“I’m a waitress at a private club.”
“I thought you were going to be an attorney,” he rasped, his voice still angry.
Shea cringed, trying not to remember what her dreams had been five years ago. Everything had changed, but she didn’t regret it. “Plans change,” she mumbled.
“Let me go.” Bryan’s voice was rough, his tone demanding. “We’ve been intimate, Shea. You know I’m not going to hurt you.”
“Tell me why I’m here?” she insisted.
“Release me first.”
“Explain first.” He was dangerous enough sprawled on the floor. She wasn’t sure she wanted to free him.
“I don’t think I will tell you anything,” Bryan replied cagily. “I’ll lose my bargaining power.” He raised an arrogant brow in challenge.
Screw it. I need to know what happened to Hayden. Now!
Shea stomped to the kitchen and rummaged around for something to cut the bindings on his hands. She found a very large knife, and didn’t even bother looking further for scissors. Let him sweat while he wondered if she could wield the knife well enough not to lose him a few fingers.
“I cut. You talk,” she said furiously, waving the knife as she kneeled beside him.
“You have my word as a Demande,” he assured her earnestly, holding his bound hands out trustingly, without a hint of fear.
Shea wasn’t sure how good his word was since she barely knew him, yet they had an unbreakable connection between them. She had to trust him. He was the only person here, and she needed his help.
“I want to know where Hayden is being kept,” she snarled as she fitted the blade between his wrists and tugged upward. The knife was razor-sharp and the bindings severed instantly.
Bryan tore the tape from his arms and let it drop to the floor before taking the knife from her and releasing his legs. “This is your first concern? This…Hayden? Who is he?” His eyes were dark and angry as he turned them back on Shea again.
She bit her lip in indecision, not wanting Bryan to know exactly who Hayden was, but she needed his cooperation and assistance. She was helpless, a prisoner in a foreign country that she knew nothing about. If he was an honorable man, the truth would serve her best right now. If he wasn’t, it probably wouldn’t matter.
Her concern for Hayden won her internal argument.
“She,” Shea corrected him heatedly. “Hayden is a female, and she’s my daughter.”
Chapter Three
She might as well have slapped him. Hard. Shea had a daughter? A husband? He saw the fear in her eyes, concern for a child she loved. “She won’t be harmed. Where was she when they took you? With your husband?” he asked tersely, a bitter taste in his mouth just from thinking about Shea married and with a family now.
She’s every bit as beautiful as she was five years ago.
Bryan’s eyes roamed hungrily over her scantily-clad body before moving to her face, wanting to reach out and feel the silken tresses of that golden brown hair, a sensual experience that had driven him nearly insane with desire. He knew exactly how those glowing locks would feel sifting through his fingers as he tasted her plump, delectable lips.
“I’m not married. Hayden was with her babysitter,” Shea replied flatly. “We need to find her. She’s not just my daughter, Bryan.” She hesitated before adding, “She’s your daughter, too.”
Forget Shea slapping him…her last words had just gutted him completely. His daughter? It wasn’t possible. They’d only been together for one night. Granted, it was a night he’d never forgotten, and Shea had been an innocent, but the chances that she’d conceived on that night were slim. “How?” He was still so stunned he could barely get the word out of his mouth.
“The usual way. We had sex. I got pregnant,” Shea answered drily. “Condoms do have a certain percentage of failures. I was one of them.”
Rising to his feet, Bryan set the sharp knife carefully on the small table beside the door, turning to look at Shea. His heart was thundering against his chest wall, and he still couldn’t quite believe… “Are you sure it couldn’t have been someone else. Maybe right after we — ”
“I’ve never been with anybody except you. Look…I don’t have time for this discussion right now. I don’t want or need anything from you except your help right now. Our daughter is missing. And she is your daughter. I’m hoping that will mean something to you, that you’ll be more anxious to find her if you know she’s your blood.” Shea fumbled with the pocket of her short skirt and drew out a small item and handed it to Bryan impatiently. “She looks just like you. She went a few days beyond term, but she was born almost exactly four years and three months ago.”
He stared down at the picture Shea had handed him, touched that she was the type of mother who carried a photo of her child everywhere. Bryan traced the lines of the angelic child’s face. Her dark hair, hazel eyes, even her facial bone structure was similar to his. There was no denying she was his child. “She has your smile,” Bryan muttered, still dazed, not quite able to take in that he and Shea had made this small individual in the picture, a lovely, tiny little girl created during their short time together. “She’s beautiful like you.”
“Thank you,” Shea said hesitantly, reluctantly. “We need to find out what happened to her. The letter said she was safe — ”
“What letter?” Bryan asked, suddenly coming out of his fog. He had no doubt that this was his daughter. He knew Shea had been a virgin when he’d taken her for the first time, and the child looked undeniably like him. His protective instincts kicked in, his shock immediately put aside to worry about the security of his daughter.
He watched as Shea walked over to the bar and picked up a piece of paper. He forced himself to focus and pushed aside his irritation that men in some private club were ogling her scantily clad body in the skimpy outfit she was wearing.
I’ve never been with anybody but you.
Could that honestly be true? Shea was a beautiful, smart woman, and if so, it definitely wasn’t because she had lacked the opportunity to be with other men. His hungry gaze devoured her, still unable to believe she was really here in Rubare Collina. Taking the note from her hand, he tore his eyes away from her reluctantly to read the contents of the letter.
It wasn’t signed, but he had no doubt who had written it…or who had arranged both his and Shea’s kidnappings.
“Damn it!” he exploded, wrinkling up the letter in a fit of rage after reading it.
“What? Please tell me Hayden is okay. Please,” Shea begged, her eyes wide with fear.
Bryan forced himself to calm down. Shea had been through enough, and he needed to calm her fears about their daughter. “She’s fine. You were actually kidnapped by my father and Simon, our royal advisor. So was I. I’m sure Hayden was brought over separately, but she’s with Moira, the royal nanny, and probably having a much better time than we are right now. As a princess of Rubare Collina, she’ll be heavily guarded, Shea. She is safe.”
“A princess?” Shea asked, confused. “Are you trying to tell me that you’re really a prince, that I’m really in Rubare Collina, and I was kidnapped by the government here?”
“More like a paranoid father,” Bryan grumbled. “And yes…I am Prince Bryan Demande, second son of our former king. My brother Xander’s now king and my father is His Royal Highness, Prince Francis now that Xander has taken the throne. As the letter mentioned, you’re my father’s…guest.”
“I don’t understand,” Shea groaned, holding her hand to her head. “Do you drug, kidnap and lock up all your guests?”
“Are you unwell?” Bryan asked with a frown.
“I’m as well as a woman who has been drugged, kidnapped, taken half way across the world, and locked up can be,” she replied sarcastically.
Bryan scowled, noticing for the first time the dark smudges under Shea’s eyes and the weary look on her face. He was fairly certain she probably had been drugged and was feeling the after effects of whatever they’d used to put her o
ut. His fury directed toward Simon and his father heightened. How could they take an innocent woman and child from their home country? Hayden could be terrified. Shea didn’t look well, and just the thought of anyone doing anything as dangerous as drugging her made him irate.
“I’m sorry.” He lifted her into his arms and strolled over to a comfortable, plush couch, the feel of her warm body pressing against him so familiar that he nearly groaned out loud. Instead, he deposited her gently on the soft, red material of the sofa and straightened reluctantly. Shea was average height for a woman, but she felt so slight, so much thinner than she had years ago, and he didn’t like it. Did she eat well? How had she managed to provide for both herself and their daughter when she’d still been a student when she’d gotten pregnant? “I’ll tell you everything shortly. Did you take anything for your headache?”
