SUSAN MEIER - Wedded For His Royal Duty

She had to fight not to squeeze her eyes shut in misery. It was the first time in a week she’d had a good memory of her dad. He’d been the best supportive, funny, loving dad, and she suddenly missed him with a fierceness that brought tears to her eyes.

She blinked them away as she rose from the sofa. She refused to get maudlin over a man who had left her and her mom in such a precarious position.

“Thank you, Sally.” She faced her mom and Queen Rose. “I’ll need to leave to get ready.”

Rose jumped up to hug her. “Enjoy the afternoon.”

Karen kissed her cheek. “Yes. Enjoy yourself. Remember, brides are happy.”

Rose laughed and batted her hand in dismissal. “We went through this with Ginny. Got pregnant in a one-night stand, barely knew Dom and suddenly had to marry a man she didn’t know because her baby would be a king.” She hugged Eva again. “It worked out for Ginny and Dom. It’ll work out for you too, sugar.”

“It will,” Karen agreed sagely.

Eva only smiled. Obviously, they hadn’t overheard any of Alex’s comments about convincing her to call off the wedding.

She turned to leave, but Sally stopped her and handed her a computer tablet.

“All the links to the websites of the approved designers are in here. I’ll need a name very soon so I can have him or her here ASAP to take measurements.” She tapped her watch. “We don’t have weeks for you to mull this over. We have, at best, a few days for you to choose a designer.”

Her nerve endings popped with apprehension. Everything would be happening so fast, she had to get with the program. This afternoon’s date with Alex had to be step one in her plan to get him to like her.

Three hours later, she stood in front of the mirror in her dressing room, inspecting herself. After watching several video demonstrations on flirting, she’d received a call from Alex’s staff with the time and location she was to meet her betrothed.

Deciding she had a good variety of flirting techniques, she’d showered and dressed in black pants and a white top, with her long hair pinned up on her head in a tight bun.

She sighed. She looked like a librarian. Casual Prince Alex would most likely wear something übercomfortable. This outfit only highlighted their differences, all but shouting that they didn’t belong together—

Oh, darn him! Now she got it. The prince who kept saying he would talk her out of this marriage hadn’t scheduled this lunch as a date. He’d set it up to get them out of the palace and in front of the press, as a way to publicly demonstrate that they didn’t belong together.

She fumed as the truth settled in. What better way to get her to back out of this wedding than by proving they were different? Really different. So awkward as a couple that the media might make an issue of it and make her life too miserable to endure.

Furious, she yanked the pins out of her hair and let it fall around her. She turned right, then left. The effect was better but still not good enough for the woman marrying Xaviera’s casual playboy prince.

Rummaging in her drawers, she found denim capris and a flirty blue top. Sleeveless and low-cut, made of airy material that billowed out when she moved, the blouse was one of her favorites. Not only was she comfortable in it, but she was pretty. She felt flirty. And the videos she’d watched on YouTube said feeling flirty was half the battle. He might be on a mission to get her to dump him, but she was on the opposite mission. If it killed her, she would get him to like her enough he’d go through with this wedding.

No! By God, she would get him to fall in love with her!

After filling her black clutch bag with her phone and other necessities, she headed out.

When she saw Alex at the small side entryway where he’d indicated he would meet her, she watched his expression falter. Wearing worn boat shoes and scruffy jeans, with a white Oxford cloth shirt that tried unsuccessfully to make him respectable, he looked like a commoner. A dirt-poor, derelict commoner.

She didn’t quite look that bad, but she hadn’t dressed like a proper princess either, and from the quick once-over he gave her, it surprised him.

He shook his head as she approached.

She smiled. “You wanted to point out our differences by looking scruffy. But I figured out your game. So I scruffed down my outfit and, guess what? Here we are. A match.”

“I did not set this up to point out our differences.” He smiled engagingly. “And you’d look great no matter what you wore.”

She’d look great no matter what she wore?

Eva stepped back. “What?”

“You look great. But, more important, we need to be out in public today because we’ll be announcing our wedding tomorrow at a press conference.”

Her eyes narrowed. “I thought you were going to talk me out of it?”

He laughed lightly. “Let’s just take this one day at a time.”

Her eyes narrowed even more as she studied him. He might be a nice enough guy to save her from embarrassment twice, but he did not want this wedding. He should not be acting as if everything was fine.

“All right. What’s up?”

He pointed at a black Mercedes. “Nothing.”

As he helped her into the car, she analyzed their situation one more time, and realized that maybe there was nothing wrong. He had to look attentive and proper in public or his dad would know he wasn’t taking this seriously. But that really worked in her favor. She could use the four or five hours they’d spend together getting him to like her.

To her surprise, he drove, with bodyguards following them in a big black SUV. Being accustomed to security details in her own country, she didn’t even blink. Instead, she glanced out the window at the scenery. Though she’d viewed most of the island from the air as her royal family’s jet touched down, being close to the thick green foliage and the rocky coastline took her breath away.

She sighed.

He eyed her curiously. “What’s up?”

“Your country is beautiful.”

“It is.”

Okay. Even though it worked in her favor, his being nice to her was getting weird.

She stole a glance at him, running the situation through her brain again. He was so sexy in his scruffy jeans and white shirt that she had to admit she sort of liked the idea of marrying him. Even if his being nice to her was an act for the press, this was her shot. Her chance. She should not be overanalyzing this. She should be using it, engaging him in normal conversation to soften him up for when she experimented with flirting.

“What was it like growing up in such a warm climate?”

He took another quick look at her. “You mean as opposed to being required to wear a parka ninety percent of the year?”

She laughed at his perceptiveness. “Yes.”

“Nice.” He thought for a second. “I loved the beach, but I didn’t like the private area behind the palace. I wanted to be on the real beach, the public beach, with kids my own age. It wasn’t easy, and my bodyguards would groan when I was home from boarding school, but they generally found a way for me to be a normal kid.”

“That’s why I fell in love with America. Most Europeans knew who I was. And if they didn’t, they knew I was ‘famous’ for some reason, so they’d Google me and that would be the end of any casual relationships. But in America, even knowing I was a princess, they’d shrug and say, ‘that’s cool,’ but otherwise, I was just a person to them.”

“Interesting.”

“I’m surprised you never encountered that.”

He sneaked another peek at her. His brown eyes softened when he thought. His lips tilted up just slightly, as if something he remembered made him want to smile.

Tingly warmth filled her. Oh, boy. It would be so flipping easy to fall for that smile. But it wasn’t real. And even though his behavior could only be an act for the press, something felt wrong. Off. Really, really off.