Page 58 of Royally Knocked Up
Her cheeks colored. “I thought you wouldn’t read it right away. I imagined you reading it in a few weeks. When you weren’t angry with me anymore — or at least, notasangry.”
“I’m not angry with you,” he told her.
“Enzo, you don’t have to lie. I understand your anger. I would be angry too, in your shoes. And it’s all right. I just hope that someday…”
“Hailey, stop.” He took her hand and held it between both of his. “Will you listen to me? Please?”
She nodded slowly.
“I mean it,” he told her. “I’m not angry. I don’t think I ever was. I washurt. I thought… well, when I found out the truth about what you’d been doing in Monteverde, I thought you couldn’t possibly ever have loved me. I felt like a fool. I thought I had allowed myself to develop feelings for someone who was only playing games with me.”
“I wasn’t,” she whispered. “I was never playing games. Everything I felt for you was real.”
“And I should have given you a chance to explain that,” he said. “Even in the face of this new information — even knowing that you were hired by my father — I know you, Hailey. I know when you’re telling the truth and when you’re lying.”
“But you didn’t know,” she said softly. “I’ve been lying to you from the moment we met. Of course you would feel betrayed. I’m sorry, Enzo. I wanted to tell you the truth, but I didn’t know what to say. I’ve never fallen in love with someone I’ve been hired to keep an eye on before. To be honest with you, I don’t think I’ve ever been in love before at all. Not like this.”
“Neither have I,” he told her. “And that’s why I can’t let you go. No matter what we have to get past, no matter how complicated our beginning is — I can’t let you go, Hailey. I want you to stayhere in Monteverde. I want us to work this out, try to make a go of things. Try to build a life together. I want us to raise our baby together. I’m not giving up on you.”
“Oh, Enzo. How can I say yes? Your father is the king, and he’s ordered me out of the country.”
“We’ll face him together,” Enzo told her. “If he insists that you have to go, I’ll go with you.”
“You can’t do that.”
“What else can I do? I can’t let you go without me. If it’s what has to happen for us to be together then I’ll go with you, and that will be that. But I think, if I explain it to him in those terms, my father might reevaluate his position. After all, we’re going to have his grandchild. That means something to him. He may be stern, but he’s not heartless.”
“I can’t believe you’re saying all this,” Hailey whispered. “When I wrote you that letter — Enzo, I didn’t think it would bring you back to me. I didn’t imagine I had the power to do something like that. I just wanted you to know that my love for you was real. I wanted you to be able to look back on me with fondness someday.”
“I don’t want to look back on you at all,” Enzo countered. He stroked her cheek with one hand, and she closed her eyes briefly. “I don’t want you to be a memory, Hailey. I don’t want you to be a piece of my past. I want you to be my present. My future.”
A tear slipped free of her eye and he wiped it from her cheek with his thumb.
“Just tell me if this is what you want,” he said, searching her face. “If you want it, we’ll find a way to make it happen. If you don’t want to be with me, I’ll let you go, but if you do…”
“Of course it’s what I want,” she whispered. “It’s all I’ve wanted for so long. But I didn’t believe I’d ever be able to have it.”
Warmth radiated through Enzo. He rose to his feet, pulling her up with him, and took her in his arms.
And for the first time in what felt like forever — though it had been only a few days — he kissed her.
The kiss was deep and passionate, and for a moment, Enzo forgot they were standing in the middle of an airport. All that mattered was Hailey, here in his arms.
“Your Highness!”
They broke apart.
A man was standing a few feet away with a camera in his hands. “Your Highness, is this the American woman who’s rumored to be having your baby? Would you like to comment on your relationship?”
Hailey’s cheeks went bright red. She looked up at Enzo.
Enzo faced the reporter head-on and smiled. “We’ll have an official statement in a few days,” he said. “But for now I’ll say that we couldn’t be more excited about the pregnancy, and we’re eager to figure out what our lives are going to look like as we start this journey.”
He gestured to the camera. “You might want to get that thing ready,” he said.
And then he pulled Hailey into his arm and kissed her again, aware that their image was likely to be on every news publication in the country by tomorrow morning.
Finally, his reputation was going to reflect something he could truly feel proud of.
