AllFreeNovel
Share Us
‘Darling, darling.’ Anna-Maria rushed to her daughter. ‘What is it?’
‘I told someone,’ she whispered, scrunching up her face. ‘Someone I thought I could trust. A boy I’d been seeing. I thought we were in love...’
‘Daniel?’ Anna-Maria asked, plucking the name from the recesses of her mind.
Amelia nodded. ‘He blackmailed me. He has the DNA proof—’
‘What DNA proof?’ Anna-Maria asked, scandalised.
Amelia flushed. ‘I got him to help me run a test.’ She groaned. ‘I thought I could trust him.’
Anna-Maria nodded without betraying any emotion.
‘He said if I didn’t pay him, he’d go to the press.’
‘And so you ran away?’
‘I paid him off first,’ Amelia said. ‘But I didn’t think he was going to let it go so easily. I got scared. And I was so angry with you, and everything was so confusing, I just needed to get away. I couldn’t be here, knowing my whole life is a lie...’
‘It is not a lie,’ Anna-Maria denied swiftly, urgently. ‘The King is your father. In all the ways that matter, he is your father.’ Anna-Maria pressed a hand to Amelia’s cheek. ‘Do you remember I told you about your father and me, how something happened to make me realise how much I loved him?’
Amelia nodded.
‘That something was you. I was unhappy, darling, when the boys were younger. So was your father. We hadn’t yet learned how to be together. I was young and foolish and when another man flirted with me, I was flattered and allowed my ego to tempt me. It was a brief, meaningless affair, and we both knew that. It was over almost before it began. But when I discovered I was pregnant, and your father couldn’t have been the King, owing to his travel arrangements, I realised how stupid I’d been. What I’d put in jeopardy! And I realised then how much I loved him. I could not bear the thought of losing him, of embarrassing him, of ruining our family.’ She sucked in a deep, shaking breath. ‘But nor could I bear the thought of lying to him. Realising I loved him meant I needed to start our marriage with a clean slate, and so I told him everything. Everything.’
Amelia stared at her mother. This she hadn’t expected. ‘What did he say?’
‘Nothing, immediately. He left the palace, for three nights, and they were the worst nights of my life, believe me, until you disappeared,’ she added, shaking her head. ‘But he came back to me, and, Amelia, if I hadn’t already loved him, I would have fallen for him in that moment. Do you know what he did?’
‘What?’
‘He apologised to me. Your father apologised to me. For my infidelity! He blamed himself. He’d been ignoring me, he hadn’t known, hadn’t understood, how he felt for me either. He had seen that I was unhappy, but hadn’t realised he could improve things for me. He said that if I would give him another chance, he would grab it with both hands. That he would love you exactly as he did the boys, perhaps even more, because you were the catalyst for us turning this corner. He was not angry. He was not threatened. And he has not once, not one day since, brought up my affair. He has never shown any hint of resenting me, of blaming me, of regretting the choice we made that night.’
Anna-Maria leaned closer, tilting her tear-stained face towards Amelia’s. ‘And what’s more, he has loved you. Every day of your life, he has loved you. To him, you are his biological child. That’s all that matters, isn’t it? What’s in a person’s heart?’
Amelia bit down on her lip. Tears filled her own eyes, and love exploded in her heart, but it was more complicated for Amelia still. ‘I’m different from everyone,’ she said, shrugging. ‘Half of me is made up of a man I never knew, a man who died before I could meet him, who didn’t even want to meet me.’
‘Yes,’ Anna-Maria conceded. ‘But all of you was shaped by your father. Your philosophies, your humour, your strength, your determination. These are things your father has taught you, by being in your life.’
Amelia closed her eyes, nodded.
‘Oh, my darling. I’m so sorry you have carried this burden on your own for so long.’ She shook her head. ‘I’m even more sorry that you paid off that bastard.’
‘What should I have done? I couldn’t risk this coming out.’
‘Why not?’ Anna-Maria demanded defiantly. ‘We are not ashamed, Amelia. We are not scared. You are our child—in our hearts, we know that.’
‘But your affair—’
‘Was a mistake, a lifetime ago.’
‘I know. I just thought—I wanted to protect you all. I was scared.’
‘Amelia, listen to me. Your father is not the only person to know about this. At the time, we recognised there was a risk of discovery. We have notified a select handful of people, including the president of the royal guard, the prime minister’s office and a team of lawyers, engaged for just such a circumstance as this. But the most important thing for you to understand is that we love you. We always have and always will. We considered you to be a gift from heaven, and you have always been exactly that to us.’
It was purely by chance that the first person Amelia should see, when leaving her mother’s suite, was Benedetto. And that he should be alone, for just about the first time since arriving in Catarno.
Amelia’s heart gave a little thump before she could remind herself her heart had nothing to do with him, at least so far as he was aware. She walked towards him with the appearance of calm, his own expression impossible to read.
