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Probably not. But after last night with Ana he felt more at home in his skin than he’d ever felt before, and he wasn’t giving up on that without a fight. He could see the future now, in all its splendour. And Ana was an integral part of it. ‘You sound sceptical.’
Rudolpho smiled tightly. ‘That’s what chief advisors are for. What of your relationship with Moriana of Arun? There is an understanding there.’
‘Moriana’s been in no more of a hurry to marry than me.’
‘But she does want to marry eventually. And she’s been promised a king.’
He knew it. And he was that king. ‘I’ll get her another king. Theodosius of Liesendaach.’
He didn’t think it possible for Rudolpho’s eyebrows to rise any more but they did. ‘The wastrel?’
‘He’s surprisingly reliable. The wastrel image is carefully cultivated.’
Rudolpho wasn’t buying it.
Never mind. He didn’t have to convince Rudolpho. He had only to convince Moriana. ‘Onto more immediate concerns,’ he prompted. ‘I want Sophia’s image in the press restricted as much as possible. She’s the innocent in all of this, just as Claudia was innocent of the crimes committed against her. The daughters of Byzenmaach must be protected.’
‘That’s the message?’
‘Yes. Comparisons with my sister will be inevitable. Use them.’
‘And the mistress who kept your child from you all these years? The one you now intend to marry? How would you like us to spin that?’
Be careful, Casimir. People break.
‘We tell the truth. She didn’t know who I was because I never told her. We had one week together. I left her to return to Byzenmaach and my duties here. I looked her up recently on an ill-advised whim. Romance ensued. We’re madly in love and looking forward to our wedding.’
‘That’s the line you want to spin?’
Casimir studied the older man. ‘You don’t like it?’
‘Not at all,’ the other man said. ‘It’s—’
‘Idiotic is the word you’re looking for.’
The words had not come from Rudolpho. They’d come from the doorway, and the voice was decidedly feminine. Ana stood there, fully dressed in grey trousers and a scoop-necked black T-shirt that emphasised all her curves. Her make-up was perfect and she’d pulled her hair back into a sleek chignon. The warm and willing woman who’d given herself over to him so completely last night was nowhere in evidence and in its place a mask of cool and steely composure graced her features. He knew such masks well. He used them regularly.
‘Marrying you will protect you from the worst of the slander,’ he offered.
‘What’s a little slander to a king’s gold-digging mistress? I’ll get used to it. Who knows? I might even cultivate it to my benefit. I’m not marrying you.’ She sounded quite adamant.
‘Why not?’
‘Because you didn’t ask!’ The tirade that followed was rich in a language he didn’t know; nonetheless he got the gist of it. ‘I will marry for love, Casimir, or not at all,’ she said at last, in English. ‘And you don’t love me.’
‘But the sex is good.’
She smiled, fast and reckless. ‘I can get good sex anywhere. I don’t need your assistance.’
Oh, it was on. If she wanted an argument she’d get one. ‘Is that so?’
‘Count on it. And will you at some point in existence put some clothes on?’
He smirked; he couldn’t help it. ‘Still distracting, right? Rudolpho, that will be all for now.’
It was a battle for who wanted to get gone faster, Ana or Rudolpho.
‘I’m not marrying you,’ she yelled from somewhere outside his room, her composure a thing of the past. ‘You’re a self-obsessed, insufferable lunatic.’
‘No, I’m making the best of a bad situation. Lunch at twelve on the terrace,’ he yelled back. ‘You and me.’
Nothing by way of reply.
‘I’ll wear clothes,’ he offered, and wondered afresh at her capacity to bring out his playfulness.
Still nothing. He stalked to the door and watched her retreat. The rigid shoulders were at odds with the delectable curves of her buttocks. Her sleekly tamed hair a stark contrast to her passionate soul. ‘Last night you said that if we made love and I then married another, you would make my life a living hell,’ he said to her retreating form. ‘I believed you.’
