Page 6 of Pregnant at the Palace Altar

“I am afraid this will not do, Katerina. You will return to Kalyva, and you will begin preparations.”

“Preparations forwhat?”

“For our wedding, of course.”

Katerina was certain she was dreaming. There was no other possible explanation for this. Only it wasn’t a dream. It was a nightmare.

Perhaps when she’d worked for him she had sometimes allowed her fantasies to wander perilously close tocaring—at least when it came to the man he was underneath the crown and the trauma responses—but she had always known a happy ending was not on the cards. That he had found her attractive had been shocking enough, and she had not dealt with that realization wisely.

So she had to deal with these events wisely. Because it wasn’t about her. It was about...

Our child.

He had said ours, and her heart... Oh, it was traitorous.

“I cannot marry you, Diamandis.”

“Getting married solves all of your concerns.”

“Hardly. The pit vipers in your court will still deem this pregnancy illegitimate. Conceived out of wedlock. A stain on the monarchy.” She couldn’t bear it. Would not allow it.

If she had to run away again, she would. Farther this time. She could go to England or America or anywhere Diamandis couldn’t reach her.

“We will concoct a story. Lysias and Zandra had an unsanctioned Athens wedding, why not us?”

“Diamandis, you are theking.” It felt a bit like going back in time, back to when she had been his assistant, and in a way, his conscience. Because he tended to listen to his old, stuffy, aristocratic advisers, but when she’d voiced concern, when she’d reminded him that tradition had its place but the world was also changing, sometimes he’d listened.

“And due to some health issues, we needed to conduct ourselves secretly,” he continued, as if she hadn’t spoken at all. Another reminder of the past. “The pregnancy complicated your health, so you remained in Athens under a doctor’s care while I returned to Kalyva. It was imperative we did not let the public in on such events so you could recuperate in peace. We could not be married in their eyes until you were well enough.”

“Who will believe this?” And why was she even entertaining such an absurd possibility? She would not marry him. She would not...

“Everyone. Because I will make certain it becomes the truth.”

Katerina knew he believed this. He might even be able to make it work by sheer force of will. That was the power of Diamandis. It was hard and it was implacable. He had been forced to build himself up into such a man after everything that had happened when he’d been little more than a boy.

She couldn’t start thinking aboutthat, though, or she might soften as she so often had as his assistant. “I am still as common as common comes, and you cannot make that different. You cannot change the narrative around you marrying your former assistant.”

“Lysias was a servant boy. They have taken to him well enough.”

“Oh, the billionaire who saved the princess’s life? Shocking that they would be supportive of the princess marrying such a man.”

She saw impatience simmer behind his eyes and yet he stayed perfectly still. “You are giving this too much thought.”

“And you are not giving it enough.”

These were lines they had said to each other often when she’d been in his employ—but in the reverse. She had always wanted him to...loosen up. Katerina had often seen ways he might make himself more human to his subjects.Shehad once been the one to accuse him of thinking too much.

And he had always accused her of not thinking of theimplications.

How on earth had their positions switched? How had she ended uphere?

“You will be an effective queen, Katerina.”

“I have no desire to be queen.” No desire to beeffectivefor him again. A tool to be trotted out when he saw fit and nothing more.

“And we have proven that we are compatible. In and out of the bedroom.”

“What bedroom, Diamandis?” she said tiredly, because they had hardly had some grand love affair. They’d had a night of foolishly shared grief. On his desk. In his office.

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