want me to write. I’ll do whatever it is you want me to do. But only because I don’t want to see you fuck it up. I don’t want you to have to hang for this if someone finds out. But you need to know—there are too many moving parts here. You need to narrow it down. It can’t be five women. It probably shouldn’t be more than two or three, and that’s still risking a lot. And you also need to know that this is a huge risk for me.”

  “It is…” He looks into my eyes and I can see something there—something I don’t quite recognize. “It is a risk. For us both.” He reaches out and touches the skin on the top of my arm, his gaze falling to his hand. His mouth opens as though he’s going to speak, but no words come out. Instead, his finger traces the length of my arm and he pulls my hand gently into his again.

  I close my eyes at his touch. Why in the hell is he so stupid? Why is he doing this?

  I press my lips into a line and open my eyes to stare at him, but he doesn’t lift his gaze to meet mine. “That, Andrew. That is what you need to stop.”

  He nods, but his eyes remain fixed on my hand, still clasped in his. He frowns at it for a few moments before he finally meets my gaze. He looks into my eyes for a long moment before he leans over, tilting his head in what is an obvious attempt to kiss me.

  I suck in a breath and lean away. “What are you doing?”

  “I… I believe I was going to kiss you.” He looks back into my eyes. “Would that be so wrong?”

  I feel my brow furrow. “You just told me that commoners aren’t appropriate. That you could never be with a commoner. That you could never fall in love—”

  “I never said anything of the sort. What I said, Victoria, is that I would never marry for love. And I never said anything about not being with a commoner.”

  Andrew

  I don’t know what’s come over me.

  Perhaps I’m merely overwhelmed with relief and hope now that Victoria has agreed to help me. Perhaps it has been too long since I allowed myself to indulge in any sort of pleasure. Or perhaps it is simply the fact that I am near Victoria, touching Victoria, and there seems to be no other choice.

  There’s a stunned expression in her eyes, almost as if she can’t believe the words that have come from my mouth—and in truth, I can hardly believe them myself. They sound much more like something Leopold would say.

  “I know this is not perhaps the best time for such things,” I say, looking down at her fingers in mine. “But I haven’t been able to stop thinking about our kiss the other night. I thought…well, that’s exactly it. I haven’t thought. I can’t.” Not when it comes to her, anyway. All I do when I look at her is think about how much I want to taste her again, how much I want to feel her body against mine.

  But Victoria yanks her hand out of mine. “What makes you think I’d be okay with that sort of arrangement?”

  I straighten. “What sort of arrangement?”

  “Don’t play stupid, Andrew. You’re looking for a wife. A noble wife. Which means what you and I had could never be anything more than sex.”

  I frown. “I fail to see what’s so wrong with that. Many people embark on relationships entirely based on sex—”

  “And many people don’t consider those arrangements relationships at all,” she says.

  “Then I chose the wrong word. But the idea is the same.” I study her face. “Can you honestly tell me you haven’t thought about it, Victoria? That you haven’t imagined what it might be like between us?”

  Before the final word is even out of my mouth, a reddish hue has blossomed on her cheeks. But she still refuses to look at me.

  “It doesn’t matter if I have or not,” she says. “It wouldn’t be appropriate.”

  “And yet you are the one who has implied multiple times that I need to loosen up. That the world would like me better if I didn’t insist on following the rules. I must start somewhere, mustn’t I?”

  “This isn’t what I meant. Can you even hear yourself?” she says. “You’ve asked me to help you find a wife. What do you think the world will think if they find out you’ve been sleeping with the reporter the whole time? What will your potential brides think?”

  In truth, I haven’t thought about it. But something about that blush on her cheeks—and about that gleam in her eyes, visible even through her anger—gives me hope.

  “You never answered my question,” I say. “Can you truthfully tell me you’ve never thought about what it might be like? That over these past few nights, as we’ve slept in each other’s arms, you never once considered what it might be like to take things one step further?”

  She finally raises her gaze back to mine. “Does that mean you have?”

  “I should think that would be obvious, given our current conversation. But yes—yes, I have. Many times. Every night we’ve spent together.” My hand falls to her arm again. “And yes, I’ve told myself that it was inappropriate. That it was an unnecessary distraction. That it was irresponsible and ill-advised. But I thought about it anyway, because I had no other choice. You can sit there and tell me the reasons why this is a bad idea, but it doesn’t matter. I already know the reasons. I just want to know if, despite all the reasons we can’t or shouldn’t do this, you’ve found yourself in a similar dilemma.”

  I let my fingers trail down her arm, and I feel a shiver move through her. She wants me. I can feel it in her skin, see it beneath the other emotions warring in her eyes.

  She doesn’t say anything. I find myself leaning toward her again, drawn to her in spite of myself. This time her eyes fall closed as my face nears hers, and my chest tightens as I close the distance between us.

  The first brush of my lips against hers is soft, tentative. The second, a little more demanding.

  Victoria seems to be frozen, and I wonder if I’ve gone too far, pushed her too much—but then suddenly her hands come up and clutch my shirt, pulling me closer, and the last of my restraint breaks.

  I yank her fully against me, and my mouth comes down harder on hers. Her soft body seems to melt against mine, and I’m consumed by the feeling of her against me. Her lips are velvety and warm, the taste of her as sweet as I remembered. My tongue traces the line of her bottom lip before plunging into her mouth. I want to drink her.