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Such a small and petty command for a new monarch to give.
He couldn’t look away from the picture of the girl. The cloud of unruly black hair, the cowlick at the child’s temple, the aristocratic blade of her nose.
Those eyes.
He put his hands to his own eyes and rubbed, but the picture was still there.
There would be no getting rid of this.
More pictures followed and each one brought with it a barrage of conflicting emotions because from a distance the kid could be any young girl, but up close…up close, and especially around the eyes—the hawkish, tawny-gold colour of her eyes…
The photo of her twirling in the garden, arms outstretched as if to catch the dust motes in the air…
Heaven help him, he was ten years old again, only this time he hadn’t left his sister alone in the garden to go and get a jar to catch the praying mantis in, and when he came back she hadn’t been gone.
Taken.
Kidnapped.
And never coming back.
Weakness didn’t sit well on him but he’d rather cut his own eyes out than look at another photo of Anastasia Douglas’s daughter. Cas closed his eyes and concentrated on the formerly simple act of breathing.
The clink of glasses and a bottle thudding down on the table prevented him from doing either. Rudolpho was back, and with him a glass and a bottle of Royal Vault brandy. Age spots and veins stood out on the older man’s hands as he poured generously and pushed the glass into Casimir’s hand.
‘I don’t know the royal protocol for this,’ Rudolpho said gruffly. ‘But drink. You’re white.’
‘She’s… It’s…’ Cas took a steadying breath. ‘It’s not her.’
‘No. It’s not her,’ Rudolpho said evenly. ‘But the likeness is uncanny. How far did you get?’
Wordlessly, Casimir picked up the photo of the child in the garden. Rudolpho winced.
‘Summarise,’ Casimir said.
Rudolpho sighed and stared momentarily at the brandy. Casimir gestured for him to have one and succeeded only in offending the man. Rudolpho was a product of an earlier era and would no more sit and drink with Casimir, Crown Prince, than fly. It wasn’t done. It breached a thousand protocols. ‘The child is six years old and has a British birth certificate, courtesy of her being born at the Portland Hospital in London and her mother’s chosen nationality.’
Now it was Casimir’s turn to wince at the thought of a child of Byzenmaach claiming a foreign nationality.
‘The mother is Anastasia Victoria Douglas,’ Rudolpho continued. ‘Twenty-six years of age. Marital status: single. Occupation: interpreter for the European Parliament and the United Nations Secretariat. Currently residing in Geneva, where most of her work is.’
‘And the father?’ He had to ask. He already knew.
‘Father unknown.’
So.
Casimir, future king of Byzenmaach, had an illegitimate six-year-old daughter. A daughter who was the spitting image of his long-dead sister.
‘Your name isn’t on the birth certificate,’ Rudolpho pointed out quietly. ‘Maybe the child’s not yours. Maybe Anastasia Douglas doesn’t know who the father is.’
Cas silently rifled through the photos for the headshot of the girl in school uniform and held it up.
Rudolpho could barely bring himself to glance at it. ‘Maybe the mother has a weakness for amber-eyed men. My point being that the girl’s mother hasn’t contacted you in seven years. She hasn’t asked you for anything, least of all acknowledgement. She provides amply for the child. The girl has a roof over her head, good schooling, loving grandparents. The child is intelligent. She won’t lack for life choices.’
‘Are you suggesting I don’t acknowledge her?’
Rudolpho stayed silent.
‘That’s your counsel?’
‘Or you could bring her here,’ Rudolpho said finally. ‘And do your best to protect her.’
Temper soared. ‘You think I can’t?’ Never mind that Casimir had been the one to leave his sister unprotected in the first place. ‘You think I’m like him?’
‘I think…’ Rudolpho paused, as if choosing his words carefully. ‘I think this innocent bastard child looks like your sister reincarnated. She’d be a target for your enemies from the outset. Front page fodder for the press.’
