LITMIR.BIZ

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Aunt Viola by her side was wonderful when life was filled with one harsh reality after another.

      Like the fact that her parents had sold her out to some prince when she’d been a toddler!

      He seemed annoyed but held it in check and remained studiously polite, a man who fully knew the meaning of aristocratic restraint. Which she appreciated. He was overwhelming enough as it was.

      “Look, we’re both adults. We should be able to figure something out.” There had to be something she could say to make him see how absolutely crazy this all was.

      He watched her as if trying to see inside her. “The country needs our alliance,” he stated simply.

      His very presence demanded that she curtsy and say Yes, Your Highness. But in addition to her Valtrian heritage, she also had her indomitable American stepmother’s spirit in her. She called on that.

      “That’s not up for negotiation.” She did her best to remain calm and match his cool demeanor.

      Her father had been a high-profile political figure, then her stepmother after him. They’d both been dragged through the mud. If there was one thing she’d known for sure at an early age, it was that she would never become a public figure when she grew up.

      “If I can make the sacrifice, why is it that you cannot?” His masculine, sensuous lips flattened. “A true daughter of Lord Marezzi would never refuse her duty.”

      I would and I will—just watch me, Buster, she wanted to say but had a feeling that she would get better results by remaining civil and rational. She needed time. Delay. “I believe we really need to talk about this. I’m going to need time here. And a lot of questions need to be answered.”

      He watched her darkly for a long moment. “Agreed.”

      So he was willing to negotiate. It saved her from having to jump from a moving car and run for the hills. She felt a small sense of relief, the first since she’d gotten off the plane.

      “You will consider the situation?” His face remained impassive, but his eyes betrayed that he wasn’t too happy with her.

      Not that she was all that thrilled with him, either. “Yes.” The situation she would consider. Marriage to him, she would not.

      Even if he wasn’t that bad to look at: raven-wing black hair and dark slate eyes, a straight, aristocratic nose and a powerfully built soldier’s body. Which, really, she should have been too angry to notice. It annoyed her to no end that she had. So he was handsome. So who cared?

      He was archaic.

      An arranged marriage. In this day and age? Who was he kidding?

      Maybe he was crazy. Not a raving lunatic, but slightly off. Madness ran in the royal bloodlines of several European countries; she remembered that from history class. Just her luck. A whole, perfectly fine country, and the first person she ran into was their off-his-rocker prince.

      They slowed for a sharp turn. She opened her mouth to talk some reason into the two men, but what happened next froze her. She watched the scene unfold, her body immobile from the terror she felt.

      Two cars plowed through traffic and pulled to a screeching halt next to their motorcade. Two men got out. One pointed a grenade launcher at the limo behind them that was supposed to carry her entourage but was empty instead, save for the driver. The guy blew it to pieces.

      Just blew it up without warning.

      Fire shot to the sky.

      Car parts rained to the pavement.

      She might have screamed. She couldn’t hear her own voice, deafened by the explosion.

      The guy pointed the grenade launcher at their car next.

      If she’d had command of her limbs, she would have been hiding under the seats by now.

      The prince opened the door and got out with murder on his face to confront the armed men. He stood tall and straight, focused on the attackers. “This is not necessary. I will come of my own will and listen to your demands.” His voice was clipped, betraying the restraint it took for him to just stand there.

      He let himself be disarmed, but with enough tension radiating from him that she thought his control might break at any second and he would attack. She felt disconnected from the whole scene as if she were watching it on a movie screen. Her mind was numb with shock.

      “No further violence is necessary.” His voice was tempered steel.

      And for a moment, she wasn’t sure whether he was trying to convince the attackers or himself.

      “I’ll go with you. We leave them here,” he stated.

      “Everyone’s coming.” One guy kept his gun trained on the prince while another reached in and yanked Judi from the safety of the limo.

      Faced with a grenade launcher, she didn’t have it in her to resist. She went like a rag doll.

      The chancellor scampered to the far end of the expansive seat and wedged himself in. They would have needed a crane to move the man. The attacker pointed the grenade launcher at him.

      She caught the prince shift on his feet and get ready to make his move, so she prepared to duck, knowing all hell would break loose in a second. But then, unexpectedly, the ceremonial army guard opened fire. Bullets pinged off the pavement and the cars.

      The kidnappers gave up on the chancellor, and Judi was unceremoniously shoved into the back of a van, along with His Highness. Then the van took off, the attackers returning fire, swerving all over the road so badly that she banged against the van’s side.

      She grabbed on to the one thing available for leverage—the prince. She could feel the flexing of an impressive amount of muscle under his military jacket, but there was no time to appreciate that now. The van swerved as bullets exploded all around it.

      “Oh God, oh God, oh God.”

      She’d been wrong, she thought. The prince wasn’t the only nut in the place. The whole country was insane.

      She so should not have come here. She yelped as the gunfire intensified. She could see little in the dim van, the prince’s wide chest pretty much filling her field of vision. She prayed that the bullets wouldn’t break through the back door and hit them. She hung on even tighter as he put an arm around her and braced them with his feet to stop from bouncing. He held them both safe by sheer strength and will.

      She was not impressed. All she could think of was that she should have gone with her first idea and celebrated her twenty-ninth birthday in Puerto Vallarta instead.

      HIS HANDS WERE TIED behind his back and he was blindfolded, but his feet were free, so Miklos walked his prison to get a sense of it. When he bumped into something, he turned around to feel it. A chair. Which he catalogued as a possible makeshift weapon before he moved on.

      “Where are we? It’s freezing,” Lady Judit asked from somewhere nearby.

      “Up in the mountains.” He had no idea beyond that. The van had had no windows, and the men had blindfolded them before taking them out of the vehicle and into a building. He figured about two or three hours had passed since their kidnapping.

      “The country’s security forces are out in full force looking for us. And probably most of the army. General Rossi would see to that,” he said to reassure her. “Lady Judit—”

      “For heaven’s sake, can you at least call me Judi?” she snapped.

      She really did have a difficult nature. “Judi. Please do not fear. I’m going to protect you.” A prince remained valiant under all circumstances. A lesson drummed into the six Kerkay brothers from early childhood by the chancellor.

      She snorted.

      Which drew him up short. He didn’t think a true princess would snort. Yet he couldn’t deny that he kind of liked her irreverent, spirited nature. Heaven

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