The Prince's Baby. Lisa Laurel Kaye
able to make it until morning without the taste of her. His passion had been intoxicating, and she had savored every drop of it.
But memories of those nights had no bearing on this one. Tonight Drew had to harden herself against that one period of weakness in her past and get by on grit, like she’d done ever since.
“Let’s get started,” she said briefly. “Annah’s baby-sitting for me, and mornings at her coffee shop start early.”
Whit nodded and led her through the front entry-way. He was still wearing his jeans, the worn denim clinging like a beautifully made second skin. To keep her eyes off him as he walked along the stone floor in front of her, Drew looked around her.
The castle had been built long ago by Whit’s ancestors, and had been mostly used by the Anders family as a second home, convenient for official travel to the United States yet secluded for vacations. On occasion, Whit’s father, King Ivar, had held charity balls there. Julie, besides being the castle’s caretaker, had been in charge of planning the last one, a few months earlier. Because King Ivar had been in the hospital for heart surgery, Prince Erik had hosted the ball. That was the night he had announced his engagement to Julie.
But tonight the ballroom was dark and quiet as Drew walked past it. She followed Whit into a room she knew to be the king’s library, declined his offer of a drink and sat down in a leather armchair opposite him. When she sank in too far, she got up and chose instead a straight-backed wooden chair which put her on eye level with Whit. She curled her fists around the ends of the armrests and faced him.
She took a breath and began, her voice strong. “You’re going to have to—”
“Is Lexi in bed?” he asked softly, interrupting her.
She gave him a surprised look. “Yes. Eight o’clock is her bedtime.”
He closed his eyes for a moment, processing the information. He had a daughter. His daughter had a bedtime. “Did you tuck her in?”
“Yes. I do every night.”
That told him that an evening out was a rarity for her, which filled him with an oddly possessive satisfaction. He hadn’t been a father to Lexi, but most likely no other man had been, either.
“Does she like to have a story read?” he asked.
“Every night.”
“Let me guess—a fairy tale?”
Drew rolled her eyes. “It’s her genre of choice,” she said resignedly.
“Does she sleep with a teddy bear?”
In fact, Lexi slept with a stuffed frog, but Drew didn’t know how to deal with Whit’s wistful line of questioning, except to bring it to a halt.
“Look, Whit, this isn’t making things any easier.”
“I wish it could be easier, too,” he said. “Too bad life isn’t like one of Lexi’s fairy tales.” He was darned if he could figure out a way to conjure a happy ending out of this mess.
Drew’s mouth quirked up at the corner. “I couldn’t agree more. If I had a pet dragon, you’d be toast. The end,” she said dryly.
He smiled at her words, but underneath them, he could sense that she felt threatened. He supposed it was natural. Still, he didn’t want her to feel that way.
“Look, Drew,” he said gently. “No one planned things to turn out like this. But it’s not going to help if you and I don’t work together. We share a common past. Let’s draw on that to deal with the present.”
Drew felt her spine stiffen. “What we shared in the past was a mistake, a mistake in judgment made by two reckless teenagers. Now that we’re older and wiser, there’s no need to compound it by making an even bigger one.” She had been foolish enough to dream, and had paid the consequences; but she didn’t want her starry-eyed daughter to have to pay a price that high.
Whit knew she didn’t mean Lexi was a mistake. She meant their relationship had been, and somehow that hurt. “I couldn’t agree more,” he said evenly. Trying to fix that mistake had been why he’d torn his heart apart when he’d torn loose and left her. “There’s no room to mess up, where Lexi is concerned.”
She looked at him, considering. “You really want what’s best for Lexi?”
“Of course. What do you think?”
She lifted her chin and faced him. “What do you think I’m thinking? Seven years ago you left Anders Point—and me—for the life you wanted. You’ve been in the spotlight ever since, moving from place to exotic place, woman to glamorous woman. You’re the Prince of Hearts,” she said, her voice rising with emotion. “Well, I’m Lexi’s mother. And I’ll do anything in this world—anything!—to protect her from being hurt.”
Her eyes flashed green fire as she pointed a finger at his chest. “So now that you’ve come back, Your Highness, you’d better listen good. Because over my dead body will I let you use my daughter, who has enough to deal with right now without being in the center ring of an international media circus, as some toy you’re going to lay claim to and play with for a while and then toss aside,” she warned. “Because when you leave—and you will—that’ll leave us to deal with the real-people, lifelong consequences.”
While she spoke she could see the muscles in Whit’s jaw flex and harden, but he said nothing. He just got to his feet and turned away from her.
Whit mentally swore a string of oaths in languages that spanned half the globe. Then he went over to the liquor cabinet and poured himself two fingers of something good and strong—no—three. He tossed it back and felt it sear his insides, but not as much as Drew’s words had.
The strange thing was, even burned by it, he still grudgingly admired the fire in her. Her flaming temper, her spark of enthusiasm, her smoldering passion were all the things that had drawn him to her. He had been her first lover, but her honest hunger for him had driven him to a heat he had never experienced with another woman, ever. Other women tried too hard or were too circumspect, both too self-conscious and too conscious of his position. But not Drew; she was an elemental woman.
As the bourbon mellowed him, Whit forced himself to look at her outburst not as an attack on him, but as a valiant defense of her daughter. As elemental a force as a male hungering for his female was the instinct of a mother to protect her child.
He gazed out of the library window, out across the ocean. Looking at it from her viewpoint, Drew had reason to feel threatened by him. As she had pointed out, he had left her, and they both knew why. It was also true that he had gone on to earn his welldocumented reputation as a man who went from woman to woman. As for that, only he knew why.
He turned back around and gave Drew a long look. He had to admit that time had done little to change the girl he had known in the first blush of womanhood, except to make a few improvements. The blond hair that she had worn long then was now cut in a short, sassy style that suited her personality. Her green eyes held even more mysterious shadows, and her lips had achieved a lush fullness. The same might be said for her body: she was still petite and trim, but the gentle curves that had eathralled his unskilled hands had swelled into even more tempting proportions.
Dismayed at the direction his thoughts were taking, Whit swore inwardly and took his seat again. After taking a deep breath, he spoke.
“It is true that I left you,” he began quietly. Leaving her when things got serious was the one noble, princely thing he had done in his entire life.
And staying to figure out what was best for their daughter was going to be the second.
He went on. “But everything else you said was pure speculation. I’m not going to waste my time denying it, because I’ve always believed that a man should be judged by his actions, not his words.” He looked at her, straight-on. “And you have the right to judge me, Drew, from this moment on, when it comes to Lexi.”
“What