A Queen for the Taking?

She just shook her head. ‘What has made you so cynical?’

‘Life, Lady Liana. Life.’ He glanced away, not wanting to think about what had made him this suspicious, this sure that everyone was just out for something, that people were simply to be manipulated and used. Even your own children.

‘In any case, you clearly don’t relish the prospect of marriage to me,’ she said quietly.

‘No, I don’t,’ he answered after a pause. He turned to meet her clear gaze directly. ‘I’m sorry if that offends you.’

‘It doesn’t offend me,’ she answered. ‘Surprises me, perhaps.’

‘And why is that?’

‘Because I had assumed we were in agreement about the nature of this marriage.’

‘Which is?’ he asked, wanting to hear more despite hating her answers, the reality of their situation.

She blinked, a hint of discomfiture, even uncertainty, in the way she shifted her weight, clutched her wine glass a little more tightly. ‘Convenience.’

‘Ah, yes. Convenience.’ And he supposed it was convenient for her to have a crown. A title. And all the trappings that came with them. ‘At least you’re honest about it.’

‘Why shouldn’t I be?’

‘Most women who have wanted my title or my money have been a bit more coy about what they really want,’ he answered. ‘More conniving.’

‘You’ll find I am neither.’

‘How refreshing.’

She simply raised her eyebrows at his caustic tone and Sandro suppressed a sigh. He certainly couldn’t fault her honesty. ‘Tell me about yourself,’ he finally said, and she lifted her shoulders in a tiny shrug.

‘What is it you wish to know?’

‘Anything. Everything. Where have you been living?’

‘In Milan.’

‘Ah, yes. Your charity work.’

Ire flashed in her eyes. ‘Yes, my charity work.’

‘What charity do you support again?’

‘Hands To Help.’

‘Which is?’

‘A foundation that offers support to families with disabled children.’

‘What kind of support?’

‘Counselling, grants to families in need, practical assistance with the day-to-day.’ She spoke confidently, clearly on familiar ground. He saw how her eyes lit up and everything in her suddenly seemed full of energy and determination.

‘This charity,’ he observed. ‘It means a lot to you.’

She nodded, her lips pressed together in a firm line. ‘Everything.’

Everything? Her zeal was admirable, yet also surprising, even strange. ‘Why is that, Lady Liana?’

She jerked back slightly, as if the question offended her. ‘Why shouldn’t it?’

‘As admirable as it is, I am intrigued. Most people don’t live for their philanthropic causes. I would have thought you simply helped out with various charities as a way to bide your time.’

‘Bide my time?’

‘Until you married.’

She let out an abrupt laugh, the sound hard and humourless. ‘You are as traditional as my parents.’

‘Yet you are here.’

‘Meaning?’

He spread his hands. ‘Not many women, not even the daughters of dukes, would enter a loveless marriage, having barely met the man in question, in this day and age.’

She regarded him coolly. ‘Unless, of course, there was something in it for them. Money. Status. A title.’

‘Exactly.’

She shook her head. ‘And what do you see as being in it for you, Your Highness? I’m curious, considering how reluctant you are to marry.’

His lips curved in a humourless smile. ‘Why, all the things you told me, of course. You’ve detailed your own attributes admirably, Lady Liana. I get a wife who will be the perfect queen. Who will stand by my side and serve my country. And of course, God willing, give me an heir. Preferably two.’

A faint blush touched those porcelain cheeks again, intriguing him. She was twenty-eight years old and yet she blushed like an untouched virgin. Surely she’d had relationships before. Lovers.

And yet in their conversation this afternoon, she’d intimated that she hadn’t.

‘That still doesn’t answer my question,’ she said after a moment. ‘I understand your need to marry. But why me in particular?’

Sandro shrugged. ‘You’re a duke’s daughter, you have shown yourself to be philanthropic, your father is an important member of the European Union. You’re fertile, I assume?’

The pink in her cheeks deepened. ‘There is no reason to think otherwise.’

‘I suppose that aspect of unions such as these is always a bit of a risk.’

‘And if I couldn’t have children?’ she asked after a moment. ‘Would we divorce?’

Would they? Everything in him railed against that as much as the actual marriage. It was all so expedient, so cold. ‘We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.’

‘How comforting.’