Ways To Ruin A Royal Reputation (Mills & Boon Modern) (Signed, Sealed…Seduced, Book 1) by Dani Collins (best ebook reader ubuntu .txt) 📗

make your tuition payments. You were adamant that you finished school with your friends. Then you got yourself expelled. I honestly didn’t know what to do. We both thought you needed a dose of reality.”

“And the reality was, I couldn’t count on my parents to be honest with me.”

“Do not play the victim here, Amy. You were an absolute pill.”

“This is not a productive conversation, Mom. Let’s take a break. A long one. I’ll call when I’m ready to chat. If you don’t hear from me by my birthday, you can call me then.”

“In five months? No. That stupid Mason fool will not cost me my only child again. I swear, I want to track him down and stab him in the eye.”

“Let me know what they set your bail at. I’ll see if I can raise it online.”

“You think I’m joking.”

“You think I am.”

“I’ll see you at Wednesday’s lunch,” her mother declared.

Amy rolled her eyes, not caring that it made her mother sigh the way it always had, ever since she’d been a young, rebellious pill.

“I’ll text you once I’ve checked my schedule at work,” Amy conceded. “Bea and Clare are away and this is my first day back. It will be hectic.”

A short time later, her bodyguards cut through the paparazzi and she entered London Connection. Despite Bea’s supportive phone call, however, she wasn’t sure of her reception.

“Amy!” someone shouted, and everyone stood up to applaud her.

Which made tears come into her eyes. She was deeply touched and had a queue of hugs to get through before she arrived at her desk and began putting things in order there.

It was a busy day. Some clients had dropped her and the agency, claiming they were “no longer a good fit,” but the phones were even busier with potential new ones. Even more heartening were the emails from colleagues in her industry who not only expressed support for her personally, but told her how much they admired her professionally.

“I would rather work for you than the agency I’m at,” more than one said. “Please let me know when you have an opening.”

As Amy absorbed what an opportunity for growth they faced, she held a quick meeting with the department heads. She tasked them with helping her make a case for expanding London Connection that she could present to Bea and Clare the minute they were back.

It was exciting and consuming and kept her mind occupied so she wouldn’t think about how thoroughly her letter had dropped the ax on any chance she might have had of a relationship with Luca. She kept waiting for his rebuttal to hit the airwaves, maybe something that would deride her for daring to be so comfortable with costing a king his crown. The arrogance! The cheek! Did she not know she had destabilized a nation?

There was only a short statement from the palace that they would not comment on the prince’s personal life. When she arrived home, however, a pair of stoic-faced men in dark suits were waiting in the lobby of her building.

“Will you come with us, Miss Miller?”

“She will not,” one of her own bodyguards said firmly, placing himself in front of her.

“It’s fine, I know who he is,” she said, nudging her man aside. Her heart began to race and she searched the face of Luca’s bodyguard. He gave away nothing.

He probably didn’t know what she faced any more than she did.

Would Luca rail at her? Force her to write a retraction? Have her thrown off a bridge?

There was only one way to find out. Despite her trepidation, she dismissed her own guards and went with the men.

They took her to a beautiful Victorian town house in Knightsbridge. The facade was white and ornate. Vines grew up the columns on either side of the black front door. She was shown across a foyer with a lovingly restored parquet floor and into a lounge of predominantly white decor. Three arched windows, tall and narrow and symmetrical, looked onto a garden where a topless maiden poured water from a jug into a fountain.

She looked at the figure and all she could think of was her walk with Luca the first day at his palace, when he’d confided in her about his father’s death. He’d been so hurt by the things his father had done, and she’d set him up for more of it.

She rubbed her sternum, hating herself for that.

“It felt like home the minute I saw her,” Luca said behind her.

Amy spun to find him leaning in a doorway, regarding her. Her heart leaped a mile high. She had missed him. So much. Then her heart took another bounce because he was so fiercely beautiful. And a third time because there was no anger in his expression. No vilification.

But no smile, either. The one that tugged at her cheeks fell apart before it was fully formed, but she couldn’t help staring at him. Drinking him in.

His neat, stubbled beard was perfectly trimmed across his long cheeks. His mouth was not quite smiling, but wasn’t tense, either. Solemn. His blue eyes searched more than they offered any insight to his reason for bringing her here.

He had the ability to wear a blue button-down shirt and gray trousers as though it was a bespoke tuxedo. A suit of gleaming armor. Whether he called himself a king, a prince, or a man, he could lean in a doorway and command a room. He projected authority and strength, and despite his intimidating and unreadable expression and the very unsettled way they’d left things, her instinct was to hurry toward him.

She touched the back of a chair to ground herself. To hold herself back.

They’d been apart only four days. Their relationship from “ruin me” to being ruined had been a short ten. How was it possible that her feelings toward him were paralyzing her? She was on a knife’s edge between hope and despair. There was no hope, she reminded herself.

But still he’d brought her here. Why?

“I—”