The Disgraced Princess Read Online Free PDF

him while you were fencing before break fast.’
    Amused, he surveyed her. ‘For a dead man he looked remarkably energetic afterwards.’
    â€˜He’s disgustingly fit.’ Rosie smiled, hoping it didn’t look as painful as it felt. Damn it, she’d get rid of this crush no matter what it took. ‘I didn’t know he was a fencer.’ In fact, she didn’t know much about her half-brother at all.
    Gerd understood, perhaps more than she liked. ‘He learned at university, I believe. He’s good. I believe you’re using today to visit the museum.’
    Rosie nodded. ‘I’m looking forward to that, and afterwards I’m checking out the shopping area.’
    â€˜Just make sure you don’t lose your guide—the central part of the city is like a rabbit warren and not many of the people speak English. If you got lost I’d probably have to mount a search party.’
    His smile made Rosie’s foolish heart flip in her chest. He isn’t being personal , she told herself sternly.
    He went on, ‘I’d like to show you around myself, but my day is taken up. I’m meeting my First Minister and then farewelling guests.’
    Including Princess Serina? Rosie concealed the humiliating question with her friendliest smile, the one that usually caused Kelt to view her with intense suspicion. ‘Rather you than me,’ she said cheerfully. ‘I’m going to have a lovely day.’
    She did, discovering that Carathia’s national flower was actually a buttercup. New Zealand too had a mountain buttercup, and, strangely enough, it too was pristinely white.
    How foolish to feel that the coincidence formed some sort of link between the two countries!
    The shopping area displayed interesting boutiques and the usual big names; her guide, a pleasant woman in her thirties with an encyclopaedic knowledge of Carathia, did her best to encourage her to buy, but Rosie resisted, even the silk scarf exquisitely embroidered ‘by hand’, the shopkeeper told her, pointing out the fineness of the stitches. She held it up. ‘And it suits you; you have the same delicate colouring, the soft clarity of spring.’
    â€˜It’s lovely,’ Rosie said on a sigh, ‘and worth every penny, but I don’t have those pennies, I’m afraid. Thank you for showing it to me, though.’
    Her regret must have shown in her tone because thewoman smiled and nodded and packed the beautiful, fragile thing away without demur.
    Back at the palace she found a note waiting for her. Apart from his signature on birthday and Christmas cards it was the first time she’d seen Gerd’s writing; bold and full of character, it made her heart thump unnecessarily fast as she scanned the paper.
    He hoped she’d had a good day, and suggested that they have dinner together at a restaurant he knew, one where they wouldn’t be hounded by photographers.
    And where they wouldn’t be alone, she thought with a wry quirk of her lips. Perhaps the princess objected to him dining with another woman in the privacy of his palace apartment, even when the other woman was related by marriage.
    It was probably only his excellent manners that stopped him pleading a previous appointment and avoiding her altogether.
    Temptation warred viciously with common sense. Should she go or do the sensible thing and say she was too tired? In the end her weaker part won. What harm could a dinner with him do, chaperoned as they’d be by the other diners, not to mention the waiters?
    She rang the bell and gave the servant her answer.
    Now, what to wear?
    Anticipation built rapidly inside her; just for tonight—just this once—she’d let herself enjoy Gerd’s company.
    After all, there weren’t going to be any repercussions. She was adult enough to deal with the situation. She’d forget her foolish crush and treat him like…oh, like the other men she’d