The Royal's American Love Read Free

she felt a frisson of
pleasure pulse through her body.
    Seriously, has it really been that long since you had a
boyfriend?
    The bartender poured her wine from freshly-opened bottle,
and she turned her gaze to the handsome stranger.
    “So now that I have a drink in my hand, I want to hear all
about you,” she said. “What brings you to Opal Featherstone’s gala?”
    “Ah, well, that’s a dull story, I’m afraid. It is simply
that Greece is proud to claim Miss Featherstone’s roots as the country of her
parents, and I showed up merely to pay my respects to a woman who is greatly
admired in my home country. I think some of it is that my mother was a fan when
she was a girl.”
    Marianna found herself charmed by the rhythm of the man’s
words. This was someone who could keep her interest by reading the phone book,
and she would have been fine with that. She was so lulled by his voice, she almost
missed it when he asked her a question.
    “So what brings you here? I saw you from the balcony. You
and Miss Featherstone seem close.”
    Something about the way he said that made faint alarms go
off in her head. She needed to be very careful. While celebrities hiring
ghostwriters was nothing new, the last thing she wanted to was to hurt Opal by
ruining her big night.
    “Oh, I’m her grandniece. Great-aunt Opal insisted I come. I
think she’s hoping I’ll meet someone.”
    “And so you have,” the man said gallantly. “My name is
Nikolos.”
    “Nikolos,” she said slowly, tasting the syllables on her
tongue. “Well, Nikolos, my name is Marianna.”
    “Are you a Mari or an Anna, perhaps? That is quite a
mouthful for a woman as…”
    “As short as me?” she asked with a grin. “Heard that one
before, and you are going to have to try a little harder if you think that you’re
going to be original. And nope. I’m not a Mari, or an Anna, or an Ann, or
anything like that. If you want to be my friend, I’m Marianna. Are you ever a
Ni?”
    His grin was wide and sharp.
    “No, not really. A bit like waving a red flag in front of a
bull. You shouldn’t call me Ni unless you want to suffer the consequences.”
    With a deliberation that was impressive, he swept his eyes
swiftly down her body, making her shiver. If it were someone else, if it were nearly
anyone else, she would have been offended. Because it was this specific man,
she felt flattered and something else that she couldn’t quite pinpoint.
    “I’ll keep that in mind,” she said, swallowing a little.
“You said you’re an emissary. What does that mean, exactly?”
    “It mostly has to do with cultural exchanges. Some
administration, some liaison work, bit of shooting the breeze. After you do it
for a while, it turns out to be pretty boring. And what is it you do,
Marianna?”
    There was a kind of intensity he gave to her name that made
herquiver . She ignored it, because she did need to keep her wits about her for
the moment.
    “I’m a writer,” she said. “A journalist, actually. I mostly
do lifestyle pieces, but I’ve worked a few different beats since I’ve come up.
The most interesting one was the crime beat, but that is really not something I
would do again.”
    He looked impressed.
    “That must have taken you through some awful places and
some awful times. It was very brave of you, and your commitment to the truth is
impressive.”
    She laughed a little self-consciously.
    “I don’t know about brave. I mean, I’m not working there right
now, am I? The truth was that I wanted a paycheck.”
    “And now?”
    “Well, I still want a paycheck, but I have the skills to
get into what I really want to get into.”
    “And what would that be?”
    She almost told him about her new interest in biography and
ghostwriting. It had been on her mind enough lately that she nearly let it
spill right then and there, but she knew that wouldn’t be appropriate. She was
simply standing too close to Opal to risk her friend overhearing, and besides,
she didn’t