Leah Ashton: His Pregnant Christmas Princess

She could not be in Vela Ada right now. She could not see Petar right now.

She needed some space to get her thoughts in order, to work out how she’d got to this point, how her life had got to this point.

But Petar did deserve an apology. And more than the swiftly written, utterly insufficient I’m sorry she’d texted to him as the car had whisked her down that cobblestone street.

She stood and walked the short distance to the kitchen. The living space wasn’t very large, and it was all open-plan—with the kitchen to one side, a long dining table in front of it and couches to its left.

All three men in the kitchen immediately turned to assist her. It was one of the nicer perks of being royalty—having people immediately pay attention to her. Quite different from her previous life, where she remembered being talked over in meetings or ignored by sales assistants. Although it did seem unfair that such courtesy wasn’t offered to everyone…

‘Excuse me,’ she said in Slavic to her guards. ‘I was just wondering where my phone and bags are.’

‘We’ve put them in your room, Your Highness,’ one of them replied.

She’d learnt long ago that palace staff would not just call her Ana.

Rhys seemed to have got the gist of the conversation. ‘I’ll show you your room now,’ he said. He gestured down the corridor and followed close behind her.

There were only a few doors off the hallway, and he directed her into the first one.

The room wasn’t large, but it had plenty of room for a queen-sized bed and a narrow writing desk against one wall.

‘There’s a private en suite bathroom through there,’ he said, nodding to the far corner of the room. ‘I chucked a few towels in there, but let me know if you need anything else. I’m not used to having guests up here, so there isn’t any fancy soap, candles or potpourri and whatnot in there. Sorry.’

He did not look at all apologetic.

‘I’ll manage,’ Ana said, and realised she was smiling again. How did Rhys do that? When he talked to her, it was as if she forgot everything that had happened today. Or this year , really.

They both stood in the doorway, and Ana was suddenly aware of how very close they were to each other. She had to tilt her chin up to meet his gaze, and she could actually smell him—the scent of his cologne or his deodorant or something—something clean and fresh.

She also registered the colour of his eyes for the first time: a dark blue that was almost grey. Outside, she hadn’t been able to determine the colour of his hair, but when they’d walked in she’d realised it was a very dark blond. This close to him she could see more variation in the thick, shaggy hair—blond and brown and even a few strands of grey.

How old was he?

Her gaze travelled over his face. He had thick eyebrows and strong, quite full lips for a guy, though without even a hint of femininity. There were a few fine lines around his mouth and eyes. Stubble covered his sharp jaw, slightly darker than the hair on his head, and he was definitely the type of guy who suited that look.

She’d already imagined him being the kind of guy who’d rescue you from a burning building—a real hero type, befitting an ex-soldier—but this close to him, seeing his stormy eyes and the shadow of a beard, he looked almost… dangerous . There was a tension to his jaw, a steeliness to his gaze…

She realised, too late, that she was staring at him. Staring into that steely gaze. And he was staring right back.

Obviously she should look away, but she didn’t. She couldn’t.

His gaze was taking her in too, and the way it traced her features so intently made her feel incapable of movement. He took in her hair, her eyes, her nose, her lips…

What was he thinking?

Their gazes clashed again, and what she saw in his made her belly heat. Her whole body heat, actually.

Had she ever felt like this before? Reacted like this to a man before? Ana couldn’t remember. She couldn’t really think, to be honest. It was just so shocking to be drawn to this man she’d barely said anything to, whom she didn’t know at all.

Her whole body itched to touch him. They hadn’t touched since they’d met, she realised. They hadn’t shaken hands… Nothing.

What would his skin feel like? Would it be hot, like hers felt right now? And how would it feel to have that big, strong body pressed against her…?

His gaze changed. It became empty, losing all that heat, all that connection. Just like he had outside in the cold, he’d switched off. He’d disappeared, as if that connection had never existed.

It was so abrupt as to feel almost physical. As if someone had dumped a bucket of snow over her head to snap her back to reality.

Reality.

Petar.

‘Thanks for showing me my room, Mr North,’ Ana said, forcing herself to put some distance between them and step into the room.

She fully intended to use his formal name from now on, and it wasn’t a joke any more. Formality was good. It was required . She had no place flirting with this man. Apart from the fact she’d meant to share her wedding night with another man tonight, Rhys was also working for Marko, for the palace. This was all kinds of inappropriate.

‘I need to phone my fiancé,’ she said.

As she said fiancé , Rhys blinked. Or maybe she imagined he’d reacted.

In fact, his expression was so stony, so unreadable, it seemed plausible she’d imagined the entire past few minutes.

It would seem Rhys was keen to forget it had happened.

Good. She’d forget it too. No problem. This was an infinitesimal blip amongst the catastrophic screw-ups of the past twenty-four hours.

But as Rhys left her in her room, Ana had to work hard to ignore the little voice in her head—the little voice that had caused her so many problems today—that told her a man like Rhys North was not at all easy to forget.

ANA HAD BEEN in her room for over an hour—easily enough time for Rhys to brief the palace guards on his property’s security system, including the mechanics of the fibre-optic perimeter sensors and state-of-the-art surveillance cameras.

He’d had to tweak a few things—mainly because he generally reviewed the footage from his many cameras only if he had a reason to, but while Princess Ana was here one of the guards would be monitoring the cameras 24/7. Although in his five years here Rhys hadn’t seen anything more interesting on film than the goatlike chamois and several curious birds—the golden eagle his favourite—Marko wasn’t taking any risks, and therefore nor was Rhys.

When Ana finally emerged, Rhys had his head in his fridge, trying to work out what on earth he was going to feed a princess for dinner.

‘Excuse me, Mr North?’ she said, very politely.

Rhys took a step back so he could see her past the open fridge door. She looked different: she’d tidied her hair into a long ponytail that fell over one shoulder and she’d washed off the rest of her wedding make-up. It didn’t look as if she’d put any more make-up on, and she’d lost her dramatic eyelashes and the perfect shape of her brows and lips, but she was still—and this was frustrating to Rhys—just as pretty.

The fridge started beeping at him for keeping the door open too long, and he slammed it closed with far more force than necessary, making Ana jump.

He didn’t feel at all comfortable with what had happened in the doorway of her room. Or even earlier, when he’d first seen her. That had been easily dismissed—she was an attractive woman, who wouldn’t gawk at her just a little? But in her room…it had felt pretty intense. Impossible to ignore.