Page 67 of Prince of Scandal

What he and Georgiana shared was special. Something to be treasured always.

Except if the king decrees otherwise.

Ashton tensed, as the reminder washed over him like a bucket of cold water. No doubt every day, his mother was in Frederick’s ear encouraging him to announce the match she’d chosen for her only son. That nameless, faceless lady from Mecklenburg Schwerin he didn’t know or wish to know, who didn’t love him but would sacrifice herself in the name of duty and position. Christ. With Georgiana in his arms, the only woman he could be happy with, the thought was abhorrent. But what choice did he have? It wasn’t like he could just write to his cousin and tell him he’d fallen in love with an English lady and that was that.

Could he?

“I can actually hear your mind crunching and whirring,” said Georgiana softly, pressing a kiss to his chest.

Ashton grunted, a part of him wanting to give her the spanking of her life for daring to suggest she would be his mistress rather than his princess. But perhaps she was correct. Perhaps his little minx was far more rational in the ways of the world than he was. How strange. He’d never thought of himself as romantic, usually shunning such fanciful notions. But suddenly he wanted to lavish gifts on Georgiana. Spout poetry. Play a flute outside her window.

Hell and damnation. He had lost his mind.

“I’m wondering if you like flowers,” he said abruptly. “Jewelry.”

Georgiana laughed. “Are we commencing official mistress negotiations, Your Highness? You’d be far more successful bribing me with strudel. Or raspberry marzipan. Or a wardrobe of shirts and breeches.”

Ashton scowled. “Do not speak of mistress matters; I have far loftier plans for you. But first I must unravel some complicated threads.”

She went very still. “Complicated how?”

“Just before we met in Brundall,” he replied, absently twirling a lock of her hair around his finger, “my mother sent a letter demanding I return to Prussia by summertime and marry the woman she had selected for me. A lady from the House of Mecklenburg Schwerin, apparently approved by my cousin the king.”

Georgiana grimaced. “So very, very complicated, then.”

Ashton sighed. “I’ve seen firsthand how loveless marriages work. I never wanted that for myself. Do you suppose you might…er…”

His throat went dry. He wasn’t actually lying naked in bed and about to propose to an equally naked woman after fingering her on the stairs of a rented townhouse and spanking her backside pink, was he? Where was the romantic grand gesture in that?

“Might what?” asked Georgiana curiously, peering up at him.

“Might like some strudel,” he finished. “Franz has been beside himself without twenty people to order about, so takes his frustrations out on the kitchens. We could eat off the floor.”

“While I believe that, I’m happy to eat from a plate,” said Georgiana, grinning as she sat up. “We should get dressed, anyway. Not that I think Franz or Phoebe or Sir Alan would rush to the scandal sheets, but I must at least be reasonable in my escapes. Xavier can’t lie for me all the time.”

Ashton’s brow furrowed. “Northam lied for you? When?”

“Yesterday. When I got home, Grandmother and Rupert were waiting. They didn’t believe I’d been out shopping, then Xav waltzed in and said he’d taken me for a curricle drive. Oh yes, I should tell you also, he’s been spying on both of us, knows everything, and didn’t go to France to fetch Rupert on my account, but because whoever he works for wanted it. Apparently, the net is closing now His Grace is involved. That is a direct quote.”

“Christ,” Ashton blurted, as he climbed out of bed. “That must have been quite a conversation.”

Georgiana hurried around the side to fetch her chemise and stays. “It was thoroughly disconcerting. My brother is not who he appears at all. But I know he cares for me, and that is the main thing. He seems to approve of you as well, and that is no small achievement. I hope you can meet properly.”

Ashton shook his head as he assisted Georgiana with her stays, then swiftly dressed himself. Give him a quiet life in Brundall any day, the intrigues and plots and twisted theatrics of the English ton were far too much, even for a Prussian royal. Then again, things were probably just as bad at the Berlin court, he’d just been away too long.

In no time at all they were both downstairs in the kitchens, eating a large slab of strudel directly from the plate it had been cooling on. When they were about a third of the way through the apple, cinnamon, and raisin pastry confection, the front door opened and Sir Alan’s voice called down the hallway, “We’re home!”

“In the kitchens,” he called back. “Did you find any ghosts?”

Miss March burst through the door; on seeing the strudel she veered left and went straight to the cutlery drawer to snatch up two forks. “I swear I felt a presence in one part of the Tower. My skin went icy cold and every hair on my arms stood up.”

“Like a hedgehog,” said Sir Alan helpfully.

Georgiana giggled. “I would have been terrified. Do you think it was Anne Boleyn? One of the lost princes, perhaps?”

“Who knows,” said Miss March, helping herself to a bite of strudel. “That place has a very bloody history and I want to move in immediately.”

“Bit out of my reach, Blossom,” said Sir Alan. “Have to stick to trinkets instead.”