Carole Mortimer - Prince's Love-Child

He took her into his arms, his brilliant blue gaze holding hers briefly before he lowered his head and his mouth claimed hers.

Oh…!

Her need for this man was just too much for her to resist, her lips parting beneath his even as her arms moved up over his shoulders.

Rik deepened the kiss, his arms tightening about her waist as he moulded her slender curves to the harder planes of his body.

Nothing had changed, Sapphie acknowledged achingly; she loved and wanted this man. Only this man. She realised now that she always would.

Enter the glamorous world of these gorgeous men…

Enter the glamorous world of the movies when you read about the love lives of the celebrity Prince brothers, owners of the prestigious company PrinceMovies. Each brother is super-successful in his field:

Arrogant, forceful and determined, the oldest, Nik, is a movie director.

Enjoy his story in

PRINCE’S PASSION

October 2005

A former bad boy, Zak is now a world-famous actor, known for being a charming rogue.

Meet him in

PRINCE’S PLEASURE

November 2005

And the youngest, Rik, is a screenwriter who’s more reserved than his brothers, but irresistible to women.

You can read about his life in

PRINCE’S LOVE-CHILD

January 2006

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PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

EPILOGUE

‘RIK…! Rik Prince, can that really be you…?’

He froze at the first sound of that husky, sensual voice. No—it was worse than that, he actually felt paralysed, every muscle and sinew immobile with shock, his chest having stopped rising and falling, only his heart, with a will of its own, continuing to beat. But faster, so much faster than normal, as if trying to protect itself from the onslaught of remembered pain.

That voice!

So easily recognisable, so painfully remembered. It was the voice that had spoken to him in his dreams so often in the past. The voice that, for months, had motivated him to pick up the telephone a dozen times a day, hoping to hear its honeyed warmth on the other end of the line…

Calls he had never made. But, he realised now, he hadn’t thought of her for months; his previous unhappiness was completely buried.

Or so he had thought…

‘Rik…?’ The precisely English-accented tones were closer now.

In fact, as her hand reached out to touch him gently on his T-shirted back, Rik knew she had to be standing directly behind him.

How the hell was he supposed to deal with seeing her again after all this time?

He wasn’t dealing with it at all at this moment; just standing here in the middle of the street, paralysed with shock, couldn’t be classed as dealing with anything!

Breathe, you idiot, he instructed himself firmly, relieved when his body obeyed the command and his chest began to rise and fall once again. Now turn around, he ordered determinedly. Just turn around and face her. It couldn’t be any harder than walking away from her had been five years ago.

Could it…?

If anything she was more beautiful than ever; tall, golden and tanned, with the most incredible green eyes he had ever seen. Diamond McCall. And how she lived up to that name—her beauty was dazzling.

Even in a skimpy pink T-shirt and ragged denim cut-offs, there was no doubting that this woman was someone. In Dee’s case, despite or because of her melodious English tones, she was the present highest-paid actress in Hollywood, her name at the top of the credits, and enough to guarantee any movie she was in would be a box-office hit.

She was also someone else’s wife…!

‘I thought it was you!’ she exclaimed excitedly now, her face alight with pleasure as she smiled at him. ‘But how marvellous!’ she beamed, one long, slender hand reaching out to grasp the strength of his bare forearm. ‘I had heard that if you sat outside Fouquet’s on the Champs-Elysées for long enough you would eventually see everyone in Paris who was anyone walking by, but I never believed it until now!’ She gave an amazed shake of her head, long, honey-coloured hair swaying against her tanned shoulders. ‘What on earth are you doing in Paris?’

His mind had gone completely blank. Had been so since the moment he looked into those deep green eyes.

Why was he here? In fact, who the hell was he? Damned if he knew…!

‘Rik…?’ Dee gave him a quizzical look now. ‘You aren’t still angry with me, are you?’ she cooed.

Angry with her? Had he ever been angry with her? Hadn’t his anger all been reserved for her manipulative stepmother and stepsister, both so determined that Dee would marry the mega-rich and powerful Jerome Powers? As he looked at Dee now, so beautiful, so intensely alive, it was difficult to believe anyone could ever be cruel or angry with her.

She gave him a poutingly reproving smile. ‘At least say something, darling!’

He wasn’t sure that he could, his tongue seeming cleaved to the roof of his mouth, like some awkward schoolboy. Which for a man of thirty-five, with a succession of screenwriting awards to his credit, plus ownership of a movie company with his older brothers, Nik and Zak, was pretty pathetic.

It was because he had had no warning of this meeting, he consoled himself.

Today had begun like any other day of his two months’ stay in Paris: he woke at eight o’clock, went for a brisk walk beside the Seine, returned to his hotel for a breakfast of coffee and croissants and lingering over the newspaper, before venturing out again later in search of somewhere to eat lunch.

Nowhere in any of that relaxed routine had he had the least premonition that he would also see Dee McCall again today!

But he had to say something, couldn’t stand here like a speechless moron for ever.

‘You’re looking well, Dee,’ he finally managed gruffly, his American accent totally at variance with her softer English tones.

‘So are you, Rik,’ she returned softly, her eyes flirting with him beneath lowered dark lashes. ‘Are you—?’

‘Is—?’ He broke off as they both began talking at once. ‘You first,’ he invited wryly.

He might not have thought of this woman for months—years?—but when he had, he had never imagined the two of them meeting like this, awkwardly, stilted, like two strangers who had never been madly in love with each other. He hadn’t imagined Cathy and Heathcliffe either, but this—this was just banal!

Dee gave him a mischievous smile. ‘I was just going to ask if you’re here with someone.’

He shook his head. ‘And I was just going to ask if you were here with Jerome.’ Her husband. The man she had married five years ago instead of him. Despite all his pleadings for her to do otherwise.