Invitation to the Prince's Palace / The Prince's Second Chance: Invitation to the Prince's Palace / The Prince's Second Chance. Brenda Harlen
state it now and then explain.’
Mel’s breath locked in her throat. Rikardo had a request of her? She glanced again at the scene below. Rikardo led a privileged life compared to the very ordinary ones playing out down there. There was a parallel to her life with Nicolette and her cousin’s parents. But there was also a difference.
Rikardo seemed willing to go to any lengths to help those who depended on his family for their livelihoods. ‘What can I do to help you? To help … them?’
‘You are kind, aren’t you?’ It wasn’t a question, and he seemed as concerned by it as he was possibly admiring of it. ‘Even though you don’t know what I may want.’
Mel lowered her gaze. ‘I try to be. What is it that you need?’
‘If it is at all possible, if it’s something you can do without it interfering unreasonably with your life or plans and I can convince you that you will be secure and looked after throughout the process and after it, I would like to ask you to take Nicolette’s place.’ Blue eyes fixed on her face, searched.
‘T-take her place?’ She stuttered the question slightly.
If Mel had peered in front of her in that moment, she felt quite certain she would have seen a hole. A rabbit hole. The kind that Alice in Crazyland could fall down.
Or leap into voluntarily?
‘Just to be clear,’ Mel said carefully, ‘are you asking me to be the one to temporarily marry you?’
CHAPTER FOUR
‘I know a marriage proposal must seem quite strange when you expected to be sent back to Australia today.’ Rik searched Melanie’s face.
He felt an interest and curiosity towards her that he struggled to explain.
And an attraction that can only get in the way of your goals.
He couldn’t let that happen. And right now he needed to properly explain his situation to her. That meant swallowing his pride to a degree, something he wasn’t used to doing. Yet as he looked at the carefully calm face, the hands clenched together in the folds of her skirt as she braced herself for whatever might come next, it somehow became a little easier.
At worst she would refuse to help him.
That would be a genuine ‘worst’, Rik. You need her help, otherwise you’ll end up locked into a miserable marriage like that of your parents, or unable to help the people of Braston at all because this plan of yours has failed.
‘May I be plain, Melanie?’
‘I think that would be best.’ She drew an uneven breath. ‘I feel a little out of my depth right now.’
She would feel more so as he explained his situation to her. He had to hope that she would listen with an open mind.
‘The arrangement that I made,’ he said carefully, ‘was to bring your cousin over here and marry her a month later.’
Melanie responded with equal care. ‘You indicated that would be a temporary thing?’
‘Yes.’ He sought the right words. ‘The marriage was to end with a separation after three months and Nicolette would then have been returned to Australia and a quick divorce would have been filed for.’
‘I see.’ She drew a breath and her lovely brown eyes focused on his blue ones and searched. ‘You didn’t intend to let your father know those circumstances until after the marriage, I’m guessing? What did you hope to gain from that plan?’
‘Aside from my brothers, Nicolette, and my aide, no one was to know of the plan.’ He’d intended to outplay his father, to get what he wanted for the people without having to yield up his freedom for it. ‘This plan probably sounds cold to you.’
‘It does rather reject the concept of marriage and for ever.’ Melanie sat forward on the bench seating and turned further to face him. Her knee briefly grazed his leg as she settled herself.
The colour whipped into her cheeks by the cold air around them deepened slightly. That … knowledge of him, that awareness that seemed to zing between her body and his even when both of them had so much else on their minds …
Is something that cannot be allowed to continue, Rik, particularly if she is willing to agree to the business arrangement you’re asking for with her.
‘In my family, many lifelong marriages have been made to form alliances or for business reasons.’ He hesitated, uncertain how to explain his deep aversion to the idea of pursuing such a path. ‘That doesn’t always result in a pleasant relationship.’
Melanie’s gaze searched his. ‘It could be quite difficult for children of such a marriage, too.’
‘It’s not that.’ The words came quickly, full of assurance and belief as though he needed to say it in case he couldn’t fully believe it?
Rik had his reasons for his decision. He was tired of butting heads with his father while the king tried to bully him to get whatever he wanted. His father needed to acknowledge that Rik would make his own decisions. That was all. ‘There have been myriad problems in the past couple of years.
‘The first year the truffle crop failed it was difficult.’ People relied on the truffle industry for their survival. ‘Around that same time, my mother, the queen, moved out. That was an unprecedented act from a woman who’d always advocated practical marriages and putting on a good front to the public, no matter what.’
Melanie covered her surprise. ‘That must have caused some complications.’
‘It did. For once my father found himself on the back foot.’
‘And you and your brothers found yourselves without a mother in residence. I’m sorry to hear that. It’s never pleasant when you lose someone, even if they choose to leave.’ A glimpse of something longstanding, deep and painful flashed through her eyes before she seemed to blink it away. ‘I hope that you still get to see her?’
‘I see my mother infrequently when there are royal occasions that bring us all together.’ Would Mel understand if he explained that his contact with his mother hadn’t changed much? That the queen had never spent much time with her sons and what time she had spent had been invested in criticising their clothing, deportment, efforts or choices in life? Better to just leave that alone.
‘My parents died years ago.’ She offered the confidence softly. ‘I went to live with Nicolette and my aunt and uncle after that happened.’
He took one of her hands into his. ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’
Dominico had informed him of some of these things this morning after the security check the aide ordered on her came through. The invasion of Melanie’s privacy had been necessary, but Rik had refused to read the report, asking only to be told ‘anything that might matter’. Though he had to protect himself, somehow it had still felt wrong.
‘Thank you.’ She gently withdrew her hand, and folded both of them together in her lap.
She went on. ‘You’ve explained about the truffle crops failing, how that’s impacted on your people. One year is a problem but two years in a row—’
‘Brought financial disaster to many of our truffle workers.’ And while Rik pursued every avenue to find a cure for the blight to the truffle crops, his father had denied the depths of the problem because he was absorbed in his anger and frustration over his queen walking out on him.
‘On top of these issues, the tourist industry also waned as other parts of Europe became more popular as vacation destinations. Tourism is Anrai’s field. He has the chain of hotels and the country certainly still gets a tourist market, but when there is so much more to do and see just over the border …‘
‘You have to have something either comparable, or totally unique, to pull in a large