His heart cramped. ‘Eden died a few years ago.’

  Sadness filled her features. ‘I’m sorry, Dev. How did she die?’

  There was something very special about this little girl that reached out and gripped his heart. She was old beyond her years—very mature in the way she spoke and listened, and seemingly very empathetic. ‘It was an accident.’ No point in telling the child it’d been cold-blooded murder.

  Dev had to grip his hands together as they started to shake. He blinked hard and clamped his jaw down tight to fight the swell of emotion that had him close to tears every time he thought of Eden’s needless death. One bullet had robbed his beautiful sister of her life and stolen a generous soul from the world.

  Her murderer was still in prison, but that wasn’t enough for Dev. He’d declared his own personal war on those responsible for her death. Maurizio Scampinelli would be the first one to fall, but Dev would make sure there were many others brought to justice.

  ‘My father’s death was an accident too,’ Eliza said as she reached out and took his hand in hers. ‘There was a big explosion at the clothing factory he owned and he was killed by it.’

  What a tragic death. Mackenzie must’ve been heartbroken. No wonder she was reluctant to become involved in another relationship. Was she still in love with Eliza’s father? Dev wanted to know more about Eliza’s father and his relationship with Mackenzie. ‘Does your mum—?’

  Suddenly a picture of excitement, Eliza spoke at the same time as Dev. ‘Do you think, after we have ice-cream, we could go and explore the palace together?’ She tugged enthusiastically at his hand.

  ‘Absolutely.’ He’d make time for Mackenzie’s daughter. Not only did he like her—he wanted to find out more about her mother and her father.

  ‘Eliza!’

  ‘Mum!’

  Dev turned to see Mackenzie walking their way with her arms outstretched. He took a step away from Eliza as she ran to her mother.

  ***

  ‘Mum,’ Eliza cried as she ran into Mackenzie’s arms and squeezed tight.

  Mackenzie looked over at Prince Devereaux with a mix of gratitude and confusion. She hadn’t been happy when he excused himself from the meeting before they’d talked about sponsorship, and would’ve gone straight after him, but she’d been waylaid briefly by a question from one of the assistants. Fortunately, she’d met a servant in the corridor who’d seen Devereaux heading towards the direction of the garden.

  Prepared to impress on him the sheer volume of work they still had to get through, and how he couldn’t walk away in the middle of a meeting, Mackenzie had been startled to see him throwing his suit jacket on the ground and beginning to climb a tree. The realisation that Eliza was at the top of the tree on a branch that bent precariously was so terrifying, it paralysed her.

  There’d been a frightening sense of déjà-vu as she remembered how her father had climbed up a tree to help Jed down when he’d been a little younger than Eliza. That hadn’t ended happily.

  Her mother had rushed out of the house and screamed out to them. Jed had wriggled in her father’s arms and ended up making her father lose his grip. Six weeks later Jed’s arm had emerged from its plaster cast but her father had hobbled around on crutches for at least a few months afterward, lucky not to have broken his neck.

  It was the memory of the incident which kept Mackenzie frozen in her tracks and completely silent, when every instinct urged her to rush forward and call out to Eliza not to panic. She hadn’t wanted to do anything to put either Eliza or Prince Devereaux at risk.

  Surprisingly, the prince had kept her daughter calm merely by engaging her in conversation the entire time he’d climbed to her rescue. For a man who professed to be allergic to children, he’d handled Eliza like a pro. When both of them were out of the tree and safe, Mac had remained quiet, trying to calm herself and get her heart out of her throat. Snippets of their conversation carried to her—enough to know the prince interacted beautifully with her daughter.

  It was another side of Prince Devereaux she had to come to terms with. Another facet of his character that didn’t fit his playboy image.

  ‘I was stuck in the tree, Mum! Dev rescued me when I got stuck up there trying to save Moggy,’ Eliza told her on a breathless rush.

  Eliza’s casual use of the abbreviated form of the prince’s name jarred.

  ‘Oh, Eliza,’ Mac said. ‘Cats find their own way down, darling.’ Honestly, Eliza was always getting into one scrape or another.

  ‘You’re right! It did!’ Eliza exclaimed in annoyance. Her features took on an earnest expression. ‘Dev told me what I did was dangerous and I’ve promised him I’ll never climb so high again.’

  Mac hugged her daughter close and frowned at the prince. She couldn’t reconcile the idle playboy who said he didn’t like children, with the guy who hadn’t hesitated to climb the tree to bring Eliza to safety—the prince who was now hunkered down putting his socks and shoes back on his bare feet.

  ‘Thank you, Prince Devereaux.’

  The prince looked up just as Eliza exclaimed, ‘You’re a prince, Dev?’

  The corners of his sensually-sculpted mouth quirked up into a smile and Mac was struck once again by his sheer good looks. ‘Yes, Eliza, I’m King Gabriel’s brother.’ He cast his gaze at Mackenzie and said, ‘You’re welcome.’

  ‘Dev’s going to take me to the kitchen and we’re going to have a big bowlful of ice-cream each, Mum. Would you like some?’

  ‘Er …’ He looked uncomfortable. ‘Now your mother’s here, you can go with her, Eliza.’

  Eliza’s face fell. ‘But you said you were going to take me.’

  ‘I think Prince Devereaux’s just remembered he needs to go and apply some lotion to his hives,’ Mackenzie said sweetly. Just what was the prince playing at pretending he disliked kids?

  ‘Bee hives?’ Eliza questioned.

  The prince sent her a small smile, ‘No, Eliza. We don’t keep bees at the palace,’ he explained patiently. ‘Your mother is talking about something else.’

  ‘The prince has an allergy he needs to look after,’ Mac said with saccharine sweetness.

  Over the top of Eliza’s head, Devereaux’s eyes narrowed and he addressed Mackenzie with an edge of impatience. ‘I should’ve known you’d follow me out here.’

  ‘Yes, you should’ve,’ Mackenzie confirmed without blinking.

  ‘This is the Garden of Eden, Mum. King Gabriel named it after Dev’s sister Eden, because she used to love to come here.’

  ‘How long were you here?’ Devereaux asked as she murmured an acknowledgement to Eliza.

  ‘Long enough to know you didn’t hesitate in going to Eliza’s aid and to realise you’re not allergic to children,’ she observed with a hint of impatience. ‘I’m grateful you saved Eliza. I’m not happy you’re painting yourself in the worst possible light. Why are you doing that? Why do you want to work against me instead of working with me?’

  Before he had a chance to respond, Eliza sucked in an audible breath. ‘Oh. Your mum’s client—the one who’s done something really silly and now people don’t like you and Mum has to make them see that you really are a good person.’

  Mackenzie stifled a groan. ‘Let’s go and get you your ice-cream, Eliza.’

  Eliza took the prince’s hand and Mac saw her give it a squeeze of reassurance. ‘Mum will help you, you know. Grandad says she’s absolutely the best. Whatever you did, it doesn’t matter, Dev, because you rescued me from the tree and I know you’re a good person.’

  Lord! If only everybody could be convinced so easily.

  ‘Darling, where’s Jemma?’ Mac asked.

  ‘You’re supposed to be with Jemma?’ Devereaux questioned.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘King Gabriel assigned Jemma to look after Eliza,’ Mac explained.

  ‘She had to go to the bathroom, Mum. I promised her I’d stay in the garden and wait for her to return.’

  ‘Surely, she should’ve returned by now?’ she asked the prince.

  Devereaux frowned. ‘I need to go,’ he told her over the top of Eliza’s head. ‘I’ll meet you back in my office later.’

  ‘But—’ She broke off her protest with a growl of impatience. The prince didn’t merely walk away from them, he just about sprinted.

  How the hell was she supposed to work with this man when he kept secrets from her and kept walking, or sprinting, away from her?

  Mac simply couldn’t make up her mind about him.

  The man staff thought was lying in bed sleeping off a night of debauchery, had been freshly showered and shaved and busy at his computer.

  She now knew he’d lied to her about disliking children. Why would anybody lie about something like that … unless, he wanted her to think badly about him? To her mind, it was more evidence that Devereaux wasn’t being truthful about his real self.

  What had he been working on that he hadn’t wanted her to see and would it impact on the result she had to achieve? It was conceivable there was some scandal about to blow that would damage his reputation beyond her ability to spin it back and redeem him.

  ‘Club Tango. Friday. Manager’s office. Midnight.’ His words replayed in her mind. Why would he meet someone in the manager’s office at the nightclub?

  There was only one way to know for sure.

  ‘Mummy, you’re frowning again. You know Granny says the line between your eyebrows will be there forever if you keep frowning.’

  God help her if Granny was right, because after her assignment with the Prince of Santaliana, she was sure to have a deep and permanent trench between her eyebrows.

  Chapter 7

  Where was he?

  After half an hour at Club Tango, Mac began to think she was on a wild goose chase and regretted the streak of innate curiosity which made her come to the club in search of the prince.

  You’re an idiot, Mac, she told herself. You could be back at the palace, tucked up in bed. Instead she was being jostled as she made her way through the packed nightclub. She’d already been groped by a man simply because she’d been pushed against him in the crush. Clubs were definitely not her scene.

  For the third time, she asked herself just what she’d come here to prove. It was a stupid question, because if she knew the answer, she wouldn’t need to be here. All she knew was that her instincts told her Prince Devereaux was hiding something, and she needed to know what it was. If there was a scandal looming, she might be better off packing her bags and going home now. There was only so much she could do for any of her clients, but trying to work with Devereaux when he didn’t want to work with her was extra difficult.

  After they’d kissed it’d been even more complicated because she’d never known such toe-curling pleasure. When he’d claimed her lips, it’d been as though he’d staked a claim on her soul.

  Rubbish! Don’t ever let him claim you. Don’t ever let any man have so much hold over you again—especially one who has such a womanising reputation.

  Trying to put all X-rated thoughts from her mind, she thought about the little things which kept coming to light—things that were at odds with his public image, and the negative traits he’d made out he possessed. He’d offered to take Eliza to the kitchen for ice-cream, for goodness sake. And, when she’d tucked Eliza into bed that night, her daughter had raved to her about how Dev was a hero.

  ‘Yes, he was very brave climbing up the tree to save you,’ Mac had agreed.

  ‘But, Mum, Dev didn’t just save me. He saved Jemma too.’

  ‘The lady who was supposed to be looking after you?’ It hadn’t been Jemma who’d come to get Eliza from the kitchen about half an hour after her rescue from the tree. Instead, an older lady had introduced herself as Miriam and said she was to replace Jemma in looking after Eliza.

  Mac hadn’t asked questions but had concluded Jemma had been relieved from the position for having left Eliza for too long unsupervised.

  ‘Jemma would’ve only been gone to the toilet for a few minutes, Mum, but Miriam said Jemma’s a diatetic.’

  ‘You mean a diabetic?’

  ‘Yes. A diabetic. Sometimes she gets busy and she forgets to eat. It’s happened before and she’s passed out. That’s what happened today. Lucky for her, Dev guessed what’d happened. He found her and she went to the hospital in an ambulance.’

  Mac couldn’t stop thinking about what Eliza had told her. The next day she’d asked Devereaux whether it was true. He’d dismissed it as nothing, yet his actions proved he knew his staff and cared about them—one more thing about him she wouldn’t have expected from a superficial playboy.

  They’d met every day this week to plan the yacht racing series and the details of the documentary she wanted filmed. Ahead of schedule, everything was in place for the press conference next Wednesday to announce the event. They’d already met with a director for the documentary which was to be released ahead of the first race, but next week they’d concentrate on the details, and possibly even commence some preliminary filming.

  Although Devereaux had largely given the idea he was bored and disengaged with the planning, Mac was beginning to believe he was far more enthusiastic than he wanted her to know. Another red herring.

  Frequently, he stared out the window of his office as though he wasn’t listening. Yet, the second she deliberately said something wrong to test his concentration, he corrected her, revealing he’d been focusing all along. So, why the Academy Award winning performance to the contrary?

  At one point he’d been explaining something about sailing to the film director they’d hired to make the documentary and his energy and enthusiasm had been impossible to miss. When Mackenzie praised his involvement, it abated.

  Someone bumped against her and brought her thoughts back to her current surroundings. Her arm was wet and sticky with the creamy liquid from a cocktail that had been spilt on her. The person who spilt it kept moving through the crowd without a hint of apology. Gritting her teeth, Mac made her way to the bar to get a paper napkin to wipe the cocktail off her skin. As she did so, she continued to look around for Devereaux.

  The media claimed this club scene was his natural habitat. Just what would she learn about him if he had come here tonight?

  She checked her watch. Fifteen minutes before midnight.

  If she hadn’t misunderstood, and if the meeting was tonight, she didn’t have long to locate him.

  The music blared, strobe lights flickered and female bodies, wearing the bare minimum, gyrated on the dance floor. Mac began her third round of the club and hated every minute of it. Pregnant at eighteen, she’d barely had time to participate in the club scene. She realised now, she’d missed nothing. It was too loud to talk, too hot to dance, and too damned expensive to drink. It was at a club very much like this one where she’d met Grayson. At the ripe old age of twenty-eight, she now realised being at such a club was pretty much akin to saying, ‘I’m available to get laid tonight’.

  Of course she wasn’t. Not tonight, and not any other night.

  Once bitten, twice shy, and she would not think about how she’d gone up in flames when Devereaux kissed her.

  Bingo! Mac saw him.

  It was no damned wonder she’d missed him on the first couple of circuits she’d done of the room. He sat in a dark, corner booth with two other men and three women. But, he was virtually hidden because he had a voluptuous blonde draped over him and she kissed him with the intensity of someone who gave mouth-to-mouth resuscitation—as if her life depended on it.

  Bitter contempt stabbed through Mac. On her second morning in Santaliana, she’d been the one Devereaux had kissed—and that was after she’d known how he’d spent his night. Shame coursed through her because she knew his reputation—knew he behaved like this every single night—and yet she’d kissed him back with fervent urgency. Just like the blonde was doing now.

  She should’ve learnt her lesson with Grayson. She thought she had. Now, here she was having the same lesson rammed down her throat once again, just as surely as the blonde looked to be ramming her tongue down Devereaux’s throat.

  The kiss ended. Devereaux shifted the blonde off his lap, spoke briefly to the people who were with him, and stood up. One hand shot out to steady himself against the table as he stood.

  Hell! He looked totally inebriated. Didn’t the man have any self-respect?

  As if to confirm her suspicions, he stumbled sideways a little.

  Hang on. It was either an incredible coincidence, or quite astonishing that for one as drunk as he seemed, he was well aware of the time and stumbled his way in the direction of the manager’s office.

  Mac moved parallel to him. Even if he looked her way, she was confident he wouldn’t recognise her. She was very used to disguising herself when she worked with her clients, often attending functions incognito. She was always present to guide them if necessary, but kept changing her appearance so nobody would realise she was a constant presence with them. Tonight, she’d tucked her hair up and she wore a black wig cut in a bobbed style. A pair of blue contact lenses completed her disguise.

  As Devereaux rounded a corner, he looked back casually over his shoulder before opening the door and slipping into the manager’s office. There’d been no sign of excess alcohol in his movements when he’d opened the door, slipped into the room and closed the door behind him. The actions had been very deliberate and controlled, making her believe he wasn’t really drunk at all.

  The situation became even more riveting when two burly men in suits took up position close to the door. They definitely weren’t men she recognised as Devereaux’s bodyguards.

  What on earth was he up to? A steamy sex romp in the manager’s office, or something more sinister? Something criminal?

  For a second she hesitated. The fine hairs on the nape of her neck pricked with the hint of danger and her self-preservation instincts warned her to retreat. Her pulse hammered on the inside of her wrists and up through her neck as adrenaline coursed through her. Swallowing down on her trepidation, she gave in to her curiosity.

  Impulsively she decided two could play the drunken game. Leaving her vantage point, she stumbled her way right up to the men. Forming what she hoped was a vacant expression on her face, she looked at the closer one as though she couldn’t quite focus properly. Smiling, she slurred her words just a little. ‘’Scuse me. I’m jush goin’ to the ladies. I need to get through.’ Her attempt to brush past him and access the office door was unsuccessful.

 

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